# Oregon Historical Quarterly/Volume 18/Hall Jackson Kelley, Part 3

Continued from Part 2, continued at Part 4
HALL JACKSON KELLEY—Prophet of Oregon
CHAPTER NINE
Four Years of Futile Effort
Kelley was a changed man when he arrived at Boston in 1836 after his long voyage from the Sandwich Islands. Only three years before "his physical nature was iron-like, possessing great power of endurance," but exposure and hardships had enfeebled his body and shattered his nervous system. Yet this gaunt shadow of a man had no thought of giving up his long cherished idea of awakening his countrymen to the great advantages, national and individual, which must inevitably follow the settlement of the Northwest Coast under the patronage and protection of the American government. He had already done much to spread broadcast information which he had obtained at second hand; now he could speak with authority, having seen the promised land and found it good
But there were personal matters which required his immediate attention. His family "every soul of them turned against me," had to be reconciled to him. He went to Gilmanton and spent some time with his father and his wife and children, but his efforts to reestablish his household resulted in failure.
His expenses had been heavy, and most of his property had been lost or taken from him, so that now he was a poor man, worried by his debts. It was not so much the amount of his indebtedness that concerned him; it was the fact that it was a debt of honor, and that he was unable to pay the small sum of three hundred dollars on account of outstanding obligations of the American Society which he had issued as general agent. These were two shares of stock, each of one hundred dollars, and five twenty-dollar certificates. Concerning them he explained, "Immediately after the Oregon expedition was broken up, the amount received for stock and certificates was re​
168 Fred Wilbur Powell
funded, all but the above, which circumstances rendered incon- venient and improper then to restore.**^
In an attempt to raise money, therefore, he ag^in worked as a surveyor. "In the year 1837, I surveyed three railroad routes in the State of Maine, each, however, of short extent, having the assistance, only, of two or three men unacquainted with engineering, and employed on the outdoor work. I planned, figured, drafted, and performed the office-work; be- sides, the entire labor with the field instruments."^ The report of one of these surveys was published;^ but whether the project was carried out is not stated.
In September, 1837, William A. Slacum, purser in the United States navy, went to Boston and conferred with Charles Bul- finch, who had long been interested in trading ventures on the Northwest Coast. He asked for a meeting with Kelley, and Kelley visited him at the Tremont House, where the matter of Oregon and its settlement was discussed.
Slacum had recently returned from Oregon, having been commissioned by the secretary of state, under date of Novem- ber 11, 1835, "to stop at the different settlements of whites on the coast of the United States, and on the banks of the [Columbia] river, and also at the various Indian villages on the banks, or in the immediate neighborhood of that river; ascertain, as nearly as possible, the population of each; the relative number of whites (distinguishing the nation to which they belong) and aborigines; the jurisdiction the whites ac- knowledge; the sentiments entertained by all in respect to the United States, and to the two European powers having possessions in that region; and, generally, to obtain all such information, political, physical, statistical, and geographical, as may prove useful or interesting to this Government."
This mission had been undertaken at the suggestion of Presi- dent Jackson, who may have been prompted by Kelley*s activ- ities during several winters at Washington, and by the knowl-
2 Kelky, Narrative of Events and Difficulties, 711.
3 IbiA, 72-3.
4 Kelley, Hist, of the Settlement of Oregon,' 8. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 169
edge that Kelley bad proceeded to Oregon with the purpose of establishing a settlement on the Columbia, The immediate suggestion, however, was due to no word or act of Kelley, who w^as then on the high seas en route for Boston, but to the fact that Slacum was "about to visit the Pacific ocean," thus pre- senting to the president an opportunity to obtain specific and authentic information upon a matter concerning which the government must soon take a definite stand.**
In the course of an investigation which extended from De- cember 22, 1836, to February 10, 1837, Slacum conferred with Dr. McLoughlin, Jason Lee, Ewing Young, and others, and collected much information which he submitted upon his re- turn. Some of this information appears in a memorial praying compensation for his services, which he presented to congress on December 18, 1837.«
In this memorial there is no mention of Kelley, though the names of several of the members of his party are given. The reason for this omission is unknown. Kelley believed that it was due to the desire of Robert Greenhow, librarian of the de- partment of state, to deprive him of the credit for having induced the first American settlers to locate in Oregon. Ac- cording to his statement Slacum declared' that he had seen a copy of Kelle/s General Circular in the hands of one of the settlers, and he "seemed satisfied" that Kelley was the founder of the first American settlement, and said that he would so report. He had brought from that settlement the copy of the General Circular and also a statement of Ewing Young declar-
5 "The investigations of Dr. J. R. Wilson led him to look upon this effort of President Jackson to get light on the situation in Oregon as bound up with his larger scheme of 'acquisition of territory in the southwest^ stretching from Texas to and including the harbor of San Francisco. Doctor Wilson came to this conclusion because Jackson's interest in this direction had in the first instance been aroused bv letters from Slacum. The scope and character of the report suggest that the author had a pretty clear and full appreciation of all the vital American interests in the Oregon situation in the thirties." — Young, Introductory note to reprint of Slacum^ report, Oregon Historical Society, Quarterly, XIII. 175-
6 Slacum, Memorial Prating Compensation for His Services in Obtaining Information tn Relation to the Settlements on the Oregon River. 25 cong. 2 ■ess. S. doc. 24. The material accompanying this memorial was reprinted as appendix **N" in Committee on Foreign AflFairs, supplemental report. Territory of Oregon, 29-47. ^5 cong. 3 sess. H, rep. loi. ​
170 Fred Wilbur Powell
ing that it was due to Kelley that he had settled in that ter- ritory.
