# History of Oregon (Bancroft)/Volume 1/Chapter 7

CHAPTER VII.
COLONIZATION.
1837–40.
Daniel Lee does not mention what the superintendent wrote to the missionary society of the Methodist church on establishing himself in the Willamette Valley, but it is to be presumed that whatever it was, the action of the society was founded upon it. A reënforecement for the Mission, consisting of eight adults and several children, sailed from Boston on the 28th of July, 1836. They took passage in the ship Hamilton, Captain Barker, bound for the Sandwich Islands, where they arrived late in the winter. There they remained guests of the missionaries at Honolulu until the latter part of April 1837, when they sailed in the brig Diana, Captain Hinckley, for the Columbia River. On the 18th of May, three months after the departure of the Loriot with the cattle company, tidings of the new arrival reached the Willamette, and Jason Lee hastened to Fort Vancouver, and found them already provided with comfortable quarters by John McLoughlin.
​The principal person of the reënforcement, and one whom it was expected would supply the great need of the Mission, was Elijah White, M. D., from Tompkins County, New York. Dr White was little more than thirty years of age, with light complexion, blue eyes, and dark hair, and of slight, elastic frame. He was thin, too, when he landed from his long voyage, though not so thin as Daniel Lee, to whose shoes the leaden soles of Philetas would scarcely have been out of place.
His manners were of that obliging and nattering kind which made him popular, especially among women, but which men often called sycophantish and insincere. He was fond of oratorical display and of society, affectedly rather than truly pious, not altogether a bad man, though a weak one. Yet we shall see that in such a society an effeminate man may be of no less consequence than a masculine woman, for here, as elsewhere, we find, as La Fontaine says, a "bon nombre d'hommes qui sont femmes." He had no talent, as Heinrich Heine would declare, but yet a character. And strange to say, the longer he dwelt upon this coast, the more he became smooth and slippery like glass, and flat withal, yet he could be round and cutting on occasions, particularly when broken on the wheel of adversity. He was accompanied by his wife, an infant son, and a lad of fourteen years named George Stoughtenburg, whom he had adopted. Mrs White was a cheerful, amiable young woman, and devoted to her husband.
Next we will mention Alanson Beers, a blacksmith from Connecticut, a man of low stature, dark complexion, thin features, and rigid alike in his views of religion and social propensities, an honest, worthy character, entitled to respect. He also brought his wife, a woman of comfortable physique and yielding temper, together with three children.
Another, W. H. Willson, a ship-carpenter, had ​sailed out of New Bedford on more than one whaling voyage. Judging from the commendations lavished upon him by his associates, he was a more than ordinarily worthy man. Tall, with a well-knit frame, cheerful temper, and an affectionate disposition, kind to children and animals, he was a general favorite, aside from the stories of sea-going adventures with which he was ever ready to entertain his listeners. Mr Willson was unmarried. While on this journey he studied medicine under White, and was afterwards given the title of Doctor, to distinguish him from others of the same name in Oregon, who spelled their name with only one l.
The other adults of the reenforcement were Miss Anna Maria Pitman of New York; Miss Susan Downing of Lynn, Massachusetts, who was engaged to marry Cyrus Shepard; and Miss Elvira Johnson, from central New York. Miss Pitman was tall, dark, somewhat gifted with poetic genius, fervently pious, and full of enthusiasm for the missionary life. Miss Downing was a less pronounced character, personally attractive, possessed of a fine figure, dark hair, blue eyes, always exercising good taste in dress, and popular with her associates. Miss Johnson, winning in manner, and pure and zealous of spirit, was devoted to her duty. She, like Miss Downing, had dark hair and blue eyes, and was to become the wife of a missionary.
It was understood that Miss Pitman was to marry Jason Lee, if they should suit each other. The meeting, therefore, was of considerable interest, not to say embarrassment, to both, when McLoughlin having introduced Dr White, that gentleman brought the superintendent face to face with the lady. "A light blush rose to her cheek, and a slight trepidation, which, added to the charm of her manner, was all the evidence," says White, "that she was conscious of the peculiarity of her position." With Jason Lee it was ​different; he was evidently pleased that the society had sent him so prepossessing a woman for a wife, and took much pains to render himself agreeable.
On the day after Jason Lee's arrival, the whole company, including Captain and Mrs Hinckley, and Mr J. L. Whitcomb, from Honolulu, second officer of the Diana, set out in canoes for the Mission, the superintendent and Miss Pitman accompanied only by their Indian crew who understood no English, an arrangement which was apparently not disagreeable. At the close of the first day, which had been bright and musical, an encampment was made under the oak trees on the south bank of the Willamette where Portland now stands. The following day they reached the mouth of Pudding River, above the falls; and at an early hour on the third day, they finally disembarked at the landing of Baptiste Desportes McKay, at Champoeg, where horses were obtained, and the journey ended with a ride through French Prairie.
At the landing, a letter from Daniel Lee was found awaiting them, with the request that Dr White should hasten forward, as twelve persons lay sick at the Mission, some of them dangerously so. This pressing demand for assistance was responded to by the doctor, who, with Willson, Mrs Hinckley, Miss Pitman, and Miss Downing, mounted and rode off at a rapid pace in advance of the others.
The reception at the Mission might well have been disheartening to the new-comers. Think of those refined young women, fresh from the comforts and orderly ways of eastern homes, dismounting before the rude, substantial Mission house in the wilderness, to find its floors covered with the sick, lying on mats and blankets, more than a dozen out of the thirty-eight native children who found a home there down with fever, and the rest of the strange unkempt brood peeping through doors and windows for a sight of the strangers. With natural care Miss Downing had ​dressed herself in trim, becoming style for the eyes of her affianced husband. This neat and gentle maiden, who would gladden the heart of any lover, happened upon Cyrus Shepard in the brown linen frock he wore about housework, and which did not by any means set off his tall symmetrical figure to advantage. It was a trying situation, but though Shepard deeply blushed in his embarrassment, he did not entirely faint away, and finally recovered himself sufficiently to welcome the ladies, after which he proceeded to lay the table with a brown linen cloth and tin plates, and to prepare dinner for the hungry travellers. The fare was venison, sausages, bread of unbolted flour, butter, cheese, and fried cakes, with wild strawberries and cream for desert. The Mission must have done well, indeed, to have been able to offer supplies like this in the third year of its existence, it being too early in the season for a garden.
