USA > Washington > Walla Walla County > An illustrated history of Walla Walla County, state of Washington > Part 4
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the river called themselves Skillouts. Drop- ping rapidly down the calm but misty stream. past a large river called by the Indians the Cowaliske-Cowlitz-through the country of the Walkiacums. at last, on the 7th of No- vember. the dense fog with which the morn- ing had enshrouded all objects, suddenly broke away, and they saw the bold mountainous shores on either side to vanish away in front, and through the parted headlands they looked into the infinite expanse of the ocean.
Overjoyed at the successful termination of their journey, they sought the first pleas- ant camping ground and made haste to land. The rain, which is sometimes even now ob- served to characterize that part of our fair state, greatly marred the joy of their first night's rest within sound of the Pacific's billows.
Six days passed in mouldy and dripping inactivity at a point a little above the present Chinook. They then spent nine much pleas- anter days at Chinook Point. This. however. not proving what they wanted for a perma- nent camp. they devoted themselves to explo- rations with a view to discovering a more suitable location.
After many adventures of which lack of space forbids us to speak. they became settled. The party wintered in a leg building at a point named by them Fort Clatsop. on the Lewis and Clark river. south side of the Columbia. On the 23d of March. 1806. they turned their face, homeward. first. however, having given to the chiefs of the Clatsops and Chinooks certificates of hospitable treatment, and posted on the fort the following notice: "The object of this last is, that, through the medium of se me civilized person who may see the same. it may be made known to the world. that the party consisting of the persons whose names
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HISTORY OF WALLA WALLA COUNTY.
are hereunto annexed and who were sent out by the government of the United States to ex- plore the interior of the continent of North America, did penetrate the same by way of the Missouri and Columbia rivers, to the discharge of the latter into the Pacific ocean, at which they arrived on the 14th day of November, 1805. and departed on their return to the United States by the same route by which they had come."
Of this notice several copies were left among the Indians, one of which fell into the hands of Captain Hall of the brig Lydia and was conveyed to the United States.
The expedition made its way with no little difficulty up the Columbia river. They dis- covered on their return a large tributary of that river (the Willamette ) which had escaped their notice on their downward journey, and made careful inquiries of the Indians concern- ing it, the results of which were embodied in their map of the expedition.
At the mouth of the John Day river their canoes were abandoned, their baggage was packed on the backs of a few horses they had purchased from the Indians, and traveling in this manner, they continued their homeward march, arriving at the mouth of the Walla Walla river on April 27th. The great chief Y ellept was then the leader of the Walla Walla nation. and by him the explorers were received with such generous hospitality that they yield- ed to the temptation to linger a couple of days before undertaking further journeyings among the mountain fastnesses. Such was the treat- ment given them by these Indians, that the journal of the expedition makes this apprecia- tive notation concerning them : "We may in- deel justly affirm that of all the Indians that we have seen since leaving the United States, 2
the Walla Wallas were the most hospitable, honest and sincere."
Of the return journey for the next liun- dred and fifty miles, that venerable pioneer missionary, Dr. H. K. Hines, writes as fol- lows :
"Leaving these hospitable people on the 29th of April, the party passed eastward on the great 'Nez Perce trail.' This trail was the great highway of the Walla Wallas, Cayuses and Nez Perces eastward to the buffalo ranges, to which they annually resorted for game sup- plies. It passed up the valley of the Touchet, called by Lewis and Clark the 'White Stal- lion,' thence over the high prairie ridges and down the Alpowa to the crossing of the Snake river, then up the north bank of Clearwater to the village of Twisted Hair, where the ex- ploring party had left their horses on the way down the previous autumn. It was worn deep and broad, and on many stretches on the open plains and over the smooth hills twenty horse- men could ride abreast in parallel paths worn ly the constant rush of the Indian generations from time immemorial The writer has often passed over it when it lay exactly as it did when the tribes of Yellept and Twisted Hair traced its sinuous courses, or when Lewis and Clark and their companions first marked it with the heel of civilization. But the plow has long since obliterated it, and where the monotonous song of the Indian march was droningly chanted for so many barbaric ages the song of the reaper thrills the clear air as he comes to his garner bringing in the sheaves. A more delightful ride of a hundred and fifty miles than this that the company of Lewis and Clark made over the swelling prairie upland and along the crystal streams between Walla Walla and the village of Twisted Hair, in the soft May days
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of 1806, can scarcely be found anywhere on cartlı.
