USA > Oregon > History of Oregon, Vol. II, 1848-1888 > Part 34
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 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84
337
HARD TIMES.
to securing the 500,000 acres of land, which on the day of Oregon's admission as a state would be hers, to be applied to internal improvements,39 and other grants which might reasonably be expected, and which might amount to millions of acres with which to build railroads and improve navigation.
Judge Pratt, thinking he would like a seat in the United States senate, advocated state admission, and to assist himself started in Portland, in connection with Alonzo Leland, a political sheet called the Demo- cratic Standard, which served to provoke the ridicule of the Statesman; while the Oregonian denounced the editors and their object in the severest terms. The Statesman, as usual, carried its points so far as electing its candidates, except in a few instances, against the whigs, and also against the prohibitionists, or Maine- law party.40 But the majority against a state con- stitution was about one hundred and fifty, a majority so small, however, as to show that, as the democrats had intimated, it would be reduced to nothing by a year or two more of effort in that direction.
In the spring of 1854 there were complaints of hard times in Oregon, which were to be accounted for partly by the Indian disturbances, but chiefly by reason of neglect of the farming interests and a fall- ing-off in the yield of the mines. The great reaction was at hand throughout the coast. Business was prostrated in California, and Oregon felt it, just as Oregon had felt California's first flush on finding gold. To counteract the evil, agricultural societies began to be formed in the older counties." The lumbering interest had greatly declined also, after the erection
39 See the 8th section of an act of congress in relation thereto, passed in 1841.
40 The Maine-law candidates for seats in the legislature were Elisha Strong and O. Jacobs of Marion; S. Nelson, P. H. Hatch, E. D. Shattuck of Clacka- mas; D. W. Ballard of Linn; Ladd and Gilliam of Polk; J. H. D. Henderson and G. W. Burnett of Yamhill.
41 The constitution of the Yamhill Agricultural Society, F. Martin, presi- dent, A. S. Watt, secretary, was published July 25, 1854, in the Or. States- man.
HIST. OR., VOL. II. 22
338
LEGISLATION, MINING, AND SETTLEMENT.
of mills in California, and lumber and flour being no longer so much sought after, caused a sensible lessen- ing of the income of Oregon. But the people of Oregon well knew that their immense agricultural resources would bring them out of all their troubles if they would only apply themselves in the right di- rection and in the right way.
The counties which led in this industrial revival were Washington, Yamhill, Marion, and Polk. The first county fair held was in Yamhill on the 7th of October, 1854, followed by Marion on the 11th, and Polk on the 12th. The exhibit of horses, cattle, and fruit was fairly good, of sheep, grain, and domes- tic manufactures almost nothing; 42 but it was a begin- ning from which steadily grew a stronger competitive interest in farm affairs, until in 1861 a state agricul- tural society was formed, whose annual meeting is the principal event of each year in farming districts.43
The first step toward manufacturing woollen fabrics was also taken in 1854, when a carding machine was erected at Albany by E. L. Perham & Co. Farmers who had neglected sheep-raising now purchased sheep of the Hudson's Bay Company." Early in the spring of 1855 Barber and Thorpe of Polk county erected machinery for spinning, weaving, dying, and dressing woollen cloths.45 In 1856 a company was organized at Salem to erect a woollen-mill at that place, the first important woollen manufactory on the Pacific coast. It was followed by the large establishment at Oregon City and several smaller ones in the course of a few years. 46
42 Or. Statesman, Oct. 17, 1854. Mrs R. C. Geer entered two skeins of yarn, the first exhibited and probably the first made in Oregon. The address was delivered to the Marion county society, which met at Salem, by Mr Woodsides. L. F. Grover, in his Pub. Life in Or., MS., says he delivered the first Marion county address, but he is mistaken. He followed in 1855. 43 Brown's Salem Directory, 1871, 37-77.
" Or. Stat., May 23 and Oct. 10, 1854; Tolmie's Puget Sound, MS., 24.
45 Or. Statesman, March 20, 1855. R. A. Gessner received a premium in 1855 from the Marion county society for the 'best jeans.'
46 Grover, Pub. Life in Or., MS., 68-9, was one of the first directors in the Salem mill. See also Watt's First Things, MS., 8-10.
339
PROPOSED TELEGRAPH.