While in WashingtcHi in 1838 Kelley examined the manu- script of Slacum's report, which was on file in the department of state. There he found Young's statement, which had been omitted from the printed copy. "The paper marked E in the report is that identical statement ; and it was evidently, at first, intended to be printed, with the matters included in the report : but it was not printed, nor to be seen by members of Congress ; nor was any allusion made to the petitioner [Kelley], or to any of his meritorious acts in Oregon." The facts in the case can- not be determined, and the report in question cannot now be found in the archives. It does not appear, however, how Greenhow could have had anything to do with the papers which Slacum chose to append to his memorial.
Kelley took advantage of his opportunity to copy Young's statement, in which he acknowledged his indebtedness to Kelley, but referred to him in terms which indicated that he had "mistaken views" about Kelley and "unfriendly feelings" toward him. "There never was, I affirm it, the least personal misunderstanding between me and Capt. Yoiuig," Kelley de- clared. "His inimical feelings were wholly owing to the lying spirit going out from Fort Vancouver, and going about to deceive those who were most likely to be friends and to stand by me."^
As has been said in the preceding chapter Kelley left the Northwest Coast with the idea of returning to establish a settlement at New Dungeness on the strait of Juan de Fuca, west of Port Discovery, but he was unable to arouse interest in the project. Of this movement he said:
"Soon after my return to New England, I announced to the public through the medium of the newspapers, my purpose and programme; and many enterprising and intelligent men of New England, some with families, a sufficient number for a settlement, enlisted for the expedition. But the war of perse-
7 StttUmtnt of Oregon, 55-8, 80; Narrative of Events and DifficuUies, 6»-B. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 171
cution continuing to rage, and the troops about me making daily attacks, and the hireling press again being turned against me, I was forced to abandon that enterprise. It was my in- tention to take my family to the place of settlement, and to be myself a settler, believing that should my abode be on that side of the continent, far away from persecuting enemies on this side, I could better, I supposed, promote the extension of the Redeemer's Kingdom. But I am now [1868] satisfied that it was ordered in Divine Providence, and for my good that that settlement should not be made by me ; that, although the ideal Tuget's Sound Agricultural Association' could do noth- ing, yet the Hudson Bay Company could do much to break up the establishment, and drive me and my friends from the coast ....
"To bring me into the lowest possible disrepute, and under universal contempt, and to break up that expedition, also, the following abusive notice was taken of me and my enterprise by the publishers of the Old American Comic Almanac of 1837. On one of its queer cuts was a geographical caricature of a portion of Oregon. On the banks of the Columbia was written 'Rowed up Salt Rive/ ; and in the country north, between the Cowlitz and the ocean, 'Kelley's Folly.' Twenty thousand copies were said to have been sold. To apprise my cruel enemies that I was yet alive, and had yet some power left to defend my bleeding character, I published the following in the Boston Post: . . ."»
The reader will be spared this communication, which was entitled "Unprovoked Cruelty." By his ill-advised outburst Kelley naturally brought a harmless bit of foolery to the at- tention of many who would have never known of it, and so added to his reputation as a man whose mind was singularly out of tune with his fellows. Nor did he ever fail to mention the insult when setting forth the long list of his tribulations.®
In 1837 he again took to writing on Oregon, but instead of
8 Settlemtnt of Oregon, 125-8.
o Kellev, Hist, of ui§ Colonigation of Oregon, appx. G; Narrative of Events
Difficufttes, appx. L ​
172 Fred Wilbur Powell
presenting the results of his observations he chose to waste his efforts on the question of the American title, concerning which he had little if any information that was not already available to the authorities at Washington. Thus, in the year mentioned, he published a series of articles in the Bunker Hill Aurora, giving an account of the discoveries and examinations made on the Northwest Coast by the early Spanish, American, and British navigators. These articles, together with docu- ments relating to the claims of Bulfinch and other Americans to the land on Vancouver Island purchased by Captain Kendrick, he presented in 1838 to Lewis F. Linn, senator from Missouri. Linn was chairman of a "select committee to which was re- ferred a bill to authorize the President of the United States to occupy the Oregon Territory." In his report he quoted at length from Slacum's memorial, and used some of Kelley's data on the discovery and occupation of the Columbia, but he does not appear to have set a high value upon this material, for he failed to mention Kelley's name.^®
During 1838 and 1839 Kelley contributed another series of articles to the American Traveller of Boston, dealing with the question of title. In 1839 came an opportunity for service of a more practical nature. Caleb Cushing, chairman of the house committee on foreign affairs, asked him to contribute a memoir on Oregon and California, based on personal observations. To this request he gladly responded. The result appears in the appendix to Cushing's supplemental report on the "Territory of Oregon."ii
In 1839 also, Kelley presented through John Davis, senator from Massachusetts, a memorial to congress "praying a grant of land in the Oregon Territory for the purpose of establishing a colony thereon," which was referred to a select committee. In this document, he made a clear statement of his eflforts to promote the . settlement of Oregon, and declared that since "many of the individuals whose attention had been directed by his exertions towards Oregon, and who originally enlisted
10 25 cong. a sess. S. doc. 470; Settlement of Oregon, 77.
