A History of Oregon, 1792-1849

Mr. Fitzgerald explains that matter so well, that we could not do justice to the truth of history not to quote him. He says, on the 14th page of his work: “There is one story told, about which it is right that the truth should be ascertained. It is said that a number of half-breeds from the Red River settlement were, in the year of 1841-2, induced by the company’s officers to undertake a journey entirely across the continent, with the object of becoming settlers on the Columbia River. It appears that a number went, but on arriving in the country, so far from finding any of the promised encouragement, the treatment they received from Dr. McLaughlin was such, that, after having been nearly starved under the paternal care of that gentleman, they all went over to the American settlement in the Wallamet Valley.”

This statement, while it affirms an important fact, gives a false impression as regards Dr. McLaughlin. He, to our certain knowledge, extended to the Red River settlers every facility within his power, and all of those emigrants to this day speak of his kindness in the highest terms. But not so of other leading or controlling members, who really represented the English part and policy of that company. Those settlers complained of the domineering and tyrannical treatment of their English overseers, which was the cause of their leaving what they supposed would eventually be the English part of Oregon Territory. They also became sensible that the Hudson’s Bay Company in Oregon was a different concern from the Hudson’s Bay Company in Rupert’s Land; that, however small their privileges were there, they were less on Puget Sound; and being near an American settlement, they naturally sought its advantages and protection.

Mr. Fitzgerald informs us that “these emigrants became citizens of the United States, and it is further said were the first to memorialize Congress to extend the power of the United States over the Oregon Territory. For the truth of these statements we do not, of course vouch, but we do say they demand inquiry.”

This statement of Mr. Fitzgerald entitles him to be considered a candid and fair writer, and one who is seeking for truth in reference to the subject he is investigating. He has naturally imbibed the feelings of an Englishman against Dr. McLaughlin, under the strong effort made by the English Hudson’s Bay Company to suppress and supersede the French Canadian influence in it.

He says, on page 15: “Dr. McLaughlin’s policy was so manifestly American that it is openly canvassed in a book written by Mr. Dunn, one of the servants of the company, and written for the purpose of praising their system and policy.”

Sir Edward Belcher also alludes to this policy. He says: “Some few years since, the company determined on forming settlements on the rich lands situated on the Wallamet and other rivers, and for providing for their retired servants, by allotting them farms, and further aiding them by supplies of cattle, etc. That on the Wallamet was a field too inviting for missionary enthusiasm to overlook, but instead of selecting a British subject to afford them spiritual assistance, recourse was had to Americans, a course pregnant with evil consequences, and particularly in the political squabble pending, as will be seen by the result. No sooner had the American and his allies fairly squatted (which they deem taking possession of the country), than they invited their brethren to join them, and called on the American government for laws and protection.”

The American reader will smile at Sir Edward’s little fling at the squatters in Oregon. He asserts a great truth in the same sentence that he utters a positive falsehood. No member of the Hudson’s Bay Company, nor the whole company together, ever encouraged a single American missionary to come to the country. Revs. Lee and Parker and Dr. Whitman came without their invitation or aid. They were entirely independent of the company, and were only suffered to remain, the company not daring to drive them from the country on their first arrival, as they all held the protection of the American government, as Indian teachers, under the great seal of the Secretary of War. This English fling at their own company is evidence of a jealousy existing which could not be satisfied short of the utter extermination of all American influence on this coast, and is further illustrated by this same Sir Edward Belcher, in contrasting the treatment of Captain Wilkes and his party with that of his own. He says (vol. 1, p. 297): “The attention of the chief to myself and those immediately about me, particularly in sending down fresh supplies, previous to my arrival, I feel fully grateful for; but I can not conceal my disappointment at the want of accommodation exhibited toward the crews of the vessels under my command in a British possession.” We old Oregonians are amused at Sir Edward’s ignorance of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s treatment of the crews of vessels, and servants of the company. We all know his crew were allowed to associate freely with the native women in the country and to distribute their rations of rum, and any other supplies they might have, without any remonstrance from the company. Sir Edward continues: “We certainly were not distressed, nor was it imperatively necessary that fresh beef and vegetables should be supplied, or I should have made a formal demand. But as regarded those who might come after, and not improbably myself among the number, I inquired in direct terms what facilities her Majesty’s ship of war might expect, in the event of touching at this port for bullocks, flour, vegetables, etc. I certainly was extremely surprised at the reply that they were not in a condition to supply. As any observation here would be useless, and I well knew this point could be readily settled where authority could be referred to, I let the matter rest. But having been invited to inspect the farm and dairy, and been informed of the quantity of grain, and the means of furnishing flour, and notwithstanding the profusion of cattle and potatoes, no offer having been made for our crew, I regretted that I had been led into the acceptance of private supplies; although, at that time, the other officers of the establishment had told my officers that supplies would of course be sent down.”

