An illustrated history of the state of Washington, containing biographical mention of its pioneers and prominent citizens, Part 19

Author: Hines, Harvey K., 1828-1902
Publication date: 1893
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 1056

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none. In 1836, Dr. Marcus Whitman and four other missionaries of the American Board. In 1837, sixteen additional members of the Meth- odist mission and three settlers. In 1838, eight persons reinforced the missions of the American Board and three white men from the Rocky mountains came into the country. This year also two Jesuit priests, F. N. Blanchet and A. Demers, arrived. In 1839, four independ- ent Protestant missionaries and eight settlers. In 1840 a reinforcement of thirty-one adults and fifteen children came to the Methodist mis- sion, and four independent Protestant mission- aries. P. G. De Smet, Jesuit missionary, and thirteen or fourteen settlers, mostly Rocky mountain men with Indian wives, arrived,- making in all eighty-five connected with the three mission establishments, and twenty-eight settlers; a total of 113 at the opening of 1840. Besides these were a small number of the super- annuated employes of the Hudson's Bay Com- pany located at various points, and yet holding legal as well as social relation to that body. In the classification of population thus presented it will be seen that the one predominating in- fluence in the country up to the close of 1840

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was necessarily that of the Protestant mission- aries. Civilly and politically there were two sentiments: one American and the other British. The Protestant missionaries uniformly repre- sented the American sentiment in the country, and the servants of the Hudson's Bay Company and the members of the Roman Catholic mis- sions could always be relied upon to further the canse of British possession of Oregon. So far as we have been able to trace the lines of in- finence and action in connection with these dif- ferent missionary establishments, there was not even an individual exception to this statement. If at this time the claim of the United States to Oregon was receiving any help at all, it was by the unanimous action of the Protestant mission- aries, while the just as unanimous action of the Roman Catholic missions aided and abetted the pretensions of Great Britain. By the relations of missionaries to patronizing societies, as well as the individual nativity and training of the men constituting them, this was inevitable. The Protestant missionaries were mainly from New England and New York, all Americans by birth, by education, and by civic and political affiliations. The Roman Catholic missionaries were all of foreign birth, educated and trained under governments opposed to republicanism and under an ecclesiastical system that cultured all their convictions away from it. Their social relations were with the Hudson's Bay Company, and they gave that company and its pretensions the most thorough support. Thus, at the close of 1840, it happened that the forces in array against each other for the ultimate possession of the country were, on the one side the Hudson's Bay Company and the Roman Catholic missions, on the other side the Protestant missions and the small number of Americans who had rolled down from the mountains or floated up from the sea and made Oregon at least a temporary home.

The first question that fairly and clearly drew the lines of demarkation between these forces was that of government. The British party, consisting of the Hudson's Bay people and the Catholic missionaries, naturally desired to re-

main as they were, since all pretended authority of law was that of the Dominion of Canada, which had been, in pretense at least, extended over all the country west of the Rocky mount- ains. Just as naturally the American party, consisting of the Protestant missionaries and American settlers, desired some forms of law according to the American idea of self-govern- ment. They had no idea of submitting them- selves to the authority of the Hudson's Bay Company or the Canadian Parliament. An American always carries his "inalienable rights" with him, and on all proper, and per- haps on some improper, occasions is prepared to assert and defend them. Laws or constitu- tions enacted for him in a foreign parliament, or by a foreign corporation, are not sacred in his eyes, especially when it is attempted to enforce them over what he believes to be American soil. It was so here; and accordingly, in March, 1838, the first public step was taken looking toward the establishment of a Territorial gov- ernment over the country claimed by the United States west of the Rocky monntains. This was in the form of a memorial to Congress signed by J. L. Whitcomb and thirty-five others, which was presented to that body by Senator Linn January 28, 1838. This memo- rial was read, laid on the table, and was never taken therefrom. In 1838 the subjeet was again brought to the attention of the Govern- ment by another petition to Congress, ably con- ceived and forcibly written, and signed by Rev. David Leslie, of the Methodist mission, and abont seventy others. The petition set forth very clearly the condition and needs of the country as seen by those upon the ground, and is of such importance historically, and exerted so much influence upon the action of Congress, and also upon the feelings of the Hudson's Bay Company toward the American settlers, that its full text is here inserted. It is as follows:

To the Honorable, the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress Assembled:

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Your petitioners represent unto your honor- able bodies that they are residents in the Ore- gon Territory, and citizens of the United States, or persons desirous of becoming such.