11 as cong. 3 sess. H. rq>. loi: 47-61. See appendix. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 173
in his scheme of emigration, have subsequently settled in that Territory . . . your petitioner has thus been the author of the first permanent American settlements west of the Rocky Mountains." He also called attention to his services after his return in communicating the results of his journey to the public. Upon these grounds he based his claim,^ which he summarized in the following terms :
"Having thus sacrificed' his time, property, and health, being now reduced to poverty, and yet remaining desirous of carry- ing the institutions of his country to the Oregon,^ he most earnestly and respectfully prays of this honorable body, the grant of so much land in that Territory as maiy enable him at once to establish a prosperous colony, and regain some portion of the property which he expended as before described."^*
That this memorial was based on tittle more than a forlorn hope is probable; for Kelley had already turned his attention to the opening of a direct means of communication with the Pacific Coast. For information as to his activities in this direction we are compelled to rely upon the unsupported state- ments in his own writings, which are themselves contradictory and in some particulars clearly erroneous. In after years he declared that after the failure of his second attempt to found a settlement, and after a physical breakdown following his surveying work in Maine,
"I, therefore, determined to ccmtinue in some field of useful enterprise; and turned to a project then on foot, from another quarter; that of a canal or railroad across the Isthmus of Panama. That choice was made, partly to prepare for memori-
12 While in the prosecation of the enterprise, it did not so much as enter mv mind ever to apply to Congress for relief, or a reward for any services or sacrifices which I might render the country; but, after its achievement, and mv return home, in 1836, — finding my health greatly impaired, my prooerty, and the very means of acquiring property, gone; and considering the nature of the circumstances which prevented the selecticm and occupancy of a lot of Jand in the Valley of the Wallamet, and also the circumstances which deprived me of a participation in the abundant harvest of the fields I had sown, I thought it my duty to apply for help; and accordingly in 1839, did apply." — Narrative of Events ami Difficulties, vostacripi.
13 26 cong. 1 sess. S. doc. ao: S. jour. 45, 76. According to Kelley a petition in support of his memoriu was presented to congress by a number of citizens of Boston, among whom was the historian, George Bancroft, but no reference to such a document has been found in the official records. — Kelley, Memorial, 1848: 11; Colonigation of Oregon, appx. F; Narrative of Events and Difficulties, appx. F.; Settlemept of Oregon, 118. ​
174 Fred Wilbur Powell
alizing Congress on the subjects of the railroad, and the civil- ization of the Indians in the United States' territories. It was thought, that working in the conspicuous position of a chief engineer, two or three years, in a southern climate, would lim- ber the limbs for operations in a northern ; and the work itself would render honorable testimony to my capabilities; and be ccMnmendatory letters to men in the council of our nation.
"Accordingly I went to Washington, in the close of 1838, hoping, under the government auspices, to make myself useful, in opening to the world a railroad thoroughfare between the two great oceans. I conferred with Mr. [Charles F.] Mercer [of Virginia], Chairman of the Committee of the Senate [house of representatives] on Roads and Canals, who said, a report would be made favorable to the enterprise. Such a report was submitted and accepted; but no appropriation was made, and nothing further done by Congress upon the subject."^*
The matter of a transcontinental railroad also engaged his attention.
"Reference to that project is made in my Geographical Sketch of Oregon, printed [written] in 1829;^** and in the Memoir to Congress, in 1839, relative to the statistics and topography of that territory .*• It has often been mentioned to
I A Narrative of Events and Difficulties, 741 Settlement of Oregon. 8. No record of such a report has been found. As to Keller's qualifications as an engineer, we have the f^ollowing testimonial of George B. Emerson of Boston, whose judgment was endorsed by Edward Everett: "From natural taste and adaptation; from the most extraordinary experience of the work, in every form and variety: from practical skill and acquaintance of all kinds of ground and all modes of operation, Mr. Kelley is singularly well qualified to under- stand, superintend, and execute the work of a survey for any railroad or other improvement, public or private." — Ibid., 75. See also Kelley, "Beloved Brehren, Jan. 14, 1870. Ms.
15 "The settlement of the Oregon country, would conduce to a freer inter- course, and a more extensive and remunerative trade with the East Indies. . . . Such an extension and enjoyment of the East India trade, would provoke the spirit of American enterprise, to open communications from the Mississippi valley, and from the gulf of Mexico to the Pacific ocean, and thus open new channels, through which the products of America and the Eastern world, will pass in mutual exchange, saving in every voyage, a distance of ten thousand miles: new channels, which opening across toe bosom of a wide spread ocean; and intersecting islands, where health fills the breeze and comforts spread the shores would conduct the full tide of a golden traffic, into the reservoir of our national finance." — Pp. 79-80. In "Beloved Brethren," Dec. 4, 1860, Kelley said that he projected such a railroad in 1831, and that in 1836 he and P. t*. F. Degrand were associated in the movement.
16 'These were the objects to whose accomplishment I looked forward, and from which I confidently anticipated many benefits: ... a certain and speedy line of communication overland from the Mississippi to the Oregon, by means of which the Eastern and Western worlds shoula be united, and meir wealth interchanged and increased." — P. 48. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 175
scientific and enterprising men, and described in my journals and papers ....
"The route begins on the bank of the Missouri near the mouth of the Kansas, crosses the back-bone of the continent through a depression near the 43d parallel, lays along the valley of the Snake P^iver, and crosses the Columbia at Walla- walla ; and, again, it makes a mountainous transit on the west- erly side of the valley of Clark's River, where, intelligent hunters suppose no formidable difficulties exist to be encoun- tered ; and terminates in a delightful and fertile tract of coun- try near the southern extermity of Puget's Sound, there to connect with the interminable tracks of the ships of the g^eat deep. The eligibility of that place, for a terminus, and for an entreport and depot, can be fully conceived of, only by those who understand the natural advantages of that portion of Oregon for commerce and agriculture; and know the chart and all about De Fuca's Straits ....
