USA > California > The history of Oregon and California & the other territories of the northwest coast of North America > Part 4
USA > Oregon > The history of Oregon and California & the other territories of the northwest coast of North America > Part 4
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53
Cape Mendocino, where the coasts of California and Oregon are united, presents two steep and lofty promontories, about ten miles apart, of which the highest is the southern, in latitude of 40 degrees 19 minutes - nearly the same with that of Sandy Hook, at the entrance of the Bay of New York. 'This cape is the most elevated land on the sea-shore of that part of America, and was formerly much dreaded by the Spanish navigators, on account of the storms usually prevailing in its vicinity; but those fears have passed away, and Cape Mendocino has, in consequence, lost much of the respect with which it was once regarded by mariners.
The interior of new California, east of the mountains which
.
19
GEOGRAPHY OF CALIFORNIA.
border the coast, is but imperfectly known. According to the vague reports of the Catholic missionaries and American traders, who have traversed it in various directions, the northern portion is a wilderness of lofty mountains, apparently forming a continuous chain, from the range which borders the Pacific coast to the Rocky Mountains ; and the southern division is a desert of sandy plains, interspersed with rocky hills, and with lakes and marshes, nearly all of them salt, and having no outlet to the sea. The heat of the sun in these plains is described, by all who have experienced it, as most intense ; and from their accounts it seems to be certain that this region, with the exception, perhaps, of the portion immediately adjacent to the Colorado River, must ever remain uninhabited.
The Colorado River forms the only outlet of the waters of these territories. It is formed near the 41st degree of latitude, by the junction of several streams, rising among the Rocky Mountains, of which the principal are the Sids-kadee, or Green River, and the Sandy River : thence flowing south-westward it passes through a range of mountains where its course is broken by numerous ledges · of rocks, producing falls and rapids ; after which it receives the Nabajo, the Jaquesila, the Gila, and other large streams from the east, and enters the Gulf of California, under the. parallel of 32 degrees. The country on both sides of this river, for some distance from its mouth, is flat and is overflowed during the rainy season, when the quantity of water discharged is very great ; and a high embankment is thus made by the deposit of the mud, similar to those on the lower Mississippi. How far the Colorado may be ascended by vessels from the gulf is not known ; but from some accounts it would seem to be navigable for three or four hundred miles.
Among the mountains west of the sources of Colorado River, between the 40th and the 42d parallels of latitude, are several lakes, which have no outlet, and the waters of which are, as a necessary consequence, salt .* The largest of these, formerly called
* As this physical fact is not as yet generally known, a few words may be here said in explanation. Whenever water runs on or through the earth for any dis- tance, it finds salts, which it dissolves and carries to its final recipient or basin, either the ocean, or some lake or marsh having no connection with the ocean or any lower recipient ; and as the water from this final recipient is taken away only by evaporation, which does not abstract a single saline particle, it is a neces- sary consequence, that the salt must be constantly accumulating there. Thus the Dead Sea, which has no outlet, is saturated with salts, while the Lake of Tibe- rias, from which it receives its waters through the Jordan, is fresh. In like man- ner the surfaces of countries, from which the water is not carried off either by streams or infiltration, are always impregnated with salt ; of this the high plains of Mexico, and the valleys immediately west of the Rocky Mountains, offer ex- amples; the soil of the parts, not regularly drained, being so salt as to render vegetation impossible, even where all the other requisites are furnished in abun- dance. The reverse is not always true ; nevertheless, the saltness of a large body of water, or of a large extent of ground, affords strong reasons for suspecting that there is no regular drain from it into a lower recipient
20
GEOGRAPHY OF OREGON.
by the Spaniards, Lake Timpanogos, but now generally known as the Utah Lake, is said to be more than a hundred miles in length and of great breadth ; it is chiefly supplied by the Bear River, which enters it on the north-east, after a long and circuitous course through the mountains. Farther south, near the 39th de- gree of latitude, is Ashley's Lake, on the shores of which the American traders from Missouri formerly had an establishment.
OREGON.
THE political boundaries of Oregon have never yet been deter- mined by common consent of the parties claiming to possess it. In the United States they are considered as embracing the whole of America west of the Rocky Mountains, from the 42d par- allel of latitude to that of 54 degrees 40 minutes. Some geo- graphers have, however, regarded as Oregon only the region actually traversed and drained by the Columbia River, for which Oregon is supposed,* erroneously, to have been the aboriginal name ; and the British government has always insisted on a still farther contraction of its limits.