How sixteen new-comers were accommodated with beds when even the floors were occupied by the sick, not one of the chroniclers of early events has told us. Fifty-four, and for a short time fifty-seven, inmates found lodgment in a building forty by eighteen feet, the space increased by a flooring overhead, which was converted into an attic under the rafters.
Thus we see in the chemistry of west-coast adventure an adaptation of self to circumstances, not unlike that of sulphuric acid and water, which when mingled are contained in less space than they separately occupied.
In apparent enjoyment, the missionary recruits and their guests explored the country by day, and slept under the same roof at night; until, after a few days, Captain and Mrs Hinckley returned to Fort Vancouver. Dr White, on looking about for the cause ​of disease, found an accumulation of vegetable matter washed up by a freshet, decaying and poisoning the air. He also noticed that a dense grove of firs between the house and the river prevented a free circulation of air. At once he set the Indian boys to lopping off branches of trees, and clearing away rubbish; after which the general health improved.
Shepard was soon prostrated with fever, and Miss Downing's loving care was as the ministration of an angel in this dark wilderness; by good nursing he escaped with a short illness. Jason Lee was fortunate in the prosecution of his suit; much of the time being spent with Miss Pitman in riding about the country, and the favorable first impression deepened. On the 16th of June there was a large gathering in the grove near the Mission house, it being the sabbath, and the marriage of Cyrus Shepard was expected in addition to the usual service.
Jason Lee delivered a discourse on the propriety and duties of marriage, a ceremony too lightly regarded in this new country. When he had finished his remarks he said, "What I urge upon you by precept I am prepared this day to enforce by example;" and characteristic as it was, without such a purpose being suspected by any one, he went to Miss Pitman and led her forth in view of all the congregation. Then rose Daniel Lee, and solemnly read the marriage service of the Methodist Episcopal Church, after which Mr Lee led his wife back into the assemblage, and returning took his nephew's place, and performed the same service for Mr Shepard and Miss Downing. When the marriages were duly solemnized, Lee preached his usual Sunday sermon, after which the communion service was held, and two members were admitted to the church. The whole number of communicants was fourteen. There was a third marriage on that day, that of Charles J. Roe and Nancy McKay, some of whose brothers were in the Mission ​school. A wedding breakfast followed the conclusion of the services. Thus was inaugurated the marriage ceremony in the Willamette Valley, where heretofore christianized forms had not been deemed essential.
The labor of settling the families now occupied all the time that could be spared from the harvest, in both of which Jason Lee and White assisted. Beers and Willson spent most of the summer in transporting the goods which arrived by the Diana from Fort Vancouver, by the slow conveyance of canoes. A log house and shop were built for Beers. White had a hewn-log house, in which the skill of the mechanic Willson was very serviceable. A school-room was added to the Mission house, and Miss Johnson installed as teacher. Mrs Shepard made and mended the clothing of the Indian children; the other women attended to the general housekeeping. A temperance meeting was held to keep alive the sentiment against the introduction or manufacture of intoxicating drinks, an effort in which the missionaries were successful for a number of years after the first formation of the Oregon Temperance Society.
In August, Jason Lee made two exploring excursions in company with his wife and Mr and Mrs Shepard. The first one, under the guidance of a French settler named Desportes, was toward the upper end ​of the Willamette Valley, by an eastward circuit to the head waters of the Mollale, and down that stream to its junction with the Willamette, which he crossed, and returned to the Mission by the west side. The second excursion was to the sea-coast, at the mouth of the Salmon River, under the guidance of Joseph Gervais. Here they sojourned seven days, bathing in the salt water, and preaching as they were able to the Killamooks. Health and pleasure with light professional occupation was the object of these excursions, Shepard particularly being in need of change of air. This visit to the coast was an example which later became the custom, namely, for camping parties to spend a portion of the summer on the west side of the Coast Range, there to enjoy the sea-bathing and rock-oysters.
Hardly had the excursionists returned to the Mission when news came of the arrival of a second reënforcement, which left Boston on the 20th of January, 1837, in the ship Sumatra, and arrived at Fort Vancouver on the 7th of September following. The Sumatra was loaded with goods for the Mission, and brought as assistants to Lee the Rev. David Leslie of Salem, Massachusetts, Mrs Leslie, and three young daughters, Rev. H. K. W. Perkins, who was to marry Miss Johnson, and Miss Margaret Smith, afterward the wife of Dr Bailey. Perkins and Miss Johnson were married November 21, 1837, Bailey and Miss Smith in 1840.
The family at the Willamette mission now numbered sixty members, including the native children, or nearly an equal number of Indians and white persons. It was a somewhat expensive process, one civilizer to every savage, especially where ninety-nine out of every hundred of the latter died under the infliction. ​Therefore it was deemed best that the missionaries should divide. Lee had purchased a farm recently opened by a Canadian near the Mission premises, with a small house now occupied by Leslie and Perkins with their wives. White and Beers were domiciled in houses of their own, leaving the Mission building in possession of Lee, Shepard, Edwards, Willson, and Whitcomb, the latter at present employed as farm superintendent. In addition to these accommodations, it was decided to erect a hospital, which was accordingly begun.
The amount of labor caused by the addition of so many persons unprovided with the conveniences of living, the transportation of the second ship-load of goods, and the care of the cattle which came in October, retarded the progress of the Indian school, which, notwithstanding sickness and other drawbacks, was in a promising condition. Perhaps because his mind is empty of the loftier civilized conceptions, the savage is a ready scholar in the elements of learning, though he rarely masters more than these. A native lad in the class of Solomon Smith at Port Vancouver learned reading, writing, and the whole of Daboll's arithmetic in eleven months, writing out all the examples for the benefit of the other scholars. Some simple penalty usually kept these primitive pupils in good order, such as being made to wear an old gun-lock suspended round the neck by a string.