The first proposal to establish a telegraph line be- tween California and Oregon was made in October of 1854. Hitherto, no more rapid means of communi- cation had existed than that afforded by express com- panies, of which there were several. The practice of sending letters by express, which prevailed all over the Pacific coast at this time, and for many years thereafter, arose from the absence or the irregu- larity in the carriage of mails by the government. As soon as a mining camp was established, an express became necessary; and though the service was at- tended with many hardships and no small amount of danger, there were always to be found men who were eager to engage in it for the sake of the gains, which were great.47 The business of the country did not require telegraphic correspondence, and its growth was delayed for almost another decade.48
47 The first express company operating in Oregon was Todd & Co., fol- lowed very soon by Gregory & Co., both beginning in 1851. Todd & Co. sold out to Newell & Co. in 1852. The same year Dugan & Co., a branch of Adams & Co., began running in Oregon; also T'Vault's Oregon and Shasta express, and McClaine & Co.'s Oregon and Shasta express. In the latter part of 1852 Adams & Co. began business in Oregon; but about the beginning of 1853, with other companies, retired and left the field to Wells, Fargo & Co., improved mail communication gradually rendering the services of the com- panies, except for the carrying of treasure and other packages, superfluous. The price fell from fifty ceuts on a letter in a gradually declining scale to ten cents, where it remained for many years, and at last to five cents; and pack- ages to some extent in proportion. Besides the regular companies, from 1849 to 1852 there were many private express riders who picked up considerable money in the mountain camps.
48 Charles F. Johnson, an agent of the Alta California Telegraph Company, first agitated the subject of a telegraph line to connect Portland with the cities of California, and so far succeeded as to have organized a company to construct such a line from Portland to Corvallis, which was to be extended in time to meet one from Marysville, California, to Yreka on the border. The Oregon line was to run to Oregon City, Lafayette, Dayton, Salem, and Corvallis. It was finished to Oregon City Nov. 15, 1855, the first message being sent over the wires on the 16th, and the line reached Salem by Sept. 1856, but it was of so little use that it was never completed nor kept in re- pair. Neither the interests of the people nor their habits made it requisite. În 1868 the California company had completed their line to Yreks, for which during the period of the civil war, the Oregonians had reason to be thankful, and having taken some long strides in progress during the half-dozen years between 1855 and 1861, they eagerly subscribed to build a line to Yreka from Portland, on being solicited by J. E. Strong, former president of the same company. Of the Oregon company, W. S. Ladd was elected president; S. G. Reed, secretary; H. W. Corbett, treasurer; John McCracken, superin- tendent; W. S. Ladd, D. F. Bradford, A. G. Richardson, C. N. Terry, and
340
LEGISLATION, MINING, AND SETTLEMENT.
Steam navigation increased rapidly in proportion to other business, the principal trade being confined to the Willamette River, although about this time there began to be some traffic on the Columbia, above as well as below the mouth of the Willamette. 49 Ocean A. L. Lovejoy, directors. Strong, contractor, owned considerable stock in it, which he sold to the California State Telegraph Company in 1863, the line being completed in March. In 1868 a line of telegraph was extended to The Dalles, and eastward to Boise City, by the Oregon Steam Navigation Company, in 1869. A new line to the east was erected in 1876, which was extended to S. F., and a line to Astoria at the mouth of the Columbia.
49 The Gazelle was a side-wheel boat built for the upper Willamette in 1853 by the company which constructed the hasin and hoisting works at the falls, and began to run in March 1854, but in April exploded her boiler while lying at her wharf, causing the most serious calamity which ever oc- curred on Oregon waters. She had on board about 50 persons, 22 of whom were killed outright and many others injured, some of whom died soon after. Among the victims were some of the principal persons in the territory: Dan- iel D. Page, superintendent of the company owning the Gazelle, whose wife and daughter were killed by the explosion of the Jenny Lind in San Francisco Bay April 11, 1853; Rev. James P. Miller, father of Mrs E. M. Wilson of The Dalles; David Woodhull, and Joseph Hunt of Michigan; Judge Burch, David Fuller, C. Woodworth, James White, Daniel Lowe, John Clemens, J. M. Fudge, Blanchet, Hill, Morgan, John Blaimer, John Daly, John K. Miller, Michael Hatch, Michacl McGee, Charles Knaust, David McLane, Piaut, and an unknown Spanish youth. Or. Statesman, April 18, 1854; Arm- strong's Or., 14; Brown's Salem Directory, 1871, 35. Among the wounded were Mrs Miller, Charles Gardiner, son of the surveyor-general, Robert Pentland, Miss Pell, C. Dobbins, Robert Shortess, B. F. Newhy, Captain Hereford of the Gazelle, John Boyd, mate, and James Partlow, pilot. The chief engineer, Tonie, who was charged with the responsibility of theaccident, escaped and fled the territory. Portland Oregonian, Jan. 29, 1870. The Oregon, another of the company's boats, was sunk and lost the same season. The wreck of the Gazelle was run over the falls, after being sold to Murray, Hoyt, and Wells, who refitted her and named her the Señorita, after which she was employed to carry troops, horses, and army stores from Portland to Vancouver and the Cascades. In 1857 the machinery of this hoat was put into the new steamer Hassalve, while the Señorita was provided with a more powerful engine, and commanded by L. Hoyt, brother of Richard Hoyt. In 1854 the pioneer steamboat men of the upper Willamette, captains A. F. Hedges and Charles Bennett, sold their entire interests and retired from the river.
