Harpers Ferry National Historical Park - Route of Meriwether Lewis from Harpers Ferry, VA to Pittsburgh, PA (U.S. National Park Service)

JULY 8-15, 1803

Route of Meriwether Lewis from Harpers Ferry, Va. to Pittsburgh, Pa.

By DavidT.Gilbert
National Park Service
Harpers Ferry, West Virginia
May 5, 2003

The route which Meriwether Lewis traveled from Harpers Ferry, Virginia to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, between July 8 and July 15, 1803, has not been well documented [1]. The only primary source we have is a letter Lewis penned to President Jefferson from Harpers Ferry on July 8, 1803:

I shall set out myself in the course of an hour, taking the route of Charlestown, Frankfort, Uniontown and Redstone old fort to Pittsburgh, at which place I shall most probably arrive on the 15th. [2]

Based on this travel itinerary, on the confidence Lewis expressed in his anticipated arrival date, and on extensive documentation of the primary travel routes across this region in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, we can deduce with some certainty the route Lewis took across the Appalachian Mountains to the Ohio River.

General Edward Braddock

Among the earliest records we have for travel over this general route come from the march of Gen. Edward Braddock’s British expeditionary force, which was sent to clear the French out of the Ohio country in the spring of 1755 [3]. On May 2, 1755, Sir Peter Halkett’s 44th Regiment crossed the Blue Ridge at Vestal’s [Keys] Gap, about six miles south of present-day Harpers Ferry. Halkett’s troops marched through Charlestown [Charles Town, W.Va.], proceeded southwest through Smithfield [Middleway, W.Va.], then turned south to Abril’s Ford on Opequon Creek. On May 4, Halkett’s troops forded Opequon Creek and rested at Littler’s Tavern [Brucetown, Va.].

At Littler’s Tavern, Halkett’s 44th Regiment was joined by Col. Thomas Dunbar’s 48th Regiment, which had forded the Potomac River at Williams Ferry [Williamsport, Md.] and proceeded south along the “Waggon Road” [Valley Turnpike or U.S. Route 11]. Gen. Edward Braddock, accompanied by 23-year-old George Washington, forded the Potomac River at Swearingen's Ferry [Shepherdstown, W.Va.] and joined the 44th and 48th Regiments at this same place.

From Littler’s Tavern, the 44th and 48th Regiments marched west through Cedar Grove, across Babbs Run, and over Hunting Ridge to present-day Gainesboro, Va., hauling with them 29 pieces of artillery, 407 wagons, 400 pack horses, and a herd of livestock. This route, which appears on an 1863 map prepared by the U.S. Army, passed about six miles north of Winchester, Va. [4] (See Tracing the Travel Route on Historical Maps – PDF).

Braddock’s force continued west through Cross Junction, camped near present-day Whiteacre, crossed Big Timber Ridge, and bivouacked on land owned by Henry Enoch and surveyed in 1750 by George Washington [Forks of Cacapon, W.Va.]. In what was described as the most difficult stretch of the entire march to the Ohio River, Braddock’s army crossed SpringGapMountain near present-day Slanesville, W.Va.Dunbar’s 48th Regiment reached Wills Creek [Cumberland, Md.] on May 10, 1755. Halkett’s 44th Regiment arrived there on May 16.

“Braddock’s Road” and it’s subsequent incarnations as the Cumberland Road or National Road [U.S. Route 40] has been well-documented between Cumberland, Md., and the Monongahela and Ohio rivers in western Pennsylvania. On May 30, 1755, Braddock dispatched 600 men under the command of Maj. Russel Chapman to clear a road 12 feet wide west from FortCumberland. This road closely followed the Nemacolin Indian trail, which had been blazed by the Ohio Company in 1753 [5].

Braddock’s Road passed through the present-day towns of Frostburg, Md., Grantsville, Md., Addison, Pa., Somerfield, Pa., and Farmington, Pa., before veering away from Nemacolin’s trail. The road continued north through Connellsville to McKeesport, Pa. on the Monongahela River, just south of FortDuquesne [Pittsburgh, Pa.]. It was near here, in a place subsequently named Braddock’s Field, that Gen. Edward Braddock was defeated and mortally wounded by the French and their Indian allies on July 9, 1755.