The first prejudice of the adult aboriginals against leaving their children at the Mission was not overcome, the school consisting chiefly of those who had no parents, which, if they were to be educated in any sense, was a favorable circumstance. But from pupils, the wards of the Mission were likely to become servants, while so much labor was required to make their teachers comfortable; and as the savage is by nature averse to labor, the demands made upon the children ​at the Mission were sure to operate against the success of the school.
A meeting to organize a society for the benefit of the Calapooyas, held on Christmas-day, was well attended, as occasions for social intercourse among the settlers were rare. Moreover, the Mission being to the Willamette Valley in points of influence and prospective importance what Fort Vancouver was to the Oregon territory, great interest was felt in its projects. It was proposed to form an organization among the missionaries and settlers to induce the natives to locate at a branch mission on a piece of ground which they should be taught to cultivate, and that they should receive encouragement in their work, and assistance to build comfortable homes. About four hundred dollars were subscribed; Frenchmen and Americans contributing from five to twenty dollars each—men who themselves used dried deerskin in place of glass for windows, and who possessed few comforts beyond the actual necessities of life, and yet had farms well stocked. Much more than this would the people have done for Lee and his associates, for the visit of Slacum, the petition to congress, and the successful formation of the cattle company had inspired them with a respect and confidence in the judgment, energy, and enterprise of the Americans. The branch mission was a failure, as might have been foreseen; for though assisted with their farming, the natives were so indolent and apathetic that the attempt had to be abandoned.
It was decided in missionary councils during the winter that the Dalles of the Columbia offered superior advantages for a mission station, and Daniel Lee and Perkins were assigned to that place. Gray states in his account of the Presbyterian missions, that he urged Whitman to establish a station at this point; ​and perhaps the latter intended to do so when he should be sufficiently reënforced. But when Gray returned from the United States in the autumn of 1838, he found the place already occupied by the Methodists.
About the middle of March 1838, Perkins and Lee proceeded by canoe to the Dalles, and selected a site three miles below the narrows, and half a mile from the Columbia River on the south side, where there was good land, springs of excellent water, a plentiful supply of pine and oak timber, and a fine view of the Columbia for several miles. Back of the chosen site the ground rose rather abruptly, and was lightly wooded with lofty pines. Standing like a watchtower in the south-west was Mount Hood, whose icy cliffs wrapped in the silent sky flung back the sun's rays defiantly.
Assisted by the natives, who at first labored with zeal, hoping now to realize the good which their interviews with Parker had taught them to expect, a house was built in which Mrs Perkins came to live in May. Unlike the natives of the Willamette, those at the Dalles showed a willingness to be taught religion, assembling on Sundays, and listening with a sober demeanor to sermons preached through an interpreter, and this to the great encouragement of their teachers.
After several journeys by river to transport supplies, each of which took three weeks to perform, early in September Daniel Lee undertook the serious task of bringing cattle from the Willamette to the Dalles by an Indian trail over the Cascade Mountains, being assisted in this labor only by the natives.
Lee's description of his squad of savages might be compared with Falstaff's remarks in mustering his recruits. There was an old Chinook, blind in one eye; ​a stout young Walla Walla, knight of the sorrowful countenance, whose name signified 'destitute,' because he had gambled away his patrimony; also another Chinook with a flattened head and wide mouth, a youth wearing the dignity of manhood; another was a Walla Walla, also a gamester and a rogue, though shrewd; yet another was a cripple with short, crooked legs, who carried a crutch of great length on which he poised himself and swung his body forward three or four yards at a leap. The sixth was to have been the guide, but failed to keep his engagement, which led to much trouble.
With ten horses belonging to the Mission, and ten others owned by the natives, and provisions for six days, Lee set out on his undertaking. The trail proved worse than he had anticipated, passing through ravines and across rapid streams, and often obstructed by fallen trees. Sometimes it lay along the margins of dangerous cliffs, and at the best was everywhere overgrown with underbrush. On the west side of the summit it was lost altogether under many generations of leaves. The six days' provisions were exhausted, and two of their horses, starving like themselves, were eaten before they had reached the Willamette, at the end of two weeks.
On this expedition Lee was overtaken, soon after leaving the Dalles, by John A. Sutter, then on his way to California. With Sutter was a party of mountain men, who were unwilling to follow the circuitous route taken by Lee's guides, and broke away from them, reaching the Mission in six days—a feat that was considered incredible but for the proof of letters sent by Perkins. Eight days more passed, and as Lee had not yet returned, a party was forming to go in search of him, when he made his appearance.
A good guide being procured, and the services of ​two white men engaged, the return journey was more easily accomplished. On the 5th of October, eight days from the Willamette, Lee arrived at the Dalles with fourteen head of cattle, to find that Perkins and his wife had gone to the old Mission to spend several months. Thus he was left during the greater part of the winter alone, with the exception of a man named Anderson, who had been hired some time previously to assist in roofing the house. As timber for fencing and for farming utensils was required before spring, and harness and implements had to be made, there was little time for mission work. Perkins returned to the Dalles with his wife and infant son in February, and farming was begun, part of the ground being held on shares with the natives, who helped to fence and plough it. But the soil, being newly stirred, did not yield abundantly; and the crop, small as it was, was partly stolen by other Indians, which so discouraged the laboring savages that they abandoned work and took, without leave, the vegetables raised by the missionaries. The latter, however, persevered, building another house in the summer of 1839, which was used for a church, and improving their home. And here for the present we will leave them, to return to the affairs of the parent Mission.
From this point we regard Jason Lee less as a missionary than as an American colonizer. When he first conceived the idea of appropriating the valley of the Willamette for the Methodist church under the protection of the United States is not very clear, for Kelley's account of Lee's intentions is open to the charge of prejudice, the former feeling himself unjustly treated. But there can be little doubt that the scheme took form on being encouraged by Slacum to look for the support of government in sustaining American supremacy south of the Columbia.
Lee had been long enough in Oregon when the first reënforcement arrived to have discovered that the tribes ​of the Willamette Valley, and of the Columbia River west of the Cascade Mountains, were hopelessly diseased and depraved; and that to sustain an asylum with a few sickly orphans did not require the services even of those persons already on the ground. Nor was the character of the Dalles savages unknown to him as the banditti of the Columbia River region, whom there was little hope of benefiting. With the exception of the Umpqua and Rogue River valleys, and a portion of the southern coast, regions avoided on account of the hostile character of the natives, he had traversed the whole country south of the Columbia without finding a single place where there was any prospect of success in missionary work. Slowly it dawned upon his mind that he and his associates would have long to wait for the spiritual sky to fall, that they might catch some larks.