To trace the explorations of these trav- elers further is not within the province of this work, but in order to convey a general idea of the labors and extent of the voyage we quote the brief summary made by Captain Lewis himself :
"The road by which we went out by the way of the Missouri to its head is 3,096 miles ; thence by land by way of Lewis river over to Clark's river and down that to the entrance of Traveler's Rest creek, where all the roads from «lifferent routes meet : thence across the rugged part of the Rocky mountains to the navigable waters of the Columbia 398 miles, thence down the river 640 miles to the Pacific ocean- making a total distance of 4.134 miles. On our return in 1806 we came from Traveler's Rest directly to the falls of the Missouri river, which shortens the distance about 579 miles, and is a much better route, reducing the dis- tance from the Mississippi to the Pacific ocean to 3.555 miles. Of this distance 2.575 miles is up the Missouri to the falls of that river; thence passing through the plains and across the Rocky mountains to the navigable waters of the Kooskooskie river, a branch of the Co- lumibia. 340 miles, 200 of which is good road, 140 miles over a tremendous mountain. steep and broken, sixty miles of which is covered several feet deep with snow, on which we passed on the last of June; from the navigable part of the Kooskooskie we descended that rapid river seventy-three miles to its entrance into the Lewis river, and down that river 154 miles to the Columbia, and thence 413 iniles to its entrance into the Pacific ocean. About 180 miles of this distance is tide water. We passed several bad rapids and narrows, and one considerable fall, 268 miles above the en-
trance of this river, thirty-seven feet, eight inches: the total distance descending the Co- lumbia waters 640 miles-making a total of 3.555 miles, on the most direct route from the Mississippi, at the mouth of the Missouri, to the Pacific ocean."
The safe return of the explorers to their homes in the United States naturally created a sensation throughout this country and the world. Leaders and men were suitably re- warded, and the fame of the former will live while the rivers to which their names have been given continue to pour their waters into the sea. President Jefferson, the great patron of the expedition, paying a tribute to Captain Lewis in 1813. said: "Never did a similar event excite more joy throughout the United States. The humblest of its citizens have taken a lively interest in the issue of this journey, and looked with impatience for the information it would furnish. Nothing short of the of- ficial journals of this extraordinary and in- teresting journey will exhibit the importance of the service, the courage, devotion, zeal and perseverance under circumstances calculated to discourage, which animated this little band of heroes, throughout the long, dangerous and tedious travel."
AAmong many journeys of discovery by land which followed that of Lewis and Clark we select as the most interesting and typical that of the Hunt party, which was the land division of the great Astor movement to estab- lish the Pacific Fur Company. That com- pany was established by John Jacob Astor for the purpose of making a bold and far-reach- ing attempt to control the vast fur trade of the Pacific coast in the interest of the United States. The sea division set sail from New York in 1810 in the ship Tonquin. In the meantime Wilson Price Hunt. the second part-
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HISTORY OF WALLA WALLA COUNTY.
mier in the concern, was at St. Louis organizing a land party, which was to eross the plains and co-operate with the division by sea. Hunt had been merchandising for some years at St. Louis. His principal trade being with trappers and Indians, he had become very familiar with the requirements of the business. In addition to this primary requisite he possessed a character, native and acquired, worthy of more frequent mention in our early annals and of more fre- quent emulation by his associates and suc- ecssors. Brave, humane, patient, cheerful and resolute, he rises from the mists of history and reminiscence as the highest type of the Jasons who vied with those of ancient story in their search for the fleeces (this time of seal and beaver instead of gold) of the far west. To a powerful physique and iron nerve Hunt added a refinement and culture rare indeed among the bold, free spirits of the frontier.
In company with Hunt from the outset was another partner, Donald McKenzie by name. He was a man insensible of fear, inured by years of hardship to the ups and downs of the trapper's life, and renowned even on the border for his marvelous accuracy with the rifle. The first thing for them was to get their men. To do this all the tact and patience of Hunt were brought into full play. For a proper under- standing of his position it will be necessary to describe briefly the classes from whom he was obliged to fill his .ranks.