Leaving the political question to be settled hereafter, the region of the Columbia River will be now examined.
The natural boundaries of this region seem to be as follows : On the east, the Rocky Mountains from the 42d parallel of latitude to the 53d ; on the south, the Snowy Mountains, which are said to extend nearly in the course of the 42d parallel from the Rocky Mountains westward to the great chain bor- dering the Pacific, and thence to the ocean west ; on the west, the Pacific Ocean from Cape Mendocino, or its vicinity to Cape Flattery, at the entrance of the Strait of Fuca, near the 49th parallel ; and on the north, the Strait of Fuca, from the ocean to its easternmost extremity, from which a ridge extends north- castward to the Rocky Mountains, separating the waters of the Columbia from those of Fraser's River. It is impossible, how- ever, to define those boundaries exactly, as the topography of the interior, and particularly the course of the great mountain chains, is but imperfectly known.
The territory included within the limits above indicated, and
* See page 142 of the history.
21
GEOGRAPHY Y OF OREGON.
drained almost exclusively by the Columbia, is not less than four hundred thousand square miles in extent ; which is more than double the surface of France, and nearly one half of that of all the States of the American Federal Union. Its southernmost points lie in the same latitude with Boston and with Florence ; while its northernmost correspond with the northern extremity of New- foundland and with Hamburg.
As the Columbia forms the most important geographical feature of the country, a particular description of that river will be pre- sented first.
The great trunk of the Columbia, which enters the Pacific in the latitude of 46 degrees 15 minutes, is formed at the distance of more than three hundred miles from the ocean, by the union of two streams ; one from the south-east, called the Sahaptin, or Snake, or Lewis River, and the other, usually considered as the main river, from the north-east. These two great confluents col- lect together all the waters flowing from the western sides of the Rocky Mountains, between the 42d and the 54th degrees of latitude.
The northernmost sources of the great river are situated in the Rocky Mountains, near the 53d degree of latitude. One of its head-waters, the Canoe River, rises in a cleft of the dividing chain, called by the British traders the Punch Bowl, within a few feet of the westernmost source of the Athabasca, one of the head- waters of the Mackenzie, which empties into the Arctic Sea. This cleft is the principal pass of communication for the British traders between the territories on either side of the ridge ; it is described, by all who have visited it, as presenting scenes of the most terrific grandeur, being overhung by the highest peaks of the Rocky Mountains, one of which, Mount Brown, is not less than sixteen thousand feet, and the other, Mount Hooker, exceeds fifteen thou- sand feet, in height above the ocean level.
At a place called Boat Encampment, near the 52d degree of latitude, Canoe River joins two other streams, the one from the north, the other, the largest of the three, from the south ; and the river thus formed, considered as the Main Columbia, takes its course nearly due south, through defiles between lofty mountains, being generally a third of a mile in width, but in some places spreading out into broad lakes. In the latitude of 48 1-2 de- grees, it receives the Flat Bow, or McGillivray's River, a large stream, rising also in the dividing range ; and a little farther south it unites with the Flat-head, or Clarke River, scarcely if at all in- ferior, in the quantity of water supplied, to any of the other branches of the Columbia. The sources of the Clarke River are in the Rocky Mountains, near the 44th degree of latitude, not far from those of the Missouri and of the Lewis; thence it runs north-
22
GEOGRAPHY OF OREGON.
ward along the base of the great chain, and then westward, form- ing, under the 48th parallel, an extensive lake, some distance below which it falls into the Columbia over a ledge of rocks. After uniting with Clarke River, the Columbia turns to the west, and passes through a ridge of mountains, where it forms a cataract called the Kettle Falls ; running thence in the same direction between the 48th and the 49th parallels it receives the Spokan from the south, and the Okinagan from the north ; after which it resumes its southern course, and thus continues to its junction with the great southern branch, near the 46th degree of latitude. These streams are generally navigable by boats, the passage being however, interrupted in many places by falls and rapids.