"My plans differ in some respects, from those by Mr. Whit- ney, now before the public. His, I think, are well devised and matured. His ideas, as, in 1848 I understood them from the projector himself, in regard to the routes, to the execution of the work, and to the benefits to accrue to the world, especially, to our nation, seem consistent and sound ; in my apprehension, there can be none better.
"He would have one-half of a strip of territory sixty miles in breadth. The United States to retain the other half, — every alternate section. Mine propose just half of that breadth ; and looking to a portion of the lands for a possession, and ap- propriate a portion for their Christianization, and for improve- ments in their aflfairs and fortune.""
The evidence presented by Kelley is not su£Bcient to give him a distinguished rank among the many men whose activities brought about the construction of a transcontinental railroad. In neither of the passages to which he referred is there any specific mention of a railroad, and we know that in the ten
17 NarraHvt of Events and DifFicuttUs, 70-1; Settlement of Oregon, 123. ​
176 Fred Wilbur Powell
years from 1829 to 1839 the railroad was a subject of great popular interest and general discussion. Moreover, it was Kelley's habit to be specific in his prophecies ; it was only in the matter of practical detail that he made use of general phrases. Asa Whitney's agitation began in 1844, and his first petition was presented to congress in 1845. At the earliest, Kelley's claim was not advanced until 1852, the year in which Whitney's plan was definitely abandoned by congress. By that time the movement for a railroad to the Pacific had become national, and Kelley's suggestion as to possible route and method of financing was only one of many, and contributed little if any- thing to the final result.*®
1 8 Oeveland and Powell, Railroad Promotion, 259-78. ​
CHAPTER TEN. The Hermit of Three Rivers.
In 1839 Kelley reestablished himself at Three Rivers. He had acted for many years as agent for Octavius Pickering of Boston, who owned land in the village and also the unoccupied mill privilege which had once been the property of the Three Rivers Manufacturing company.^ He was not yet fifty years old, but his active life was already done; and broken in body and in spirit, he passed the remaining thirty-five years of his life in poverty and isolation.
His house was at the edge of a grove on the side of a hill overlooking the village which he had come to regard with singular aflfection. The site was well chosen, but the house was hardly a fit abode for a man whose ideas were all in the superlative. It was a composite structure of a story and a half, built of odds and ends of lumber with regard rather to the limitations of the material than to any architectural design. The rooms were of unequal height, and the stairs approached the vertical. In the upper story there were three floor levels, two in a single room. There were half a dozen sizes of win- dows. By the door stood a clump of lilacs, and a large wild cherry tree shaded the yard. Below the house was a small orchard of apple trees, many of which defy identification. Pro- truding glacial boulders and tangled poison ivy gave evidence that the occupant of the place was concerned with other matters than appearances.
Here his wife and children visited him occasionally down to 1843, but he was never able to effect a complete reconcilia- tion. Of his domestic troubles he said "My bosom friend with whom I never had a moment of misunderstanding was enticed from me; and my beloved sons were carried away captive by
I Kelley, Hist, of th4 Settlement of Oregon, 21-2. Pickering was reporter of the Massftchusetts supreme judicial court, 1822-40. He was a son oiF the famous OAontl Timothy Pickering of Salem, who was quartermaster-general in the Revolution, postmaster-general, secretary of war, and secretary ot sute under Washington, and senator from Massachusetts. ​
178 Fred Wilbur Powell
the enemy." The enemy, it appears, was Mrs. Bradlee, Mrs. Kelley's aunt and foster mother. "That woman," said Kdley, "exerted, terribly against me, the influence which a kindred relation to an adopted daughter, and an annual income of $12,000, gave her." He attempted, however, to win his wife back to him through correspondence which he published in 1851 under the title Letters From An Afflicted Husband To An Astranged Wife.^
One of the matters which engaged his attention was his claim against the Mexican government for indemnity for the seizure of his property at Vera Cruz in 1833. "My claim for indemnity was preferred against Mexico in 1840; and a more just claim could not be. I think it probable, the minds of the American and Mexican commissioners were so darkened by my enemies, about them, as to see no merits in the claimant, and not to care to open his case."* This statement he made in obvious disregard of the strained relations then existing between the two nations over the matter of Texas.
His interest in the Kendrick lands continued; and he pre- pared for Charles Bulfinch and other claimants, a "memorial praying that their title to certain lands in the Territory of Oregon may be confirmed." This memorial which was pre- sented in 1840 by Abbott Lawrence, congressman from Massa- chusetts, was referred to the committee on foreign affairs.* It was followed in 1843 by a similar memorial which was presented by Robert C. Winthrop, congressman from Massachusetts, in the name of Kelley as agent of Charles Bulfinch and others, "praying that their purchases of Indian lands in Oregon Terri- tory be recognized." This also was referred to the committee on foreign affairs.'
He also made a serious effort to put into shape for publica- tion his narrative on Oregon and the Sandwich Islands and
2 Kelley, NarraHve of EvenU and Difficulties, 2, 14; Temple, Hist, of the Town of Palmer, 266, 269. An appendix appeared the same year under the title
Palmer. Narrative of Events and DifFiculties. 76.
3 Narrative of Events and DifFiculties, 73.
4 26 cong. I seas. H. doc. 43; H. jour., 202; Settlement of Oregon, 79.
