USA > Washington > History of Washington; the rise and progress of an American state, Vol. III > Part 29
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Only two of the attacking party were wounded during this encounter-the guide Burge, and one soldier. What the Indians suffered was never known.
On the day following Hays and Slaughter, with their own and part of Wallace's command, attacked and dispersed a small party of hostiles on the upper Puyallup. Most of them fled early in the fight, but a few took post behind rocks and logs, and killed one of the regulars and wounded four others.
In reporting these engagements Captain Maloney paid a high compliment to the volunteers. A better company than that of Captain Hays, he said, could not be brought into the field, to act against Indians. "I have always found them ready and active at any moment, and they have my most hearty thanks, both officers and men."
Many of the settlers had, by this time, abandoned their homes and taken refuge in the towns, at the Hudson's Bay post at Nisqually, or at Fort Steilacoom. "I have nearly all the women and children in the country at this post," wrote Lieutenant Nugen to Governor Mason on November Ist, "and of course will protect them." Some who were too far away from these places of refuge to remove thither, built blockhouses of their own, and prepared to defend them- selves as best they could, should emergency require. Where three or four families were living near enough together, they all removed to the premises of that one whose place was most easily defensible, and there built a house of rough logs,
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with the upper story projecting about a foot beyond the walls of the lower on every side. In a shelter of this kind, the inmates could easily prevent the Indians from piling brush or other inflammable material against it and setting it on fire. The doors were made of heavy planks, and there were but few windows. The portholes left here and there in every side, through which rifles might be aimed at the foe, were sufficient for light and air. No less than twenty-three of these blockhouses were built by the settlers during the war, while thirty-five blockhouses and stockades were built by the volunteers, and a few by the regulars. Some of these were stockaded, enclosing a considerable area outside the buildings. The one at Olympia enclosed about two squares, and those in other towns were sometimes large enough to include several buildings, and in these the families of many of the volunteers found protection while the war lasted.
On October 22d, becoming convinced that it was more prudent to be too well, rather than not well enough, prepared for what might happen, Governor Mason called for four additional companies of volunteers, to be used as a reserve, but subject to be called into active service whenever occasion should require. These were promptly filled. By the time the legislature met early in December, ten companies, amounting in all to 700 men, had enlisted, about 500 of whom were mounted. In addition a small company of rangers had been raised at the Cowlitz farms station of the Hudson's Bay Company, and although not regularly mustered, were reported to be ready for any service required of them.
But the lack of arms was now more seriously felt than before. There was no lack of brave hearts and hands to use them, but all the guns had been secured from the forts, and from the Decatur and Davis, that could be spared, and
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there was no other source of supply nearer than the military supply station at Benicia in California, unless possibly some might be obtained at Victoria. Not doubting that Governor Douglass would furnish what he could, application was made to him for arms and ammunition, and he was also requested to send one of the Hudson's Bay Company steamers to the Sound, because of the effect it would have on the hostiles, if they were thus shown that their old friends were supporting the settlers. The governor responded promptly and gener- ously, sending half of all the guns on the island, and promising to send the Beaver or Otter, whichever should return first to Victoria, to cruise in the Sound as Governor Mason had requested. The supply of arms amounted to only fifty muskets, but it was very helpful in equipping the companies as they reported, and the readiness with which they were furnished, gave assurance of the moral as well as material support of the Hudson's Bay people, and this was a matter of no small importance.
An adjutant, and a commissary and quartermaster-general now became necessary, and James Tilton, the surveyor- general, was appointed to the former position. The war had broken up his surveying parties, and practically sus- pended the business of his office, and, as he had seen service during the Mexican war, he was admirably fitted for the place thus offered. When the legislature met it was asked to provide for the latter office, and W. W. Miller was named. This position was one of no small difficulty. It was not only necessary to provide food, clothing, ammunition and shelter for the seven hundred men in the field, and deliver it at their several camps, but the families of many of the volunteers must also be looked after, and the Indians who had been disarmed and sent to the camps provided for them on the
GEN. WILLIAM WINLOCK MILLER.
A native of Kentucky. His boyhood was spent in Missouri and Illinois. He came to Washington in 1852, under appointment as surveyor of customs, and was stationed for a time at Fort Nisqually, and afterwards at Olympia. At the outbreak of the Indian war he was appointed quartermaster-general, and managed that department so successfully as to win high praise from Governor Stevens. He married a daughter of Judge O. B. McFadden, and resided at Olympia during the remainder of his life. He was successful as a business man, and prominent in all the leading enter- prises of the settlers during his lifetime.
