USA > Washington > History of Washington; the rise and progress of an American state, Vol. II > Part 23
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The morning of Monday, November 29th, was cold, foggy and cheerless. Most of the sick people were better, though three were still dangerously ill. The doctor was calm but more serious than usual, still he went about among his patients, noting their condition and giving each a few words of advice or encouragement. Mrs. Whitman did not appear, and after breakfast was served one of the children carried some food to her room. She was found sitting by her bed with her face buried in her handkerchief. Taking the proffered food she motioned the bearer to leave her, and then put it aside. It was found untouched long after.
An Indian child was to be buried near the mission that morning, and while waiting for the funeral party to arrive the doctor conversed with Mr. Rogers, his assistant, telling
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him of the alarming report he had heard, and suggesting various means of conciliating the Indians. The Catholic bishop was coming to see him soon, Catherine Sager heard him say, and he thought he would have a favorable influence with them. "If things do not clear up by that time," he added, "I will move my family below."*
Although a large number of Indians had now assembled about the mission none but the family of the dead child had been present when it was buried. The doctor remarked upon this, on his return to the house, but added that they had probably come for their share of the beef which the men were killing for the use of the station. They were accus- tomed to assemble at such a time, and were always given a part of the slaughtered animal. But they had not come that morning for food. It was easy to see that they were in an ugly humor, and more insolent and boisterous than usual. Some of them had already thrust themselves into the kitchen and sitting room, but as this was not an unusual circumstance no one was unduly alarmed by it. Mrs. Whitman came in and asked the doctor to go upstairs and see Miss Bewley, who was quite ill. He did so and when he returned he crossed the room to the sash door, that fronted the mill, and stood for a few moments drumming on the glass with his fingers. Then turning to Mrs. Whitman he said :
"Poor Lorinda is in trouble and does not know the cause. I found her weeping, and she says she has some strong presentiment of approaching evil that she cannot overcome. I will prepare her some medicine and you take it up to her, and try to comfort her a little, for I have failed to do so." This poor girl's fate was to be the saddest of all those who escaped the slaughter.
* I. e., to the Dalles, as Dr. McLoughlin had recommended.
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The Indians who were now in and about the house had become so noisy and insulting that Mrs. Whitman, who had been preparing some hot milk for the sick children, left the room. Some of the Indians tried to follow her, but she closed the door in their faces and bolted it. The doctor was busy at his medicine case, and apparently made no effort to quiet the increasing disturbance. An Indian stepped to his side and began to talk to him about medicine for a member of his family who was sick, when another struck him on the head from behind with a hatchet. At the same instant two shots were fired, one of which struck him in the neck, and the other killed John Sager, who was in the room engaged in winding twine to make brooms.
Other men who were employed in various capacities about the place were set upon at the same moment. The mission miller was shot dead at the first fire. The tailor was mortally wounded by a pistol shot while sewing at his bench. Mr. Kimball, one of the men who were engaged in slaughtering the beef, was shot through the arm, the bullet shattering the bone and rendering it helpless. Mr. Canfield received a bullet in the side, but the wound was not dangerous, and he made his escape, going on foot to Lapwai, one hundred and twenty-five miles distant, to notify the Spaldings of their danger. Mr. Hoffman was attacked by several Indians, and defended himself bravely with an ax, wounding one of his assailants severely in the foot, but he was finally over- powered and killed.
