USA > Oregon > Douglas County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 5
USA > Oregon > Jackson County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 5
USA > Oregon > Josephine County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 5
USA > Oregon > Coos County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 5
USA > Oregon > Curry County > History of southern Oregon, comprising Jackson, Josephine, Douglas, Curry and Coos counties, comp. from the most authentic sources > Part 5
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The fragata reached Acapulco soon after the larger vessel, the ravages of the scurvy having deprived it of its commander, pilot and the greater portion of the crew on the return voyage. This disease and its cause do not appear to have been well understood at that time. The suffering it caused was most terrible, and it is remarkable what fortitude the Spaniards displayed in continuing their voyages during the preva- lence of such a horrible malady. In describing their sufferings, Torquemada says : " Nor is the least ease to be expected from change of place, as the slightest motion is attended with such severe pains that they must be very fond of life who would not willingly lay it down on the first appearance of so terrible a distemper. This virulent humour makes such ravages in the body that it is entirely covered with ulcers, and the poor patients are unable to bear the least pressure; even the very clothes laid on them deprive them of life. Thus they lie groaning and incapable of any relief. For the greatest assistance possible to be given them, if I may be allowed the expression, is not to touch them, nor even the bed clothes. These effects, however melancholy, are not the only ones produced by this pestilential humour. In many, the gums, both of the upper and lower jaws, are pressed both within and without to such a degree, that the teeth cannot touch one another, and withal so loose and bare that they shake with the least motion of the head, and some of the patients spit their teeth out with their saliva. Thus they were unable to receive any food but liquid, as gruel, broth, milk of almonds and the like. This gradually brought on so great a weakness that they died while talking to their friends. * * Some, by way of ease, made loud complaints, others lamented their sins with the deepest contrition, some died talking, some sleeping, some eating, some whilst sitting up in their beds."
The great river said to have been discovered by this expedition attracted much attention at the time. The historian quoted above said of it: "It is supposed that
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this river is the one leading to a great city, which was discovered by the Dutch when they were driven thither by storms, and that it is the Strait of Anian, through which the ship passed in sailing from the North sea to the South sea ; and that the city called Quivira is in those parts; and that this is the region referred to in the account which his majesty read, and which induced him to order this expedition." No great river exists in latitude 43 degrees ; but it is well known that the navigators of that period were seldom accurate in their observations, often varying as much as half a degree, and it is quite possible the stream referred to may have been the Umpqua. A few years later it was supposed that this stream was one end of a passage extending from the Gulf of California to Cape Blanco, making of California a huge island, and this idea was supported by the knowledge of the Colorado river, which had been explored many miles to the northward. Venegas, writing in the seventeenth century, speaks of Califor- nia as an island, and it was so designated on all maps until the end of the century. After this was discovered to be a mistake, the river was laid down on some maps as a large stream flowing from the interior of the continent-such a stream as the Col- umbia- or as the western end of a passage leading from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Very little was known of the width of the continent ; and geographers supposed it was but a short distance between the South sea and North sea. They had no idea that a passage between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans would have been 4,000 miles in length.