What should he do? Clearly as special agent of the Lord, the Lord did not require his services here? Should he then serve his fellow-man, or even himself? Might not he serve God as well by ministering to civilized man, ministering in things material as well as in things spiritual, assisting in establishing a grand and virtuous commonwealth, as by waiting on sickly savages? Would it not please his Maker as well if he became a little more a colonizer and a little less a missionary? and would it not please himself better? But how would the good people at home regard such a change of base, those earnest in sewing-societies, church sociables, and in gathering the Sunday-school pennies? Jason Lee felt that these would not approve of such a course; that in their eyes the one sickly savage was more than the ninety and nine of civilization, and that to abandon the attempt of conversion would be apostasy. He knew well enough that it was not the abandonment of his trust, or of any trust worthy of his manhood; in fact, there was nothing to abandon. Nevertheless, for the sake of the cause, which was just now beginning to assume ​shape in his mind, he would deceive them a little; for the sake of progress and the God of progress, his God and theirs, he would not tell them all at once his whole heart.
For the old affair he had more help than he needed; for his slowly evolving purpose he had not enough. Moreover, the fruits of the sewing-societies and the Sunday-schools would be none the less acceptable to civilization than to savagism at this juncture. Therefore he decided in the winter of 1837–8 to visit the states and obtain more men and means.
Preparatory to this, Lee made a hasty excursion in March 1838 to the Umpqua Valley, to inform himself of its nature and advantages for the purposes now in contemplation. A convention was called in order to memorialize congress to extend jurisdiction over the Oregon colony. The memorial set forth that the settlement began in 1832, and had prospered beyond all expectation; that the people of the United States were ignorant of the value of the country west of the Rocky Mountains, of the mildness of its climate, the wealth of its resources, and its commercial advantages in relation to China, India, the Islands of the Pacific, and the western coast of America; for all of which reasons the government was urged to take formal possession without loss of time; not only because of its general importance to the nation, but for the consequent benefits to the colony. Moreover, if this were not done, evil to the settlers would ensue. The interests of the memorialists they declared were identical with those of the country of their adoption. They felt themselves the nucleus of a great state, and were anxious to give it at the beginning an elevated moral and intellectual tone. They were concerned, also, about the character of those who might emigrate to Oregon, and desired congress to say by whom the territory should be populated. Unprincipled adventurers, Botany Bay refugees, renegades from civilization now ​roaming the Rocky Mountains, deserting seamen from Polynesia, and banditti from Spanish America were not wanted.
Thus far, said the memorial, the colony had depended to a great extent on the influence of the Hudson's Bay Company, which had preserved peace among both the settlers and the natives by its judicious management. But they could not hope, as the settlements became independent of the fur company, that this condition of harmony would remain unchanged, with a mixed population, and without a civil code. The memorial is dated March 16, 1838, and signed by the ten preachers and laymen, Ewing Young and ten other colonists, and nine French Canadians.
Toward the last of March, Lee left the Willamette Valley on his projected mission, and proceeded to Fort Vancouver, the Dalles, and Fort Walla Walla. Edwards accompanied Lee, having long contemplated leaving Oregon; yet although he had no disposition himself to remain, he gave favorable accounts of the country, during subsequent years, to the frequent inquiries for information on that subject. There were also with them F. Y. Ewing of Missouri, and two Chinook boys named W. M. Brooks and Thomas Adams, who had been in the mission school for some time. Possibly ​the three sons of Thomas McKay were also of the party, though there is a conflict on that point in the statements furnished.
The first tidings of his family received by Jason Lee were of a most painful character. At Pawnee Mission, near Council Bluffs, an express arrived from Fort Vancouver, sent by McLoughlin, with the intelligence of the death of Mrs Lee on the 26th of June, three weeks after the birth and death of a son. Mrs Lee was buried among the firs that had overshadowed her when her marriage vows were taken, and her burial was the first of any white woman in Oregon.
After crossing the Mississippi, Lee began a lecturing tour, drawing large audiences in the churches, where he presented the subject of Oregon with the ardor of an enthusiast, and stimulated his hearers to furnish funds and men for the settlement of that paradise of the west. The effect of his labors was to draw into his paradise "hundreds of immigrants," says White, "from the western frontier of the states, of a restless, aspiring disposition," who gave him subsequently no little uneasiness. The interest at Peoria, Illinois, was augmented by the illness of Adams, the young Chinook, and by his remaining there through the ​winter. In his imperfect English he told marvellous stories of the Columbia River, and the salmon it contained, which excited a desire among some of the young men to enter into business there, and to found a city at the mouth of that magnificent stream. Of this attempt details will be given in another chapter.
At New York Lee made his report to the missionary society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and upon his information a call was published in the Christian Advocate and Journal for five missionaries, and for laymen, physicians, farmers, mechanics, and young women for teachers. This call was responded to by thirty-six persons, and sixteen children increased the number to fifty-two, all whom the missionary society .was asked to employ in Oregon in addition to those already there. The ship Lausanne, owned by Farnham and Fry of New York, and commanded by Captain Josiah Spaulding, was chartered, and laden with everything that an infant colony could require, at a cost to the society of $42,000. It was not without effort that this extraordinary sum was raised; and the talent of the Oregon superintendent is well illustrated in his success. Hines says that Lee met with warm opposition from some members of the board, who doubted the expediency of the measure; but the superintendent, who had just come from the field of operations, perseveringly and powerfully urged the claims of the Mission, and succeeded in obtaining more than he demanded, for in his opinion but two ministers were required, but in the estimation of a majority of the board, if there were to be as many laymen sent out as Lee called for, two ministers would not be sufficient.