There were at this time two great classes of trappers. The first and most numerous were the Canadian voyageurs. These men were mainly of French descent. Many of them were half-breeds. They were the legacy of the old French domination over Canada. Cradled in the canoe or batteatt, their earliest remem- brance being the cold blue lake or foaming river, almost amphibious by nature and train-
ing, gay and amiable in disposition, with true French vivacity and ingenuity, gilding every harsh and bitter experience with laugh and song, with their quick sympathies and humane instincts easily getting on the best side of the savages, not broad in designing but not the less patient, courageous and indomitable in executing, these French voyageurs were the main dependence of traffic in the wilderness.
The second class were free trappers ; Booshaways they were sometimes called. These men were mainly Americans. Virginia and Kentucky were the original homes of many of them. They were the perfect antipodes of the voyageurs. Often with gigantic frames built up on prairie dew and mountain breeze, with buffalo steak and wild birds' flesh wrought into their iron sinews; with nerves of steel. on which it seemed might harmlessly play even the lightning's of Missouri storms, the drift- ing snows of winter but a downy coverlid to them, and the furnace blasts of summer but balmy zephyrs ; gorging themselves in the midst of plenty, but mocking the power of hunger and thirst when in want; mighty braggarts, yet quick as lightning to make good their boasts; patient and indefatigable in their work of trap- ping, but when on their annual trips to the towns given to wild dissipations and savage revelings, "sudden and rashi in quarrel," care- less of each other's sympathy or company : harsh and cruel to the Indians when in power over them, but bold and recklessly defiant when weaker than they; seizing without compunction the prettiest Indian women and the best horses as their rightful booty; with blood always in their eyes, thunder in their voices, and pistols in their hands, yet underneath it all many of them having hearts as big as buffaloes, could they but be reached,-this now vanished race of Booshaways has gone to a place in history be-
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HISTORY OF WALLA WALLA COUNTY. 1
side the old Spartans, whose greatest boast it was that the city had no walls, their army being the wall and every man therein a brick, or beside the Spanish conquerors of Mexico and Peru, like Orellana, who descended the Amazon on a raft and then put to sea with such a climax of audacity that even the stormy AAtlantic was frightened into acquiescence and let him pass in safety. to be loosene : by the golden lever of wages in advance. Worst of all, Hunt found at nearly every station where he tried to engage men that the agents of the Missouri Fur Com- pany, chief of whom was a Spaniard named Manuel Lisa, were neutralizing his efforts by representing the dangers from the hostile tribes and barren wastes intervening between the Missouri plains and the Pacific. But This old streak of brutality and tyranuy, originally cast into the Anglo-Saxon nature and manifested in its best form in the savage grandeur of the Norse Valhalla, and in the overpowering energy of the Vikings, and at every emergency breaking with volcanic fury through the thin crust of modern culture, has shown itself in no way more notably than in the whole Indian management of the American Goverment. These free trappers executed with a vengeance the unspoken, but not less real. policy of our government. Humanity, and even shrewd policy. had little place in the thoughts and actions of most of them. The Indians were simply to be stamped on like so many rattlesnakes. In the trapper's code, for an Indian to look longingly at a white man's Hunt's patience and perseverance, backed by Astor's unstinted purse, overcame all obstacles, and in April. 1811, the winter rendezvous at the mouth of the Nodowa (four hundred and eighty miles above St. Louis) was abandoned, and in four boats, one of large size, and mount- ing a świvel and two howitzers, the party of sixty set forth up the almost untraveled Mis- scuri. Of the party five were partners, Hunt. Crooks, Mckenzie, Miller and Mclellan. One was a clerk, Reed by name. There were two English naturalists, Bradbury and Nuttall. Forty of the party were Canadian voyageurs. They were to do the rowing, transporting. carrying, cooking, and all the drudgery in gen- eral. The remainder were American hunters and trappers. These were the fellows to hunt horse, or even to be seen in the vicinity of a - and fight and plan and explore, and, when the beaver trap, was sufficient warrant to send a rifle ball ploughing its way through his heart.