Mr. Fitzgerald says “the American policy of the Hudson’s Bay Company would seem, from the above facts, to be more than a matter of suspicion,” while we Americans are only disposed to regard them as a part of the duplicity of that company in their effort to deceive their own countrymen as to the value of the country over which they had ruled so long.

They had been too successful in deceiving all American writers to allow their own countrymen to understand their secret policy. Sir Edward Belcher and our English historian were equally misled in relation to the American policy of the Hudson’s Bay Company. It is true that Dr. McLaughlin, though he was a French Canadian subject, had not lost his American soul. The British iron had not driven the last noble sentiment of humanity from his heart, nor his connection with that polluted corporation of iniquity which pervades half the continent of North America; for when he found that this Hudson’s Bay Company was utterly lost to humanity, he tells them to their teeth: “Gentlemen, I will serve you no longer.”

No true American historian will allow, without contradiction, that corrupt company to hand down to future infamy the name of a noble and generous servant, because their infamous policy was defeated by the establishment of the American missions in the country. Dr. McLaughlin did all that he could, honorably, to comply with their “system of iniquity.”

Our English author says, on page 19, in reference to the conduct of the company: “They are convictions which have strengthened and deepened at every step of the inquiry; convictions that the Hudson’s Bay Company has entailed misery and destruction upon thousands throughout the country which is withering under its curse; that it has cramped and crippled the energies and enterprise of England, which might have found occupation in the directions from which they are now excluded; that it has stopped the extension of civilization, and has excluded the light of religious truth; that it has alienated the hearts of all under its oppression, and made them hostile to their country; above all, that the whole and entire fabric is built upon utterly false and fictitious grounds; that it has not one shadow of reality in law or in justice; that there is not the smallest legal authority for any one of the rights which this corporation claims. It is this conviction which has urged me to submit the statements and arguments contained in the following pages to the consideration of the public; and to arraign before that tribunal, from which in these days there is no escape, – the judgment of public opinion, —a corporation who, under the authority of a charter which is invalid in law, hold a monopoly in commerce, and exercise a despotism in government, and have so used that monopoly and wielded that power as to shut up the earth from the knowledge of man, and man from the knowledge of God.”

With the statements and convictions of this English author before us, we will add a statement of Sir James Douglas, given in answer to interrogatory 11 in the case of Hudson’s Bay Company’s Claim v. United States, to give the reader a better idea of the power and influence of that company in Oregon, in 1846.

Sir James says: “The Honorable Hudson’s Bay Company had fifty-five officers and five hundred and thirteen articled men. The company having a large, active, and experienced force of servants in their employ, and holding establishments judiciously situated in the most favorable portions for trade, forming, as it were, a net-work of posts aiding and supporting each other, possessed an extraordinary influence with the natives, and in 1846 practically enjoyed a monopoly of the fur trade in the country west of the Rocky Mountains, north and south of the forty-ninth parallel of latitude. The profits of their trade,” says this witness, “from 1841 to 1846 were at least seven thousand pounds sterling annually.”

The fifty-five officers and five hundred and thirteen articled men of the company, with their eight hundred half-breeds, and the Indians they could command by the judicious position of their respective posts, were deemed by them sufficient security for their trade, and a substantial reason why they should not give up the country without making another direct effort to drive the missionary and American settlements from it, notwithstanding all their pretension to join in the provisional government organized by the pioneer Americans in 1843.

The reader is referred to the discussion on the liquor question between Judge Sir James Douglas and Mr. Samuel Parker, as found in the tenth and eleventh numbers, first volume, of the Spectator, published June 11 and 25, 1845, and in another chapter of this work, and requested to keep all these facts before the mind, so as not to lose sight of the commanding influence, or, in other words, the commander, when we enter upon the preliminary and immediate causes of the Whitman massacre, and the Indian war that followed.

We have before us the original depositions in reference to the facts stated, and also the attempt to excuse the principal actors in that horrible transaction, as given by Brouillet in justification of the course pursued by the Jesuit missionaries.

We have also the superficial and bombastic report of J. Ross Browne, special agent of the Treasury Department, dated December 4, 1857, containing a copy of this Jesuit history of the murder of Dr. Whitman. In his remarks previous to giving Brouillet’s history, he says: “In view of the fact, however, that objections might be made to any testimony coming from the citizens of the Territories, and believing also that it is the duty of a public agent to present, as far as practicable, unprejudiced statements, I did not permit myself to be governed by any representations unsupported by reliable historical data.” – “The fact also is shown that, as far back as 1835, the Indians west of the Rocky Mountains protested against the taking away of their lands by the white race. That this was one of the alleged causes of the murder of Dr. Whitman and family.”