They further represent to your honorable bodies that they have settled themselves in said Territory under the belief that it was a por- tion of the public domain of said States and that they might rely upon the Government thereof for the blessings of free institutions, and the protection of its arins.

But your petitioners further represent, that they are uninformed of any aets of said Govern- ment by which its institutions and protection are extended to them; in consequence whereof themselves and families are exposed to be de- stroyed by the savages around them, and others that would do them harm.

And your petitioners would further represent that they have no means of protecting their own lives and the lives of their families, other than self-constituted tribunals, originated and sustained by the power of an ill-instructed public opinion, and the resort to force and arms.

And your petitioners represent these means of safety to be an insufficient safe-guard of life and property, and that the crimes of theft, murder, infanticide, etc., are increasing among them to an alarming extent, and your petition- ers declare themselves unable to arrest this progress of crime and its terrible consequences without the aid of law, and tribunals to ad- minister it.

Your petitioners therefore pray the Congress of the United States of America to establish, as soon as may be, a Territorial government in the Oregon territory.

And if reasons other than those presented were needed to induce your honorable bodies to grant the prayer of the undersigned, your petitioners, they would be found in the value of this terri- tory to the nation, and the alarming circum- stances that portend its loss.

Your petitioners, in view of these last consid- erations, would represent that the English Gov-

ernment has had a surveying party on the Ore- gon coast for two years, employed in making accurate surveys of all its rivers, bays and har- bors, and that recently the said government is said to have made a grant to the Hudson's Bay Company of all lands lying between the Column- bia river and Puget sound, and that the said company is actually exercising unequivocal acts of ownership over said lands thus granted, and opening extensive farms upon the same.

And your petitioners represent that these circumstances, connected with other acts of said company to the same effect, and their declara- tion that the English Government owns and will hold, as its own soil, that portion of Oregon territory situated north of the Columbia river, together with the important fact that the said company are cutting and sawing into lumber and shipping to foreign ports vast quantities of the finest pine trees upon the navigable waters of the Columbia, have led your petitioners to ap- prehend that the English Government do intend, at all events, to hold that portion of this terri- tory lying north of the Columbia river.

And your petitioners represent that the said territory north of the Columbia is an invaluable possession to the American Union, that in and about Puget Sound are the only harbors of easy access and commodious and safe upon the whole coast of the territory, and that a great part of this said northern part of the Oregon territory is rich in timber, water power and val- nable minerals. For this and other reasons your petitioners pray that Congress will estab- lish its sovereignty over said territory.

Your petitioners would further represent that the country south of the Columbia river and north of the Mexican line and extending from the Pacific ocean 120 miles into the interior is of unequaled beanty. Its mountains, covered with perpetual snow, pouring into the prairies around their bases transparent streams of pur- est water, the white and black oak, pine, cedar, and fir forests that divide the prairies into sec- tions convenient for farming purposes, the rich mines of coal in its hills, and salt springs in its

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valleys, its quarries of limestone, sandstone, chalk and marble, the salmon of its rivers, and the various blessings of the delightful and healthy climate, are known to us and impress your petitioners with the belief that this is one of the most favored portions of the globe.