The Gallic gentleness and sociability which enabled the Canadian voyageurs to go almost anywhere unharmed among the Indians, found no counterpart in the sterner composition of the great majority of American trappers and traders.
Such were the men from whom Hunt had to make up his little army, and a vexations job it was, too. The rivalries of opposing companies were the opportunity of the trappers. Big wages were demanded. Old whisky bills had to be paid off. The clutch of the sheriff had
proper place was reached, to cast themselves upon the mercy of the savages and wild beasts, endure hunger and thirst and establish trading posts. The chief of these hunters was a Vir- ginian named John Day. We shall meet him frequently. The party was in all respects most bountifully equipped. They designed following as nearly as possible the route of Lewis and Clark.
Many interesting and some thrilling and exciting scenes were encountered on the pas- sage up the Missouri, especially on their way through the country of the Sioux Tetons. But they met with no serious hindrance, and on
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the 11th of June they reached a large village of the Arickaras, fourteen hundred and thirty miles above the mouth of the Missouri. It had been determined before this, on the advice of several hunters who joined the party in the wilderness, after they had left the Nodowa, to abandon their canoes at this point and, se- curing horses, strike across the country south of Lewis and Clark's route, so as to avoid the dreadful Blackfeet, who, alike the terror of the other Indians as well as of the whites, dominated all the region of the upper Mis- souri. So with eighty-two horses heavily loaded-the partners only. together with the family of Pierre Dorion, being mounted-on the 18th of July they set out hopefully, though with many gloomy prognostications from trappers remaining at the Arickara village, on their march across the Great American Des- ert and through the volcanic defiles of the great divide.
On the wide monotony of the sky-bordered prairie they seemed to make no progress. Day succeeded day, and every morning's sun shot up, hot and dry, on apparently the very land- scape of the day before. They did not seem in fact, though taking a more direct route, to make so good time as did Lewis and Clark. Guided by the Crow Indians, they penetrated range after range of the stepping stones to the final ridge, supposing each to be the last, only to find when it was surmounted that one yet higher succeeded. and at last on the 15th of September-the summer already gone- they mounted a lofty peak whence the bound- less wilderness over which they had come as well as that which they must yet traverse, lay like a map at their feet. Gazing attentively westward their guide finally pointed out three shining peaks ridging the western sky, whose bases he assured them were washed by a trib-
uitary of the Columbia. These peaks are now known as the Tetons from their peculiar shape. A hundred miles evidently lay between the weary travelers and that goal. When there, they felt that they would be almost at the end of their journey, little realizing the character of the thousand miles of travel yet awaiting them.
Passing the green banks of Spanish river. a tributary of the Colorado, they laid in a large stock of the plentiful buffalo, gave their horses five days' rest and grazing on the abundant grass, and on the 24th of September, crossing a narrow ridge, found themselves on the banks of a turbulent stream, recognized by their guide as one of the sources of the Snake. From the name of the guide the stream was called Hoback's river. Down the rugged promontories which flanked this stream the party descended. often in danger of fatal falls, to its junction with a much larger one, which so much exceeded the first in fury of current as to receive the name of Mad river. This seemed to issue from the midst of the Tetons, whose glacial and snowy immensity overtopped the camp of the trav- elers at the junction of the two streams. The all important question now arose, should they abandon the horses and make canoes with which to descend the river. It was evident that, though containing abundant water for large boats, it was so impetuous as to render navigating a dangerous business. But the Canadians insisted on making the attempt. Weary of the toilsome and rocky foot-paths of the mountains, and having all confidence in their well-tried ability in handling boats in any kind of water, they longed to betake them- selves once more to their favorite element, and, paddle in hand, their gay French songs beating time to the music of the paddles, they
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HISTORY OF WALLA WALLA COUNTY.
would be ready to shoot another Niagara, it it came in their way. The partners finally gave their consent to make canoes. Forthwith the voyageurs repaired with joyful hearts to the adjacent woods, which soon began to yield up its best timber for the projected boats. Meanwhile a party of three, of whom the re- doubtable John Day was one, went down Mad river on a two days' journey. They returned declaring that neither in boats nor with horses along the banks could the party possibly go.
