USA > Washington > Spokane County > Spokane > History of the city of Spokane and Spokane County, Washington : from its earliest settlement to the present time, Volume I > Part 35
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The first steamboat to run the Columbia above the international boundary was built by Captain Lew White where the town of Marens now stands. It was chris- tened the "Forty-Nine," and Miss Christina MeDonald and Miss Mary L. Brown drove the first nails. It was launched November 18, 1865. and made its first run about April. 1866, with Lew White as captain, Wesley Briggs purser, A. C. Pingstone mate, and Wash. Eldridge engineer.
The first annual statement of the treasurer of Spokane county, as shown by the records, is as follows:
PINKNEV Crrv, W. T., January 1, 1863.
To amount received
$2,587.58
Paid out:
By county orders redeemed $1.881.98
By cash, school fund, 1861 277.02
By cash, school fund, 1862 122.26
By cash, territorial fund, 1861 106.01
By cash, territorial fund, 1862 56.22
By cash, war fund 50.00
Fees, R. H. Douglass 8.12
Fees, for disbursing
85.18
By Cash
.79 $2,587.58
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SPOKANE AND THE INLAND EMPIRE
Under date of December 28, 1862. Mr. Winans' journal contains this entry : "E. F. Smith, my employer, started below, with $22,000 in gold dust, accompanied by James Monaghan, Pucket and Lieut. Hoadley." And January 2, 1863: "Con- ner's mule train got in with goods from Wallula, 13.000 pounds of bacon, sugar, etc., thirty-six days since he started for the goods. Paid freight bill on same, $1,950."
"On May 26. 1863, at the upper Palouse camp." writes Mr. Winans, "there were stolen from Ferguson & Co., nine mules. The teams to which these animals belonged were en route to Colville with goods. The mules were driven towards British Columbia, crossed the Columbia at Dancing Bill ferry, and thence up the Okanogan to British Columbia. Francis Wolff accepted an offer of $500 for the return of the mules. At the boundary line he struck their trail. and changing horses several times with the Indians, he overtook the thieves, and watching his opportunity at night. about ten miles this side of Nicholas lake. B. C., he recov- cred the mules, leaving the thieves afoot. He drove the mules to Colville, arriving June 15, 1863, about twenty days after they were stolen. he living most of that time on suckers bought from the Indians. The thieves were W. Page, an Eng- lishman with pock marks, Louis Williams, or 'Nigger Louie,' and John Wagoner, or 'Dutch John.' Afterwards, in 1864. Page was concerned in the Magruder murder, and killed at Lewiston. Wagoner, with a partner, held up a wagon train near Boise: the partner was killed, he was caught and hung. I have no record of what became of 'Nigger Louie,' but Ben Burgunder says he was living at one time with the Indians at Kamloops. B. C."
By act of January 30, 1863, the legislature cut off from Walla Walla county the territory lying between the international boundary on the north and the Wenat- chee river on the south, and the Columbia river on the east and the Cascade moun- tains on the west, and named it Stevens county. W. B. Yantis was named as sheriff and Charles H. Campfield auditor. The county seat was "temporarily" located at "Il. E. Young's store." "No attempt was made to organize the county of Stevens at 11. E. Young's store," says Mr. Winans, "for it was so temporary that it remained within its proposed boundaries but a few months. The officials named, being miners, were on the move hunting new diggings, the claims they abandoned being occupied by hundreds of Chinamen, who were apparently making good wages and paying no taxes."
It is Mr. Winans' recollection of the discussion of this question that the principal reason advanced for the annexation of Stevens to Spokane was the need of control of both sides of the Columbia, to prevent evasion of head tax by Chinese shifting from one side of the river to the other. "Our representative evidently tried to fol- low out his instructions, but in his endeavors to have Stevens county attached to Spokane, the legislature reversed him, for the act of January 19, 1861. attached Spokane to Stevens, but the officers of Spokane were made the officials of Stevens."
Dr. Tobey secured the passage of an "Act to protect free white labor from com- petition of Chinamen." levying a quarterly tax of $6, the sheriff to have 25 per cent, the remainder to be divided equally between the county and the territory. Under this act there was paid the treasurer of Stevens county $2.910 in 1861. $1.512 in 1865, and $3,076 in 1866. Explanatory of the small collections of 1865, it is recalled that bogus collectors, impersonating the sheriff and his deputies, went
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among the confiding Chinese and collected several hundred dollars of the tax. The law was repealed in 1869.
