Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, February 20, 1995 TAG: 9502210026
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: BISMARCK, N.D. LENGTH: Medium
``Meriwether Lewis has been one of the most featured of all the historical figures on my list whose questionable death deserves investigation,'' said James Starrs, a professor of both law and forensic science at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. ``In historical mysteries, this one leads the pack.''
Lewis, who along with fellow Virginian William Clark led an expedition up the uncharted Missouri River, died Oct. 10, 1809, in a roadhouse about 65 miles southwest of Nashville. He suffered a bullet wound to the head and another to the chest. He was 35.
Popular opinion is that Lewis was driven to suicide by alcohol, depression or syphilis, but some speculate he was murdered.
Starrs said he believes Lewis' remains could hold enough clues to settle the dispute.
So far, however, the National Park Service has denied his request to dig up the bones, which rest under a stone monument in the Natchez Trace Parkway in Tennessee.
``What he is requesting is contrary to normal National Park Service policy,'' Dan W. Brown, superintendent of the Natchez Trace Parkway, told The Bismarck Tribune. ``We normally do not enter into the process of exhuming human remains.''
The Park Service questions how much information could be gained by examining the remains, and fears potential damage to the monument, Brown said.
Still, the Park Service has not ruled out Starrs' request.
``There may have been a few people that expressed some concerns, but there was a lot of interest in the possibility of learning more about the life and death of Meriwether Lewis,'' Brown said.
Starrs plans to renew his request to exhume the remains this summer. Starrs has been involved in studying the deaths of other historical figures. He led the exhumation of Dr. Carl Weiss, the man accused of assassinating Louisiana Gov. Huey Long in 1946. Starrs also unearthed the five victims of the ``Colorado cannibal,'' Alferd Packer.
Dave Borlaug, a board member of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation and the National Lewis and Clark Bicentennial Commission, questions the need of trying to settle debate on how Lewis died.
``I can certainly see some compelling evidence'' for exhuming the remains, said Borlaug, of Bismarck, ``but there are some things that are better left unsolved than to go to great extremes.''
Lewis, a native of Albemarle County, Va., and Clark, a native of Caroline County, Va., became famous as explorers. At the direction of President Jefferson, the men set out from St. Louis in 1804 and traveled to the Pacific Coast. They returned in 1806 with valuable information about the Far West.
Memo: ***CORRECTION***