In 1855 a new class of steamboats was put upon the Willamette above the falls, stern-wheels being introduced, which soon displaced the side-wheel boats. This change was effected hy Archibald Jamieson, A. S. Murray, Amory Hol- brook, and John Torrence, who formed a company and built the Enterprise, a small stern-wheel hoat commanded by Jamieson. This boat ran for 3 years on the Willamette, and was sold during the mining rush of 1858, taken over the falls and to Fraser River by Thomas Wright. She finished her career on the Chehalis River. Her first captain, Jameison, was one of a family of five steamboat men, who were doomed to death by a fatality sad and re- markable. Arthur Jamieson was in command of the steamer Portland, which was carried over the falls of the Willamette in March 1857; another brother died of a quick consumption from a cold contracted on the river; an- other by the explosion of the steamer Yale on the Fraser River; and finally Archibald and another brother hy the blowing up of the Cariboo at Victoria.
Another company, consisting of captains Cochrane, Gibson, and Cassady,
341
INLAND NAVIGATION.
navigation, too, was increasing, but not without its drawbacks and losses. 50 In the midst of all, the young and vigorous community grew daily stronger, and more able to bear the misfortunes incident to rapid progress.
In July 1854 there was a raid in Rogue River Valley by the Shastas; unattended, however, by seri-
formed in 1856, built the James Clinton and Surprise, two fine stern-wheel boats. In 1857 the Elk was built for the Yamhill River trade by Switzler, Moore, and Marshall; and in 1858 the first owners of the Enterprise built the Onward, the largest steamboat at that time on the upper river.
In 1860 another company was incorporated, under the name of People's Transportation Company, composed of A. A. McCully, S. T. Church, E. N. Cook, D. W. Burnside, and captains John Cochrane, George A. Pease, Joseph Kellogg, and E. W. Banghman, which controlled the Willamette River trade till 1871. This company built the Dayton, Reliance, Echo, E. D. Baker, Iris, A bany, Shoo Fly, Fannie Patton, and Alice, and owned the Rival, Senator, Alert, and Active. It ran its boats on the Columbia as well as the Willamette until 1863, when a compromise was made with the Oregon Steam Navigation Company, then in existence, to confine its trade to the Willamette River above Portland. In 1865 this company expended $100,000 in building a dam and basin above the falls, which enabled them to do away with a portage, by simply transferring passengers and freight from one boat to another through a warehouse at the lower end of the basin. The P. T. Co. sold out in 1871 to Ben Holladay, having made handsome fortunes in 11 years for all its principal members. In the next two years the canal and locks were built around the west side of the falls at Oregon City, but the P. T. Co. under Ilolladay's management refused to use them, and continued to reship at Ore- gon City. This led to the formation of the Willamette Locks and Transpor- tation Company, composed of Joseph Teal, B. Goldsmith, Frank T. Dodge, and others, who commenced opposition in 1873, and pressed the P. T. Co. so bard that Holladay sold out to the Oregon Nav. Co., which thus was enabled to resume operations on the Willamette above Portland, with the boats pur- chased and others which were built, and became a powerful competitor for the trade. The Locks and Transportation Co. built the Willamette Chief ex- pressly to outrun the boats of the P. T. Co., but found it ruinous work; and in 1876 a consolidation was effected, under the name of Willamette Trans- portation and Locks Company, capital $1,000,000. Its property consisted of the locks at Oregon City, the water front at Astoria belonging formerly to the O. S. N. Co., and the Farmers' warehouse at that place, and the steam- boats Willamette Chief, Gov. Grover, Beaver, Annie Stewart, Orient, Occi- dent, with the barges Autocrat, Columbia, and Columbia's Chief. This secured complete monopoly by doing away with competition on either river, except from independent lines. Salem Will. Farmer, Jan. 7, 1876; Adams' Or., 37 -8
50 The steam-tug Fire-Fly was lost by springing aleak on the bar in Feb. 1854. Thomas Hawks, captain, L. H. Swaney, Van Dyke, Wisenthral, and other persons unknown were drowned. At the close of the year the steam- ship Southerner, Capt. F. A. Sampson, was wrecked on the Washington coast. The steamer America, bound to Oregon and Washington ports, was burned in the harbor of Crescent City the following summer.
