"Apocrypha" Edition of Lewis & Clark
An important early source for Lewis and Clark, one of the so-called "Apocrypha" or early compilation editions. The present work was issued under the name of William Fisher, but it is really a compilation drawn from a variety of sources. The text originally appeared in Philadelphia and London in 1809, followed by German editions of 1811 and 1812. Another Philadelphia edition, also issued in 1812, came out under a slightly different title. The present Baltimore edition, printed by Anthony Miltenberger, was, like other versions of the Apocrypha, intended to meet the American public's thirst for knowledge about the West. Miltenberger was an enterprising printer and stationer with a shop at 10 North Howard Street in Baltimore.
Due to a series of delays in the preparation of the official account of Lewis and Clark's travels and the public's growing curiosity about the West, several publishers saw an opportunity and put out their own unofficial publications. The most famous of these early publications was that based on the journal of Patrick Gass, which appeared in book form at Pittsburgh in 1807. However, that publication may only have only whetted the public's thirst for more information about the West. The subsequent compilation editions, collectively known as the "Apocrypha" by historians and bibliographers of Lewis & Clark, brought together information to meet a market need. The present volume, while presented as the work of one William Fisher, is actually based on a variety of sources, including Patrick Gass, William Clark, Alexander Mackenzie, and Thomas Jefferson's Message of 1806.
Interestingly, the present volume opens with a one-paragraph recommendation by Thomas Jefferson, perhaps intending to mislead the reader into believing the book had official government sanction. The double-page frontispiece presents portraits of Captains Lewis and Clark: "Imagined works of an engraver, the images nevertheless appeared to give a stamp of approval to the volume" - Stephen Dow Beckham.