The crack of the murderers' rifles was heard plainly inside the house and caused the greatest consternation. The sick people sprang from their beds; some of the children ran cry- ing out of doors, but were brought back by Mrs. Whitman,
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who did what she could to quiet them, although remembering what the doctor had told her during the previous evening, she evidently realized that the massacre had begun, and that her own life would soon be required. "Oh, the Indians, the Indians," she said repeatedly, "they have killed my husband and I am a widow." Mary Ann Bridger, who had been in the kitchen when the doctor was attacked, fled through an outer door, and hurried to the sick room where the women and children were. She could only say that the doctor was dead, as she believed him to be. Kimball came in with his shattered arm hanging by his side. "Mrs. Whitman, the Indians are killing us all," he said, and sank to the floor. He soon began to ask for water, and Mrs. Whitman went to an adjoining room and fetched him some. Then she went downstairs and opened an outer door which had been locked, to let in a number of emigrant women and their children who had collected there from the other buildings. With the help of one of these she carried her wounded husband to an adjoining room. He was still conscious but could answer her only in whispers. She knelt by him and asked him many questions, but he could only answer "yes" or "no," as the case might be. As the shooting still continued she would go to the sash door and look out for a moment, and then return saying, "Oh, that Joe Lewis is doing all this." Several times this wretch looked in at the window, but when she would ask, "What do you want, Joe?" he would turn away. Some of the children called to her that Mr. Rogers was running toward the house, pursued by a party of Indians. She went to the door to let him in, but before she could do so he sprang against it, breaking some of the glass. She opened it as soon as she could and let him in, and then closed and bolted it in the face of his pursuers.
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He had been shot through the wrist, and was also wounded in the head by a blow from a tomahawk.
The schoolteacher had by this time come to the outside door, which was locked, and Mrs. Whitman motioned to him to go back. He did so and had reached the foot of the stairway leading to the schoolroom, when he was attacked by an Indian with a knife-probably one of those the butchers had been using. He grappled with his assailant, and was making a brave struggle for his life, when a second Indian joined the first, and he was quickly overpowered and killed. Mrs. Whitman and Catherine Sager were watching this deadly struggle from the window, when a bullet came crashing through the glass and struck Mrs. Whitman in the shoulder. Clasping her hand over the wound, she staggered to the room where her husband lay, and fell beside him. "I ran to her and tried to raise her up," Mrs. Pringle-who was Catherine Sager-says, "but she said, 'Child, you cannot help me; save yourself.' We all crowded about her and began to weep. She commenced praying for us : 'Lord save these little ones.' She repeated this many times. She also prayed for her parents, saying, 'This will kill my poor mother.'"
The frightened women now retreated to the upper floor, accompanied by the children, and Mr. Rogers helped Mrs. Whitman to her feet, and up the stairway to the hospital room, where she was laid alongside little Helen Mar Meek and two other sick children. Rogers knelt by the bedside and began to pray. The shooting by this time had ceased, but the crashing of breaking doors and windows gave notice to the trembling occupants of the sick room that their time had probably come. Kimball seized a broken gun with his unwounded hand, and taking his stand at the head
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of the stairway threatened to shoot the first Indians who would attempt to ascend it. The cowardly wretches retired for a time, and after consulting together, one of them ad- vanced toward the foot of the steps and said he had just arrived and would save them all if they would come down. "I told mother," says Mrs Pringle, "that I had seen this Indian killing the schoolteacher, but she thought I must be mistaken. Then he said they were going to burn the house and we must leave it. I wrapped my little sister up and handed her to him, with the request that he would carry her. He said they would take Mrs. Whitman away, and then come back for us. Then all left save the children and Mr. Kimball. When they reached the room below mother was laid upon a settee and carried out into the yard, by Mr. Rogers and Joe Lewis. Having reached the yard, Joe dropped his end of the settee, and a volley of bullets laid Mr. Rogers, mother and brother Francis bleeding and dying on the ground. While the Indians were holding a council to decide how to get Mrs. Whitman and Mr. Rogers into their hands, Joe Lewis had been sent to the schoolroom to get the schoolchildren. They had hid in the attic, but were ferreted out and brought to the kitchen, where they were placed in a row to be shot. But the chief relented, and said they should not be hurt; but my brother Francis was killed soon after."
The dropping of the settee with the wounded woman upon it, by the inhuman half-breed, had apparently been the signal for the final and most murderous volley. Three persons had been killed or mortally wounded by it-a man, a noble self-sacrificing heroic woman, and a harmless orphan boy, not yet twelve years of age, who had already done and suffered much in his short span of life.