Upon his return to Mexico Viscaino strongly urged the viceroy to establish supply stations at San Diego and Monterey and to thus take possession of a country which he was satisfied, from what he learned by careful inquiry among the natives he encountered along the coast, was extremely fertile and rich in the precious metals; but the viceroy had too much consideration for his personal interests, since the expense of such an under- taking would have fallen solely upon himself, and neglected to utilize the information thus obtained. Viscaino, disgusted with the viceroy's inactivity, departed for Spain to present his views at court; and after long delay and persistent importuning secured a royal mandate to the viceroy, commanding him to establish a supply station for the India trade at Monterey. This order was issued in 1606, and with it Viscaino hastened to Mexico; but before the final preparations were completed he was taken sick and died, and the colonizing enterprise was abandoned. With no enthusiastic explorer to arouse him to action and with no hostile fleets in the Pacific to annoy him, the Spanish mon- arch apparently thought no more of the Pacific coast or the northwest passage, and a few years later there was enough to occupy his attention at home. He ordered no more voyages of exploration, and the viceroys were careful to undertake none upon their own responsibility, nor any other enterprise unless the immediate prospective profits were great. For a hundred and sixty years Spain made no further effort to extend her ex- plorations of the coast, nor did she even attempt the establishment of colonies at San Diego or Monterey, either for the purpose of taking possession of the country or forming refuge and supply stations for vessels returning from India. With the exception of the annual galleon which reached the coast on its return voyage in the latitude of Cape Mendocino, no Spanish vessel visited our shores for a century and a half. Not even the mythical straits, the fabulous city of Quivira, the untold riches and many wonderful objects supposed to exist in this vast unknown territory, were potent to aronse Spain from her lethargy. She made a few feeble efforts to protect her commerce at times
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during this period when attacked by roving privateers, but her attempts at colonization in Lower California, which will be spoken of later on, met with little success. There seemed to be no new Cortes, Pizarro, De Leon, Balboa or De Soto. The spirit of adven- ture was dead. Spain had passed her zenith and was rapidly on the decline. Wars with the Netherlands, France and Portugal were most disastrous. Power, wealth and territory rapidly decreased, and in a century she declined from the foremost position in the world to that of a second rate power, and has never been able to regain her lost ground. With such disasters crowding upon her in the Old World, her apathy in the New was but a natural result.
Though Spain had ceased her voyages of exploration, such was not the case with her powerful European neighbors, who were indefatigable in their efforts to explore and colonize the Atlantic coast of America. The English, French and Dutch planted col- onies on the coast, while their hardy navigators unremittingly explored its bays, rivers, straits and sounds. Uppermost in the minds of all was the northwest passage. The stories of its discovery which have already been related, and many others unworthy of repetition, kept the Straits of Anian constantly in the public mind. In 1608 Henry Hudson passed into and to a certain extent explored the bay upon which he bestowed his name; yet he was but following the route pursned by Cortereal more than a century before, whose theory that it connected with the Indian ocean had given rise to this umi- versal belief in the mythical straits. In 1616 William Baffin penetrated into the bay that bears his name, lying between America and Greenland, and entered a passage ex- tending westward near the 74th parallel, but was unable to proceed because of the vast quantities of ice. This voyage and others made into the extreme north, proved con- cinsively that no open passage could be possible in the 75th degree of latitude, where Maldonado had located his tortnons channel leading from the Atlantic to the North sea, and geographers became convinced that if such a passage and sea existed they were the straits and bay explored and named by Hudson. The belief was natural, then, that if found at all, the Straits of Anian should be looked for in some of the many unexplored arms of Hudson's bay. For a time, however, after Baffin's voyage, England was so engrossed in her own troubles that neither Royalists nor Commoners had time or inclina- tion to prosecute foreign explorations.
The expeditions of the Dutch were chiefly to the southward, and in 1616 Lemaire and Van Schouten made a most important discovery. It was that in passing from the Atlantic to the Pacific, it was unnecessary to tempt the dangers of Magellan's straits, but that to the south of these there existed an open sea. Though the passage of Cape Horn, named by them in honor of the city in Holland from which they came, was still a tem- pestnous one, it served to remove the fear all seaman entertained of undertaking to cross from one ocean to the other through the narrow and rocky channel above Terra del Fuego. This discovery was nearly as disastrous to Spanish commerce in the Pacific as that of the much feared one from the North sea could possibly have been; for there now existed no obstacle to prevent hostile vessels from entering or leaving the Pacific at will, since the open sea was too large to be guarded even had Spain the necessary vessels of war for such a purpose.
Spain was now involved in European wars, and to the disasters that were showered upon her head at home were added others in America. English, French and Dutch
WALLING - LITH. PORTLAND OR.
Amm Call
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buccaneers, and especially the latter during the war for independence by the Nether- lands, ravaged the Spanish settlements on the Pacific coast. Dutch privateers fre- quented the Gulf of California, from which they preyed upon the Spanish commerce and enriched themselves with captured booty. By their victims they were known as Pichilingues, because the bay of Pichilingue, on the western side of the gulf, was made their chief point of rendezvous.
