In a June 20, 1803, instruction to Meriwether Lewis, President Thomas Jefferson directed the expedition to explore the Missouri River and such principal stream of it as might offer the most direct and practicable water communication across the continent for commerce by its course and communication with the waters of the Pacific Ocean, whether the Columbia, Oregan, Colorado, or any other river. William Clark recorded that on May 21, 1804, the party arrived at St. Charles at 12 oClock, where French people and Indians flocked to the bank to see them. He described the village as about one mile in length on the north side of the Missouri at the foot of a hill from which it took its name, Petiete Coete or the Little hill, containing about 100 houses and about 450 inhabitants, chiefly French, whom he said appeared poor, polite, and harmonious. He also recorded that they set out at half passed three oClock under three cheers from the gentlemen on the bank. The permanent party included co-commanders Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, William E. Bratton, Toussiant Charbonneau, John Collins, John Colter, Pierre Cruzatte, George Drouillard, Joseph Field, Ruebin Field, Robert Frazer, Patrick Gass, George Gibson, Silas Goodrich, Hugh Hall, Thomas Proctor Howard, Francois Labiche, Jean Baptiste Lepage, Hugh McNeal, John Ordway, John Potts, Nathaniel Hale Pryor, Sacagawea and her child Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, George Shannon, John Shields, John B. Thompson, Peter M. Weiser, William Werner, Joseph Whitehouse, Alexander Hamilton Willard, Richard Windsor, and York.