While the missionary board were considering the question of ways and means, the missionary colonizer ​was not idle. The petition prepared in Oregon was forwarded by him to congress, whereupon Caleb Cushing of Massachusetts wrote to Lee, desiring further information concerning the population of the country, the classes composing it, and the objects of the Mission. Lee replied from Middletown, Connecticut, January 17, 1839, that there were in Oregon belonging to the Methodist Mission 25 persons of all ages and both sexes, who would shortly be reënforced by 45 more, making 70. As a matter of fact, the number reached was 77. There were 16 persons belonging to the missions of the American Board; and about 20 settlers, missionaries, and others, going out from the western states in the spring; in addition to which there were about 45 men settled in the country who had Indian wives and half-breed children. After declaring the objects of the Mission to be the benefit of the Indians west of the Rocky Mountains, by the establishment of manual-labor schools, making it necessary to erect dwelling and school houses, to farm, to build mills, and in fact to establish a colony, Lee proceeded to the main object as follows:
"It is believed that, if the government of the United States takes such measures in respect to this territory as will secure the rights of the settlers, most of those who are now attached to the Mission will remain as permanent settlers in the country after the Mission may no longer need their services. Hence it may be safely assumed that ours, in connection with the other settlers already there, is the commencement of a permanent settlement of the country. In view of this, it will be readily seen that we need two things at the hand of government, for our protection and prosperity.
​"First. We need a guaranty from government that the possession of the land we take up, and the improvements we make upon it, will be secured to us. These settlements will greatly increase the value of the government domain in that country, should the Indian title ever be extinguished. And we cannot but expect, therefore, that those who have been pioneers in this arduous work will be liberally dealt with in this matter.
"Secondly. We need the authority and protection of the government and laws of the United States, to regulate the intercourse of the settlers with each other, to protect them against the peculations and aggressions of the Indians, and to protect the Indians against the aggressions of the white settlers.
"To secure these objects, it is not supposed that much of a military force will be necessary. If a suitable person should be sent out as a civil magistrate and governor of the territory, the settlers would sustain his authority. In proof of this, it is only necessary to say that almost all the settlers in the Willamette Valley have signed a memorial to congress, praying that body to extend the United States government over the territory. . . . You are aware, sir, that there is no law in that country to protect or control American citizens. And to whom shall we look, to whom can we look, for the establishment of wholesome laws to regulate our infant but rising settlements, but to the congress of our own beloved country? The country will be settled, and that speedily, from some quarter, and it depends very much upon the speedy action of congress what that population shall be, and what shall be the fate of the Indian tribes in that territory. It may be thought that Oregon is of little importance; but, rely upon it, there is the germ of a great state. We are resolved to do what we can to benefit the country; but we are constrained to throw ourselves upon you for protection."
​In the light of this correspondence with Mr Cushing, Jason Lee's object in demanding so large a reënforcement of laymen is unmistakable. His declarations present him unequivocally as a missionary colonizer; and though born a British subject, and with no evidence to show that he ever became a naturalized citizen of the United States, yet he talks glibly of appealing to 'our own beloved' country for the establishment of laws.
In August 1838, at Lynn, Massachusetts, the old home of Cyrus Shepard and Miss Downing, a society called the Oregon Provisional Emigration Society was organized. The intention of this association was to send to Oregon at the outset not less than two hundred men with their families, to be followed by other divisions at intervals, until thousands should settle in the country. The constitution debarred all persons from becoming members who were not of good moral character and believers in the Christian religion, and the general expenses of the enterprise were to be paid out of a joint-stock fund, no member to be assessed more than three dollars a year. The society published a monthly paper devoted to the exposition of its objects, called the Oregonian. The officers were Rev. Samuel Norris, president; Rev. Sanford Benton, vice-president; Rev. F. P. Tracy, secretary; Rev. Amos Walton, treasurer. The committee consisted of fourteen members, ten of whom were ministers.
While Mr Cushing was in correspondence with Jason Lee, he received letters from the secretary of this organization, and in reply to inquiries as to its object, was told in a letter of the 6th of January, 1839, that it was designed, first, to civilize and christianize the Indians, and secondly, to avail themselves of the advantages offered by the territory for agriculture, commerce, and manufactures.
"Having reached the territory," says the secretary, ​"we shall seek such points of settlement as will afford the greatest facilities for intercourse with the tribes; for agriculture, manufactures, and commerce; and also for defence, in case of hostilities from any quarter. For the benefit of the Indians, we propose to establish schools in which instruction in elementary science will be connected with labor; the males being made acquainted with farming, or some useful mechanical art, and the females with household duties and economy. . . . For our own emolument, we shall depend principally upon the flour trade, the salmon fishery, the culture of silk, flax, and hemp, the lumber trade, and perhaps a local business in furs. We shall establish a regular commercial communication with the United States, drawing supplies of men and goods from thence; and ultimately, we shall contemplate the opening of a trade with the various ports of the Pacific. A few years only will be required to fill the plains of Oregon with herds as valuable as those of the Spanish savannas, and various sources of profit will reveal themselves as the increase of the population shall make new resources necessary. We shall wish that no person in connection with us may have a claim upon any tract of land unless he shall actually settle upon and improve that land. . . . We shall, of course, be very unwilling to settle in a savage wilderness, without first having obtained a sufficient title to the land we may occupy, and without being assured that political obstacles will not be thrown in the way of our prosperity.
"We are confident that our settlement, more than anything else, would subserve the purposes of our government respecting the Oregon Territory. Our relations with the Indians will give us an influence over them which Americans will hardly obtain by any other means, and which, at a future day, may be found an advantage to the United States. We shall by the same means, as well as by our local situation, be prepared to hold in check the avarice of a foreign power, ​and to establish and maintain American interests generally, with the least expense to the nation and the best prospect of bloodless success."
If Jason Lee had anything to do with the formation of this society, it does not appear; and yet its objects and those of Kelley were identical with his own; it is possible that Lee's action with the government in his colonization scheme led the society to consider itself forestalled, or possibly it depended upon the success of certain measures in congress which Lee put in motion; at any rate, the society never sent out any persons as emigrants.