Spain made a few feeble and spasmodic efforts to dislodge these piratical pests and protect her plundered commerce, by sending out expeditions against them and by attempting to plant a colony on Lower California as a base of defensive operations. In 1631, 1644, 1664, 1667 and 1668 such efforts were made; but they were wholly fruitless, and in no instance were the enterprises conducted with the vigor and courage displayed by the Spanish adventurers of a century before. A final effort was made in 1683 by Don Isdro de Otondo, who headed an expedition of soldiers, settlers and Jesuit priests, whom he established at various points, making La Paz the headquarters and chief settlement and building there a chapel for worship and to aid in the conversion of the natives. Father Kino was in charge of the religious part of the enterprise, and set about learning the Indian language, and soon translated into their tongue the creeds of the Catholic Church. The effort lasted about three years, during which time they were visited with an eighteen months' drought, and before they had recovered from the blow, received orders to put to sea, and bring into Acapulco safely the Spanish galleon, then in danger of capture by Dutch privateers lying in wait for her. This was snecessfully accomplished, the treasure-ship was conveyed safely in, but the act resulted in the abandonment of the colony; and a council of chief authorities in Mexico soon after decided that the reduction of California by such means was impracticable.
After Charles II. came to the throne of England, from which his father had been driven by the austere Cromwell, attention was again turned by that nation to explorations for the northwest passage. The belief that in Hudson's bay would be found the en- trance to the mythical straits, led to the organization of the Hudson's Bay Company. to which the king granted. in 1669, the whole region whose water- flow into that great inland sea. The objects of "The company of adventurers of England trading into Hudson's Bay." as expressed in the charter, were those of trade and the discovery of a passage leading into the Pacific ocean. It was not long. however, before the company learned that its franchise for trading purposes was an exceedingly valuable one, and that the discovery of a passage through its dominions, which would of necessity invoke competition from other organizations, was highly undesirable. From that time it not only made no effort to discover the passage, but discouraged all such expeditions, even keeping as secret as possible all geographical knowledge acquired by its agents, which policy obtains even to the present day, and which has kept as a fur-bearing wilderness the whole northern half of the North American continent.
5
CHAPTER V.
RUSSIA ENTERS THE PACIFIC.
Russia a New Factor in the Contest of Nations-Plans of Peter the Great-Behring's First Voyage Proves that Asia and America are Distinct Continents-Voyage of the St. Paul-Behring Reaches the American Coast and Expires on the Return Voyage-Terrible Suffering of the Crew-Beginning of the Pacific Fur Trade-Result of Russian Explorations.
Though France confined her attention to inland explorations from her Canadian colonies, England to fostering her colonies in America and exploring the north Atlantic coast, and Holland to the founding of New Amsterdam and the plundering of the Span- ish commerce and settlements in the south Pacific ; yet the North Pacific coast was not wholly neglected during the first half of the eighteenth century. A new and almost unexpected factor made itself felt in the Pacific, and this was the powerful and autocratic monarch of Russia. Peter the Great had redeemed Russia from a state of almost utter barbarity and set it on the highway to civilization and national power. In the arts of war and peace he had patiently instructed his people, had cemented their national union, had awakened a national pride and love of power within their bosoms, had extended his domain and increased the number of his subjects, and had made of a people formerly scarcely thought of when the affairs of Europe were discussed, one of the most influ- ential nations of the world. It was his constant aim and the legacy he left to his successors, to extend the power of Russia on all sides, to build up the nation and make it the foremost on the globe, and the czars have never relaxed their efforts to accomplish this mighty purpose. Gradually the dominion of the czar was pushed eastward until his authority extended across the whole of Siberia to the Pacific at the peninsula of Kamtchatka. The rich furs of that region became a source of revenne to the govern- ment which Peter was desirous of increasing. He wanted to extend his power still further east to the American settlements of the English, Spanish and French, though how far that was neither he nor anyone else had the least conception. To this desire is due the discovery and exploration of the northern Pacific coasts of both Asia and America. Peter commanded vessels to be built at Kamtchatka, and at Archangel on the White sea, that they might endeavor, the one in the Arctic and the other in the Pacific, to find the long-sought northwest passage, or as they viewed it a northeast passage. It was Peter's idea that vessels could sail from the Atlantic through the Arctic ocean and enter the Pacific by the way of this passage, provided America did not prove to be simply an eastern extension of Asia ; but Peter died before his project was executed, and the scheme lay dormant for a few years.