There are sixty-six pages in this report. Twelve of them are Mr. Browne’s, one page of official acknowledgment, and fifty-three from the parties implicated.

The statements of Mr. Browne, of Mr. Fitzgerald, and the oath of Mr. Douglas, are sufficient to show the ignorance, stupidity, and falsehood incorporated in his report, were there no other historical facts to convict him of ignorance in allowing such representations to be made in an official document. In the proper place we will bring this report into our history, with both sides of the question.

Were we to express an opinion of Mr. J. Ross Browne’s report, with our personal knowledge of what he pretends to relate, we would say he ignored the people, the country, and the government whose agent he claimed to be, and was reporting for the special benefit of the Roman religion and British government, as these are extensively quoted as historical data from which his report and conclusions are drawn.

The reader will understand our main object to be to give a full history of all influences and prominent transactions and events that have occurred in Oregon from 1792 to 1849.

To understand cause and effect, and the true history of the country, we have to examine the facts as connected with actions, and also to trace back the history of the actors, in order to see how far they may be made responsible for the result of their actions.

Oregon, from the time of its discovery, has been a field where all the influences of which we are writing have been living, active influences; and they are by no means inactive or dead at the present time. Some of them are more active now than they were in 1836.

A full knowledge of the past will enable us to guard the present and the future. Our English writer has gathered his facts and drawn his conclusions in London. We, upon this, our western coast, are witnesses of the cause and results of his conclusions, and any statement he makes we feel ourselves abundantly able to corroborate or correct.

As we proceed with our history we shall have frequent occasion to quote Mr. Fitzgerald, as the best English evidence, in favor of our American statements or positions. Since writing the above we have noticed a lengthy article in the Edinburgh Westminster Review for July, 1867, giving a concise history of the Hudson’s Bay Company, under the heading, “The Last Great Monopoly.” In that article the author has shown extensive historical knowledge of the operations and influences of that monopoly in that portion of our continent over which they have held exclusive control.

He regards them as a blight upon the country, and an “incubus” to be removed by national legislation. If our work had been published, we should conclude that he must have drawn many of his facts from our own observations. But this is not the case; hence the value to us of his corroboration of the facts we affirm from personal knowledge.

CHAPTER IV

Care of Great Britain for her fur companies. – Columbia Fur Company. – Astor’s second fur company. – Major Pilcher’s fur company. – Loss of the ship Isabel. – Captain Bonneville’s expedition. – Cause of his failure. – Captain Wyeth’s, 1832. – Indians ask for missionaries in 1833. – Methodist Mission. – Fort Hall established. – Fort Boise.

By reference to the act of the British Parliament of June 2, 1821, it will be seen that the affairs of the North American British Fur companies were in a fair way to defeat all British interests in America. To suppress these feuds among their own people became a matter of national importance and policy.

To accomplish so desirable an object, Parliament, in the act above referred to, extended the civil and criminal jurisdiction of Canada over all the territories of the Hudson’s Bay Company; in the thirteenth article of the act, and in the fourteenth, repealed all that was before taken away from that company, and confirmed absolutely all the rights supposed to have been given by the original charter, as follows: —

Section 14. “And be it further enacted, that nothing in this act contained shall be taken or construed to affect any right or privilege, authority or jurisdiction, which the governor and company of adventurers trading to Hudson’s Bay are by law entitled to claim and exercise under their charter; but that all such rights, privileges, authorities, and jurisdictions, shall remain in as full force, virtue, and effect, as if this act had never been made; any thing in this act to the contrary notwithstanding.”

This act, however just it may have been considered, certainly embodied a large amount of national prejudice against the people of French or Canadian birth, in exempting the territory of the Hudson’s Bay Company from its influence. It had a twofold effect: the one, to check feuds among British subjects; the other, to unite them in one vast Indian monopoly, – to license this united company to go forward with their Indian political arrangements unmolested, – to punish and dispose of all intruders upon their supposed, or asserted rights, as they might deem for the interest of their trade, which, according to the charter of Charles II., bearing date May 2, 1670, they were “at all times hereafter to be personable and capable in law, to have, purchase, receive, possess, enjoy, and retain lands, rents, privileges, liberties, jurisdiction, franchises, and hereditaments of what kind, nature, or quality soever they be, to them and their successors.”

