USA > Washington > Thurston County > Early history of Thurston County, Washington : together with biographies and reminiscences of those identified with pioneer days > Part 11
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"When at the place where we were held up to make the raft our provisions were exhausted and we had absolutely nothing to eat. Had it not been for the kindness of an Indian family who were camped not far from where we were we would have starved to death. This family had a considerable stoek of salmon, dried and pounded, which I always thought looked like the stuff they stop up cracks in boats with (oakum). This family was mighty good to us and let us have enough of the salmon to keep alive on for four or five weeks. In payment Mr. Pattison told them to pick out whatever we had that they wanted, and, if they didn't choose my clothes. So one by one I had to see the articles of my wardrobe disappear-now a dress, then a skirt or jacket, and so on till my clothes were all eaten up and I had a good many, too, for I hadn't been married a great while and my parents had given me a good setting out. Well, by the time my clothes were all gone, down to one ragged skirt and jacket, the raft was done and we man-
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aged to get on down the river to where Portland now is, but there were only a few log cabins there then. A man loaned us a boat and we went on up the river to Oregon City, which was a settlement of several houses. Our men folks got work on the road which was being built from this place to Portland, and we were fortunate enough to find an empty log house into which we could move. I didn't go outside the house; I was that ragged and poorly dressed I was ashamed, besides I had all those men to cook for, the baby to take care of and mighty few utensils to manage with. I didn't even have a washboard and it was no light task washing the heavy shirts for those men. besides Willie's-the baby's clothes. Well, one day a neighbor woman, Mrs. Moore, called to me across the back yard and asked me if I wouldn't like to do some sewing for her. I eagerly accepted the offer and she told me she would give me calico for a dress for myself if I would make her one. I was just plum tickled and when her dress was done it looked so nice and neat that the other women in Oregon City asked me to sew for them, too, so I began to earn enough to get my- self some decent clothes again. I was always up at daybreak in the morning and would sew every minute I could spare from my cooking and other work, and when night came I would make up a big fire in the old fireplace and sew by the light of the flames. I had no other light of any kind.
"After about a year of this life Father-in-Law Pattison decided we would come up into the Cowlitz country. I hated to leave Oregon City, for the men could get work there and I was beginning to get a little used to the place, but we had to come. Our means of travel this time was down the Columbia River in Indian canoes manned by Indian braves. When we reached the mouth of the Cowlitz River we found one family already settled there-the Catlins. They were very kind to us and showed-us many favors. Father-in-law liked the looks of the country and decided to stop there. A little shack was built 'way out in the brush and we soon moved in. One day a white man, heading a train of about one hundred Indians, came riding up to the shack. The Indians had their ponies packed with bundles of dried furs which they were taking to the Hudson Bay trading post, which wasn't very far away, on the Columbia River.
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" 'Hello,' called the man, 'my name is Roberts and I am manager of the Hudson Bay post; can I stay here all night ?' " 'Why,' I said, 'you see, we haven't much room,' but he said the Indians could camp on the ground outside the house and if only he could sleep in the house he would be satisfied. We let him do that and a very pleasant and talkative man he was. too, and very interesting. During the evening he told about having a ranch or clearing further on up the Cowlitz River and said he didn't see how he was going to get it worked, for it took all his time to manage the Hudson Bay property. Mr. Pattison didn't say anything, but I just wanted to break away from the old folks and take up Mr. Roberts' offer more than I ever wanted anything in my life. In the morning Roberts went on his way, telling us that he would be back within a few days. The old man must have guessed what was in my mind, for he gave me hardly any chance to talk to my hus- band alone, but when Mr. Roberts came back again and we were all sitting around the fireplace in the evening I managed to get my seat right in front of my father-in-law's where he couldn't see my face and when Mr. Roberts began talking again about his elearing. I said. . My husband and I have de- cided to accept your offer and go and work your ranch if you want us to.' Husband didn't say anything, but father-in-law was terribly mad, but couldn't object right there. So then and there the bargain was struck. 'When can you be ready?' asked Mr. Roberts. 