The steamships engaged in the carrying trade to Oregon from 1850 to 1855 were the Carolina, which I think made but one trip, the Seagull, Pan- ama, Oregon, Gold Hunter, Columbia, Quickstep, General Warren, Frémont, America, Peytonia, Southerner, and Republic. Three of these had been wrecked. the Seagull, General Warren, and Southerner, in as many years. Others survived unexpectedly.
342
LEGISLATION, MINING, AND SETTLEMENT.
ous damage. The treaty Indians of Rogue River sickened in the reservation, and the agent permitted them to roam a little in search of health. Some of them being shot by white men, their chiefs demanded that the murderers be brought to justice, as had been promised them, but it was not done. Few of such cases ever came into the courts,51 and it was as rare an occurrence for an Indian to be tried by process of law.52
So great had been their wrongs during the past five years, so unbearable the outrages of the white race, that desperation seized the savages of the Klamath, Scott, and Shasta valleys, who now took the war-path toward the country of the Modocs, to join with them in a general butchery of immigrants and settlers.
In the absence of a regular military force, that at Fort Jones, consisting of only seventy men, wholly insufficient to guard two hundred miles of immigrant road, the governor was requested to call into service volunteers, which was done. Governor Davis also wrote to General Wool for troops. Meanwhile a company was sent out under Jesse Walker, who kept the savages at bay, and on its return received the commendations of Governor Curry, Davis having in the mean time resigned.
This expedition was used by the dominant party for many years to browbeat the influential whigs of southern Oregon. The Statesman facetiously named it the "expedition to fight the emigrants;" and in plainer language denounced the quartermaster-gen- eral and others as thieves, because the expedition cost forty-five thousand dollars.53
51 In Judge Deady's court the following year a white man was convicted of manslaughter of an Indian, and was sentenced to two years in the peni- tentiary. Or. Statesman, June 2, 1855.
52 The slayers of Edward Wills and Kyle, and those chastised by Major Kearney in 1851, are the only Indians ever punished for crime by either civil or military authorities in southern Oregon. U. S. H. Misc. Doc. 47, 58, 35th cong. 2d sess.
53 Grasshoppers had destroyed vegetation almost entirely in the southern valleys this year, which led to a great expense for forage.
343
INDIAN DISTURBANCES.
Drew in his report seemed to apologize for the great cost, and pointed out that the prices were not so high as in 1853, and that many expenses then in- curred had been avoided; but he could not prevent the turning into political capital of so large a claim against the government, though it was the merchants of Yreka and not of Jacksonville who overcharged, if overcharging there was.54 The attacks made on the whigs of southern Oregon led to the accumula- tion of a mass of evidence as to prices, and to years of delay in the settlement of accounts. On the side of the democrats in this struggle was General Wool, then in command of the division of the Pacific, who wrote to Adjutant-general Thomas at New York that the governor of Oregon had mustered into ser- vice a company of volunteers, but that Captain Smith was of opinion that they were not needed, and that it was done on the representations of speculators who were expecting to be benefited by furnishing sup- plies. 55
There was a massacre of immigrants near Fort Boisé in August, that caused much excitement on the Willamette. The party was known as Ward's train, being led by Alexander Ward of Kentucky, and consisting of twenty-one persons, most of whom were slain.56 Not only was the outrage one that could not be overlooked, or adequately punished by civil or military courts, but it was cause for alarm such as was expressed in the report of Quartermaster Drew, that a general Indian war was about to be pre- cipitated upon the country, an apprehension strength- ened by reports from many sources.
In order to make plain all that followed the events recorded in this chapter, it is necessary to revert to
54 The merchants and traders of Jacksonville, who were unable to furnish the necessary supplies, which were drawn from Yreka, testified as to prices. U. S. II. Misc. Doc. 47, 32-5, 35th cong. 2d sess.