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islands, or in other places where they would be least likely to be visited by the hostiles, required to be fed. To procure supplies in any quantity, in the scattered and demoralized settlements, was difficult. Most of the settlers had been driven from their homes before their crops were gathered, and where they had been gathered the Indians sometimes seized them, or burned the building in which they were stored. Their cattle were scattered, and at most they had but few to spare. In such a condition the Puget Sound Agricultural Company's farms at the Cowlitz and Nisqually, and the Hudson's Bay Company's storehouses at Victoria must be, and were, the main reliance of the commissary and quartermaster's department. They were liberally drawn upon and, so far as they were able, furnished what was asked of them, at prices not then or since considered unreasonable. As payment could not be made in cash, and as the governor was not authorized to give drafts on the national treasury, and as it was evident that the territory was not then, nor soon likely to be, able to pay, this was done at some risk-a risk which a foreign corporation, doing business amid sur- roundings which it had long had reason to know were unfriendly, might well have refused to assume. But as the responsible head of that Company on the coast, Governor Douglass never hesitated to make advances when called upon, and when he could not accept the guaranty of payment offered, as an officer of the Company, he purchased the sup- plies called for with his own funds and sent them forward. The risk he thus personally assumed amounted at one time to $5,000. Considering the unfriendly relations that had begun in the attempts of the settlers to locate claims on lands which the Company had improved, and which it ex- pected to hold under the treaty, until paid for; the uncertainty
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that the claims for goods furnished would ever be rec- ognized by the national government, and the further fact that a well-defined difference of opinion between Governors Stevens and Douglass in regard to the San Juan boundary had already been disclosed, the magnanimous conduct of Governor Douglass in this emergency deserves the highest praise, and the people of Washington will be ungrateful if they ever fail to recognize and remember it.
And it was not only difficult to get supplies; it was equally difficult to deliver them to the many points where they were needed. There were but few roads, and none of these had been much improved. In many cases supplies had to be delivered at places where no roads existed, as in the Sno- qualmie Valley, where the northern batallion under Major Van Bokkelin built four blockhouses; on Black River, and Muckleshoot Prairie, on the Nisqually near the Michel, and to Colonel Shaw's command at Walla Walla and in the Grand Ronde Valley. Teams and wagons were not numerous; to get them at all it was often necessary to impress those which the settlers had urgent need of, to prepare the ground and plant the crops that would be required to support their families, and their defenders. But somehow the supplies needed were always regularly delivered, and the volunteers were never allowed to go hungry. Both the adjutant- general's and the quartermaster's departments were so well managed during the war, that Governor Stevens paid their chiefs the very highest compliments at its close, saying of General Miller that "he imparted extraordinary efficiency to his department, the most difficult of all," and that his management "had reflected the highest capacity, and devotion to the public service upon its chief and subordinate officers."
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After the skirmish at Green River on November 6th, and . the scout up the Puyallup on the day following, Captain Maloney withdrew from the Puyallup Valley, and estab- lished a camp on John Montgomery's ranch, about two miles east of Spanaway Lake, where Fort Hicks was sub- sequently built, and this became one of the general supply stations during the remainder of the war. A good road was opened to it from Olympia, by way of Tenalquot and Yelm prairies, and it was easily reached from Forts Nisqually and Steilacoom. It was within striking distance of the favorite resorts of the Indians on the Puyallup, White and Green rivers, and, as the Indians were now thought to have broken up into small marauding parties, which would require to be hunted down and attacked wherever they reappeared, this was deemed to be a desirable point from which to dispatch forces as they would be required for that purpose.
Early in November General Wool arrived at Fort Vancou- ver, bringing with him from California one company of artillery, under command of Captain E. D. Keyes, after- wards famous as a major-general in the Army of the Poto- mac, a company of dragoons from southern Oregon, where they were quite as badly needed as on the Columbia, and two thousand stands of arms. This addition to the defenses of the territories would have done much to encourage the settlers, if Wool had permitted them to be used as they might have been. But, strange to say, in view of the distance from which he had brought them, he found no better employment for most of the troops than to send them into winter quarters. He arrived at Vancouver about the time that Rains returned to the Dalles from his fruitless expedition to the Yakima- a time when a vigorous commander would have used every resource to retrieve what had been lost, and if possible
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strike a blow that would end the campaign with credit. But Wool had no such purpose in view. He had no heart for the war. He persisted in believing that the settlers were the aggressors, and pretended to believe that they had brought on the war for the sole purpose of speculation. He pro- fessed to believe that he had no need for help from the volunteers, and that the regulars were abundantly able to control the situation, if allowed to manage it in their own way. He reproved Rains for asking assistance, and refused to recognize the volunteers, or to furnish them arms or subsistence, except where circumstances actually forced him to do so. He would have nothing to do with the com- pany which Shaw had raised by order of Governor Mason, and marched to Vancouver, to go to the rescue of Governor Stevens; refused to provide them with arms or supplies, and left them to disband for want of them, and yet at the same time he hurriedly sent to Washington for another regiment of regulars to come to his assistance.