'We haven't anything to get ready.' I told him, 'so we can go any time.' In the morning Mr. Roberts sent some Indians with us in a canoe, together with what few possessions we could call our very own. We travelled all day up the Cowlitz, and when we finally reached the landing were met by a Hudson Bay man. a friend of Roberts', a Mr. Gobar. A brother of my husband had taken the trail along the river's banks with the span of mules with which we proposed to plow the land. At the landing we were met by a brother of Mr. Roberts with a yoke of Spanish oxen and only the running gear of a wagon. I just couldn't stick on that wagon gear, so our things were tied on as best we could and Willie and I were put on one of the mules. I had a man's saddle and had to hold the baby, so couldn't manage the beast very well, and when we were about four miles from the end of our destination my
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mule bucked me, Willie and the saddle off. I struck my head against the root of a tree and that is where I got this scar." (Mrs. Pattison pushed back her silver hair and showed a very perceptible scar above the temple). "Husband came back to see what was the matter, and as we still had four miles to go and as it was getting on towards night I just had to climb up on that mule again and ride him on to the clearing. Well, when we finally got there we found that the house we had been promised was a good half mile away and not finished at that and it was raining hard. What to do then? There we were miles and miles from anywhere with no roof to cover us for the night. While the men were bemoaning the hard plight I looked around and spied a sheep shed that had been aban- doned the year before by the Hudson Bay people, as it was their custom, when one pasturage was eaten off, to drive the flock on to some new place. I went over and looked in and decided that here, at least, was shelter, for there was a fairly good roof and the dirt floor was dry, although lumpy and rough from the sheeps' feet. I called the men and started to fix a pole across one side of the pen to hold our bedding in position during the night. I then had our bedclothes unloaded from the wagon and made the bed so the baby could go to sleep. There was a big log right in front of the opening or door of the sheep shed. so the men made a big fire there and I got supper. As the season was getting late, the men had to go right to plowing, so they left Willie and me there to get settled as best I could. The first thing was to clean house, so I hacked a good stout branch off a tree and with long tough grasses I managed to tie cedar branches to this stick for a broom. I then swept the roof and walls of the shed, smoothed down the dirt floor the best I could and began to make my furniture. Not far from the sheep shed there had been a barn made of boards hewn out by hand and put together without nails, the joists tied together with rawhide thongs. During the previous winter this barn had blown over sideways, loos- ening a number of the boards so I could pull them away. The only tools I had to work with were a hammer, ax and augur- no saw, and I would have given an eye tooth for a saw.
"My first work was to put a floor in the shed, so I dragged these wide boards from the barn and as they were much too
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long, I slipped them along the dirt floor, letting one end push ont under the logs, which didn't come quite to the ground. Many and many a trip I had to make between the barn and the shed before I had finished, Willie trailing along after me every trip, never whining and complaining as most babies would do these days-just trailing along. When the floor was done I hacked with an ax enough boards to go inside, and with these made a sort of a platform on one side of the shed. On this I spread a lot of hay that had been left in the barn and there was our bed. When the barn was blown over it left exposed some of the round stumps which had been used for corner foundations. I rolled two of these to the shed-our seats. After a long time and with lots of work. Mr. Pattison and I bored auger holes in the boards of the floor in which we fixed two upright sticks cut from the woods; on these I put some boards, letting one end extend out through a crack between the logs, and so we had a table-all the furniture we wanted or could use. I did my cooking and we kept warm by the open fire in front of the shed. We lived there all that summer and until the crops were harvested. Later in the fall we moved into Mr. Roberts' house, a half mile away from the field. which the men finished in a rough way for occupancy. While in this house a band of Indians came by one morning. They came close to the door to look in, as we were a sort of curiosity to them. Willie stood in the open door watching them, and so came in contact with them. Their papooses had a contagious disease, but I didn't know it then. The baby caught this disease and died within a few days. I thought I never could get over that blow. When the crops were gathered we took the wheat to the barn of Mr. Gobar, our nearest neighbor, and flailed the wheat out on his floor. He gave us the use of his fanning mill and we had a considerable lot of wheat and potatoes to pay us for our summer's work.