55 Message of President Pierce, with correspondence of General Wool, in U. S. Sen. Ex. Doc. 16, 33d cong. 2dl sess.
56 For particulars see California Inter Pocula, this series, passim.
344
LEGISLATION, MINING, AND SETTLEMENT.
statements contained in the correspondence of the war department. That which most concerned this par- ticular period is contained in a document transmitted to the senate, at the request of that body, by Presi- dent Pierce, at the second session of the thirty-third congress. In this document is a communication of General Wool to General Cooper at Washington City, in which is mentioned the correspondence of the former with Major Rains of the 4th infantry, in command of Fort Dalles, and of Major Alvord, U. S. paymaster at Vancouver, who had each written him on the subject of Indian relations. As the re- port of Rains has been mentioned in another place, it is not necessary to repeat it here. Colonel George Wright had contributed his opinion concerning the "outrages of the lawless whites" in northern Cali- fornia, and to strengthen the impression, had quoted from the report of Indian Agent Culver concerning the conduct of a party of miners on Illinois River, who had, as he averred, wantonly attacked an Indian en- campment and brutally murdered two Indians and wounded others.57 The facts were presented to Wool, and by Wool to headquarters at Washington. The general wrote, that to prevent as far as possible the recurrence of further outrages against the Indians, he had sent a detachment of about fifty men to re- enforce Smith at Fort Lane; but that to keep the peace and protect the Indians against the white people, the force in California and Oregon must be increased. This letter was written in March 1854.
On the 31st of March, Wool again wrote General Scott, at New York, that the difficulty of preserving
67 U. S. Sen. Ex. Doc. 16, 14-15, 33d cong. 2d sess. Lieut J. C. Bonny- castle, commanding Fort Jones, in relating the attack on some of the Shastas whom he was endeavoring to protect, and whom Captain Goodall was escort- ing to Scott's Valley to place in his hands, says: 'Most of the Indians hav- ing escaped into the adjacent chapparal, where they lay concealed, the whites began a search for them, during which an Indian from behind his bush for- tunately shot and killed a white man named McKaney.' In the same report he gives the names of the men who had fired on the Indians, the list not in- cluding the name of McKaney. U. S. Sen. Ex. Doc. 16, p. 81, 33d cong. 2d sess .; U. S. H. Ex. Doc. 1, 446-66, vol. i. pt i., 33d cong. 2d sess.
345
ATTITUDE OF THE ARMY.
peace, owing to the increase of immigration and the encroachments of the white people upon the Indians, which deprived them of their improvements, was con- tinually increasing. There were, he said, less than a thousand men to guard California, Oregon, Washing- ton, and Utah, and more were wanted. The request was referred by Scott to the secretary of war, and refused.
In May, Wool sent Inspector-general J. K. F. Mansfield to make a tour of the Pacific department, and see if the posts established there should be made permanent; but expressed the opinion that those in northern California could be dispensed with, not- withstanding that the commanders of forts Reading and Jones were every few weeks sending reports filled with accounts of collisions between the white population and the Indians.
At this point I observe certain anomalies. Congress had invited settlers to the Pacific coast for political reasons. These settlers had been promised protection from the savages. That protection had never to any practical extent been rendered; but gradually the usual race conflict had begun and strengthened until it assumed alarming proportions. The few officers of the military department of the govern- ment, sent here ostensibly to protect its citizens, had found it necessary to devote themselves to protecting the Indians. Over and over they asserted that the white men were alone to blame for the disturbances.
Writing to the head of the department at New York, General Wool said that the emigration to Cal- ifornia and Oregon would soon render unnecessary a number of posts which had been established at a great expense, and that if it were left to his discretion, he should abolish forts Reading and Miller in California, and establish a temporary post in the Pit River coun- try; also break up one or two posts in northern Cali- fornia and Oregon, which could only mean forts Jones and Lane, and establish another on Puget Sound,
346
LEGISLATION, MINING, AND SETTLEMENT.
and, if possible, one in the Boisé country; though his preference would be given to a company of dragoons to traverse the Snake River country in the summer and return to The Dalles in the winter.
Governor Curry, on learning that the expedition under Haller had accomplished nothing, and that the whole command numbered only sixty men, and think- ing it too small to accomplish anything in the Snake River country should the Indians combine to make war on the immigration, on the 18th of September issued a proclamation calling for two companies of volunteers, of sixty men each, to serve for six months, unless sooner discharged, and to furnish their own horses, equipments, arms, and ammunition; the com- panies to choose their own officers, and report to Brig- adier General Nesmith on the 25th, one company to rendezvous at Salem and the other at Oregon City.
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.