Disappointed in this plan they now took the advice of Hoback to go to a trapping post which had been established the year before by Mr. Henry, of the Missouri Fur Company. This post Hoback knew to be on one of the upper waters of the Snake and he thought that it could not be far distant. A violent storm of sleet, arising in the midst of their deliberations, admonished them that winter was near at hand and that they must hasten on one way or the other. The Snake Indians who had come to their camp before the storm and had professed to know the location of Henry's post, now agreed to guide them thither. Accordingly on the 4th of October, the hills all around being spotted with snow, they resumed their horseback march. Four days of cold and difficult journeying took them to a cluster of deserted log huts. This had been Henry's trading station, but was now entirely abandoned. Beside the huts flowed a beautiful river a hundred yards wide. It was to all appearance a fine navigable stream. Two weeks of industrious work pro- vided fifteen canoes, and in these, hastily em- barking, they pushed out into the stream. Their horses were left in charge of the two Snake Indians. Nine men also, including Miller, one of the partners, had been detached from the party at points between Mad river
and Henry's river, as the new stream was called. These men were to divide up in squads and trap on the streams thereabout. Well pro- vided with traps, clothes, horses and ammuni- tion, they set out cheerfully into the unknown and wintry recesses of the mountins, expect- ing to issue thence in the spring with a great stock of valuable peltries. With these they could make their best way to Astoria.
With the rapid current aiding the skillful paddles of the voyageurs, whose spirits rose. to an unwonted height, even for them, as soon as they found themselves on the water, the canoes swept swiftly on toward the sunset. They soon came to the mouth of a stream which they took to be their old friend, the Mad river. They now considered themselves fairly embarked on the main body of the Snake, and already, in imagination, they began to toss on the vast current of the Columbia, and even to smell the salt breeze of the mild Pacific. Oc- casional rocky points abutting on the river made rapids which alternated with calm stretches of water, whose banks, shallow and grassy, were enlivened with perfect clouds of wild geese and ducks. For nine days they swept gaily on, with comparatively slight in- terruptions, making over three hundred miles from the place where they had first embarked.
Then they met with a most lamentable dis- aster. In the second canoe of the squadron were Mr. Crooks as bowman and Antoine Clappine as steersman. The first canoe hay- ing safely passed a dangerous rapid, the sec- ond essayed to follow. With a sudden lurch she missed her course and the next instant split upon a rock. Crooks and three of his companions succeeded, after a hard struggle, in reaching the land. but Clappine, one of the most popular and useful men in the company, was lost amid the boiling surges. They had
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HISTORY OF WALLA WALLA COUNTY.
now arrived at an unboatable chain of rapids and frightful bluffs, among which neither boats nor horses, nothing, in short, but wings, were of use. At the beginning of this strait was one of those volcanic cracks peculiar to the rivers of this coast, in which the whole volume of the Snake is squeezed into a place thirty feet wide. This miniature maelstrom received from the disheartened voyagers the name of "The Caldron Linn."
The whole squadron now came to a halt. It was evident that a portage at least would be needed. And from the shaggy volcanic ap- pearance about and below them, they had great fear that the obstructions extended a long dis- tance. This fear was realized when, after a forty-mile tramp down the river, Mr. Hunt discovered no prospect of successful naviga- tion. Returning to the main body, therefore, and discovering that they had but five days' food and no prospect of getting more, he de- termined to divide the party into four parts, hoping that some one of them might find abund- ant game and a way out of the lifeless, vol- canic waste in which they were. One party, uncler Mclellan, was to descend the river ; another under Crooks was to ascend it, hoping to find game or Indian guides on the way, but. if not, to keep on to the place where they had left their horses. Still another detach- ment, under Mckenzie, struck northward across the plains, having in view to reach the main Columbia.
Mr. Hunt, left in charge of the main body, proceeded at once to cache a large part of their goods. Nine caches having been made to hold the large deposit, they took careful notice of the landmarks of the neighborhood for future return, and then got themselves in readiness to move just as soon as the word should come from any of the scouting parties. Within
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