Of the great southern branch of the Columbia, the farthermost sources are situated in the valleys or holes, as they are called, of the Rocky Mountains, near the 42d degree of latitude ; within short distances from the sources of the Yellow Stone, the Platte and the Colorado of California. The principal head-waters are Henry's River, the most eastern, and the Portneuf, which flows from the vicinity of the Utah Salt Lake ; below their junction the Lewis flows west, and then north-west, receiving on its way the Malade, or Sickly River, the Boise, or Reed's River, the Salmon River, and the Kooskooskee from the east, and the Malheur and Powder Rivers from the west, to its union with the northern branch of the Columbia, near the 46th degree of latitude, about a thousand miles from its sources. These streams are all bordered, in most places, by steep mountains, generally of volcanic origin ; and some of them rush violently, for long distances, through deep and narrow chasms. Like the northern branches of the Columbia, they also abound in cataracts, which must forever prevent their be- ing used as channels for transportation by boats ; though the country in the vicinity of the Lewis even now affords passage for wagons from the Rocky Mountains to the point of junction of the two great branches of the Columbia.
The width of the Columbia, at a short distance below the point of junetion of its northern and southern branches, is about three- quarters of a mile. Thence it flows westward, gradually becoming narrower, to its falls in the chain of mountains which runs nearest the coast ; receiving the Walla-Walla, the Umatalla, John Day's River, and a large stream called the Fall's River, (the Towahnahiok's of Lewis and Clarke) all from the south. This part of the Columbia is navigable by boats ; but the passage is always attended with much danger, from the tortuous course of the river, and the num- ber of the rapids and whirlpools. The falls are formed by ledges of rocks, over which the river is thrown with violence, between perpendicular walls of basalt. Four miles lower are the dalles,
23
GEOGRAPHY OF OREGON.
great rapids formed by the passage of the water between vast masses of rock ; and thirty miles below these are the cascades, a series of falls extending about half a mile, near the lowermost of which the tides of the Pacific are observable. All these cataracts have, it is said, been passed by boats descending when the river was at its floods; the navigation, however, according to all ac- counts, must be most perilous, and from the nature of the ground adjoining, it seems that no attempt to obviate, by art, the difficulties thus presented, would be successful.
The cascades are about one hundred and twenty-five miles from the mouth of the Columbia ; near them, the Clakamis River joins the great stream from the south ; and a little farther down, the Willamett or Multonomah comes in from the same direction by two mouths, between which is Wappatoo Island, thus named from a root much used as food by the Indians of the country. A few miles lower, the Cowelitz River enters from the north, below which the Columbia begins to widen ; and, at the distance of ten miles from the sea, it spreads out to the breadth of several miles, forming, on its northern side, a cove called Gray's Bay, in honor of the com- mander of the first ship which entered the river. Finally all the wa- ters, collected from these various sources, rush into the Pacific be- tween two points, seven miles apart ; namely, Cape Adams, on the south, and on the north Cape Disappointment, in latitude of 46 de- grees 19 minutes, and longitude of 124 degrees west from Green- wich, or 47 degrees west from Washington.
The mouth of the Columbia is the only harbor for ships on the whole coast between the Bay of San Francisco and the Strait of Fuca ; a distance equal to that from the mouth of Chesapeake Bay to the mouth of the St. Lawrence, or from the Straits of Gibraltar to the Straits of Dover; and during the greater part of the year it is difficult and dangerous, and often impossible, for any vessel either to enter or quit the river, on account of the intricacy and variability of the channel and the violence of the breakers, pro- duced by the collision of the river floods with the ocean billows. Many vessels have already been injured in attempting the passage, even under circumstances apparently the most favorable ; and many have been lost, when nothing seemed to indicate the ap- proach of danger, until they were violently thrown upon the bot- tom.
The coast south of the Columbia is most perilous to navigators at all times ; as the shores are every where steep and rocky, and bordered by reefs, on which the waves of the Pacific are driven with fury by the prevailing north-west winds. Vessels not draw- ing more than eight feet, may, however, find a harbor in the mouth of the Umqua, a small stream falling into the Pacific in the latitude
24
GEOGRAPHY OF OREGON.
of 42 degrees 51 minutes, immediately north of a remarkable promontory called Cape Orford, probably the Cape Blanco of the old Spanish navigators. Small vessels may also find anchorage in a cove or recess of the coast named by the Spaniards Port Trini- dad, under the parallel of 41 degrees 3 minutes, about forty miles north of Cape Mendocino, and in some other spots ; but no place on this coast can be said to offer protection to vessels against winds or waves.