The whole trade, fisheries, navigation, minerals, etc., of the countries, are granted to the company exclusively; all other of the king’s subjects being forbidden to visit, hunt, frequent, trade, traffic, or adventure therein, under heavy penalties; and the company is moreover empowered to send ships, and to build fortifications for the defense of its possessions, as well as to make war or peace with all nations or peoples not Christian, inhabiting those territories, which are declared to be hence-forth reckoned and reputed as one of his Majesty’s plantations or colonies in America, called Rupert’s Land.

It will be remembered that as early as 1818, a question arose between the United States and Great Britain, as to which was the rightful owner of the Oregon country. The Northwest Fur Company were the only subjects of Great Britain that had competed with the American fur companies in the discovery or trade of the country. To ignore that company altogether would weaken the British claim to Oregon by right of prior discovery and occupancy. Hence, by uniting the two companies under an ancient English charter, combining their united capital and numerical strength, discarding all doubtful subjects, and confirming the absolute power of their own British company, they could easily secure Oregon as British territory. The wisdom and effect of this policy will be developed as we proceed.

By the third article of the convention between the United States and Great Britain, signed October 20, 1818, “it is agreed that any country that may be claimed by either party on the northwest coast of America, westward of the Stony Mountains, shall, together with its harbors, bays, and creeks, and the navigation of all rivers within the same, be free and open for the term of ten years from the date of the signature of the present convention, to the vessels, citizens, and subjects of the two powers; it being well understood that this agreement is not to be construed to the prejudice of any claim which either of the two high contracting parties may have to any part of said country, nor shall it be taken to affect the claims of any other power or state to any part of the said country; the only object of the high contracting parties, in that respect, being to prevent disputes and differences among themselves.”

This convention secured at that time the Northwest Fur Company’s existence in the country, by the act uniting the two British fur companies three years later. In 1821, the privileges here secured were transferred and confirmed to the Hudson’s Bay Company, who at once took the most active and efficient measures to guard against any future competition, by assessing and setting apart ten per cent. on their capital stock, which was counted at £200,000, as a sinking fund for the special purpose of opposing all competition in the fur trade by land or water.

The convention above referred to shows that Great Britain held a watchful eye over her fur traders in this distant country; and the act of her Parliament in 1821, that she was disposed, in a direct manner, to secure to her own people, as traders, the absolute sovereignty of the country. While Great Britain was protecting and strengthening her fur traders in North America, the American government was simply asserting its prior rights to the Oregon country, founded upon its discovery and subsequent purchase in what is termed the Louisiana purchase, from France; the treaties and conventions only serving to encourage and strengthen the British claim, while they used their influence, capital, and power against all American competition and settlement in the country.

In 1821, as was to be expected by the union of the two great British fur companies, under the license of the British Parliament, and absolute charter of Charles II., many of the servants, and especially such as were found favorable to the American fur traders, or violently opposed to the Hudson’s Bay Company, were thrown out of employment. They naturally sought to continue their wild Indian trade and habits, and formed a company under the name of the Columbia Fur Company, extending their operations up the Mississippi, Missouri, and Yellowstone rivers. In 1826, they transferred their interests to Astor’s second North American Fur Company, of which John Jacob Astor was the head. This company appears to have been commenced or organized in connection with Mr. W. H. Ashley, in 1823, and under his direction extended its trade to the south and west, along the Platte River, and passed into the Rocky Mountains as far as Green River, being the first to discover its sources, making a successful trading expedition that year.

In 1824, another expedition under Mr. Ashley explored the Rocky Mountains as far south as Salt Lake, and built a fort on the borders of a small lake, to which he gave his own name. In 1826, Mr. Ashley transported a 6-pound cannon to his establishment near Salt Lake, through what has since been termed Fremont’s, or the south pass of the Rocky Mountains, in a wagon. This establishment had in its employ over one hundred men, and was remarkably successful and profitable to the partners.

In 1826, Mr. Ashley sold all his interest to the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, composed of Smith, Jackson, and Subleth, who extended their trade into California, and as far north as the Umpqua River, in Oregon; where Smith and his party were met by a professedly friendly party of Indians, who murdered his men, seized his furs, and delivered them to a party of men sent by the Hudson’s Bay Company, under Mr. John McLeod and Thomas McKay, to receive the furs and pay the Indians for their services – as learned by the writer from eye-witnesses.

During this same year, 1827, Major Pilcher, with forty-five men, crossed the Rocky Mountains, and, in 1828-9, traversed the western portion of them as far north as Fort Colville. This fort had been established, and farming operations commenced, in 1825. This party of Major Pilcher were all cut off but two men, besides himself; his furs, as stated by himself to the writer, found their way into the forts of the Hudson’s Bay Company.