"One day while I was sitting at the door of the sheep shed with Willie playing at my feet, who should come riding down the trail but a white woman with a little boy astride on the horse behind her. It proved to be Mrs. George Barnes, who was just married and coming to Olympia from Portland with her young husband. The boy was her little brother, John Miller Murphy. How glad I was to see one of my sex I can
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never tell you, and years afterwards when we finally settled in Olympia. Mrs. Barnes renewed the acquaintance began in front of the sheep shed and we became fast friends. Many a night Mrs. Barnes would take her lantern and come along the trail to my house to visit me during the evening while my children were sleeping. She was a good woman and I will never forget her.
"About this time we decided to take advantage of the Government's liberal offer in regard to donation claims. In those days to every man was given the chance to take up 640 acres of land and, as an encouragement to the women who had to endure the trials and privations of the wilderness, for a very few years the Government made the offer to her of an equal amount of land as that her husband was given, as a sort of a recompense for her hardships. Uncle Sam gave us women this land just as he would a new dress or something else we wanted real badly, for it was a recognized fact the women were worth as much as the men in settling up and developing the new country. Well, with an ox team we came to Tum- water. or Newmarket, as it was called then. Crosby's mill and store was about all that there was there. We swam the oxen across the Des Chutes River and went out on what was even then called Chambers Prairie, travelling through big woods all the way. David Chambers was living on the Chambers home- stead and we took up our donation claims next to his. Pat- tison Lake was on our place and was named from my hus- band. Here we built what was to be our home for many long, hard years-a log cabin, added to from time to time as the babies began to come. Three of my children were born there. It was a hard, lonesome life I led there. It seemed that if ever there was a hard, unpleasant thing to be done I was the one to be called on. For a few years I had no babies to keep me tied down, so whenever the neighboring women for ten miles around were sick, or there was a new baby came, or a death- any trouble- I was always the first one sent for, and I was nothing but a kid in years myself."
Here Mrs. Pattison ceased talking for a moments and be- gan silently musing into the past. Her eyes grew dreamy and it was plain that once again the heroic woman was ministering the wants of the friends who long since have finished their
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work. A query about the Indian war brought her wide awake again and started her flow of reminiscences.
"Yes, indeed, I was in the Indian war, and knew the in- stant Mr. William White was killed, for I heard the shot and saw part of the struggle. Mr. White, with his wife and her sister, Mrs. Stewart, had been to church that day, the two women, each with a little child in her arms, were riding in a cart, with Mr. White walking behind with the lines in his hands driving the horse, when the Indians emerged on foot from a little point of timber a little ahead of them. They began to struggle with Mr. White and the horse became frightened and ran away with the women. This brought them away safe, and the last Mrs. White saw of her husband in life he was grap- pling with a big Indian buck. We knew very well that Mr. White was killed, but none dared to go after his body that evening, so all night we waited in fear and trembling, not knowing what moment the Indians would attack our cabin, but we were not molested, and in the morning my men folks started after Mr. White. I told them to take one of my sheets along, which they did. They found the body where they thought they would. There had evidently been a great strug- gle before Mr. White gave up his life, for the ground was all torn up and trampled. Mr. White's dog had stayed by his master all night. The Indians had stripped the body of every stitch of clothing except the boots. Our men placed the body on a board they had taken for that purpose, spread the sheet over him and brought the remains to the spring in front of our house. They called me and I bound up the dead man's head the best way I could to hide the cruel wounds and bruises the Indians had made. One arm was broken and he was shot through a vital part. Then I spread another clean sheet over the form and the men carried him on the board to a vacant house belonging to Mr. Chambers. I followed on foot and that wasn't an easy thing to do. When we got to the house we were joined by Mrs. White and the neighbors. Among the most pathetic events of this awful day was the arrival of Mrs. Bigelow, Mr. White's daughter. Mrs. Bigelow had only been married a little over a year and was quite a young girl. She came galloping up with her four-months'-old baby in her arms, the rain simply pouring down on the mother and child.
