USA > Oregon > Pioneer days of Oregon history, Vol. I > Part 17
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This story was told me by Dr. William C. McKay, about 1885, who was the grandson of Mrs. McLoughlin. He was then a little boy, not over four years old, and was brought up at Fort Vancouver. He was a favorite with Dr. Mc- Loughlin and told me that he stood on the bank of the Co- lumbia that late afternoon, and saw that great fleet of war canoes come floating down. When they were in sight of the fort they formed in a single line that reached all the way across. Leaving the canoes to float with the current, they came slowly down; they used the paddles to drum on the sides of the canoes, that gave a hollow sound; they blew conch shells, beat drums and sang Indian war songs, that all made a horrid din.
On came the fleet, floating with the current, while the fort lay in deepest silence. Not a human being was visible -save the little boy who stood alone on the shore. The only thing in motion was the flag of Old England that waved over the ramparts. It was a sight the lad never for- got and related with fervor. The question was: What would the Wasco fleet try to do? That was solved when, coming abreast of the fort, at a signal, it whirled, as on a
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pivot, and landed on the south shore of the Columbia. They had been brave in anticipation, but the day was nearly gone and it did not seem prudent to make the attack that after- noon. It may have occurred to the wiser ones that they had been too precipitate; that the broad-spread fort, with heavy stockade and frowning bastions, could not be easily captured with bows and arrows.
The Wascos and Multnomahs were friends and had much trade together. Hardly had they made camp when Kiesno and some of his men went over to visit them. They were having a friendly chat when suddenly a dull roar sounded from the six-pounder in the lower bastion and a rumbling reverberation went roaring among the hills. The Wascos were terrorized, demanded the cause, and were told that it was only King George's men making thunder and light- ning; that they did so whenever they felt in the humor. Before the Multnomahs crossed back to their own camp that evening, they had filled the Wascos full of very strange tales of things King George's men could do and their power over the elements.
When morning came they heard the sunrise salute and thought it even louder than the evening gun. They had not half so much interest in the capture of Fort Vancouver as they had in the outset, but concluded to make the best of the situation and visit McLoughlin. Their canoes reached the north shore just as a messenger came down from the governor, who sent them a kind greeting and invited three of the head men to visit him at the fort, but the rest were to remain at the river shore, where he would send them a feast. This was rather cool treatment of such a redoubt- able war party, but they had conceived new ideas from
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Kiesno as to the white man, and no longer desired the capture.
McLoughlin had heard from Kiesno all that occurred, so was prepared to lay down the law. The three Wasco chiefs wended their way from the landing to the big post- ern, where they found a magnificent Highlander standing guard-who took no notice of them, however. He wore kilt and tartan, broadsword and a fierce look, and they thought him invincible ; passing inside they were taken to the great reception room and told to wait there until Mc- Loughlin could come. There they found Collin Fraser, an- other six-foot Highlander, who was the company's piper. As he marched to and fro he took not the least notice of them, but kept his bagpipes screeching one tune after an- other. They thought he was making medicine, and won- dered if there was any way to make stronger medicine than that strange man was squeezing out of his wind-bag.
It was an hour before McLoughlin arrived, and all that time the bagpipes were making them feel weaker and weaker. When he did appear, the pride of Wasco was at low ebb; its chiefs and warriors had concluded that they were no match for the men of King George. The governor was pleased and sociable with them, but not familiar ; he told them just what he intended to do-and what they must do; he ordered many things to be brought and distributed among them, so they went back to their canoes after they had been treated to the best there was to be had. The men at the shore were also treated kindly and they and the Mult- nomahs were furnished a bullock to have a barbecue. Pres- ents were sent to the women at home, so there was no cause for complaint.
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The women of Wasco were not satisfied with the limited supplies sent them, but had to accept the men's excuses, that there was no medicine man in all Wasco who could set up the practice of diabolism with the skilled men who did that business for King George.
