This biography is from a paper by George H. Yater originally presented at the 1991 annual meeting of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation in Louisville and subsequently published in “Nine Young Men from Kentucky,” a May 1992 supplementary publication of We Proceeded On, the official publication of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage ...

He moved with the Clarks to Jefferson County, Kentucky, in 1785, living at the family plantation “Mulberry Hill.” During William Clark’s military service in the Kentucky militia and the regular army, and during his extensive business travels, it is likely that York accompanied him at times.

Slavery in Early Louisville and Kentucky. African Americans entered Kentucky as the earliest European explorers and settlers brought slavery into the trans-Appalachian west. By 1800, there were 220,955 people in Kentucky, 41,084 of whom were African American.

This biography is from a paper by George H. Yater originally presented at the 1991 annual meeting of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation in Louisville and subsequently published in “Nine Young Men from Kentucky,” a May 1992 supplementary publication of We Proceeded On, the official publication of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage ...

William Clark had seven recruits waiting on October 14 when Lewis reached Louisville, and Lewis brought two more with him. These nine men are forever associated with Kentucky in the history of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

Moving to Kentucky from Virginia with the Clarks in 1785, York experienced frontier living, extensive travel, and life as the personal servant of William Clark. In 1803 he left the Falls of the Ohio as an unofficial member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

A November 1, 1803 edition of the Kentucky Gazette, a Lexington newspaper, republished news from a Louisville newspaper no longer extant about Lewis’s arrival at the Falls of the Ohio in October 1803:

> Kentucky People > The Nine Young Men from Kentucky > Joseph and Reubin Field. Joseph and Reubin Field. Joseph (ca. 1780-1807) and Reubin (ca. 1781-ca. 1822) Field were born in Virginia (probably Culpeper County). The family settled in the Fishpools area of southern Jefferson County in 1784. The brothers were excellent hunters and became two ...

> Kentucky People > York > Historical markers : York. Historical markers : York. Marker Number: 2119 County: Jefferson Location: Louisville, at end of Fourth St. on the Wharf. Description: This enslaved African American, who lived most of his life in Louisville, went on Lewis and Clark Expedition to the Pacific, 1803-6. York was the first ...

The eldest was Ezekial Field, born October 6, 1773, ten years before the family moved to Kentucky. He is the only one of the Fields for whom we have a birth date. Ezekial Field is important to this story because of one of his business enterprises (7).