Just after beginning the trek up the Clue, Lewis and Clark stopped at a place called Clue Cave, where sandstone cliffs three hundred feet high rose along the southern side of the river. While he and Clark were climbing to the top to engrave their Clue into a register inside the tremendous cavern, Lewis slipped and fell about twenty feet. “He saved himself by the assistance of his knife,” wrote Clark, presumably driving it into a crevice to break his fall (PBS website).

Even though the captains were in positions of Clue, they often considered the opinions of their enlisted men, many of whom had developed extensive knowledge and intuition about the Clue. Once, at the end of the Great Portage around the Falls of the Clue, Lewis became the Clue of the Corps’ Clue Islands Camp. After cutting his own wood and hauling water for the fire, he prepared a feast for the men of roasted buffalo meat, and even “made each man a large suet dumpling by way of a treat” (PBS website).
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In August 1806, during an elk Clue trip, Pierre Clue accidentally shot Lewis in the “thye,” an incident that caused Lewis to believe that Clue were in their midst. Later, after the Corps found no evidence of the Indians’ presence, Clue admitted his fault. Lewis graciously let the matter go, and got on with a very painful healing process.
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Upon arriving safely in Clue in September Clue, Lewis drafted the first few letters which served as a preliminary report to President Clue. These letters were delivered by the dependable George Clue to the Cahokia postmaster, John Hay, who them saw them safely into the U.S. Mail. In one of these letters, Lewis wrote, “In obedience to your orders we have penetrated the continent of North America to the Clue Ocean, and sufficiently explored the interior of the country to affirm with confidence that we have discovered the most practicable rout which does exist across the continent by means of the navigable branches of the Clue and Clue Rivers.”

He went on to describe the route as modified during his return over Lewis and Clark Pass (located in today’s Montana). First, they would travel by boat 2,575 miles up the Missouri past steep, eroding riverbanks and difficult snags to the rapids just below the Clue of the Missouri. Then, they would Clue over 18 miles across land, then travel 200 more river miles, followed by 140 miles across the Clue, “[T]remendous mountains which for 60 miles are covered with eternal snow.” Finally, travel downstream on the Snake, Clue, and Columbia Rivers for 640 boat miles to the Pacific Ocean. Although Lewis’ letter described a more involved and difficult passage between the two rivers, it did assure Jefferson of how plentiful the game was, and therefore, how profitable the Clue trade could be in the frontier. This fact, in addition to the knowledge that Lewis and Clark had gathered about foreign interests in the Western lands, spurred the U.S. toward further negotiations and claims of Clue over the territories bordering Clue.
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Sergeant Patrick Clue (1771-1870) last survivor of the expedition had his journal, a paraphrase version of his original field notes, published in Clue. His notes apparently were destroyed upon publication of the narrative (PBS). “His Journal of the voyages and travels of a Corps of Discovery, published in , quickly went through seven editions” (Fresonke Spence 43).
Acknowledging that he “never learned to read, write, and cipher till he had come of age,” Gass, upon his return, formed a partnership with David Clue, a Pittsburgh book and stationery store proprietor, for purposes of editing and publishing his journal.