CHAPTER XXVIII
FREE TRAPPERS AND MOUNTAIN MEN
AMONG the sketches written on pioneer days, of which I wrote much in the time from 1885 to 1890, were what fol- lows of several of the free trappers and mountain men who were prominent features in the time of fur trade rule. I had known these men then for a quarter of a century, and now they are all gone. As a freely written picture of that early time, before emigrations had crossed the plains, when life was almost nomadic, and when fur traders and missionaries were "powers that be," this may answer the purpose better than any new attempt. It gives their own story in their own words, and describes the era of mountain life and wilderness experience lived by the fearless men who left civ- ilization to enjoy the freedom of the wilderness ; a time that can never come again, as the conditions that made it possible are gone forever.
Among the earliest pioneers of the great mountain wilderness of the mid-continent there was a class of men whose occupation was in sympathy with the fur company, for they were mountain men, hunters and trappers of the wilds. Selling their hardly earned furs to the fur com- panies at a price that would now seem very exorbitant, which the fur trader, however, paid very freely and made a heavy profit on. These men were the "free men" of the mountains. The regular employé of the fur company
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was under indention to that company, bound by special contract to work for wages at a stated price. The price was often very remunerative, because the mountain man be- came at times very expert and successful. These free trap- pers were very much like the "free lances" who engaged in the wars of Continental Europe in old feudal days, and were more solicitous as to the price to be paid them than for the principles at stake. I lately met one of the few re- maining of these "free men" of the early century, and gath- ered from him many facts of special interest, because, from being a mountain man, he became a pioneer settler of this great Willamette Valley.
GEORGE W. EBBERT
settled very early on Tualatin plains, and when I first came to Oregon (1850) I remember that he was a frequent visitor to Portland, and rather livened up its earlier history by his ways of stirring up the town. He was then in life's prime and had spent the active years previous to reaching the age of thirty-five in mountain pursuits. He is now a bright- eyed and active-minded veteran verging toward four score, actually having passed three-quarters of a century. His mind is clear and vigorous, and he gave me his life's story clearly and rapidly.
Ebbert was born in Kentucky, where his mother was a widow comfortably fixed. When about thirteen years old he was bound apprentice to a machinist and served within three months of the seven years he was bound for when he fell in love and wanted to marry, but his employer and his mother both insisted that George should first complete his
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apprenticeship, and then could marry and settle down in life. The young fellow was headstrong and took umbrage at the restraint. He very inconsistently asserted his inde- pendence by running away from shop and girl and home. He found himself in St. Louis in a few days, and as he was a thorough mechanic he soon got work at $3 and board, at a machine shop.
WHAT'S IN A NAME?
"Squire" Ebbert has always been a character in the Tua- latin region, and I asked him how he came to carry that title through life; whether he received it from having been ap- pointed as a justice of the peace by the provisional govern- ment, or how he got it. The little man laughed and said he earned that name when he was a little boy not more than eight years old. One of their neighbors was the squire. He had just purchased a cow whose pedigree and good quali- ties were worth $100. One day this famous cow was incon- siderate enough to tear off the top rail and jump into the Widow Ebbert's garden, where she was playing havoc amongst cabbages and cauliflowers when discovered. His mother said, "George, I wish you would kill that cow !" Now George was eight years old, but his father's old gun was hanging over the fireplace, so he climbed up and got it down, went out doors, lay down, took a good rest across a big Kentucky cabbage head and pulled the trigger. No one knew if the gun was loaded and the presumption was to the contrary, but it went off and the cow only went when she was hauled. The dutiful boy had obeyed orders and the Kentucky dame was like the Spartan mother enough not to
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grieve over his act. She ordered a team to haul away the carcass and paid the squire $100. That was the way the boy earned the name of "Squire." Because he killed the squire's cow they dubbed him squire and he never had any other name. Not many would know him by his true given name. His mother had $500 to pay as default for Squire's running away as an apprentice a dozen years later. True, his "boss" only had three months more time coming on the indenture, but he demanded his money as "nominated in the bond," and got it. Squire kept his mother in hot water much of the time, but she worshipped her boy and paid his defaults.
