USA > Oregon > Sources of the history of Oregon > Part 22
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I can not say when you may expect to see me but in the mean- time I am well here and with a little more success could be very happy.
I am yr afte Son N. J. W.
CCXXXIV.
Columbia River Oct 6th 1834
Brother Leonard
I have no good news to impart. The vessell mis- carried owing to having been struck by lightening on her way out so that our fishing is defer[r]ed to another year. After so long an abstinence I feel hungry for a little success. I have built a Fort as I mentioned in my last on Snake or Lewis River in Latt 43 deg. 14 min N. Long 113 deg. 30 min. W. and raised the Am. Standard in a new region amid the noise of guns and the Sound of revelry. I met the vessell to a day, and two months after both expected to arrive here. I have commenced a fine farm on the Multnomah. Were all I wish to see, and they are not many, here I think I should never wish to return. I journey this winter into the interior to the vicinity of the Great Salt Lake and shall prob- ably make 2 more Forts, and return hither about the 15th May next to see what can be made of the Salmon fish[e]rys. If at the close of next year our prospects are not brighter you may expect to see me back again, following with fresh spirits some new or old plans of profit or improvement.
I only write to you to evince that my mind still looks back to the good and worthy that it has left behind, that it compares the
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Hideous squaw with polished white woman the faithless savage with the upright and buisy white man, and sees the difference. Give my respects to the Mess. Osgoods and their family and my love to your wife and children and let them hear the name of their uncle if they do not see him.
Tr. afte Bro. N. J. W. CCXXXV.
Columbia River Oct. 6th 1834
Bro. Charles
Since my last of June 21st 1834 I have made the establishment then spoken of on Snak[e] River in Latt. 43 deg. 14 min. N Long 113 deg. 30 min. West and raised the Stars and Stripes amid ex- plosions of gun powder and whiskey according to custom, and they now wave to the wind in the naked wastes of central America a wonderment to the simple savage who can not con- ceive the meaning of so much disturbance. I have now made a farm on the Multnomah on a prairie of about 15 miles long border- ing on the river which is nearly as large as the Ohio surrounded by beautiful and well assorted timber and watered by a good mill stream. The soil is beautiful. If some of the things on which the minds eye casts a "longing lingering" look where [were] here I might be content to rest from my labors and lay my bones in this remote wild.
I leave here in a few days on a voyage to the interior and shall establish two more Forts one of which will be near the Great Salt Lake if I can find any tribe of Indians who can give trade enough to support it.
You must excuse my writing short letters I have much to do in a short time and some things that can not be ommitted. Give my respects to Mr. Norris and family, and be assured of my best wishes for you and yours
Vr Afte Bro. Nathl J Wyeth CCXXXVI. Columbia River Oct. 6th 1834
Leond. Jarvis Esq. Dear Uncle Since mine of June 21st from Hams fork I have as I then proposed built a Fort on Snake or Lewis River in Latt 43 deg. 14 min. N. and Long 113 deg. 30 min. W. which I named Fort Hall from the oldest gentleman in the concern. We manufactured a magnificent flag from some un- bleached sheeting a little red flannel and a few blue patches, sa- luted it with damaged powder and wet it in vil[1]a[i]nous alcohol, and after all it makes, I do assure you, a very respectable appear- ance amid the dry and desolate regions ; of central America. Its Bastions stand a terror to the sculking
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Indian and a beacon of saf[e]ty to the fugitive hunter. It is man[n]ed by 12 men and has constantly loade[d] in the Bastions 100 guns and rifles. These bastions command both the inside and the outside of the Fort. After building this Fort I sent messengers to the neighboring nations to induce them to come to it to trade, and am now about starting with an equipment of goods for the winter trade. After leaving these at the Fort I shall locate and build two more one of which will be scituated near the Great Salt Lake. I shall return to this place about the 15th May next to see what can be done in the Fishing buisness.
I am now about 75 miles from the mouth of the river, on the South Side. We have built a few buildings for store houses, smiths and Cooper shops, and dwellings. We are near the mouth of the Multnomah. About 40 miles up this river I have begun a farm on a beautiful prairie of about 15 miles long one end touching the river a good mill stream in the center the whole surrounded with good and well assorted timber, of fine soil and mild climate, much game, in fact all that a man ought to have, but still one is tempted to exclaim "Oh solitude, where are the charms that philosophers have seen in Thy face?"