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The butchery for that day was now finished. All the grown men about the place except two, who were too sick to leave their beds, were either dead or wounded, or had escaped. These two and one other would be slaughtered later. Nine persons in all were dead-the doctor and Mrs. Whitman, John and Francis Sager, Rogers, the assistant who had been shot while helping to carry Mrs. Whitman out of the building,* and the wounded Kimball would die a few hours later, and three others including the two sick men, Sales and Bewley, would be butchered before the savage ferocity of their murderers was satisfied.
A man named Hall, who with his wife and five daughters, the oldest a girl of ten and the youngest an infant, were win- tering at the station, fled as soon as the shooting began, and carried the news of the massacre to Fort Walla Walla. He appears to have been crazed with fear, and to have thought only of saving himself. After securing some food at the fort he resumed his journey to the Willamette, and is supposed to have been drowned some days later near the Des Chutes River. Mr. and Mrs. Osborne, both of whom were sick, managed to conceal themselves and their three children beneath the floor during the day, and at night made their escape. About three miles from the mission they hid them- selves in the bushes until the next night, when, after traveling about five miles, Mrs. Osborne gave up and could go no further. Taking one of the children Mr. Osborne made his way to the fort, from which men and horses were promptly sent to Mrs. Osborne's rescue.
On learning what had happened, McBean, the chief trader in charge, sent his interpreter, and his Indian wife,
* This was not the Cornelius Rogers who was earlier employed both at Waiilatpu and Lapwai.
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accompanied by another Indian, to the mission "to tell the Chief, Telequiet," as he says, "that his young men had already gone too far by killing Dr. Whitman and his wife, and the rest; that they had acted a cruel and cowardly part, and that I wanted him to spare the poor women and children. When my messenger arrived, Indian women, armed with knives and other implements of war, were already assembled near where the captives were, awaiting the order of the Chief, Telequiet, who was present. On being informed of my request, he hung down his head and paused; then with a wave of his hand preemptorily ordered the women away- these abusing him and calling him a coward." These mes- sengers evidently arrived none too soon, for Mrs. Pringle says their arrival was very opportune. Apparently it saved the schoolchildren, who were already prepared for the slaughter, from their fate.
The slaughter seems to have begun some time in the after- noon; it was not finished until evening, and then the mur- derers seemed to be reluctant to quit their bloody work. All the men then about the station were either dead or mortally wounded. Their families were in the various buildings which they had been occupying. The sick and the orphan children, who had been Mrs. Whitman's special care, were huddled together in the hospital room, and the wounded Kimball was with them. As night came on their terrors increased. During the day they had been too much excited by the shooting, by the comings and goings of the Indians and the savage half-breed who had been their willing messenger, by the murders which had been committed before their eyes, by caring for the wounded, and by the momentary expectation of their own slaughter, to take note of the passing of time. But now that the terrifying noises
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were no longer heard, and the darkness began to gather about them, the horror of their situation more completely enveloped and appalled them.
The Indians did not early leave the place and return to their own homes. They seemed to be doubting and delib- erating what to do next. Their coward hearts forbade them to do what they most wished to do. The alarmed watchers could hear them coming and going and consulting together. Finally they began to break down the doors and windows, destroy the furniture, and pile the splintered re- mains of it together upon the floors. Occasionally the watchers heard talk of fire, and from the noise made in the preparations, they knew that they were arranging to burn the building. "We now thought," says Mrs. Pringle, "that we were to be burned alive in the ruins of our home, but strange to say I experienced a feeling of relief at the thought. Anything rather than meet again those fierce savages with their knives."