FALLS AFOUL OF CUPID AGAIN
At St. Louis Ebbert repeated his scheme of falling in love. He worked there nearly a year, and met a young French girl, and they agreed to be married. The banns were called in church three Sundays and the wedding was to come off the next Sunday. He wrote to ask his mother to attend, and her reply came in the shape of a protest against the marriage. "If you want to kill your mother, George, marry a French woman, and, if you love me and care for me, marry an American and first of all a Kentuckian." That was her missive and it took the boy all aback. She was a beautiful and good girl, and withal had "great expecta- tions." The lots her father gave for her portion sold in two years after for a hundred thousand dollars. But Squire Ebbert was loyal to his mother. He ran away again. He met Sublette, the fur trader, and entered into indentures to work with his company at $150 for six months and $350 a
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year afterwards. This was not over one-third his St. Louis wages. He had about $100 wages in hand and on short notice was ready and off for the Rocky Mountains.
He went to see his girl and told her how matters stood and left her, "Like Niobe, all tears." When he went back, in 1848, seventeen years later, he found her married and well situated in life, and she was glad to see him. So we have done with the East, and now for mountain life and for Western experience.
ROCKY MOUNTAIN EXPERIENCE
For nine years Ebbert stayed in the Rocky Mountains, trapping beaver, most of the time getting $8 for a large skin and $5 for a small or young one. He averaged eighty a year, about one every four days, and could have made far more at his trade in St. Louis, but there is fascination in mountain life. Four years he was under contract and five more he was a free man, trapping on his own account. He came to the mountains about 1830. One year his earnings were $900, and some years he did not pay expenses. In 1833 he came with an express from Fort Hall to Fort Walla Walla, and in 1838 he came to Whitman's and worked for him awhile as a blacksmith at Lapwai. Perhaps it was there that he got his Nez Perce wife, a woman who seems to have done a good part by him and had secured his own personal affection very strongly.
They had wild experiences in their mountain life. Once his company bought out another and among other assets there was a cache at Salt Lake that had to be found by de- scription. The making of caches was a fine art. It was
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usual to send off all but a few trusty men and then select a spot on a bluff river bank for the hiding place. Every precaution was taken to avoid discovery. A small hole was dug deep down, sometimes fifty to seventy-five feet deep, and then a chamber was excavated large enough to hold all the goods to be hid. The dirt taken out was all of it thrown into the rapid stream and swept off. In this manner furs or supplies of great value were deposited for a long time, and they managed so as to seldom lose by discovery of ene- mies. They had a close description of this cache at Salt Lake. A large party searched for it unavailingly, day after day. The reward for its discovery was increased, and after a week lost one of the men drove a stake down into soft earth and the game was won. Sometimes excavation is dangerous from the caving of earth, and in such cases men's lives have actually been sacrificed.
TRIES BLACKSMITHING AT LAPWAI
When at Whitman's and at Lapwai he had laid in a few notions to trade on and to make presents to his wife's rela- tives there, and this excited the jealousy of Pambrun, the nearest agent of the Hudson's Bay Company, who was probably in charge of Walla Walla (now Wallula), and he threatened the Nez Perce and Cayuse Indians if they would trade with "that American" that he would not show them any favor. The Indians appreciated Ebbert's kindness and liberality to them, as well as his matrimonial alliance with their tribe. So when Pambrun refused to exchange tobacco to Ebbert for his beaver skins, they all sent him a little piece of their own, making an aggregate of a sack full that
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weighed nearly fifteen pounds. His stock was very small and only intended to exchange for provisions and supplies. What he had left he used to buy eighteen beaver skins. He had trapped three years before that with the Hudson's Bay Company, but they tolerated no competition, however small, that could possibly grow.
He started back in 1838 for the Rocky Mountains, and found the Snakes very troublesome and dangerous, and con- cluded to abandon the life of a free mountain man and trapper and go down to the Willamette.
LIFE AND WAYS OF A TRAPPER
Trappers move in the field from the middle of August to the time when winter prevents them from their work. High up in the mountain ranges the fur is good all summer, but usually is not good until August comes. They begin again as soon as March comes, or weather comes favorable for trapping. It is usually kept up until June. Then all hands go to the rendezvous to spend the money earned and go in debt (oftentimes) for fresh supplies. That was the reason the rendezvous was always crowded with idle men in summer, frolicking and gambling away their hard-earned wages. Gamblers would come there, both during the sum- mer and winter vacations, and lay for the beaver catchers just as they had laid their traps for the beaver. It was a regular business for speculating sharps to lay for the reck- less trapper, as it is for merchants in cities to carry on the most respectable branches of trade.