On the 28th of January, 1839, the memorial drawn up before Lee left Oregon was presented to the senate by Linn of Missouri, and ordered to be printed. On the 11th of December, 1838, Linn introduced a bill in the senate authorizing the occupation of the Columbia or Oregon river; organizing a territory north of latitude 42° and west of the Rocky Mountains, to be called Oregon Territory; providing for the establishment of a fort on the Columbia, and the occupation of the country by a military force of the United States; establishing a port of entry, and requiring that the country should be held subject to the revenue laws of the United States. On the 22d of February he made a speech in the senate supporting a bill to provide protection for the citizens of the United States in the Oregon Territory, or trading on the Columbia River. It is not necessary to follow the action of congress further, in this place. The reference is here made to point out the agency of Jason Lee in directing that action, and the strong influence he seems to have wielded in Washington as well as with the missionary board. How much his suggestions, especially concerning land matters, moulded subsequent legislation will be made evident in considering the action of the government at a later period. A proof of the favor with which his designs were regarded by the ​cabinet is furnished by the appropriation of considerable money from the secret-service fund, for the charter of the Lausanne, as related by one of her passengers. Lee kept the secret, and so did those who gave him the money, until the boundary question was settled between the United States and Great Britain.
Everything being finally arranged, the mission family, a term by which this emigration was more particularly designated, assembled at New York, whence the Lausanne was to sail. Jason Lee had certainly improved his time in several respects; for the so lately bereaved husband was returning comforted with a new wife. Following are the names of the members of this reënforcement: Mr and Mrs Jason Lee; Rev. Joseph H. Frost, wife and one child; Rev. William W. Kone and wife; Rev. Alvan F. Waller, wife and two children; Rev. J. P. Richmond, M. D., wife and four children; Ira L. Babcock, M. D., wife and one child; Rev. Gustavus Hines, wife and one child; George Abernethy, mission steward, wife and two children; W. W. Raymond, farmer, and wife; Henry B. Brewer, farmer, and wife; Rev. Lewis H. Judson, cabinet-maker, wife and three children; Rev. Josiah L. Parrish, blacksmith, wife and three children; James Olley, carpenter, wife and children; Hamilton Campbell, wife and children; David Carter, Miss Chloe A. Clark, Miss Elmira Phillips, Miss Maria T. Ware, Miss Almira Phelps, teachers; Miss Orpha Lankton, stewardess; and Thomas Adams, the Chinook whom Mr Lee had brought with him from Oregon. The other Chinook, Brooks, had died.
It was on the 10th of October, 1839, that the Lausanne sailed. The mission family gathered on the ​steamer which was to convey them to Sandy Hook, where the ship was anchored. Assembled there were many friends, and some strangers drawn thither by curiosity regarding so unprecedented a missionary exodus. Religious services were held conducted by the reverend doctors Bangs and Anderson, secretaries of the American Board. Stronger to move the heart than sound of brass or stretched strings is the music of the human voice; and as prayer and song fell upon the ears of those excited by hopes and fears, their souls were stirred within them, and sobs, tears, and embraces mingled with the farewell benedictions, as the travellers stepped from the steamer to the ship. No company ever sailed from that port whose departure was watched with more interest by religious and political circles.
The ship reached the harbor of Honolulu on the 11th of April 1840, where all disembarked, and were hospitably entertained until the 28th, when they set sail for the Columbia River. During their sojourn, Lee held a conference with Kamehameha III., relative to an exchange of productions between the Islands and Oregon, and an informal treaty of commerce was entered into, to the manifest pleasure of the king.
Before the Lausanne reached its destination, it may be well to glance over the condition of things at the Mission during Lee's absence. In June had occurred the death of Mrs Lee, as previously related; in August White's infant son was drowned, the first boy ​born in the Willamette Valley of white parentage. This accident occurred at the cascades of the Columbia, a canoe containing Mr and Mrs Leslie and Mrs White and her infant being upset. Mrs White and Mr Leslie escaped with great difficulty.
The house occupied by Mr Leslie was burned in December, with all the personal effects of the family, a loss the more severe on account of his wife's serious illness. Their pecuniary loss was met by the board.
An event of this year was the forming of the second cattle company, numbering twenty-seven men, under the command of T. J. Hubbard. Its object, like that of the first, was to bring cattle from California. In pursuance of this plan, a party proceeded as far south as Rogue River, where they were attacked by natives. The men scattered in the mountains, some wounded and suffering many hardships, but all finally reaching the settlements.
Late in December protracted revival meetings were held at the Mission, Mr Leslie preaching with earnestness and power; and besides his own daughters and White's adopted son, there were added to the church a number of the settlers and many of the natives.
At the Dalles, Lee and Perkins found the effect of their teachings very different from what they had expected. It was easy for an Indian to believe in miraculous power; old superstitions concerning spirits ​of good and evil, and their influence on human affairs, prepared them to accept the Christian belief, but in a sense surprising to their teachers. The principal point in the Methodist faith is the efficacy of prayer, which was impressed upon the minds of the Indians in their first lessons, causing them earnestly and sincerely to strive for that state which they imagined necessary to the working of the spell which was to bring them their hearts' desires. On being disappointed, they lost faith, and reproached their teachers.
Said an Indian to Perkins, "I want a coat. Perkins replied, "You must work and earn one." "Oh," says the neophyte, "I was told if I took your religion, and prayed for what I wanted to have, I should get it. If I am to work for it, I can earn a coat at any time of the Hudson's Bay Company."
On one occasion a chief at the Cascades set adrift a canoe belonging to Daniel Lee in order to sell him one of his own. To secure his friendship and prevent a repetition of the theft, Lee presented him a musket, which so affected the chief that when he met another of the missionaries at Fort Vancouver he assured him that his people now all obeyed Lee's instructions, and as for himself, "his heart was full of pray." They often stopped in the midst of their supplications to demand pay for praying.
In the autumn of 1839 the natives at the Dalles, by this time convinced that prayer did not place them on an equality in worldly goods with their teachers, became so intrusive and committed so many thefts that the missionaries began to fear for their lives; and Daniel Lee took the precaution to provide himself with arms and ammunition from Fort Vancouver, intending to garrison the mission house, and to resist any hostile attempts. To his relief and astonishment on returning to the Dalles he found Mr Perkins in the midst of a "work of God," among the Indians. Several of ​the natives had begun to pray, and one was converted, which greatly encouraged Mr Perkins.