At the distance of forty-five miles north of the mouth of the Columbia, under the parallel of 47 degrees, a small bay opens to the Pacific, which was discovered in May, 1792, by Robert Gray, ' of Boston, the captain of the ship Columbia, and named by him Bulfinch's Harbor, in honor of one of the owners of his vessel ; it has also been called Gray's Harbor, and on English maps may be found generally represented as Whidbey's Bay, after one of Van- couver's officers, who surveyed it in December, 1792. The en- trance is about three miles in width ; thence the bay extends east, south and north, about six miles in each direction, receiving at its eastern extremity a small stream called the Chekelis. The harbor is however shallow, and its entrance is obstructed by bars of sand, effectually preventing the passage of all vessels drawing more than eight or ten feet. Besides Bulfinch's Harbor, there is no port or place of security for vessels between the mouth of the Columbia and the Strait of Fuca ; and the only spot worthy of mention, on this part of the coast, is Destruction Island, near the continent, in the latitude of 47 1-2 degrees, so called by the captain of an Aus- trian trading ship in 1787, in consequence of the murder of a number of his men by the natives of the adjacent country.
The Strait of Fuca is an arm of the sea, separating a great island from the continent on the south and west. To this strait, considerable interest was at one time attached, from the supposi- tion that it might be a channel connecting the Atlantic with the Pa- cific : it extends from the ocean eastward about one hundred miles, varying in breadth from ten to thirty miles, between the 48th and the 49th parallels of latitude ; thence it turns to the north-west, in which direction it runs three hundred miles farther, first expanding into a long, wide bay, and then contracting into narrow and intri- cate passages among islands, to its reunion with the Pacific, under the 51st parallel. From its south-eastern extremity, a great bay, called Admiralty Inlet, stretches southward into the continent more than one hundred miles, dividing into many branches, of which the principal are Hood's Canal, on the west, and Puget's Sound the southernmost, extending nearly to the 47th parallel. This in- let possesses many excellent harbors, and as the country adjacent is healthy and productive, there is every reason to believe that
25
GEOGRAPHY OF OREGON.
this part of America will, in time, become valuable, agriculturally, as well as commercially. There are many other harbors on the Strait of Fuca, of which the principal are Port Discovery, near the entrance of Admiralty Inlet, said by Vancouver to be one of the best in the Pacific, and Poverty Cove, called Port Nuñez Gaona by the Spaniards, situated a few miles west of Cape Flat- tery. That cape, so called by Cook, and afterwards named by Vancouver Cape Classet, is a conspicuous promontory in the lati- tude of 48 degrees 27 minutes, near which is a large rock, called Tatooche's Island, united to the promontory by a rocky ledge, par- tially covered by water. The shore between the cape and Admi- ralty Inlet is composed of sandy cliffs overhanging a beach of sand and stones; from it the land gradually rises to a chain of moun- tains stretching southwardly along the Pacific to the vicinity of the Columbia, the highest point of which received, in 1788, the name of Mount Olympus.
The great chain of mountains, already so often mentioned as extending along the whole western coast of the continent, runs through Oregon, generally at the distance of eighty or one hun- dred miles from the shore, as far north as the 49th degree of latitude, where the eastern extremity of the Strait of Fuca washes its base. Thence one of its ridges runs north-east to the Rocky Mountains, dividing the waters of the Columbia from those of Fraser's River ; another ridge overhangs the sea-coast north-west- ward ; and the islands of the North-west Archipelago, which border the continent from the 49th to the 58th parallels, may be regarded as another range stretching through the sea.
The part of this chain included in Oregon, has received several appellations, of which, no one is as yet universally adopted. It is called -the Californian Mountains-the Clamet Mountains, from a tribe of Indians inhabiting a part of the country on its western side -the Cascade Mountains, from the cascades or cataracts formed by the Columbia, in passing through it -and finally, a patriotic citizen of the United States, has proposed to call.it the President's Range, and has assigned to some of the highest peaks, the names of chief magistrates of the Federal Republic .* One of these peaks, in the latitude of 44 degrees, received from Lewis and Clarke, who, first of all white men, beheld it in 1805, the name of Mount Jefferson ; for which, the British traders have thought proper to substitute that of Mount Vancouver. The other principal points in this ridge, are - Mount Baker, near the 49th parallel, and Mount Rainier under the 47th ; Mount Saint Helens,
* The author of these pages will venture to suggest one more name - The Far-West Mountains.