If he had any plan at all for conducting the war, it was formed so far as possible to avoid doing anything that either Governor Stevens or Governor Curry had recom- mended, or thought advisable. Seemingly the only purpose he had in view was to keep the hostiles east of the mountains from invading the settlements on their western side. He did not believe a winter campaign practicable-perhaps for the reason that he was unfamiliar with our climate, and sup- posed it more severe than it is. Even when the Oregon volunteers were preparing to march to the Walla Walla country, after their return from the Yakima, and asked him to loan them two howitzers and men to handle them, he allowed Rains to refuse them. A few days later when a messenger brought the news to Rains' camp that Kelley and
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his brave volunteers had begun the battle on the Walla Walla, and had already had one day of hard fighting, no support was sent them, and the order withdrawing Rains and his regulars to Vancouver was carried out, as though there was no need for them elsewhere. It is even reported that they and the messenger who brought the news of Kelly's almost desperate situation, came down the river to Vancouver by the same boat.
Captain Keyes and his company were now sent to Fort Steilacoom, which was as comfortable a place as Fort Van- couver, and he took command there on November 28th. Though thoroughly imbued with his commander's views in regard to the causes of the war, and the manner in which it ought to be conducted, he did not entirely suspend the opera- tions then in progress, although he displayed no vigor, and as soon as he conveniently could do so, gave notice to the governor that he could furnish no supplies to the volunteers, or recognize them in any way, after the term for which they had been enlisted had expired. As the Washington com- panies, the earliest raised, had been mustered into the service of the United States for three months, he was compelled to recognize and make use of them during that time.
Events soon began to show that he might soon have urgent need for them, as indeed he did. The Indians who had scattered into small bands after the fighting on the White and Green rivers, so as to more readily secure subsistence, now began to show signs of reassembling. There was evidence also that their strength had been recruited by accessions from the tribes east of the mountains. Dr. Tolmie had reported to Nugen, two or three weeks earlier, that a band of twenty Klikitats had been seen on the prairie south of Fort Steila- coom. Early in December he applied to Keyes himself for
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a guard for Fort Nisqually, and it was not likely that he would need a guard to protect him against the Indians among whom he had so long lived in peace. But Keyes did not seem to think these indications alarming.
Soon after assuming command he sent Hays, with his company, to make a scout along the Nisqually toward its upper waters, and dispatched Slaughter with his company of regulars, and part of Wallace's Steilacoom volunteers, on an expedition through the Stuck Valley to the junction of White and Green rivers, the object of which has never clearly appeared. Possibly Slaughter knew of some Indian camp in the neighborhood, and wished to break it up and disperse it. Possibly he wished to punish the murderers of the White River settlers, as he knew they lived in that neighborhood. Keyes had visited him at his camp on the Puyallup just before he started, and although their conver- sation had been brief, and carried on under some difficulties, as Keyes was not able to cross the river which was then running bank full, it is quite possible that Slaughter suggested the expedition, and obtained permission to make it.
He left his camp that afternoon and moved down the Puyallup toward the Stuck. On the following morning, which was Sunday, Lieutenant McCaw, with sixteen men from Wallace's company, was sent forward to the vicinity of the village of Sumner of the present day, where they found that the houses of Kincaid, Woolery, and McCarthy had been burned by the Indians, while several other houses in the neighborhood had been pillaged, though not burned. All that night the camp was surrounded by Indians, who made several attempts to stampede the horses. The camp was enveloped in a thick fog, making it impossible for the guards to see each other, or the lurking Indians, and while they
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occasionally discharged their rifles in the direction in which they heard some prowler moving, they inflicted no injury so far as known. On the following morning E. G. Price, one of the volunteers, who had gone down to the river bank to wash, was shot and slightly wounded. Some of the Indians say this shot was fired by Leschi.
They tell this story to show how this chief demonstrated his ability as a marksman, and also proved his right to com- mand. For a considerable time after the hostiles from the several tribes had assembled in one camp on White River, there was more or less controversy as to who was really the great chief. Some of those who claimed this distinction were very boastful, as Indians usually are, and told frequently of their great bravery, and of their ability to do this or that that would distinguish them in war. Kitsap, or possibly Kanasket, was fond of bragging about his great skill as a marksman, and often urged this as a reason why he should be given the chief authority. Leschi listened to these vain boastings with much patience for a time, but finally resolved to put the boaster to the test. "Come," he said, "let us see whether you can shoot better than I can." It was evening, and the moon was shining brightly enough to make it possible to distinguish objects at a considerable distance. Taking his gun he withdrew the wooden ramrod, and walking out of the tepee he struck it in the ground at a distance as far away as it could be seen, and called upon the boaster to shoot at it. He did so, but while he hit it, it was only with a glancing blow that scarcely left a mark upon it. Leschi then took his place and fired, cutting the rod in two. From that time forward there was less boasting in the Indian camp about skill with the rifle. The Indians claim that Leschi shot at Price
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to show his warriors that they ought to be better marks- men.