Indeed the deserts of the interior have their wealth of pasturage, and their lakes, evaporat- ing in summer, leave in their basins hundreds of bushels of the purest soda. Many other cir- cumstanees could be named showing the im- portance of this territory in a national, com- mercial and agricultural point of view. And although your petitioners would not undervalue considerations of this kind, yet they beg leave especially to call the attention of Congress to their own conditions as an infant colony with- ont military force or civil institutions to pro- tect their lives and property and children, sanc- tuaries and tombs from the hands of uncivilized and merciless savages around them. We re- spectfully ask for the civil institutions of the American republic. We pray for the high privilege of American citizenship, the peaceful enjoyment of life, the right of acquiring, possess- ing and using property, and the unrestrained pursuit of rational happiness. And this your petitioners will ever pray.

DAVID LESLIE, and about seventy others.

It is difficult to fix the exact personal author- ship of this remarkable document. Its honor appears to be somewhat divided between David Leslie, at that time pro tem superintendent of the Methodist mission in the absence of Jason Lee, then on his return from the States by sea to Oregon at the head of what is known in the history of the mission as the "great re-enforce- ments," and Mr. Robert Shortess, an immi- grant of the same year in which the petition was written. It is probable that both had to do with its preparation. At all events it re- fleets honor upon the small American colony, not then reaching 100 persons in all, and shows how elearly and fully from the beginning our

people comprehended the issues pending be- tween their own country and Great Britain, and how thoroughly American were their sympa- thies and purposes.

There is one phrase in the petition, given in italics, which was understood by all to refer to the Hudson's Bay Company, and shows with what jealonsy that company was watched by the American. Doubtless the phrase had its justification, and was not intended to convey the sense of extreme entity by that company against the Americans that some writers have supposed. At all events, while the company was faithful to itself, there is no evidence that it did intentionally incite its own people, or the Indian tribes, who were thoroughly under its control, to acts of violence against the Ameri- cans. And besides the humane Dr. MeLough- lin was then at the head of the company, and no unprejudiced man who ever knew him could believe him capable of any such sinister action.

The above qnoted petition had gone on to Congress. A year or two must certainly pass before any relief could come from it, even if any ever came. Meantime the necessities of the people in Oregon, or, more accurately, in the Willamette valley, where all the American settlers and most of the Protestant missionaries resided, were growing more and more urgent. To meet them a meeting of some of the inhab- itants was held at Champoeg, not far from the Methodist mission, on the 7th of February, 1841, for consultation on the steps necessary to be taken for the formation of laws and the election of officers to execute them. Rev. Jason Lee was called to the chair and asked to express his opinion of the step required. He advised the appointment of a committee to draft a con- stitution and by-laws for the government of that portion of the country south of the Column- bia river. Nothing of moment was done fur- ther at this meeting.

A few days later an event occurred which served to revive the matter in a new and more imperative form. Mr. Ewing Young, a gentle- man of prominence in the country and possess-

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ing a considerable estate, suddenly died: He left no heirs in the country, and no one had any authority to care for or administer upon his estate. His funeral was held on the 17th of February, at which most of the people of the valley were present. At the close of the funeral services a meeting was held, over which Rev. Jason Lee presided, when it was resolved to hold another the next day at the Methodist mission. Nearly all the people of the settle- ment were present. Rev. David Leslie was chosen to preside, and Rev. Gustavus Hines and Mr. Sidney Smith were secretaries. A com- mittee was chosen to draft a constitution and code of laws, of which F. F. Blanchet, after- ward Roman Catholic archbishop, was chair- man. After much discussion it was finally decided to elect a person to serve as judge with probate powers, and Dr. Ira L. Babcock was chosen. The meeting adjourned to meet again on Thursday, June 11, at the Catholic mission. At that meeting it was found that the chairman of the committee appointed at the previous meeting to draft a constitution and laws had not called the committee together, and so this meeting adjourned to meet on the first Thurs- day in October. Before that time arrived the feeling had become somewhat prevalent among the people that it would be unwise to establish any permanent form of government so long as the peace of the community could be preserved without it, and consequently the meeting was never held. Thus ended the first attempt to establish a government west of the Rocky mountains.