At the election, July 13, 1863, for delegate to congress, the vote of Stevens county was: Cole 56, Turney 22, Raynor 11, Richardson 2.
The following entries are taken from the Winans diary :
"July 26. 1863. Received news today of the battles and victories of Gettysburg and Vieksburg, of July 4, only twenty-two days. Very quick time."
"August 17, 1863. Very hard frost last night; killed the potato and squash vines : also the wheat and oats were rendered valueless."
"September 8, 1863. Mareus Oppenheimer and W. V. Brown took possession of some of the buildings of the British Boundary Commission, abandoned last year by Col. Hawkins and the sappers and miners."
Brown died some years before Oppenheimer. The latter filed a homestead on the place, and the town of Mareus, now on the site, was named for him.
As some confusion arose from the fact that the county seat was ealled Pinkney City, but the postoffice Fort Colville, the name of the county seat was changed to Fort Colville by an act passed January 4, 1868. Seven years later, the little village of Spokane Falls, ambitious to become the seat of government, made an audacious effort to take the county seat from Colville. An aet was actually passed, November 5. 1875. loeating the county seat at Spokane, and dirceting "that on or before May 1, 1876, the county commissioners shall remove all records to that place." "The county commissioners did not permit an act of the legislature to override their per- sonal preferences," observes Mr. Winans, for the county records show that on April 26. 1876, all three commissioners. L. W. Meyers, D. F. Percival and J. La- mona, being present, the question of changing the county seat was discussed, and the majority decided that 'the aet was null and void, because it was an amendment to the aet of 1863, which was repealed by act of 1864, which located the county seat at Colville.' Pereival dissented, but no further action was taken. We think this is the first instance of a board of county commissioners passing on the legality of an act of the legislature and winning out, for the county seat remained at Colville, and is there to this day."
Dismemberment of Stevens county began November 27, 1871, with the cutting away of Whitman county. Then, in chronological order, came the cutting off of Spo- kane. October 30, 1879: Kittitas and Lincoln, November 24, 1883: Adams, Franklin and Douglas. November 28. 1883; Okanogan. February 2. 1888; Ferry. February 21. 1899; and Chelan. March 13. 1899.
The aet creating Whitman county took from Stevens all territory south of a line drawn from White BInffs northeasterly to Lougenbeel creek; thenee by Fifth standard parallel to the Idaho line, and appointed as its first officers: Charles D. Porter. sheriff : James Ewart, auditor, and W. A. Belcher, treasurer.
"The county officials named," says Mr. Winans, "assembled January 1, 1872, and took oath of office in the hewn log house built by J. A. Perkins, being the first house in Colfax. and it still stands in the rear of the present residence of the builder, who not only ereeted the first house, but also assisted in building the first sawmill, and has, during his long residenee in the county, been one of its most efficient, unselfish and leading factors in building up that thriving city and prosperous community."
Speaking of the organization of Whitman county, Captain James Ewart has said: Vol. 1-18
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"At this first meeting the question arose, who would administer the oath of office. No one present was authorized to do so. It happened that Anderson Cox. an officer of the land office at Walla Walla, was in Colfax, and they, making virtue of neces- sity, had him swear in James Ewart as county auditor, and he administered the oath of office to the other officials. A statement of the organization was afterwards made to Judge Kennedy, and he deelared it legal."
We return now to the early history of Spokane and Stevens county. "It was not until after the war that parties divided politically." continues Mr. Winans. "Then for a few years it was Union and Demoeratie parties, but in 1869 five of the seven avowed republicans met in the office of the writer and agreed on a plan of organiza- tion, which was carried into effcet by placing a republican ticket in the field and electing the greater part of it. The seven were Henry Wellington, W. V. Brown, HI. E. Young, F. W. Perkins, George McCrae, S. F. Sherwood and W. P. Winans. For political literature the democrats circulated Briek Pomeroy's Democrat. and the republicans the New York Tribune and Harpers' Weekly."
According to the same authority, the legislative representatives eleeted during the first few years of Spokane-Stevens county are: J. A. Bates, 1861; Charles H. Campfield, 1862. B. F. Yantis, contested. Campfield made no appearance, and Yantis got the seat ; Dr. Isaac L. Tobey, for 1863, reelected for 1861, but resigned. as the pay. $3 a day and mileage in "greenbacks" at 40 cents on the dollar would not cover his expenses and he did not go to Olympia a second time. Win. V. Brown, for 18G5, would not leave his business to go to the capital. J. J. H. Bokkelem for 1866. W. P. Winans for 1867, member of the first biennial session ; Charles H. Montgomery. 1869; W. P. Winans, 1871 ; T. O. Favorite. 1873; R. H. Wimpy, 1875; D. F. Porei- val. 1877 and 1879.