5 27 cong. 3 sess. H. jour., 350. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 179
on the Indians. In 1840 he issued a prospectus of a book, then "in n6ar readiness for the press" to be called "Travels And Voyages Through Many Of The Indian And Unexplored Countries of North America; And Over The Atlantic And Pacific Oceans Made In The Years 1832, '33, '34 and '35." The book was never published, however ; for "a nervous affec- tion in the head deranged the thoughts and enfeebling the pen, disenabled him for the task." What became of this unfinished manuscript is unknown. But his literary efforts were not at an end. "He planned, however, for a less difficult work; a bode wbich would be a printed record of his manner of life; of the part he had acted in making Oregon and one of the Califomias the possession of the United States; of the facts relative to. his claim on Mexico for indemnification on account of the plunder of his property while passing through that coun- try ; and relative to a claim of certain of his countrymen to lands on Quadra's [Vancouver] Island, in which he was so largely interested, and which has been so very obnoxious to the power- ful men of the Hudson's Bay Company ; and of the interesting things concerning the ancients, and the geography and sta- tistics of the countries examined by him."* This, too, he abandoned.
In 1843 he made another attempt to obtain action of congress in favor of his colonization project. Having failed to receive a grant of land as requested in 1839, he now- presented through Rufus Choate, senator from Massachusetts, a "petition praying permission to purchase from the Indians in the Oregon Terri- tory a tract of land for the purpose of forming a permanent settlement thereon." This petition was referred to the com- mittee on private land claims.'^ It was followed in 1844 by a petition "praying for a grant of land in the Territory of Ore- gon," which was presented through Robert C. Winthrop and referred to the committee on foreign affairs.®
The grant sought in 1844 was desired not as an aid to settle-
6 Settlement of Oregon, iv n; Narrative of Events and Difficulties, preface
7 27 cong. 3 sess. S. jour., 192; Cong. Globe, XI, 311.
8 a8 cong. i seas. H. jour., 237-8. This memorial appeared in the Palmer Sentinel of December 10, 1846. ​
180 Fred Wilbur Powell
ment, but as compensation for services. The year in which Kelley finally abandoned his colonization scheme, therefore, can be stated definitely as 1844. With but unimportant exceptions, his published writings thereafter were confined to memorials and petitions to congress and pamphlets designed to support his claim for compensation or reward for his services in bring- ing about the settlement of Oregon by American citizens, thus preparing the way for the assertion of jurisdiction over that territory by the national government.®
After an interval of four years he presented through John A. EHx, senator from New York, a memorial "praying a grant of land in the Territory of Oregon, in consideration of import- ant services rendered by him in exploring and developing the resources of that country," which was referred to the com- mittee on public lands.^^ This memorial was privately printed as an eighteen-page pamphlet entitled Memorial Of Hall J. Kelley ; Praying For A Donation Of Land, And Testimonials Concerning The Colonization Of The Oregon Territory. The memorial itself occupied but four pages, and six pages were given over to notes from Kelley's journal covering that part of his journey from Monterey to the Columbia. Some of the testimonials were written in 1843 to accompany the memorial of 1844 ; the others were obtained in 1847. Among those who contributed testimonials were: John P. Bigelow, secretary of the commonwealth of Massachusetts, who was soon to become mayor of Boston ; William Wheildon, friend of Edward Everett and editor of the Bunker Hill Aurora, whose name had ap- peared on the list of agents of the American Society For En- couraging The Settlement Of The Oregon Territory; Wash- ington P. Gregg, secretary of the common council of Boston and former treasurer of the American Society; William G. Brown, former editor of Zion's Herald ; John McNeil, surveyor of the port of Boston and former president of the American Society; Isaac O. Barnes, United States marshal at Boston;
o In 1846 and 184/ he published two series of articles in the Palmer Sentinel, one on "Oregon;" the other on "Colonization Of The Oregon Territory.** 10 30 cong. I sess. S. jour., 245; Cong. Globe, XVIII, 567. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 181
P. P. F. Degrand, well known for his public activities, partic- ularly in connection with the movement for a transcontinental railroad ; and David F. Green, secretary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.*^
A similar memorial was presented the following year, 1849, through Senator John Davis of Massachusetts, "praying to be allowed a grant of land in the Territory of Oregon, in con- sideration of his services and sacrifices in aiding in the explora- tion and settlement of that country." This also was referred to the committee on public lands.^ The report of this ccwn- mittee, as submitted on February S, 1850 by Alpheus Felch of Michigan, was as follows:
"The petitioner asks a grant of land from the government, in consideration of his services and sacrifices in the exploration of the Oregon Territory. That Mr. Kelley is one among the many enterprising citizens who, within the last thirty years, have directed their attention to the exploration and efforts to settle our possessions on the Pacific, and has, in common with others, suffered loss from the failure of his efforts, the com- mittee have no doubt. They are, however, of opinion, from an examination of the whole case, that the prayer of the peti- tioner cannot, under just and safe principles, be granted. The case does not, in their opinion, present those distinctive features which ought to single it out from others, and make it the subject of special legislative action.
"They therefore recommend the adoption of the following resolution :
"Resolved, That the prayer of the petitioner be not granted."^^
With the adoption of this report by the senate on February 21, Kelley's claim was formally disallowed." It would seem
II This memorial in abridged form appears in the Hist, of the Settlement of Oregon, 91 -a. The testimonials were also reprinted in that pamphlet.
13 31 cong. I sess. S. jour., 38, 51; Cong. Globe, XXI. 92. 99; This memorialj most of it from th« forms used in printing that of 1848, was reprinted in the Hut. of the Colonisation of Oregon, 1-8 [9-16], 17-18.
13 31 cong. 1 sess. S. rep. 42; S. jour., i3i; Cong. Globe^ XXI. 292-3. It is perhaps significant that only one of the members of this committee was from New England.