In 1828, the brig Owyhee, Captain Demenses, and the schooner Cowrey, Captain Thompson, entered and remained nearly a year in the Columbia River, trading with the Indians. They were owned in Boston.

In 1830, the British ship Isabel was lost on Sand Island – the second known to have been wrecked on the bar, or in attempting to enter the river. The crew were all saved, and it was the opinion of the company at Vancouver that, had the crew remained with the ship, no great loss would have been sustained.

In 1832, Captain Bonneville, of the United States army, on furlough, started, with over one hundred men, on an expedition into the Rocky Mountains. He crossed the mountains, and reached the Wallawalla Valley, on the Columbia River; but, through the influence of the Hudson’s Bay Company, his men were nearly all induced to leave him, so that he was obliged to abandon his property, and his expedition was a total failure, except the little scientific knowledge of the country gained by it.

To charge the failure of Captain Bonneville directly to the Hudson’s Bay Company would not be strictly true; but their great influence over the Indians was sufficient to prevent them from furnishing his party with food or horses, while he was within reach of their forts. Hence, many of his men became dissatisfied, and left him, till his party became too weak to effect their return to the States with their valuable furs and property. These eventually were lost, or fell into the hands of the Indians, and through them, his furs reached the Hudson’s Bay traders’ establishments.

This same year, 1832, Captain Nathaniel Wyeth, of Massachusetts, started on an exploring expedition to the mouth of the Columbia River, with a view of establishing a permanent trade in the Oregon country. He traveled across the continent and gathered all the information requisite for the undertaking, and returned to Boston in 1833; and in 1834, having completed his arrangements, chartered the brig May Dacre, and dispatched her with his own, and the goods of the Methodist Mission, for the Columbia River.

The same year, some Flathead Indians, from a tribe in the midst of the Rocky Mountains, went to St. Louis, and, through Mr. Catlin, an American artist, made known their object, which was to know something more of the white man’s God and religion. Through the representations of these Indians, the Methodist Episcopal Society in the United States established their missions in Oregon, and the American Board sent their missionaries among the Nez Percés, which, as will be seen, was the commencement of the permanent settlement of the country. It appears from the facts, briefly stated, that there had been eleven different trading expeditions and companies, besides the Northwest and Hudson’s Bay companies, that had sought for wealth by making fur-trading establishments in Oregon. All of them, including the Northwest and Hudson’s Bay companies, have retired from it, but the American missionaries are residents of the country, and their influence and labors are felt, notwithstanding other influences have partially supplanted and destroyed the good impressions first made upon the natives of the country by them. Still civilization, education, and religion, with all the improvements of the age, are progressing, and the old pioneer missionaries and settlers that were contemporary with them, with a few exceptions, are foremost in every laudable effort to benefit the present and rising generation.

In the month of March, 1833, a Japanese junk was wrecked near Cape Flattery, in the then Territory of Oregon, and all on board, except three men, were lost. Those three were received by Captain McNeal on board the British ship Lama; taken to Vancouver, and thence sent to England. Rev. Mr. Parker gives this, and another similar wreck on the Sandwich Islands, as evidence of the origin of the natives of those countries. But we give it for another object. The three Japanese were taken to England, and, during their stay, learned the English language, were sent back to Macao, and became the assistant teachers of Mr. Gutzlaff, the English missionary at that place, and were the means of opening their own country to missionary and commercial relations with other nations.

Captain Wyeth, with Revs. Jason and Daniel Lee, Cyrus Shepard, and P. L. Edwards, the first missionary party, together with Doctor Nutall, a naturalist, and J. K. Townsend, an ornithologist, sent out by a literary society in Philadelphia, all under the escort furnished by Captain Wyeth, crossed the mountains and reached the plain formed by the Portneuf and Snake rivers. At their junction Captain Wyeth stopped, and established Fort Hall, while the missionaries and scientific men of his party, in company with an Englishman by the name of Captain Stewart, and a party of Hudson’s Bay traders, under the direction of Mr. McLeod and McKay, proceeded to Fort Nez Percés (present name, Wallula). Thence they traveled in Hudson’s Bay bateaux to Vancouver.

Captain Wyeth established his post on the Snake River, by erecting a stockade of logs, and quarters for his men, and then proceeded to the lower Columbia to receive his goods, which arrived in the May Dacre, Captain Lambert, from Boston, about the time he reached Fort William, on what is now known as Sauvies Island, a few miles below the mouth of the Multnomah River, now called the Wallamet.