The joint councilmen representing Walla Walla, Spokane, Stevens and other counties for the first few years of organization were: John A. Simms, 1861-2; Dan- iel Stewart, 1863-4; Anderson Cox. 1865-6: B. L. Sharpstein, 1866-7; J. M. Van- sycke, from 1867 to 1870; HF. O. D. Bryant, 1871-2; Charles H. Montgomery, 1873-4.
Under the caption of "Incidents," Mr. Winans records the following:
Before the organization of the county government, gold was dicovered on the Pend d'Oreille river by Joe Morrell in 1851, and in 1855, the news being scattered abroad, quite a number of miners, packers and traders came into the Colville valley among them Francis Wolff, who in 1856 brought the first merchandise on wagons into the valley, starting from The Dalles, going by Walla Walla valley, and erossing Snake river at the mouth of the Palouse by lashing canoes together. After driving across country. he ferried the Spokane in the same way, and passed thenee into the valley by way of Walker's prairie, making the wagon tracks that Major Lougenbeel followed in 1859 when he came to establish the military post.
The discovery of gold, the influx of miners, and the location of the United States military posl called the attention of the territorial legislature to the valley, and on January 11. 1859, an net was passed "Authorizing Edward L. Massey to establish a ferry across Snake river, where the road crosses between Walla Walla and Fort Col- ville." On December 14, 1859, the general government was petitioned to build a wagon road from Seattle, via Snoqualmie pass, to Fort Colville.
In 1859 and 1860 J. R. Bates operated the ferry at the Government crossing on the Spokane river. He sold out to W. J. Terry and William Nixon, and on Septem-
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ber 20, 1860, James Monaghan was employed by them to take charge of it, he at that time being 20 years old. The legislature, on January 11, 1861, granted them a charter to build a bridge. This ferry afterwards became the property of James Monaghan, who built the first bridge in 1865, at this erossing. This bridge after- wards was called Lapray's bridge, Joseph Lapray purchasing it about 1875.
The first bridge built on the Spokane river was above the Mullan road erossing, in 1861, by Tim Lee, Joe Herrin and Ned Jordan. High water in the spring of 1865 took it out, and it was rebuilt by the same persons that year.
The Kootenai mines were discovered in the fall of 1863, and to ascertain if a practical route could be had by water, D. H. Ferguson & Co., in the spring of 1861, bought a canoe, employed Dick Fry, Adam Boyd and Old Piene as guide, provisioned them for six months, and sent them to find a route to the mines. They went up the Columbia river to its headwaters, portaged the eanoe three-fourths of a mile to the Kootenai river, and floated down that stream to the mouth of Wild Horse creek, where the Walla Walla trail erossed the river. They used the eanoe as a ferry boat to cross the miners from the south, en route to the mines.
About 100 miners wintered (1861-65) at Mareus, and in the spring of 1865 started up the Columbia river and prospected the streams emptying into it, and dis- covered the French Creek, or Big Bend mines, in the fall of 1865.
To enable the people of Colville to reach the Kootenai trail with the products of the valley, it was necessary to make a road from Cottonwood ereek, a few miles south of Chewelah, to Peone prairie, a distance of about sixty miles through the timber. The people volunteered the labor, and the merchants, C. H. Montgomery, D. H. Ferguson & Co., and W. P. Winans donated the provisions. The road was laid out by a company, consisting of D. H. Ferguson as commissary, John U. Hofstetter as overseer, and an Indian as guide. The people by the dozens worked there during the summer and fall of 1867, and completed the road so that it has been used ever sinee. In 1871 Chief Engineer Moberly, in charge of the surveying parties of the Canadian Pacific railroad, bought provisions in Colville, and they were packed over this road to Kootenai, British Columbia.
In July, 1881, Captain Hunter, with a detachment of the First cavalry, repaired the road, John U. Hofstetter again overseeing the work. He eamped at the beanti- ful lake on the divide, and on account of the numerous loons, named it Loon lake, by which it is now known.