Incidental to, and having no little influence upon, the final action of the people in the estab- lishment of the provisional government, it must be mentioned that in 1842 Dr. Elijah White, who had formerly held the position of physician to the Methodist mission, and who had returned to the States after some disagreement with its superintendent, Rev. Jason Lee, appeared sud- denly in the country holding a government commission as sub-agent for the Indians in the region west of the Rocky mountains. He

claimed plenary power over all questions be- tween the settlers and the Indians, as well as all civil and criminal cases that might arise in the country. He appointed temporary magistrates to try cases that might occur in his absence. The people received him joyfully, their thank- fulness at any proof that the Government had not entirely forgotten their necessities probably disposing them to a too generons credence of his pretensions. At a meeting called to receive him a series of highly complimentary resolu- tions were passed, and ordered transmitted to the Government of the United States, in order that the views and wishes of the people in rela- tion to this country might be made known.

The course of Dr. White in the relation which he claimed as de facto governor of the colony, provoked violent criticisin, as well as re- ceived emphatic defense. While it would an- swer no valuable purpose to trace the one or the other, it seems needful to say that Dr. White doubtless claimed much more authority than the Government ever designed he should exer- cise. At the same time he was zealons and active in the discharge of his duties, visiting every part of the country wherever his presence seemed to be required, and contributed in many ways to the quiet of the Indian tribes. Still the infirmities of his disposition and temper were such that he could not retain the confi- dence of masses of the people however desirous he might be of doing so. His letters to the Government earnestly urged that the country might be taken possession of by the United States, and the laws extended over it. A far more fortunate selection for Indian agent in Oregon might have been made: at the same time impartial history must record that the presence of Dr. White as such, albeit neither the man nor his work was ideal, did something to prepare the country for the rule of law which was now soon to be instated.

The arrival of the immigration of 1842, bringing as it did a great increase of American settlers, decidedly influenced the sentiment of the country in favor of the immediate organiza.

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tion of a government. What form it should take, whether it should be entirely independent of both nations claiming jurisdiction over the country, or provisional, looking to an ultimate supersedence by the extension of the laws of the United States or Great Britain over Oregon, became subjects of warm and often acrimonious debates. That this should be so was but natural, as it was not easy to harmonize the sentiments of those who yet expected the supremacy of England on the Pacific coast with those who confidently believed that the United States rightfully owned the country. And besides there were those who fostered an artificial an- tagonism between the Protestant missionary settlements and the distinctively American population. We have called this antagonism "artificial " because there was no ground for it in reality, since all these missionary establish- ments were intensely American, and their real views could not but be in harmony with the in- terests of Oregon's Americanization. Probably a careful analysis of the causes lying back of this particular phase of the questions at issue would discover that they were largely of a social nature, and came out of the fact that a great preponderance of the capacity and training for public affairs then in the colony was found among the gentlemen connected with these missions, and it was but natural that, in emergencies like the present, they should appear more conspicu- ously than others. Of course, in addition to these divisions of sentiment, there was the Ro- man Catholic element, always most anxions for that which would most subserve the plans and purposes of the hierarchy of Rome. It were no small feat to so far harmonize these variant elements as to seenre an organization at all; for there would needs be plots and eounterplots, and no one knew where the majority would stand when the final count should come.

Dr. John MeLoughlin gave the great weight of his name to the plan of an independent gov- ernment; one entirely separated from either the I'nited States or Great Britain. With him, as a matter of course, went the men of the Hud-

son's Bay Company, now settlers south of the Columbia, and almost as much a matter of course the Roman Catholics. This presented a formidable combination, one that it proved not easy to overcome.

The first publie indication of the result oc- curred at Willamette Falls (now Oregon City), then the chief town of the colony, in the dis- enssion, in a publie lyeenm, of a resolution in- trodneed by L. W. Hastings, as attorney for Dr. MeLoughlin, in the following words:

" Resolved, That it is expedient for the set- tlers of the coast to organize an independent government."