After building Fort Hall. as befor[e] stated I pro- ceed[ed] hither and 011 the 14th ulto. met the Brig then just arrived and coming up the river to find me. She was struck by lightening on the way out which oc- casioned a delay of about 3 months in consequence of which our fishing season was entirely lost. I shall therefore detain her until another season and then try.
We suffered nothing coming out but lived sometime very short and poor after leaving the Buffaloe country but this is what all who come this way must expect.
I have given a letter of introduction to Capt. William Stewart of the British army to you. He is a gentleman of high family and general attainments and having travelled in the Mountains for upwards of a year past, I thought that you might be pleased to see him.
Now I desire that you will give my best compliments to my aunt and assure her that all the time I have been addressing my self to you I have been thinking of her and her many kindnesses of old times, this is not a country in which I forget the ladies.
I am yrs. &c. N. J. W.
CCXXXVII.
Copy of note left for Mr. Richardson at the mouth of a fork of the River Des Shutes.
Jany. 7th 1835
Mr Richardson
Sir In case I return to this place before you I shall leave a note on this pole with directions. I think you
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had not in any case better stay up this fork more than three weeks, unless the prospect for beaver is very good. At the time you arrive here if you find no note from me, you can either go up the stream in search of beaver, and remain until I send the horses, or send for you, or return to camp as you like. When I go down I shall leave notice at the mouth of each creek in order that you may know my movements, and if you follow me up stream I wish you to leave a notch cut in my poles, one up one down in order that I may know if you are above or below me. Also at each creek that you go up leave a peeled pole and one also on your return.
Vrs Nathl J Wyeth CCXXXVIII.
Friend Weld
Wappatoo Island Ap 3d 1835
I write, but do not know when I will' have an op- portunity to send. I am in the mood which you know is always enough for me. If I were at Cambridge the wine would suffer to night and you pretty well know who would be the company. I have had a severe winter of it. . All my men have been sick ex- cept myself and one man and nothing but pure obstinacy has kept me from being hauled up. It may be interesting to you to know a little of what I am doing. In the first place I got here somehow not worth relating. When here found my Brig not ar- [r]ived but outside the bar. Went down the river and met her coming up. This was on the 11th Sept. and entirely after salmon time. Her late arrival was occasioned by having been struck with lightening and being in consequence obliged to put in to Valparaiso to repair. After shaking hands, set about arranging a party to send to a Fort which I have built among the Rocky Mts. This party consisted of Capt. Thing 13 Sandwich Islanders and 8 whites. They proceeded about 200 miles up the Columbia in- land at the same time I took a party of 4 Sandwich Islanders and . 16 whites and followed inland 150 and got news that Capt Things Islanders had all run away from him. This obliged me to spare all my Islanders, and all but 6 of my whites to enable Capt. Thing to proceed to Fort Hall. With the residue I pro- ceeded to look up the deserters. I struck south thinking that they might have started for California. This was the middle of Nov. During Dec. Jany. and Feb. I got no news from them. About the first of March I heard that some of them were near the Columbia. On this I changed my route and struck that river where I learned from the Inds. that 7 of them had passed down five days before. I followed and overtook them about 80 miles from the mouth of the river 7 in number and took them to Fort William our establishment on Wappatoo Island about 75 miles up the Columbia at the mouth of the Multnomah. Two were
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killed by the Indians one was drowned and one froze to death in the Mts. and two are still unac[c]ounted for as yet. On arriving here I set about preparing for fishing. Have commenced a house Boat 70 feet long for a conveyance about to the different fisherys. Have finished a canoe 60 feet long 3 feet wide 2 12 deep of one tree which has not a shake or [k]not in it, and this after cutting off thirty feet of clear stuff from the same tree, and still this is by no means a large tree here. I think I could find trees here free from shakes or [k]nots that would square 4 feet one hundred feet long. It is quite a job to make one of these canoes. I have heard to day that our Brig has arrived at the mouth of the river from the Sandwich Islands whither she went last winter with a cargo of Lumber, and I expect more buisness more company and more provisions soon the last not the least desirable of the three. This Wappatoo Island which I have selected for our establishment is about 15 miles long and about average of three wide. On one side runs the Columbia on the other the Multnomah. It consists of woodlands and praire and on it there is considerable deer and · those who could spare time to hunt might live well but a mortality has carried off to a man its in- habitants and there is nothing to attest that they ever existed ex- cept their decaying houses, their graves and their, unburied bones of which there are heaps. So you see as the righteous people of New England say providence has made room for me and without doing them more injury than I should if I had made room for myself viz Killing them off. I often think of the old knot of cronies about the town with whom I used to spend so much time especi- al[1]y of an evening. When I sit down in my lodgeon the ground and contrast the past with the present and wonder if the future will give as much difference. and which way the difference will be for better or worse?