Since removing to the Willamette, Ebbert had continued his trapping in a small way, often going out with his old
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mountain friend and now near neighbor, Caleb Wilkins, for a little hunt on their own account. Of late years they trapped more for the meat than the fur. Old trappers are generally very partial to the meat of a fat beaver. He tells me the leg of a beaver, roasted and sliced off cold, is equal to the finest pig roast. Then the beaver is a very nice animal and selects the cleanest spots to live in, as well as the neatest and cleanest food to eat. So the two old moun- taineers and trappers hunted beaver every year. Only last year Ebbert caught two; in 1883 he caught eighteen, and has caught more or less for the forty-six years he has lived in Washington County. The Hudson's Bay Company paid less for skins than other companies, but they sold their goods so much cheaper that it compensated for the differ- ence.
FARMING IN THE WILLAMETTE
In 1839 Ebbert made a little place on the open prairie and put in six or eight acres of wheat and oats. What he had to spare he sold to the Hudson's Bay Company at sixty cents a bushel. This was the going price for grain year after year. Dr. McLoughlin would furnish any one with seed to sow. The average yield of wheat was thirty-five bushels to the acre. The "currency" of the country was in rather a singular fix in the earliest days. Orders on stores, and especially on the Hudson's Bay Company, were first- class. The Hudson's Bay Company allowed 11s. 6d. for a beaver skin, almost $3, and 5s. 6d. for the skin of a "kitten." The Mission (below Salem) gave their own orders, re- deemed "when their ship came in," and it fortunately did come. Ewing Young was a prominent man, and traded
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beaver currency, or so many beaver skins at the current rate. All others traded wheat and provisions. Most people worked "on their own hook," opening farms and making improvements. They only worked out to earn something to eat or wear. If they were good hunters they could kill game on the prairies and foothills, and fish abounded at Oregon City and on the lower rivers. Ebbert raised twenty- five acres of wheat in 1840, having saved his seed. He worked some for the Methodist Mission, making rails and doing general farm work. It came rather hard on a moun- tain man to go at such work, but the good grit that was in him was paramount and he soon became a good worker. He worked hard to get a start, and it is interesting to learn how he managed to get well fixed.
EARNING STOCK FOR HIS FARM
There were swine at the Methodist Mission, and Young had them at his place in Chehalem Valley. Several farmers on French Prairie Joseph Gervais, Latourette, DeLors and Hubbard-all had swine and made much of them. They had a few each and monopolized them. Dr. McLoughlin kindly loaned Ebbert two pigs that he was to replace at Sauvie's Island at a certain time, which he did, and so got a start of his own. Ewing Young was quite a nabob among the early settlers. He had a saw mill on a creek that run by thunder showers occasionally, and he swapped lum- ber all over the country for all sorts of "ictas." Ebbert first located near Champoeg, and he sold that place in 1841 for one hundred bushels of wheat, which he got in about three years. He packed this wheat on horses and mules to
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Salem, twenty-five miles, where it was ground; then packed the flour down to Tualatin Plains, seventy-five miles, where the new location was. He crossed the Willamette at Cham- poeg in a canoe, ferrying the flour and swimming horses and mules. He carried one hundred pounds on each side of a horse, and got along well until he came to a deep creek near home. He packed the flour over on his shoulder, and his children no longer cried for bread.
After he grew wheat at Tualatin, he packed it twelve miles to Columbia slough, then boated it up the slough to the Willamette, and down the Willamette and up the Co- lumbia to Vancouver, or rather to the Hudson's Bay Com- pany's mill six miles above there. Before any mills were built they boiled wheat, but when his children once tasted good bread they clamored for it, and Ebbert couldn't refuse any effort to satisfy their appetite. Cannon & Mckay had a small mill at Champoeg, where they used to take two bushels at a time and have it ground unbolted. In 1839 he would buy wild fowl, swan, geese and ducks of the In- dians, and occasionally purchased wapatoos of them, and traded for venison.