Immediately following the Wright campaign of 1858, the war department decided to establish a permanent military post in the Spokane country, and in the spring of 1859 four companies of the Ninth U. S. infantry, under Major Pinkney Lougenbeel, were ordered to the Colville valley. The command crossed the Snake river at the mouth of the Palouse. the Spokane at the point now known as the Lapray bridge, and located, June 21, 1859, the military post on the flat near Mill ereck, about three miles from the present town of Colville. A four company post was built of hewn logs. R. H. Douglass and John Nelson had built a sawmill in 1858, at the falls on the ercek about three miles below the site of the fort, and Major Lougenbeel tried to rent it on a basis of $20 per thousand for lumber sawed, he to supply logs and labor. The owners demanded $10, whereupon the Major built a dam half a mile above the post site, put in a sawmill and cut out enough lumber for his own needs.
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then leasing the mill to others, and in this way the settlers were enabled to buy lumber at $10 a thousand.
The same year. says Mr. Winans, the British boundary commission, under Col- onel Hawkins, located their quarters on the south side of the Columbia river, two miles above Kettle Falls, and about fifteen miles from the American post, and built comfortable log houses to shelter his command. The place is now oecu- pied by the town of Marens. On Angust 6. 1861. Captain John G. Parke sold sneh supplies as he had belonging to the American Boundary Commission (the American and British engineers had worked together locating the boundary) and left for the States; and on April 4, 1862, Colonel Hawkins abandoned his building and started for England by way of Walla Walla.
For the historic dates in this chapter, relating to the military occupation of the Colville valley, I am indebted to the valuable journal of Mr. Winans.
On November 17, 1861, Major Lougenbeel was relieved of the command of Fort Colville by Major James F. Curtis. with two companies of the Second Infantry, Cali- fornia Volunteers. One of the first orders issued by Major Curtis dismissed the post sutler, Charles R. Allen. It was terse, emphatic and patriotic: "Sir: You are dis- missed as sutler from this post for your unqualified secession principles."
Some of the California Volunteers were a rough and disorderly lot, reputed jail- birds of San Francisco, a city then swarming with the offscourings of civilization.
"Besides getting drunk, they would fight. steal and kill. Within four days of their arrival they broke into the only washhouse in town, ran off the Chinamen and stole the clothes, leaving most of the citizens with only what underclothing was on their persons. February 8. 1862. Lieutenant John M. Henry came to the town, and in cold blood killed John Burk with a butcher knife. The coroner's inquest found Henry guilty of murder. Major Curtis confined him to his quarters for about twenty days, and then, on account of criticism by citizens, turned him over to Sheriff Fran- eis Wolff. The nearest jail being 170 miles distant, at Vancouver. the sheriff took him to his farm, about five miles distant, and kept him until spring. when Henry de- manded a hearing before a justice of the peace. At the examination, and on ac- count of the intimidation of these soldiers, no one appeared to proseente, and he was discharged and left the place. It was reported some months later that he was killed in a row in California. Sheriff Wolff was allowed $352 by the county commissioners for guarding and feeding Lieutenant Henry."
February 22. 1863, passes into history as memorable for the largest and most brilliant social event that had ever been given in the Spokane country, the great ball of the California Volunteers. Invitations were sent out to practically everybody in the Colville valley, including the officers and men of the British Boundary Com- mission. The times were democratic, social distinctions were obliterated between officers and men, and there was a joyous commingling of the native and Caucasian races. More than 100 guests attended. including about 150 women of the valley. chiefly natives and mixed bloods, and half a dozen white women, all that could be mustered in the fort and the country. Major Curtis and his officers attended in full dress uniform, and were hospitable to a degree, exerting themselves to see that none lacked attention, and capping their hospitality with a bountiful supper. Evidently the California Volunteers were on their good behavior, and there was only a "sound of revelry by night" where too frequently had been a sound of deviltry by day.
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One of the company barracks, a log building 25x100, had been patriotically and beautifully decorated as a ballroom. At each end, over the great fireplaces, were rosettes of guns and sabers, flanked by the flags of the United States and the British Empire. Flags and bunting were on the sides of the building in profusion, and for illumination artistie hands had formed great chandeliers of bayonets attached to hoops, in cone and pyramidal effect. The dancing and the feasting lasted until daylight.
We quote now from Mr. Winan's diary :
March 26, 1862. Lieutenant Wing of the California Volunteers committed sui- eide by shooting himself, placing the muzzle of the pistol in his mouth. The first use made of the beantiful marble of which the valley has such a great variety and abun- dance was a slab marking his grave.
April 21, 1862. Major Curtis came with his command to the town, went to John Shaw's distillery, took the worm of the still out and up to the fort, knocked all the barrels of whisky in the head, and ordered every one in town not to sell liquor to any one, which order was obeyed. The character of some of the men in his com- mand was such that life and property were not safe when they were drinking. The order was obeyed, not only because it was an order, but for self-protection.