4
26
GEOGRAPHY OF OREGON.
the highest, rising not less than fifteen thousand feet above the ocean level, due east of the mouth of the Columbia, for which the name of Mount Washington has been proposed ; Mount Mac- laughlin and Mount Macleod, so called by the traders of the Hudson's Bay Company, in honor of two of their factors ; Mount Hood, near the 45th parallel ; Mount Shasty near the 43d, and Mount Jackson, a stupendous pinnacle, in the latitude of 41 degrees 40 minutes, which has been also called Mount Pitt by the British traders. Some of these peaks are visible from the ocean, particularly Mount Saint Helens, which serves as a mark for vessels entering the Columbia : they present, when seen from the summit of the Blue Mountains on the west, one of the grandest prospects in nature.
The country between the Pacific coast and this westernmost chain of mountains, consists of ranges of lower mountains, separated by narrow valleys, generally running parallel with the great chain, and with the coast. The climate of this region resembles that of California : the summer is warm and dry, and rain seldom falls between April and November, though during the remainder of the year it is violent and almost constant ; snow is rarely seen in the valleys, in which the ground sometimes continues soft and unfrozen throughout the winter. The soil in some of these valleys is said to be excellent, for wheat, rye, oats, pease, potatoes and apples, fifteen bushels of wheat being sometimes yielded by a single acre ; Indian corn, which requires both heat and moisture, does not succeed there or in any other part of Oregon. It is, however, evident, that with the peculiarities of climate, above-mentioned, the country can never be very productive, without artificial irrigation, which is practicable only in a few places. Hogs live and multiply in the woods, where an abundance of acorns is to be found; the cattle also increase, and it is not generally necessary for them to be housed or fed in the winter. The hills are covered with timber, which grows to an immense size. A fir, near Astoria, measured forty- six feet in circumference at ten feet from the earth ; the length of its trunk, before giving off a branch, was one hundred and fifty- three feet, and its whole height not less than three hundred feet ; another tree, of the same species, on the banks of the Umqua River, is fifty-seven feet in girth of trunk, and two hundred and sixteen feet in length, below its branches. " Prime sound pines," says Cox, " from two hundred to two hundred and eighty feet in height, and from twenty to forty feet in circumference, are by no means un- common." The land, on which these large trees grow, is good ; but the labor of clearing it would be so great as to prevent any one from undertaking the task, until all the other spots, capable of cultivation, should have been occupied.
27
GEOGRAPHY OF OREGON.
The superficial extent of this westernmost region of Oregon, does not exceed forty thousand square miles ; of which, a small proportion, not more than an eighth or a tenth, is fit for cultivation. The best lands are believed to lie around Admiralty Inlet, on the Chekelis River, which empties into Bulfinch's Harbor, on the Cowelitz, on the Willamet, and on the Umqua.
Settlements have been formed by individual Americans and by the Hudson's Bay Company, in each of those parts, as also at one or two places on the banks of the Main Columbia, of which those in the valley of the Willamet appear to give the greatest promise of success ; but they are all on a scale so small, they have existed so short a time, and the accounts as yet received of them are so inexact and so much at variance with each other, that it is impossible to arrive at any definite opinion with regard to them .*
The region within about two hundred miles east of the western- most or maritime chain of mountains, embraces several tracts of country, comparatively level, and some valleys wider than those west of the same chain ; the soil is, however, less productive, and the climate less favorable for agriculture, than in the places similarly situated nearer the Pacific. The most extensive valleys in this region, are those traversed by the streams, flowing into the Columbia from the south, between the maritime range, and the Blue Mountains, which form the western wall of the great valley of Lewis River; the plains, as they are called, though they are rather tracts of undulating country, are on both sides of the north- ern branch, between the 46th and the 49th parallels of latitude. The surface of the plains consists generally of a yellow sandy clay, covered with grass, small shrubs and prickly pears; in the valleys farther south, the soil is somewhat better, containing less of sand and more of vegetable mould, and they give support to a few trees, chiefly sumach, cotton-wood, and other such soft and useless woods. The climate of this whole region is more dry than that of the country nearer the Pacific, the days are warm, and the nights
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.