But they listened in vain for the kindling flames. Finally they heard one of the Indians addressing the others. The speech continued for some time and then all was still. They had evidently left the premises. Three of the children were very sick. Their clothing was wet with blood, from lying on the bed with Mrs. Whitman after she was wounded. They had no fire or light. "I tried to put the children to sleep," says Mrs. Pringle, "reasoning with myself that if we could lose consciousness in slumber, the roof of the burn- ing house would fall upon us and we would not know it." "The sick children were suffering for water, and begged for it continually. A cupful had been brought in, the night previous, for one of the sick, and search was made for it, but in the darkness it was overturned. The disappointment
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only seemed to increase their thirst. The pitcher which Mrs. Whitman had brought for Kimball still stood on the floor beside him, but he said the water was bloody and not fit to drink. As the hours dragged slowly along, the children, one after another, forgot their thirst and their terrors, and fell asleep. Finally only Kimball and I re- mained awake. I sat upon the side of the bed," she says, "watching hour after hour while the horrors of the day passed and repassed before my mind. I had always been much afraid of the dark, but now I felt that it was a protection to us, and I dreaded the coming of the daylight. Again I would think, with a shudder, of the dead who were lying in the room below. I remember yet how terrible the striking of the clock sounded."
The wounded schoolteacher, Rogers, still lay on the ground outside and the terrified watchers could occasionally hear him praying: "Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly." He often repeated this until his voice failed, and they knew he was dead.
While it was still dark some of the sick children awoke and renewed their piteous appeals for water. As all was now quiet below, Kimball told Catherine Sager that if she would tear up one of the sheets and help him to bandage his wounded arm he would try and get them some. She hesitated at first, saying that "mother would not like to have the sheets torn." But he replied, "Poor child, do you not know that your mother is dead, and will never have any more use for the sheets ?" With some difficulty his arm was bound up, and a blanket was tied over his shoulders, as he was afraid that he might faint when he got outside and suffer from the cold while unconscious. Being thus prepared he took the pitcher and went downstairs. They waited long
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for him but he did not return. They never saw him again alive.
When morning dawned the Indians began to return. They searched through the buildings for Hall and Osborne, who had escaped, and not being able to find them they went to the kitchen and prepared themselves breakfast, from the food they found there. After a time they sent Joe Lewis with several Indians to induce the women and children above stairs to come down, pretending that they were going to take them to the fort, as soon as a team could be got ready. They asked what made the children cry, and when told that they were hungry and wanted water, one of them went for water and one for food. But the supply they brought was so small that the children were not satisfied and begged for more, but the Indians seemed to think they had done enough for them and refused to exert themselves further. Finally the party were made ready and taken downstairs. The bodies of the dead lay all about them. That of John Sager, who had been one of the first killed, still lay on the kitchen floor where he had fallen, and that of his brother Francis, and Mr. Rogers just outside. Dr. Whitman's was in the sitting room. The Indians had spread blankets or quilts taken from the beds over most of these. One of the little children lifted the quilt from Dr. Whitman's face and said, "Oh, girls, come and see father!" Some of them did so and saw a sight which they never afterwards forgot. The face had been brutally mutilated with a tomahawk. Father Brouillet says there were three deep wounds in it.
No attempt was made during that day by the Indians to move or bury any of these bodies. The women and children were compelled to pass by, and sometimes over them, as they were removed to one of the smaller mission houses,
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which was to be their prison for some days to come. No preparation was made to take them to the fort. There was no intention of taking them there.
On the morning of the second day after the massacre Father Brouillet appeared. He had left Umatilla on the morning following Dr. Whitman's departure, on a mission to the various Indian tribes. At Fort Walla Walla he learned of the massacre and hastened to Waiilatpu. Before reach- ing the mission he was asked to visit some children who were sick, and did so, baptizing three of them. For this he was very severely censured, in after years, by Mr. Spalding, who charged that "he had baptized the children of the murderers whose hands were still wet with blood of their victims," before he had made any effort to ascertain whether he could be of service, either to the living or dead, at the scene of the massacre. It has been claimed in his defense that it was his duty, as a priest, to minister to the dying before attending to the dead.