It has rained almost continually from last Oct. to this time but still there has been no cold weather except in the mountains at great elevations.
Now I do not wish this letter published I do hate every thing in print.
I am yr Friend and Servt. Nathl. J. Wyeth CCXXXIX.
Fort William Sept 6th 1835
Frederic Tudor Esq.
Sir My last was dated Oct. 6th 1834 from this place. I have not received one letter from the States since I left. A package came into the Indian country for me but fell into the hands of another Co. and was detained. Possibly you might have writ[t]en by that channel. This buisness has not been successful in any of its branches therefore it will terminate soon. I shall not order another equipment to this country until I see again
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those concerned with me, and if I know the people they will be the last to go very far in any buisness that commences unprofit- ably. If I meet with no fatal accident I shall be in Boston by the Ist Nov. 1836 and probably if any opening opens adequate to my wants I shall not after leave it. I need not disguise from you that I must have a living somewhere and that there is no kind of buisness for which I am in any way competent except my original vo- cation, which I so heartily detest that I will loose my scalp before I will reengage in it, and the Ice buisness, and that in the latter I have no prospect except through yourself. The buisness I am in must be closed not that it might not be made a good one but because those who are now engaged in it are not the men to make it so. The smallest loss makes them "fly the handle" and such can rarely succeed in a new buisness. This your own ex- perience will justify. Personally I have no means to prosecute the buisness further and, however mortifying, must give it up. My intention is to return and if I can obtain any scituation that I am not ashamed of, to remain, if not the woods will alway[s] sup- ply the wants of one who is not lazy and where pride is not con- cerned wants but little. These things I state in plain language because I for[e]see that when I may arrive in Boston the case will admit of no delay. I have then to make the last election of my course for life and whether such course prove comfortable to iny- self or not I shall stick to it. I cannot hope after what I have done that you should have so much regard to my wishes as to alter any arrangement that you may have made of your buisness in order to give me a place but I am bound to avail myself of all the chances in my reach to live.
Since writing you last we have lost by drowning, Scalping &c 14 persons none by natural death altho the country is sickly. Loss of property from hostility of Indians has been considera ble.
I have taken the liberty to send you a 12 bbl. of plain salt- ed salmon which I hope you will find good. We do not this year send home more than half a cargo.
I am off for the interior
about the first next month. The winter will not admit of starting later. I am therefore obliged to trust the putting up of the salmon for my friends at home to Capt. Lambert. Should there be any unsuitableness in it, I ask you to excuse it with the same good feeling you used to overlook more serious failings.
I am Your obt Servt. Nathl. J. Wyeth
CCXI.
Fort William Sept 6th 1835
Friend Brown
Doubtless you have observed in your quondam associ- ate some small imperfections, and altho he may now have no
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temptation, yet the grain may be stil[1] in him. A quotation from an author you used sometimes to read will do for his creed
"My son these maxims make a rule, And lump them ay the gether;
The rigid righteous is a fool,
The rigid wise anither:
The cleanest corn that e'er was dight May hae some pyles o' Chaff in;
So ne'er a fellow creature slight For random fits o' daffin.["]
I am disappointed in not having rec[e]ived a single letter from home since I left the frontier settlements, while others have. I know it is not reasonable that those who loose but one compan- ion should feel as much as those who loose all. A letter to the last is in the shape of food to the hungry man. The benevo- lent bestow in proportion to the want, therefore you should write me two letters for one. I am not scolding you for your good but for my own. I am in hopes to make you write either by force or fraud but whether you do so or not I am determined to continue the correspondence until you acknowledge me to be as bad as the old man who rode Sind Bad the Sailor and perhaps you may get rid of me in the same way.