In 1728 the great Catherine determined to carry out her husband's plans for Pacific exploration, and agreeably to his former instructions she ordered an expedition to be prepared on the northeast coast of Kamtchatka, which she placed under the com-
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mand of a Danish navigator of skill and courage, Vitus Behring, who had been desig- nated by Peter for that position before his death. He sailed on the the fourteenth of July in a small vessel, and followed along the coast of Asia east and north until in latitude 67° 18' he found it steadily trending westward, and was satisfied he was then in the Arctic and following the northern coast to the west. Convinced that he had fulfilled his instructions and demonstrated the fact that Asia and America were separate continents, and being unprepared for a winter voyage, he returned to Kamtchatka. How far America lay to the eastward of Asia he knew not, for no land had beeu observed in that direction, and he was totally ignorant of the fact that he had, both in going and returning, passed through the narrow channel separating the two con- tinents and been within a few miles of the American shore. This was made evident a few years later, and Behring's name was bestowed upon the straits. The elusive northwest passage had been found, though it took many years to discover that as a means of communication between the Atlantic and Pacific it was absolutely impracticable. That Behring's passage meets the requirements of the Straits of Anian as depicted by Maldonado, both in latitude and general features, can- not be denied, but to navigate the North sea as described by him and to pass through the tortnous straits he locates in the 75th parallel into the Atlantic is utterly impos- sible ; and, therefore, Behring's straits cannot be looked upon as lending any support to the romance with which the unscrupulous Maldonado regaled the Council of the Indies.
The next year Behring undertook to reach America by sailing directly eastward, but adverse winds forced him into the Gulf of Okotsk, and he abandoned the under- taking and proceeded to St. Petersburg. During the next few years many other expeditions by land and sea, one of which was driven upon the coast of Alaska in 1732, more clearly defined the Asiatic coast, and the nature of the passage between it and America. The Empress Anne prepared for another expedition, but dying before it was ready to sail, was succeeded by Elizabeth, who dispatched two vessels, the St. Peter and St. Paul, from the Bay of Avatscha on the fourth of June. The former was commanded by Behring and the latter by Alexei Tehirikof, who had been his lieutenant on the former voyage. The vessels were soon separated in a gale and were not again united. Tehirikof returned on the eighth of October, having reached a group of islands on the coast in latitude 56 degrees, where sixteen of his men were slaughtered by the natives, and having lost twenty-one of his crew by scurvy, includ- ing the distinguished French naturalist Delile de Crayere.
Of the discoveries inade by Behring and the sufferings endured by the crew of the St. Peter, the only record is that of a journal kept by Steller, the German surgeon and naturalist, which was first published in full in 1795, though its tenor and leading fea- tures were known at a much earlier date. Its nautical and geographical details are not as definite as could be desired. It seems that Behring sailed south-easterly as far as the 46th parallel without encountering land and then steered to the northeast as far as the 60th degree, when he discovered an immense snow-covered mountain which he uamed St. Elias because it was first seen on the eighteenth of July, the day assigned to that saint in the Russian calender. Entering a narrow passage between an island and the mainland a strong current of discolored water was observed, indicating the pres-
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ence of a large river whose size proved the land through which it flowed to be of con- tinental proportions. The conclusion was at once reached that America had been found; but Behring, who was ill, refused to explore the coast to the southeast in the direction of the Spanish possessions, and set out upon the return voyage. Delayed and baffled by violent winds and the many islands of the Aleutian group, but slow pro- gress was made. For two months they wandered or were driven about by furious winds in the open sea to the south of the archipelago, famine and disease claiming their victims almost daily. "The general distress and mortality," says the journal of the surgeon, "increased so fast that not only the sick died, but those who pretended to be healthy when released from their posts fainted and fell down dead; of which the scantiness of water, the want of biscuits and brandy, cold, wet, nakedness, vermin, and terror, were not the least causes." On the fifth of November they landed upon an island with the purpose of spending the winter there, and constructed huts from the wreck of their vessel which was dashed by the waves upon the beach soon after the landing was effected. Behring died on the eighth of December, and during the winter thirty of the crew followed him. The survivors, having lived upon sea and land animals killed on the island, constructed a small vessel from pieces of the wreck, and succeeded in reaching the Bay of Avatscha the following August. The little island where they had spent the winter and where were buried their commander and so many of their comrades, they named Behring's Isle ; it lies about eighty miles from the Kamt- chatkan coast, and consists of granite peaks thrust up from mid ocean, against which the waves dash with ceaseless fury.