On arriving at the scene of the massacre he found that Joe Stansfield was already preparing a grave. Many Indians were gathered about, some of whom still had arms in their hands, and regarded him with no evidence of favor. None of them offered help to bury their victims, or prepare them for burial. Nor did he attempt to encourage them to render any. He was content if they would leave him alive until the work could be completed.
Stansfield, assisted by the priest, finished the grave during the afternoon. It was about three feet deep, and wide enough to contain the eleven bodies, Mr. Pringle says. Then the priest, with this one assistant, collected the bodies and placed them side by side, unshrouded and coffinless, in the grave they had prepared, and covered them over. During
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the whole time they were at work Father Brouillet says he watched the Indians with anxious eyes, not knowing what minute he might be struck down, and laid beside those for whom he was now piously performing the last services which one human being can render to his kind. They did not molest him, however, nor did they help him until his work was completed and he rode away.
Some months later the soldiers found that wolves had dug up some of these bodies and devoured them. They gathered up the bleaching bones again and replaced them in the earth, and sixty years later the place was suitably and appropriately marked with a monument.
So Marcus Whitman and his heroic wife died and were buried. After sacrificing home and friends, to live among savages; after leading the way across a continent, and brav- ing the terrors of a wilderness which women, and men with women had never before invaded; after spending eleven years in an almost hopeless effort to reclaim the savage, to teach him to live better and be better than he was, offering him peace and good will, and health and abundance in place of war, savagery, sickness and starvation; and often receiv- ing little in return except insolence and abuse, which they bore patiently, following the example of Him who when he was reviled, reviled not again, they were murderously struck down on their own threshold and under the roof which their own hands had raised, by the inhuman wretches for whom they had done most and suffered most.
Behold a sower went forth to sow, hoping in time for the harvest. And some of the seed fell in stony places, where they had not much earth; and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth; and when the sun was up they were scorched; and because they had no root
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they withered away. So these missionaries sowed, hoping for a harvest that was not to be in their time. The seed they sowed fell in stony places indeed, and though giving some promise for a time it turned to ashes in their sight. Had they sown dragon's teeth the result could not have been more disappointing. But their sowing was not altogether fruit- less. Something of the good work they did remained. The processes of civilization are slow, and they are not to be changed either by the most painstaking efforts or the blunders of men. Some part of every good work done will always remain. Neither the storms of time nor the fury and savagery of ignorance and superstition can completely prevail against it. Something from every sowing falls into good ground and, in the fullness of time, brings forth fruit, some thirty, some sixty, and some an hundred fold.
CHAPTER XXIX. THE RESCUE.
A S SOON as the first frenzied messenger reached Fort Walla Walla with news of the massacre, McBean, the trader in charge, began to make preparations to send news of it to Fort Vancou- ver. He had only five men with him at the time, and one of these, his interpreter, he immediately sent to Waiilatpu to do what could be done to put an end to the bloody work going on there. Before the evening of the 30th he had dis- patched a boat down the river with a letter to Chief Factor Douglas, in which the story of the massacre was briefly told. Fortunately that experienced traveler and trader, Peter Skeen Ogden, was at Vancouver when the startling news arrived. He, better than all the other agents of the Hudson's Bay Company, knew the various tribes on the upper Columbia, and he knew how to reach them most quickly. He knew also what would most need to be done to secure the release of such of the residents at the mission as yet remained alive. They could be bought, if their release could be secured at all, and a supply of such goods as was most likely to prove effective for their purchase was immediately made ready, and by the 7th of December his swiftest boat, manned by sixteen paddlers, was ready to set out on its journey up the river.
Dr. McLoughlin was no longer in charge at Fort Vancou- ver. He had resigned a little more than two years earlier, and retired to his claim in Oregon City. Chief Factor Doug- las was now at the head of all the Hudson's Bay interests on the Pacific Coast. Before Ogden departed Douglas and he had sent a letter to the provisional government at Oregon City, and to the main office of the American Board of Com- missioners for Foreign Missions in Boston, in which after stating what had happened at Waiilatpu they said :
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