14 31 cong. I sess. S. rep. 42; S. jour., 172-3; Cong. Globe, XXI, pt. I, 4". ​
182 Fred Wilbur Powell
that Senator Davis had been negligent, for under date of July 25, 1850, he wrote to Kelley :
"I now enclose the report which you ask for. It had some- how escaped my attention that such a report had been made. It can however do you little harm. I had conferred with Judge Underwood, who formerly had charge of the business, and he promised me to give every attention to it ; but it seems without my knowledge. Gov. Felch took charge of it."
The failure to obtain either recognition or reward was a crushing blow to Kelley, who said : "That report went to con- firm the false perceptions of me of not a few public men, and to strengthen the prejudices of friends and to give general currency to the vile reports of adversaries ; that he is 'stupid and crazy,' and to the sayings every where rife, 'that he came to this country without mind or means to do anything and went away' .... It was a strange report ; though it did me monstrous injustice and tends to deepen and perpetuate my sorrows, and though all the gold ever taken from the mines of California could not sufficiently make amends for the injustice dcMie me and my near kindred ; yet I impute no wrong motive to them that made it. It denies me the merit of having taken any part as a pioneer in the colonization of Oregon, or in bringing about the events which led to the government acquisi- tion of Alta California. It was a great mistake — I cannot account for it."*'
To Kelley defeat was only an incentive to further effort. In 1854, therefore, he presented another petition, this time through Charles Sumner, senator from Massachusetts, "praying a dona- tion of land, or gratuity in money, for his services. and sacri- fices in attempts to colonize and explore the Oregon territory, and for the public benefits that resulted from his efforts." After this petition had been referred to the committee on territories, the senate upon Sumner's motion ordered that Kelley have leave to withdraw it.*^
IS Settlement of Oregon, 89-90.
X6 33 cong. I sess. S. jour., 196, 346, 301: Cong. Globe, XXVIIl, 447. 989* 1x86. lliis 'i»etition asking for a srant of land or pecuniary relief appears aa an appendix to the Narrative o( Events and Difficulties, having been bound in that pamphlet two years after its original publication. It differs but little from the memoriala of 1848 and 1849. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 183
Again in 1866 the appeal was renewed. In that year Henry L. Dawes, representative from Massachusetts, presented a peti- tion "relative to a land g^nt," which was referred to the com- mittee on private land claims. This also sought pecuniary re- lief as an alternative, as is evident from the title of the reprint, which reads Petition Of Hall J. Kelley, Praying For A Grant Of Land, Or A Donation Of Money." The result was another failure.
With the double purpose of creating a favorable public senti- ment and of supplementing his applications for congressional bounty, Kelley published several pamphlets. The first was History Of The Colonization Of The Oregon Territory, which was published in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1849. The edition must have been small, for but a single copy is known to be in existence. On the title page, appears Kelley's name as "the pioneer and chief projector." The "prefatory remarks" thus set forth the purpose of the pamphlet :
'The writer claims to have been the chief pioneer to plan and execute the work of colonizing the Oregon Territory ; and has prepared the following pages to show the identity of his name with the history of that magnificent and meritorious achieve- ment; and also to explain the causes and events which gave direction and impetus to public enterprise, and led to the ac- quisition and settlement of California."
Another pamphlet with the same title was published in Wor- cester in 1850. In 1852 appeared A Narrative Of Events And Difficulties In The Colonization Of Oregon And The Settle- ment of California ; and also a history of the claim of American citizens to lands on Quadra's Island ; together with an account of the troubles and tribulations endured between the years 1824 and 1852 by the writer. This was published in Boston, and we are told in the appendix that "but few copies of this book have been printed." A half dozen copies only have been lo- cated. While the preface declares that "The present book aims
17 ^8 cong. 2 sesa. H. jour.. 93; Cong. Globe, XLVII. 181. The reprint appearea as a seven-page pamphlet, whkh was also incorporated in the Mist, of th€ Settlem^fii of Oregon. It was a revised and enlarged version of the earlier memorials and petitions. ​
184 Fred Wilbur Powell
to correct the falsities in the various histories of Oregon hither- to in vogue ;" liberal space is given to the "troubles and tribu- lations" of the writer.
Kelley's final*® word was published in 1868 in Springfield, Massachusetts, under the title, A History Of The Settlement Of Oregon And Thfe Interior Of Upper California; and of persecutions and afflictions of forty years' continuance endured by the author. This is a pamphlet of 128 pages. In the preface Kelley thus set forth its purpose :
"This Book is an appeal to the justice and humanity of the Christian public for help to put an end to persecutions endured for more than forty years, as terrible as were ever known ; and to bring back to my bleeding bosom by beloved household, which more than fifteen years ago, were torn from it and carried away from me, by the merciless hands of bloody men ; and to bring back kindred and friends long ago turned from and against me.
"It has in view other objects : — to verify and illustrate the statements of the Petition now before Congress ; to correct the belied histories of the American and British domains beyond the Rocky Mountains — countries, which, until after the public announcement of my Oregon enterprise, were marked on maps, unknown; and to remove unreasonable prejudices, and the false perception which friends everywhere have of me, and the obstacles which enemies in all places have thrown in the path- way of my usefulness."