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My husband took the baby and helped the distracted girl from her horse. She ran into where her father's body was laid and I tell you that was hard, too. I warmed the baby and tended it all day. That baby is now Mrs. Tirzah Royal.
"We buried Mr. White out in the little cemetery on Cham- bers Prairie and then had to return to our homes. When I started back, one after another of the neighboring women begged to go with me and stay at our house till the scare quieted down. So in all we were fourteen who were sheltered by our two-room cabin. Here we stayed for three weeks while the men were building the block house. This block house on Chambers Prairie was standing until a few years ago. As I had a big Dutch oven I baked all the bread that was consumed by these fourteen people, and I can tell you I baked every, and all day, too.
"When the block house was finished we all moved in. The families who were there at that time and who had rooms in the block house were Thomas Chambers, the McMillans, Mrs. White with her children, the O'Neals, the Parsons and Mrs. Stewart. Mrs. Stewart gave birth to a baby the day after we moved in. Almost all our men had joined the volunteers to fight the Indians and we women, with the children, had to stay there all the time with one or two men left to guard us. We brought our water from the creek, the banks of which had been cleared of brush so the Indians couldn't ambush there. It was very unhandy to do our work, for each family had only one room in the block house to live in, and every- thing-cooking, washing, sleeping-had to be done in this one room. I got so tired of that way of living that we were the first family to return to our home, but we were not molested and soon took up our regular way of living.
"Well, the years passed and we had three children who were ready to be sent to school, so we sold my part of the donation claim to David Chambers and moved into town, where the children could have advantages and see something. We came to Olympia the week Lincoln was assassinated. I was glad to come, for we were all good and tired of living away out there. We bought a place of John Swan, on the Eastside. which has been the Pattison home ever since, although the orchard that my husband planted has long ago been divided
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up into city lots and is almost all built over now. When we moved to our new home, Mrs. Bigelow, Mrs. Horton and a little later, Dr. Lansdale, were my only neighbors. We have had seven children, only two, my son James Renwick and Mrs. Brad Davis, are still living. My husband, father-in-law, all the Pattison brothers, my babies, all are gone, but I am still here."
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LOUIS BETTMAN
Louis Bettman came to Olympia in 1853 from the land of his nativity, the province of Bavaria, Germany, while a mere lad of 20 years of age. In company with his brothers. Mose and Sig Bettman, he opened a general merchandise store in the newly settled hamlet of Olympia. The location of this pioneer store was on the corner of Main and Second Streets. Indeed, all the business conducted in the hamlet was centered within a radius of a very few blocks in that neighborhood. Contemporaneous merchants were George Barnes, Gus. Rosen- thal and Thomas Macleay and Samuel Percival.
There was very little money in circulation among the pioneer settlers, consequently much of the trade consisted in bartering groceries, shoes and dry goods for butter, wool, hides and some grain. As the price allowed for these commodities was very low and the demand from San Francisco brisk for every kind of produce, the profits accruing to the merchants by the exchange was considerable.
In 1860 Mr. Bettman took a pleasure trip to San Francisco and while there met and fell in love with Miss Amelia Coblentz, who was visiting in that city from her home in Los Angeles. After a very few weeks' courtship Mr. Bettman persuaded Miss Coblentz to accompany him on his return to Olympia. The young couple started for Puget Sound immediately after their wedding. A journey of four days on a sailing vessel before Olympia was reached.
In Mrs. Bettman's own words: "We landed at Brown's wharf, down on the west side, which was the only landing place for large vessels then. My first breakfast in the town was taken at the Pacific House, on the corner of Fourth and Main Streets, with 'Aunt Becky' Howard as landlady.
"We soon went to housekeeping in a tiny house owned by Judge Landers, which stood for many years on the site now occupied by the Mitchell Hotel. The place was then well
LOUIS BETTMAN AND WIFE
THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
AU CA, LENOX AND .I DEN FOUNDATIONS.