July 11, 1862. Major C. H. Rumrill. with two companies of the Washington Territory Volunteers, relieved Major Curtis, who, with his command, went to Fort Vancouver.
November 3, 1862. The order of Major Curtis of April 21, stopping the sale of liquors, was suspended by order of Major Rumrill, and whisky selling was again permitted. It might be proper to say that during the prohibition the settlers expended about the same amount of money, but it was noticeable that their families were more comfortably housed and better elothed.
During the fall and winter of 1862-63, some desperadoes, driven out of Lewiston, came to Colville. One of them, Charles Harper, shot and killed Mrs. MeRice at a danee, at the British Boundary Commission barraeks. He fled, but on the twenty- seventh of January, 1863, was caught by a party of miners and hanged at Leo's bar on the Columbia river, about fifteen miles below the old fort.
Another ealled Williams ( who was thought by his associates to be Wells. a man who killed a sheriff and his deputy and driver near Sacramento four years before) with three others, were stopping on the Little Pend d'Oreille, on the place afterwards owned by Mrs. A. Reeves Ayers. His companions became afraid of him and killed him. The younger one, a boy of 18, told Major Rumrill about it, alleging self- defense. hoping to get the supposed reward offered for Wells. The body. when un- carthed and examined, showed that Williams had been shot. knocked in the head with an ax. and choked with a searf. This investigation implicated the others, and they tried to get out of the country. but the sheriff and posse, with the guidance of James Monaghan and his prompt action, overtook them on the Spokane, near An- toine Plant's ferry, and took them baek to Colville. There being no jail. they, with two others, were kept in the guard house all winter, and the following April broke away from the guard. and were afterwards seen in Walla Walla.
November 5. 1863, Lieutenant Charles P. Egan was married to Miss Emma Johnson, at the commanding officer's quarters, by D. H. Ferguson, justice of the peace. A splendid dinner followed the ceremony. This officer, as commissary gen-
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eral, attained considerable notoriety in canned beef contracts during the Spanish- American war.
December 21, 1863, military ball at the Fort. All the people of the Valley were there, the Washington Volunteers trying to excel the California Volunteers in the entertainment of the year before.
May 26, 1865, Captain F. O. MeCown, with one company of Oregon Volunteers, relieved Major Rumrill and his command of two companies of Washington Territory Volunteers, they going to Walla Walla. Captain MeCown, on taking command, au- thorized W. P. Winans to act as post trader.
November 9. 1865, Captain John S. Wharton, with one company, sixty-two men, Fourteenth U. S. infantry regulars, arrived and relieved Captain MeCown and his command, who went to Vancouver to be mustered out of service. From this date until abandonment. September, 1882, the fort was garrisoned by regular troops from different regiments with different officers.
On January 19. 1866, John S. Davis, living at the British Boundary Commis- sion barracks, was punishing his squaw; her mother, seeing it, ran a knife through his body, killing him. A few hours afterward the mother was found hanging by her neck in one of the vacant buildings. The people did not take the law into their own hands in every case. for in 1865 an Indian killed a white man on Kettle river, at night while the victim was sleeping. He was given a jury trial, was found guilty of murder, and hanged from a gallows erected by the sheriff.
On February 18, 1867, a party of five soldiers came to town, and shot and killed 11. P. Stewart, the probate judge. On June 8, 1867. the court met, presided over by Judge J. E. Wyche, and soldier Reilly was found guilty and sentenced to twenty years in the penitentiary at Steilacoom. Judge Stewart was buried with Masonic ceremonies. Seven Masons were present. This was the first Masonic funeral in the county.
Lieutenant-Colonel Merriam, with his command of three companies, camped during the winter of 1879-80 on Foster creek, and in the spring of 1880 went to Chelan and commeneed to build a post, but the difficulties of access, and the lack of transportation were such that a new location was sought for, and the fort was finally located near the mouth of the Spokane river, and built there in 1881.
Lieutenant Webster and his command were then withdrawn from Colville, leav- ing a quartermaster's man, Christ Gilson, in charge, who, after a few months, was discharged, and in 1882 the fort was left to the tender mercies of the people. In a . few years not a house was left on the original site. Parts of them, though, can yet be found, twenty-five miles away from where they formerly stood. The land of the military reserve was appraised and sold, and is now owned by citizens and cultivated as farms.
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