Over two years were spent in the preparation of this pam- phlet. The delay is easily accounted for when we consider that it was not written but dictated by a half-crazed man of nearly eighty, who was almost blind and suffering from malaria and the infirmities incident to age as well as hardship and priva- tion, and suffering too from his obsession that all his troubles and all the pranks of mischievous boys in the neighborhood were
1 8 In 1869 and 1870 Kelley prepared a series of eight letters addressed *'Be- loved Brethren." and designed as the appendix to his History of th€ Sfttlemtnt of Orsgon. These letters were not printed, however, because the printer declared that the manuscript was "incomprehensiole.*' Hence Kelley's statement: "The printing press everywhere in my state is turned against me.*' Letter to J. Q. Thomtoti, Oct 31. 1870. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 185
due to the desire of the Hudson's Bay company to persecute him. He concluded the preface with the following paragraph, with its naive prediction of the millennial dawn certain to follow from an awakened public confidence in him :
"When the nefarious plans and plottings and murderous pur- pose of the conspiracy at Three Rivers — one as diabolical as was ever known in Christendom — conspiracy, I say ; diabolical, with emphasis I repeat, have been described, and the public understand about them, then will persecutions cease, and the deep-rooted prejudices on the minds of men will be removed, public confidence in my statements and character be restored, my household and my kindred so long gone from me, will return, and all, I trust, will treat me with respect and visit me in my 'afflictions'."
The nature of these aflFlictions is set forth in detail in all of these pamphlets. The selections that follow will serve as illus- trations. They do not make pleasant reading, but they are es- sential to an understanding of the man and his environment.
"Causes and effects alternately changing are traceable from the widely separated places, London, Vancouver and Boston, to the little village of Three Rivers ; even to my humble and lonely cottage ....
"The Appendix shows how cruelly certain persons in the neighborhood of my desolated residence — hirelings under the powerful men above described, have used me. It particularizes many ways by which I have been made to suffer, but not all. Within the last twelve years, they have dragged me into fifteen lawsuits; and brought great pecuniary embarrassments upon me. In a single transaction* I have been defrauded of $1,500, of property and caused a further loss of more than $1,000, — partly expenses incurred in a suit of nine years' pending."^®
forest wood and timber sufficient to pay a debt of $1,500, which they bad assumed. B7 the last of i843f they had cut enough to pay the debt, and $1,500 more. As they refused to settle or to account for any considerable part of the property; an action in Chancery, in i845> wis brouf^ht against them, a hearing was had in 1853; and an award rendered for the plaintiff. Exceptions were taken by the defendants. This is the state of the case, March, 1854.
19 Narrwog of Events and DifficulfUs, Preface, 2-3. See also pp. 78-9. ​
186 Fred Wilbur Powell
"The last two years, adversaries, at and about the place of my abode, have very much troubled me. The troops at this place have come daily to vex and to torture, hoping speedily to make an end of me ; guerillas, headed by one of my bitterest enemies — at times, another with him — ^both were, as it regarded their ccm- duct toward me, much like despots and demons. Within the last thirty years, until the two last, since beginning to write histories of countries explored by me, and to prepare accoimts of my scientific researches in the far west, and of my efforts to propagate Christianity about the shores of the Pacific, and of the war of persecutions so long ago waged against me, they have often ccMne to plunder my property — have plundered, and carried off, the value of several thousand dollars; and to de- vastate my estate; and have so done; and have desolated the village of Three Rivers, so that it now is, and has been for several years, a desolation, *a heap'. They at times break into my house, and take away documents and manuscripts and papers of great value to me, such as furnish the best material for the book ; perhaps, within this period, what of the last would make a 4to. volume of a thousand pages.^
"In telling about the conspiracy, it is not my intention to designate persons, unless hard provoked to it, nor specify as to conduct, cruel as it has been, further than it shall be duty in the vindication of myself. . . ."
"To confuse my head and delay my writings, I am everywhere represented as stupid, an idler, and prodigal of my means of living. But I am certain that neither my greai calamity, nor the persecutions and afflictions I am made to endure, have in the slightest degree impaired my understanding ; it was never better than at the present day. And diligent search of the Scriptures, the last thirty years . . . has much enlarged my comprehension of things himian and divine. I consider also
20 SettlemsHt of Oregon, iii-iv. "The author has recently lost from hi» house all the copies of a pamphlet called 'History of the Colonization of Ore- gon;* which was to comprise portions of the supplemenUl appendix of this book; and also, manuscripts and papers of (|[reat value to him. He has Kood reason to believe, it was the felonious service of some hireling or sub-affent of the friends of the H. B. Co., to vex and trouble him."— Norrolwe of EvenU and Diniculttss, appx. insert. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 187
that industry, frugality, temperance, benevolence, intense pur- pose, brotherly kindness and charity have all along marked my career. I do not thus speak of myself to glorify self; but to glorify Him whose servant I am."^
"The shattered and morbid-smitten nervous system is never so bad as in the hot season of the year, and has never been so terrible as in the present season. Am all the while faint, and suffering a slow fever. As I have heretofore said, am forced to live alone. I am fond of society, and delight in communion with the virtuous and intelligent. Am forced to do my indoor and outdoor work. There are none disposed to help me. Help, both male and female, are turned from me. My beloved house- hold, and all in the circle of kindred, every soul of them de- ceived, have gone from me and are turned against me, and all in the circle of friends and acquaintances, deceived, have turned to treat me with contempt, some with shameful abuse. . . ."^
There ar€ middle-aged men to-day in Three Rivers who would be surprised to learn that their boyish practical jokes upon the strange old man were charged against the account of the Hud- son's Bay company, and that when they robbed his orchard they were interfering with the preparation of works for which future historians would search in libraries and collectors would pay extravagant sums in the auction rooms. When in the thought- less cruelty of youth they called out "Old Kelley" as he passed along the street, they did not know that they were acting as "guerillas." The boy who put pepper on the stove after offer- ing to help Kelley about his housework could hardly have known of the Hudson's Bay company, yet he was classed as one of its "troops."