At the close of the discussion the vote was taken, and the resolution was adopted. At this point Mr. George Abernethy, afterward gov- ernor under the provisional government, introdneed another resolution for discussion the following week, in the following words:

" Resolred, That if the United States extends its jurisdiction over this country during the next four years. it will not be expedient to form an independent government."

This resolution was very skillfully drawn. Its passage would do two things: First, tenta- tively pledge the people against an " independ- ent" government; and, second, clearly express their faith in the ultimate extension of the laws of the American Union over the Pacific coast. It was not against any government at the present time, but against what was then understood as the scheme of an " independent government;" that is, one looking to its own perpetuation as an independent power among the governments of the world.

At the close of an earnest debate the resolu- tion of Mr. Abernethy was adopted. This set at rest the scheme of an " independent govern- ment," but it left the question of the formation of a provisional government, looking to its own supersession by the authority of the United States at some future date still an open one. In regard to this the disenssion went on with undiminished interest.

Meanwhile some of the leading men of the

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settlement had called a public meeting to be held at the house of Joseph Gervais, where the town of Gervais now is, on the first Monday in March, to consider measures for the protec- tion of the herds of the settlers from the depre- dations of wild beasts. This was a subject that appealed to all strongly, for savage beasts were numerous and destructive. The attendance was large, for it had become bruited about that some other matter of importance would be brought forward at the meeting. This gathering was known among the settlers as the " wolf mect- ing."

The result of this gathering, over which James ('Neil presided, was the adoption of a series of resolutions providing for the payment of bonnties for the destruction of predatory ani- mals. After this was done, a motion was made by W. H. Gray that a committee of twelve per- sons be appointed to take into consideration the propriety of taking measures for the civil and military protection of the colony. This was unanimously adopted, the committee was elected and the " wolf meeting" had gone into history.

Between the time of the adjournment of this meeting and the assembling of another at Cham- poeg on the 2d day of May, 1843, those opposed to the organization of any form of government were not idle. These were notably the people of the Hudson's Bay Company and those who called themselves "the Canadian citizens of Oregon." They held public meetings at Van- couver, at Willamette Falls, and at the Catholic Church on the French Prairie. An " Address of the Canadian citizens of Oregon to the meet- ing at Champoeg," prepared by the Romish priest, F. N. Blanchet, was circulated, and every influence possible from these quarters were ex- erted to prevent affirmative action at the meet- ing of May 2.

The address of the Canadian citizens of Ore- gon, written as it was by a man who, though a master of dialectics in one tongue, the French, was unable to intelligently Anglieize his speech, is a unique specimen of literary work. Still it discovers the entire un-American sentiments

of those for whom it was penned at that time, and their great wish to hold the country un- committed on all questions that might have an influence in finally settling the dispute for pos- session of Oregon between England and the United States in favor of the United States. A quotation of paragraphs 11 and 12 of the " Ad- dress" will disclose these facts. They are as follows:

" 11. That we consider the country free at present, to all nations, till government shall have decided; open to every individual wishing to settle, without any distinction of origin, and without asking him anything, either to become an English, Spanish or American citizen.

" 12. So we, English subjects, proclaim to be free, as well as those who came from France, California, United States, or even natives of this country ; and we desire unison with all the re- spectable citizens who wish to settle in this country; or we ask to be recognized as free among ourselves to make such regulations as appear suitable to our wants, save the general interest of having justice from all strangers who might injure ns, and that our reasonable ens- toms and pretensions be respected."

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An illustrated history of the state of Washington, containing biographical mention of its pioneers and prominent citizens, Part 19

Author: Hines, Harvey K., 1828-1902 Publication date: 1893 Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company Number of Pages: 1056

Author: Hines, Harvey K., 1828-1902
Publication date: 1893
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 1056