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back in the woods and surrounded by tall, ugly stumps. I sometimes thought I'd just die of homesickness when I first came here, everything was so new and strange and rough. I thought I never could endure to spend my young life amid such scenes. But when the children began coming and my household cares kept increasing this feeling gradually wore away and before I realized it I had gained quite a circle of pleasant acquaintances and began to feel at home and satisfied.
"The people in the town then were like one big family. Every once in a while we would get together for an all-night danee. Everybody daneed with everybody else. There were no cliques-nobody put on style, and everything was free and easy. My intimate friends among the pioneer women were Mrs. George Blankenship, Mrs. Rosenthal, Mrs. Chas. Burmister. Mrs. George Barnes and Mrs. Captain Doane."
Mrs. Bettman was reticent in talking about herself and husband, but it needs no historian to recall to the memory of the old timers that Mr. Bettman was always prominently identi- fied with the prosperity of the growing city and at the time of his death in 1904 had accumulated a considerable property and left a reputation for business integrity and personal honor which entitles his memory to a niche in the hall of fame of Olympia pioneers.
Three children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Bettman : Belle. Mrs. Oppenheimer; Josephine, who died several years before her father, and W. W. Bettman, the latter still conducting the store founded by his father over 60 years ago. Mrs. Bettman is best known locally through her untiring labors in the Ladies' Relief Society. For many years she has been chairman of the relief committee of this society and wherever and whenever she hears the call of want or distress Mrs. Bettman responds with ready sympathy, judicious expenditure of the society's funds and unfailing judgment.
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THOMAS PRATHER
A dark, rainy afternoon was devoted to gathering such fragments of the reminiscences of that Nestor of Pioneers, Thomas Prather, as stood out most prominently in his recol- lection.
Had the compiler of this sketch kept to original inten- tions and recorded word for word the story of Mr. Prather's experiences as told by himself, the reader, as was the writer, would be led a merry chase from Boone County, Missouri, to California, back to the boyhood home again, then to Oregon, down to Panama, out to sea, struggling with sea sickness, to the Colville gold fields, fighting Indians, making love to the Pioneer maidens, canoeing, surveying, logging. always in the front ranks of action, and ever and always every whit a man, and now, in his declining years drifting into a quiet eddy, spending his days at peace with his God and his fellow man.
As the tale progressed and Mr. Prather's memory travelled back to the scenes and incidents of those stirring times a reminiscent glow came into his eyes, his form straightened and many times he would stride around the room in the ex- citement of calling once again from the shades of the past those friends who. shoulder to shoulder with him, laid the foundation of our city and made possible the prosperity and advantages the descendants of these men and women enjoy today.
Although Mr. Prather's reminiscences were often rambling and embroidered with many irrevelant particulars, his memory was surprisingly good and his unswerving loyalty to his old time friends and associates was a beautiful tribute to the warm feelings these Pioneers entertained for each other. The essential incidents of Mr. Prather's life as told by himself are as follows :
"I was born in Boone County, Missouri, in 1832, which
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makes me in the neighborhood of 82 years of age. I was the fifth son of my parents, and a hard struggle we had for existence on my father's plantation in the then territory of Mis- souri. My father died when I was only eight years old, and I can remember spending many a day in the hot sun dropping corn for 25 cents for the ten hours' work.
"In 1849, came the story of the gold strike in California. and my brother James took the gold fever and left for the West. The following Spring of 1850, I said: 'Now. Tom. no more working for 25 cents a day, when you might as well be getting from $6 to $8 a day in the gold fields.' So in spite of mother's remonstrances, I left the school room, joined an ox train, and came to California, spending seven and a half months on the journey.
"When I got there, sure enough, I went to work at once for $6 a day, and soon had saved up $250, which was more money than I'd ever had at one time before in my life. I was sick, however, and thought I had better pull out of there and go home. I went by water this time, by the way of Panama.
"I had no sooner got back to Missouri than the lure of the West called me again, so in the Spring of 1852. when Judge Gilmore Hays and Andrew Cowen, as partners, organized a wagon expedition to come to the almost unknown country called Oregon, I tendered my services, which were accepted.
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