My last was dated Oct. 6th 1834 from this place since which time there has been the Devils own work in this Country 14 of our people drowned and killed and much property lost. Personally I am still happy go lucky with only a broken toe and two or three upsettings in cold water. This you know I am used to. I ex- pect to come to Boston about Nov. Ist 1836, perhaps to stop. We this year put up about a half a cargo of Salmon 12 bbl. of which you will find marked with your name also one for my Father one for my wife for Leond Jarvis Chas Wyeth Leond I Wyeth. N. J Wyeth and Frederic Tudor. Any expense please charge to me.
Will you give my sincere respects to your wife and a kiss all the little ones known and unknown and believe me one of those whose friendships hold from youth to age who has some ac- quaintances who are not friends and some friends who are not ac- quaintances and one who is friend and acquaintance, and only one.
Y'rs &c Nathl. J. Wyeth. CCXLI.
Columbia River Sept 20th 1835
Leonard Jarvis Esq. (Baltimore Md.)
Dear Uncle My last was from this place dated Oct. 6th 1834. We have had a bad season for salmon. About half of a cargo only obtained. The salmon part of the buisness will never do. I have sent 16 a bbl. to you which you will re- ceive through Mr. Brown. Capt. Lambert attends to putting
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them up, on the voyage, as there is not time for me to do so he- fore. If there should be any thing wrong you will excuse it on this account. I am now a little better from a severe attack of billious Fever. I did not expect to recover, and am still a wreck. Our sick list has been this summer usually about one third the whole number and the rest much frightened. 13 Deaths have oc- curred beside some in the interior killed by the Indians. Some property has been lost also by Indians. I leave this in a few days for the interior to winter at Fort Hall. I intend in the spring to return to this place and take up goods then I shall turn my face toward the rising sun, and hope to have the pleasure of see- ing you about the last of Oct. 1836. I some think of taking the route by Santi Fee and N. Orleans but hostilities of the Indians render it uncertain what route I may be obliged to take but without serious accident I shall not be far from that time. I am surrounded with difficulties beyond any former period of my life and without the health and spirit requisite to support them. In this scituation you can judge if memory brings to me the warit- ings of those (wiser and older) who advised a course which must at least have resulted in quietness. Yes memory lends its powers for torment. A few days ago she told me a tale which carried me back to early life, led me through the varying shades of days and years while at every step the tale grew darker and at last delivered me to [the] horrors of the present time. What at that moment they were you may imagine, a buisness scattered over half the deserts of the earth, and myse[1]f a powerless lump of matter in the extremity of mortal pain with little hope of surviving a day and if it could have been said "he never existed" glad to go down with that sun. But with coming health comes also a sense of the obligations that we are under and say to us "Up and be doing."
The above my Dear Uncle are the clouds of sickness they will pass off before I reach the mountains and the clear air of the upper country. I have received no letters from home since leaving. There has been however a great number intercepted by one of the Cos. in the mountains as I have heard. Perhaps you have written by that route. You will remember me to my Aunt desire her to accept that affectionate regard which she deserves from me. That she may pass without vicis[s]itude through life is the wish of at least one of her old pets. I will not presume to wish you any definite good wish but only that all things may tend to complete and fulfil your happiness.
believe me Dr Sir Yr Affte. Nephew Nathl. J. Wyeth CCYLII.
Columbia River Sept. 22d 1835
Bro Charles (Baltimore) I am too buisy and too unwell to write
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much even to you It sometimes appears to me that the nearer the person is to whom I write the less competent is the mode to the ideas I would wish to express. However this may be one thing I know. That to my best friends I always write the short- est letters in fact I had nearly writ[t]en you as short an epistle as Caesars to the Senate viz "I am sick dead and buried" and yet I am not "the Scipper" but the last principle of human life is not extinct. Hope still maintains her throne and throws the mists of futurity over the deformities and misfortunes that she cannot hide.
Our salmon fishing has not succeeded. Half a cargo only ob- tained. Our people are sick and dying off like rotten sheep of billious disorders. I shall be off by the first next month to the mountains and winter at Fort Hall. . In the Spring I shall return here then again to Fort Hall and start about June to see all in the States, lucky if I get through with all this without accident.