On Monday night the camp on the Stuck was again envel- oped in fog and, as on the preceding evening, was surrounded by Indians soon after dark. During the day Lieutenant McKeever, with twenty-five men, had come up, and the Indians seemed also to have been reinforced. They were bolder in their movements than on the night before. The guard was strengthened, and shots were exchanged early, and continued more or less frequently during the whole night. The Indians could often be plainly heard encouraging each other to the attack, but none of them could be seen. The soldiers fired in the direction from which their voices seemed to come, but their firing seemed to have no effect, save that the Indians were admonished by it that their enemy was awake and ready for an attack. In the morning it was found that one Indian had been killed, but his companions had succeeded in running off 32 horses and mules belonging to their enemies, a loss which at that time was severely felt. It was subsequently learned that fully 300 Indians were engaged in this attack, mostly Nisquallies under Quiemuth and Kitsap, and Klikitats under Kanasket.
The command was now gradually advanced along the Stuck toward the White River, which was reached on Tues- day, December 4th. Lieutenant Slaughter, with the advance, pushed on to Captain Hewitt's camp, which was still on or near the ground where the massacre had occurred more than a month earlier. That evening while sitting in the cabin once occupied by the Brannan family, but now abandoned, Lieutenant Slaughter was shot by an Indian and instantly killed. He was conversing at the moment with Captain Hewitt, Lieutenant Harrison, of the revenue cutter Jefferson
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Davis, and Dr. Tyler, surgeon of the Decatur, who had accompanied the expedition. The cabin door was open. A fire was blazing brightly just outside, making each member of the party a shining mark for an Indian bullet. It was not suspected that any Indians were in the vicinity, but a number had crept near enough for one of them to fire this fatal shot. Slaughter fell dead without a groan. The rest of the camp immediately prepared for defense, and another battle in the darkness was fought, which continued for several hours, during which Corporal Barry of the regulars, and Corporal Clarendon of Wallace's company were killed, and six soldiers were wounded, one of them mortally.
Lieutenant Slaughter's death was universally regretted, not only by the regular soldiers, but by the volunteers and citizens generally among whom he had a wide acquaintance. He was only 28 years old, and was a man of promise. A native of Kentucky, he had been appointed to West Point from Indiana, his family then residing near La Fayette in that State. On graduation he was assigned to the 4th infantry, in which General Grant was then a first lieutenant, and sent to California. He was seven months on the voyage, and was seasick every moment of that time. On reaching the coast he found an order awaiting him directing his return, on account of a mistake in his assignment. He was again returned to the coast after reaching New York, and Grant found him at Panama, in 1852, as seasick as he had ever been. About one-third of all the people who crossed the isthmus that year died of cholera, but poor Slaughter, who had been sick so long and suffered so much, escaped it. He told Grant lugubriously, that he often wished he had taken his father's advice, and joined the navy instead of the army, for then probably he would not have had to go to sea so much.
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Although his career in the army was brief, it gave promise that he would ultimately have achieved distinction, had he been permitted to live. He had already shown that he pos- sessed most of the great soldierly qualities-courage, tact, sound judgment, and energy, while his personal worth was such as to endear him to all who met him. He was buried at Steilacoom with military and masonic honors.
No effort was made to pursue the Indians farther, after Slaughter's death, or to inflict any punishment upon them. Keyes occupied himself with writing discouraging letters to Governor Mason in regard to the flooded rivers, his broken- down animals, the difficulties of campaigning under such conditions, and reminding him that he could only with great difficulty supply the volunteers with what they required, and would be wholly unable to make any use of them after their term of enlistment expired, though if they were retained on duty he would be glad to act in concert with them. In all this he no doubt reflected the views of his superior officer, General Wool, rather than his own.
For a month the Indians made no hostile demonstrations, when the news was hurriedly sent from Olympia to Fort Steilacoom that Leschi, with a force of thirty-eight hostiles, was visiting the reserve camp on Fox Island, where they had taken the agent, John Swan, prisoner, and were holding him as a hostage, while they were endeavoring to persuade their acquaintances among the able-bodied Indians in camp, to take the war path. If successful here, it was feared that he intended also to visit another camp of friendly Indians on Squaxon Island. The same messenger also brought news that another body of hostiles, probably Klikitats, and num- bering a hundred warriers, had been seen on the prairie near Fort Nisqually.
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