No disposition was manifested by the rulers of Russia to prosecute further dis- coveries for more than twenty years. Individual enterprise, however accomplished something. The returning survivors of Behring's ill-fated expedition took with them the skins of animals which had served them as food during that terrible winter, and sold them at high prices. This led to short voyages eastward in quest of furs, the beginning of that enormous fur trade in the Pacific which was for years a bone of con- tention between nations and which led to the first settlement and occupation of Oregon. It is thus described by Greenhow:
" The trade thus commenced was, for a time, carried on by individual adventurers, each of whom was alternately a seaman, a hunter, and a merchant ; at length, how- ever, some capitalists in Siberia employed their funds in the pursuit, and expeditions to the islands were, in consequence, made on a more extensive scale, and with greater regularity and efficiency. Trading stations were established at particular points, where the furs were collected by persons left for that object ; and vessels were sent, at stated periods, from the ports of Asiatic Russia, to carry the articles required for the use of the agents and hunters, or for barter with the natives, and to bring away the skins collected.
" The vessels employed in this commerce were, in all respects, wretched and inse- cure, the planks being merely attached together, without iron, by leathern thongs; and, as no instruments were used by the traders for determining latitudes and longitudes at sea, their ideas of the relative positions of the places which they visited were vague and incorrect. Their navigation was, indeed, performed in the most simple and un- scientific manner possible. A vessel sailing from the Bay of Avatscha, or from Cape
RESIDENCE. WAILING- LITH -PORTLAND.OM.
PILOT ROCK. H.F. BARRON'S STOCK RANCH, BARRON, JACKSON CO.
STAGE HOUSE.
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Lopatka, the southern extremity of Kamtchatka, could not have gone far eastward, without falling in with one of the Aleutian islands, which would serve as a mark for her course to another ; and thus she might go on from point to point throughout the whole chain. In like manner she would return to Asia, and if her course and rate of sailing were observed with tolerable care, there could seldom be any uncertainty as to whether she were north or south of the line of the islands. Many vessels were, never- theless, annually lost, in consequence of this want of knowledge of the coasts, and want of means to ascertain positions at sea ; and a large number of those engaged in the trade, moreover, fell victims to cold, starvation and scurvy, and to the enmity of the bold natives of the islands. Even as late as 1806, it was calculated that one-third of these vessels were lost in each year. The history of the Russian trade and estab- lishments on the north Pacific, is a series of details of dreadful disasters and suffer- ings; and, whatever opinion may be entertained as to the humanity of the adventurers, or the morality of their proceedings, the courage and perseverance displayed by them, in struggling against such appalling difficulties, must command universal admiration. " The furs collected by these means, at Avatscha and Ochotsk, the principal fur- trading points, were carried to Irkutsk, the capital of Eastern Siberia, whence some of them were taken to Europe; the greater portion were, however, sent to Kiakta, a small town just within the Russian frontier, close to the Chinese town of Maimatchin, through which places all the commerce between these two empires passed, agreeably to a treaty concluded at Kiakta in 1728. In return for the furs, which brought higher prices in China than anywhere else, teas, tobacco, rice, porcelain, and silk and cotton goods, were brought to Irkutsk, where all the most valuable of these articles were sent to Europe. These transportations were effected by land, except in some places where the rivers were used as the channel of conveyance, no commercial exportation having been made from Eastern Russia by sea before 1779; and when the immense distances between some of the points above mentioned are considered (Irkutsk to Pekin, 1,300 miles ; to Bay of Avatscha, 3,450 miles ; to St. Petersburg, 3,760 miles), it becomes evident that none but objects of great value, in comparison with their bulk, at the place of their consumption, could have been thus transported with profit to those engaged in the trade, and that a large portion of the price paid by the consumer must have been ab- sorbed by the expense of transportation. A skin was, in fact, worth at Kiakta three times as much as it cost at Ochotsk."
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