I have sent 12 a bbl. Salmon to you which you will receive through Mr. Brown. I hope they will be good but as I cannot personally attend to putting them up I will not insure it. Now Charley may God give you to enjoy life, may the wife be all a wife should. and may the children be the solace of your age.
I am Vr. afte Bro Nathl. J. Wyeth. CCXLIII. Columbia River Sept. 22d 1835
Bro. Leonard (N York)
You often complain of short letters but as I get no return at all even short ones are enough for you.
Salmon half a cargo one third of our people on the sick list continually, 17 dead to this date is the amount of the summer. I am but just alive after having been so bad as to think of writ- ing up my last letters.
I send you 12 a bbl.of Salmon but as I can not attend to putting them up myself you will excuse any imperfection. You will re- ceive them through Mr. Brown. I am off for the Mts. to winter at Fort Hall in about 6 days. I hope the winds of the hills will bring me up. I intend to return to this place in the Spring then to Santi Fee thence home by about the last of Oct. 1836.
Please give my compliments to my sister and an affectionate kiss to all my little nieces and nephew. My respects also to the Messrs Osgoods and believe me
yr afte. Bro. Nathl J Wyeth CCXLIV. Columbia River Sept 22d 1833[5]
Dear Parents
I avail myse[1]f of the last opportunity of writing
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you for some time. I expect to be home by the Ist Nov. next year therefore this will be my last until I see you.
I have sent you 12 bbl. of Salmon which you will get through Mr. Brown. I hope they will prove good but I could not put them up my- self therefore if they are not quite right lay it to anyone but me. I have been very sick but have recovered. The season has been very sickly and we obtained but about a half a cargo of Salmon. I am off for the mountains in about 6 days. You may be sure I am much hurried or I would write a longer letter.
I am yr afte. Son Nathl. J. Wyeth.
CCXLV. Columbia River. Sept. 22d 1835
Dear Wife
I have been very sick but have got well and shall be on my way to the Mts. to winter at Fort Hall in about 6 days. I expect to be home about Ist Nov. 1836. Mr Nuttall is here and well. I have sent you 12 bbl. Salmon which I hope will be in good order. I can not attend to putting them up myself there- fore they may not be so good. The season has been very sickly. We have lost by drowning and disease and warfare 17 persons to. - this date and 14 now sick. Keep up good spirits my dear wife for I expect when I come home to stop there and altho I shall be . poor yet we can always live. I hope to find my trees growing when I come and all things comfortable. I think this will be the last until I see you. Give my respects to your mother and Aunt Rebecca my love to Sister Mary and Bro. Perry if you see them. And believe me
Vr afte Husband N. J. W.
For letters after this date see small letter Book.
[The book referred to has not yet been found.]
JOURNAL OF CAPTAIN NATHANIEL J. WYETH'S EXPEDITIONS TO THE OREGON COUNTRY.
[The book containing the Journal has been mutilated. There are traces of the removal of four leaves just preceding the page that has the first of the narrative preserved. According to "Wyeth's Oregon Expedition" the Wyeth party on his first expedition left Independence, Mo., May 3rd., 1832. June 6th would thus have been the thirty-fifth day on the route.]
[June 6th, 1832.]
gray and my face like a plumb pudding the skin is entirely bare [?] of skin is entirely off one of my ears On the bluf[f]s the ghnats are equally troublesome but they do not annoy us much except in the day. Geese appear here mated and I have seen some broods of gooselings. Some rain last night. still barren and grass bad our horses about the same our men troubled with the relax toward night found buffaloe killed one which made a scanty meal for all hands for supper made 25 miles
7th Started out hunting killed two antelope about 10 saw a herd of Buffaloe crossing the River waited til they rose the Bank and commenced slaughter killed 3 and wounded many more these afforded a timely supply to the party and we ate heart[il]y. Saw today the first appearance of muskrat since leav- the settlements also Pelicans. Last night in cutting a tree for fuel caught two young grey Eagles one of which we ate and found it tender and good also a Badger saw some rattlesnakes and some other kinds not known to me the men [horses?] appear a little better the men [horses?] about the same Thr. 90 deg. wind S. E. my face so swelled from the musquitoes and ghnats that I can scarce see out of my eyes and aches like the tooth ache
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