The meetings were continued all winter, Mr and Mrs Perkins following up the good beginning and visiting all the tribes along the river in their neighborhood. In the spring a camp-meeting was held among the Kliketats, when twelve hundred Indians were present, and during the winter and spring several hundred, thought to be converted, were baptized and admitted to communion.
The account of a large Indian church at the Dalles, shortly afterward published in the east, created great enthusiasm among religious people. But this was hardly written before the converts began to fall from grace. A chief was killed by an enemy, and the hearts of the Indians were cast down. "What was the good of praying?" they asked. Their chief had prayed, and now he was dead. If prayer would not avert death, why pray? If they remained Christians they would not be permitted to avenge the murder of their relatives, or to fight their enemies; and though Perkins restrained them at that time from violence, they were not satisfied that it was the better way. They assumed an importance, too, now that they were Christians. Perkins sent away a native boy for some misconduct, soon after which the boy died. This became the occasion for demanding pay, as Perkins was held responsible for the death of one of the tribe. Their demands not being complied with, the savages became insolent, and indemnified themselves by stealing horses. They even pretended to be offended because they were not honored by a visit from the superintendent of the missions, from whom they probably hoped to receive presents for their efforts at good behavior. To control these capricious natures was beyond the power of any missionary.
Elijah White was again afflicted by the death, on the 16th of August, 1839, of his adopted son, ​George Stoughtenburg, who, while attempting to ford the Willamette on horseback, about a mile below the Mission, was drowned. That autumn Shepard was seriously ill with a scrofulous trouble, which necessitated the amputation of his leg; he did not long survive the operation, his death occurring on the 1st of January, 1840. For two years he had suffered from the disease. He left a wife and two infant daughters. Thus passed away from his work in the Methodist Mission its most faithful and successful servant, whose gentleness had won him the hearts of all his associates. He was a large, fine-looking man, but little over forty years of age at the time of his death. With Shepard died all interest in the hopeless scheme of educating the native children of the Willamette. We cannot blame his associates for feeling its hopelessness; to them it was a rootless Sahara, upon which the sun might beat for centuries without bringing forth fruit enough to feed a whip-poor-will. And yet his was a self-sacrificing, generous nature, that never lost faith in the power of love to redeem the lowest humanity.
Such was the condition of affairs in the spring of 1840. The Lausanne not arriving as early as was expected, Daniel Lee, who had been waiting a few days at the Willamette Mission, grew impatient, for his betrothed was among the passengers, and he hastened forward to meet the ship at its anchorage. Solomon Smith accompanied him with his Clatsop wife, who wished to return to her own people as a missionary, having experienced a change of heart; and on the 16th of May they started on their trip, and held religious services with the Indians wherever they found it convenient to land. They had just encamped on the 21st of May at Chinook, when a vessel was seen coming up the channel under Cape Disappointment, and anchoring in Baker Bay. Lee lost no time in going on board, and in meeting his uncle and the ​great reënforcement. Miss Maria T. Ware was the one above all others whom he sought; for to her he had been engaged for some time, and on the 11th of June following they were married.
Jason Lee, impatient over the necessary delay, and anxious as to the accommodation of so large a company, took a canoe and went in advance to the Mission. When there he handed over the ship's list of passengers, headed by the name of Mr and Mrs Jason Lee, that he might notify his old companions that he had returned with another wife. He made no remark on the subject, and nothing was said to him. Deeply stirred had been the sympathies of his old associates as they thought of his return to his desolate home; and now the revulsion of feeling was so great that the supremacy of Jason Lee in their hearts was thenceforth a thing of the past.
* ↑ Moss' Pioneer Times, MS., 3.
* ↑ Whites Ten Years in Or., passim; Mrs Wilson, in Or. Sketches, MS., 23.
* ↑ White's Ten Years in Oregon, 72.
* ↑ Mrs Hinckley died not long after her visit to Oregon, and Captain Hinckley married a daughter of Martinez of California. In describing the wedding festivities, Mrs Harvey says that dancing was kept up for three nights, with bull-fights in the daytime; feasting, and drinking a good deal, especially sweet wines. Life of McLoughlin, MS., 25.
* ↑ Hines' Oregon Hist, 25; Lee and Frost's Or., 149.
* ↑ Roe had a strange history. He was born in New York in 1806 and came to Oregon in 1834. He early joined the Methodist church in which for many years he had a good standing. On the death of his wife he married again in 1856 another half-breed girl of good character; but becoming jealous of her, he murdered her in 1859, for which he was hanged, professing to hope for forgiveness, and expressing a willingness to pay the penalty of his sin. Hines' Oregon Hist., 25; Or. Statesman, March 1, 1859.
* ↑ Parker says that when he urged the duty of the marriage relation he was met by two reasons for dispensing with a legal marriage: one, that if the men wished to return to their former homes they could not take their Indian families with them; and the other, that the Indian women did not understand the obligations of the marriage covenant, and might at any time, through caprice, leave them. Parker's Jour., Ex. Tour., 180–1.
* ↑ Wilkes, whose visit to the Willamette settlements occurred in 1841, expressed his surprise at the general regard for temperance, and opposition to distilling spirits among a class of men who might be expected to favor that indulgence. But they were all convinced that their welfare depended on sobriety. Wilkes' Nar., U. S. Explor. Ex., iv. 386.
* ↑ A pear-shaped mollusk in a soft shell, incased in the sandstone of the sea-shore at the mouth of the Salmon River. It is found by breaking open the rock, and seems to have enlarged its cell as required for growth.
* ↑ Individual instances of savage intellect are often found which are far superior to the average civilized mind.
* ↑ Lee and Frost's Or., 150.
* ↑ Daniel Lee calls these mountains the President's Range, after Kelley; nor were they as a range ever otherwise formally named. It was from the circumstance that travellers so often said 'the Cascade Mountains,' to distinguish them from other ranges in the country, that they obtained their present name.
* ↑ Lee and Frost's Or., 155.
* ↑ Sutter's Personal Reminiscences, MS., 7–8; Sutter Co. Hist., 23; Yuba Co. Hist., 34.