DAVID AND JONATHAN OVER AGAIN
Caleb Wilkins was a good hunter, while Squire Ebbert was not. Wilkins was his nearest neighbor and intimate friend. They had for several years trapped together, and now were located together on the Tualatin. Their lives should be written in partnership, for they were David and Jonathan over again, as far as friendly feeling went. I must devote more space to Wilkins before I close.
About 1842 Wilkins traded with Tom McKay for seven
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hogs running at Scappoose. This gave them a good start of swine. The two men were practically partners in busi- ness until their farms were opened. Both were in their prime and each had a Nez Perce wife. They worked out four calves, which were legal tender at the rate of a thou- sand rails for a calf. In 1844 Squire Ebbert made 4,900 rails for a good Spanish cow and heifer calf. They got their clothes cheap at Vancouver, promising to pay wheat at sixty cents a bushel, delivered on the banks of the Willa- mette. The shipping point was at McCarverstown, a little . way below Springville, near the head of the slough, on the Willamette. This place was a shipping point before Port- land was ever heard of. For many years there were no wagon roads and no wagons used. Wilkins and Ebbert bought good Nez Perce horses, that were easily broken to work in harness. They made can- vas backbands and rope traces. They got bits made for bridles and thus rigged up a harness. For years all transportation was done on pack animals, but time mended all that.
MANUFACTURES A PLOUGH
Ebbert being a machinist and blacksmith, procured bel- lows and anvil and made the tools he could not buy, and soon rigged up a shop. He made a set of bar-shear irons, and got them wooded, with a wooden mould-board, and thus had a plough. Mr. Rogers of the mission, who was afterwards lost by going over the falls of the Willamette, stocked the plough in exchange for six days' work scoring for hewers. The mission soon after brought out harness and supplied the settlers' wants in that line.
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About 1846 Ebbert and Wilkins got their farms fairly opened and comfortable houses up. They had horses, cattle, hogs, chickens, and even a few sheep, but the wolves always molested them. Ebbert had one hen that made her way into the cabin chimney from the outside and laid seven eggs. She hatched them and turned them over to the rooster to bring up and laid thirteen more in the same place. So hen and rooster soon had a flock of twenty chicks. Cattle in- creased rapidly, and they had a good band in a few years. Wolves (coyotes) killed their sheep and a California lion took the last one that was left. Wilkins rigged a pit and a pen for this panther, and one day the trap had a visitor. They killed and stuffed his lionship and sold him in Oregon City for $10. The stuffed skin went afterwards to the Sandwich Islands and sold there for $35.
CALEB WILKINS AND ROBERT NEWELL
were also free trappers of the Rocky Mountains. Wilkins came originally from Zanesville, Ohio, and was a hatter by trade. He came out with Captain Bonneville and went back. Wilkins was a good hunter, and when East finally got a gun made to suit him, with a bore carrying at the rate of twenty-eight to the pound, and returned to Oregon again with Captain Wyeth. Ebbert met him in the mountains, and they struck up a friendship that is yet vigorous, though they are quite old men, and Wilkins is paralyzed in mind as well as body. They trapped together in the Utah country, and were close companions for several years. They separated and then met again in the Willamette, located claims near each other and worked together on the Tualatin.
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When Ebbert lived at Champoeg, Wilkins came to see him and told him their old friend Bob Newell was coming from the mountains also. They three had worked together trapping as free men many years. The two went to Oregon City to meet Newell and had a warm greeting. All three went across the Willamette River and selected claims, about 1840, in the Tualatin country, before returning home from the Oregon City trip. The three friends wished to locate together. All were in the prime of life, not much over thirty years old. They all went to Champoeg, where Eb- bert sold out, and six of them who had been free trappers in the Rocky Mountains returned to Tualatin to make per- manent homes and open farms. Three years after, Newell swapped places with one Pomeroy, who lived at Champoeg, where he remained until he was appointed Indian agent at Lapwai, for the Nez Perces. All three were born in 1810, as was also Joe Meek, who settled with them in the Tualatin plains country. Wilkins is very feeble now, but lives with three children on the original location. Ebbert still owns his donation claim, but lives with a son-in-law. Newell has been deceased many years. His Nez Percé wife died be- fore him, and he married again a white lady. All three had Nez Percé women for wives and were very sincerely attached to them.
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