* ↑ 25th Cong., 3d Sess., H. Rept. 101; Evans' Hist. Or., MS., 235–6. The signing of this memorial by Young and his associates indicates that their standing was very different at this time from what it was when they first entered the valley and were ostracized by McLoughlin; otherwise they were signing a petition to exclude just such adventurers as themselves. Jason Lee had marked ability in using others for his own advantage; Edwards was his instrument in drawing up this memorial, enabling Lee himself to keep in the background. Edwards' Sketch of Oregon, MS., 17.
* ↑ Returning to Missouri, Edwards studied law, married, and during the Mormon troubles in that state in 1841 did military duty, receiving the title of colonel. In 1850 he emigrated to California, settling in Nevada County, where he engaged in politics as a whig and afterwards as a republican. In Shuck's Representative Men, 461–72, is a biography written by Robert E. Draper; and there is also his Diary of the Willamette Cattle Company, and Sketch of Oregon. He died May 1, 1869, leaving descendants in California.
* ↑ Daniel Lee does not mention them in this connection, and Hines in his Hist. Or., 30, agrees with Lee. White states that Alexander, William, and John McKay accompanied Jason Lee, and that they returned in 1842 from the east; having gone there to be educated in the Wilbraham Academy, Massachusetts, where the Lees, years before, had completed their studies. Mrs. Elizabeth Wilson of the Dalles says that Jason Lee persuaded McLoughlin to have William C. McKay sent to Wilbraham instead of to Europe as was intended. There he remained two years, and then entered a medical college at Pleasanton, Vermont, and subsequently attended lectures at Albany. Or. Sketches, MS., 21–2; Ten Years in Or., 140.
* ↑ Hines' Hist. Or., 31–2; Lee and Frost's Or., 153. Gray does not credit McLoughlin with sending the message the entire distance. Gray's Hist. Or., 182.
* ↑ Later the remains were removed to Salem. 'In the mission graveyard at Salem Oregon is a grave, on the head-stone of which is recorded these words: "Beneath this sod, the first ever broken in Oregon for the reception of a white mother and child, lie buried the remains of Anne Maria Pitman, wife of Rev. Jason Lee, and infant son. She sailed from New York in July 1836, landed in Oregon June 1837, was married in July 1837, and died June 26, 1838, in full enjoyment of that love which constrained her to leave all for Christ and heathen souls. So we have left all, and followed Thee; what shall we have therefore."' Portland P. C. Advocate, Jan. 2, 1879. It will be observed that the inscription is incorrect as to the date of Miss Pitman's arrival, which was in May.
* ↑ Ten Years in Oregon, 91.
* ↑ Hist. Or., 36–7. 'No missionaries,' says Blanchet, ' were ever despatched to represent the various sects in any land under more favorable auspices than were the ladies and gentlemen belonging to the Methodist Episcopal Church ...amidst the "wilds" of Oregon.' Hist. Cath. Church in Or., 12. 'It was the greatest Methodist exodus probably ever sailing from an eastern port to any coast.' Wilson, in Or. Sketches, MS., 23.' This particular mission involved an expenditure of $42,000 in a single year. . .At the end of 6 years there were 68 persons connected with this mission, men, women, and children, all supported by this society. How a number of missionaries found employment in such a field it is not easy to conjecture, especially as the great body of the Indians never came under the influence of their labors.' Olin's Works, ii. 427–8; Marshall's Christian Missions, ii. 263–4.
* ↑ 25th Cong., 3d Sess., H. Rept. 101, 3, 4.
* ↑ 25th Cong., 3d Sess., H. Rept. 101, 25, 28.
* ↑ Linn's Life and Services, 224.
* ↑ Fry and Farnham not being able to furnish a ship to bring out the missionaries for the price offered by the society, the government paid fifty dollars additional for each person. Parrish, who relates this, says also that he was not aware of this assistance by the government until he had been seven years in Oregon. Or. Anecdotes, MS., 8.
* ↑ Hines' Hist. Or., 80.
* ↑ From a comparison of dates, it appears that the first child of white parentage born in Oregon was Alice Clarissa Whitman, born at Waiilatpu, March 4, 1837, and drowned in the Walla Walla River June 22, 1838. Jason Lee White was born in July 1836; he was eleven months old at the time of his death. Lee and Frost's Or., 212. While canoes were the only means of travelling by water, fatal accidents were not infrequent, which makes the coincidence in the mode of death of the first two infants less notable. On the 15th of September, 1837, Joseph Beers was born, and in 1882 resided in Marion Co., the oldest American native of Oregon. On the 15th of November, 1837, a daughter named Eliza was born to Mr and Mrs Spalding at Lapwai, and she afterward married a Mr Warren of Brownsville, Linn County. The next birth was that of Jason Lee's son, June 6, 1838, who died soon after, and who was the fifth child, and third boy—though J. L. Parrish claims him for the first. See an article in the Riverside, a weekly newspaper published at Independence, Oregon, June 13, 1879. On the 7th of December, 1838, a son was born to Mr and Mrs Walker, at Waiilatpu, the first boy of white parentage in eastern Oregon, or what is now Washington. Olympia Transcript, Dec. 16, 1876; Seattle Pacific Tribune, Dec. 1, 1876; Corvallis Gazette, June 23, 1876. A son was born to Mr and Mrs W. H. Gray about this time. In the autumn of 1838 a daughter was born to Mr and Mrs Shepard, named Anna Maria Lee, and a son to Mr and Mrs Perkins.
* ↑ Among the converts were James O'Neal, Charles Roe, S. G. Campbell, Baptiste Desportes McKay, J. P. Edwards, and Solomon Smith. Daniel Lee says: 'The scene was awful. Poor C. felt as if he was just falling into hell, and with great earnestness besought the prayers of all present. Prayer went up, and shouts of praise followed, for the soul of the prisoner was soon released. About nine o'clock several of the boys and girls came rushing into the room, fell upon their knees, and began crying aloud for mercy.' Lee and Frost's Or., 107–8. The excitement continued for some weeks.
* ↑ Raymond's Notes, MS.
* ↑ Lee and Frost's Or., 230.
* ↑ Oregon City Argus, April 18, 1857.
* ↑ He was born in Phillipston, Massachusetts, August 16, 1799.