There are also men in Three Rivers who can testify that Kelley's interests were cared for by his neighbors, and that food was regularly reserved from their tables for the old man, who came daily to their door, pail in hand. Yet of these acts of kindness the pamphlets tell nothing. Nor do they tell of the efforts of his brother to induce him to leave his hermitage
21 Settltment of Oregon, v.
22 IWd., 16-7. ​
188 Fred Wilbur Powell
on the hill and to share his home in East Gilmanton. "Te- naciously he would cling to his little home," wrote a contem- porary, "believing that if he stayed there his fortune would ulti- mately turn, and the little tract of land which his friends allowed him to remain upon and which he finally believed was his own, would become of untold value, and again he would be a wealthy man. Feeble and almost blind for a year or two, he has tottered about the village, leaning upcMi his cane, an object of pity, believing that in the development and building up of the village the golden time was approaching."^
The question naturally arises as to what he would have done had his prayers to congress been granted. This question Kelley himself answered :
"He asks for a donation of land, that he may be able to repay, in lands or money, those who have contributed to the means of prosecuting his enterprise ; and to make some suitable provision for support now in the decline of life. Could he be placed in a state of freedom from nervous irritation, and have things convenient and comfortable; and could his mind rest from anxiety and excitement caused by his persecuting enemies, and his hands be untied and his feet unfettered, he could again, he thinks be measurably useful to his country ; and with a good degree of vigor, and effect, engage in laborious and philan-
23 Springfield Daily Union^ January 23, 1874.
"I will now speak as to my usefulness to the people of Three Rivers; what I have done to promote the growth and good appearance of the village. . . .
village and promote the mterest of the company, I freely gave to the company land . . and also took several shares ot the stock at par, and also did my
friend Pickering of Boston take fifteen or twenty shares, and in other ways en- couraged the building of the road.
"Built three houses and parts of two others and that by my own bands. . . .
"Mr. Pickering, for whom I acted as agent, sold at a reduced price the site of the school house called Pickering Hall, and gave a bill for that spadous and beautiful building, this he freely did, though at my suggestion. . . .
"To make myself further useful to the people, I prepared a circular giving a description of the place, which was sent to the manufacturers abroad, and to such capitalists and enterprising men, as would be likely to come and contribute to its growth and prosperity. . . .
"For several years after coming into the place, I practiced hauling and tilting fsic] wood at the door of poor families and in other wa^s did I consiaer the poor. On the occasion of a Thanksgiving day I made a feast, it would well compare with any of the feasts the rich prepare for the rich and invited widows and orphans to it. My house was filled, ana their hearts were made idad. The next day the fragments were distributed to the poor not present** — Kelley, "Beloved Bretlvcn,** Jan. 14, 1870. Ms. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 189
thropic undertaking, as when he was strong 'as a lion and swift as an eagle'."^
"The petitioner has objects in view. He would appropriate a part of what Congress would allow him, for educational pur- poses in the land of the freedmen, and a part for the founding of a benevolent institution in the manufacturing village of Three Rivers, to be called The Widows' and Orphans' Horne'."^
Thus to the last his spirit of altruism persisted, and he died as he had lived, a philanthropist at heart. One day his accus- tomed rotmd of visits was not made ; and he was found lying on the floor of his little house, stricken with paralysis. He soon became tmconscious, and on the following evening, Janu- ary 20, 1874, his troubled life came to an end.**
24 Colonisation of Oregon, 4.
25 SettUmtnt of Oregon, i.
26 Springfield Daily Vmon and Springfield Daily Republican. January 23, i}J74. ​ ​
CHAPTER ELEVEN. The Writings of Kelley.$^1$
Kelley's literary efforts began early and continued until a few years before his death. His output was therefore volumin- ous, though his longest single work was of but 128 pages. Of his school books enough has already been said. Had he written nothing else his name would now be known only to the anti- quarian. We are here concerned with what he wrote about Oregon and about himself.
Both the Geographical Sketch and the General Circular have been denounced as grossly inaccurate and poorly written, and both have been praised as remarkably accurate and well written statements of fact. As was shown in an earlier chapter, "W. J. S." outdid himself in an attempt to convince the readers of the New England Magazine that Kelley had nothing but sec- ond-hand information about Oregon to present, and that his statements were unworthy of acceptance. Nor did he stop at that. "Some one ought to send Mr. Kelley a copy . . . of Guthrie's Grammar," he declared in one article,-^ and in another place he singled out for ridicule a sentence in which Kelley said that the proposed settlement would be ef- fected as soon "it has consummated their title to the Indian lands."* But no one was better aware of those defects than Kelley himself. In his History Of The Settlement Of Oregon, after giving a brief paraphrase of the General Circular, he con- tinued, "Here I leave the manual. This document is not given in the exact language in which it was couched. It would be mortifying to do it. It does not furnish a fair specimen of my composition. The productions of my pen in 1829 and several after years, were abundantly marked with faults. At times of mental excitement and nervous irritation, I almost lost the
1 See Powell, Bibliography of Hall J. Kelley, Oregon Historical Society, Quarterly, VIII, 375-86 1907).
2 W. J. S., Oregon territory. New England Magazine, II, 131.
3 W. J. S., Geographical sketch of Oregon territory. New England Mag- azine, II, 334. ​
192 Fred Wilbur Powell
physical ability of speech, and was scarcely able to converse or write upon any subject, however familiar. At every eflFort my language was broken and full of errors. One of the hireling writers of my adversaries, in a Boston periodical in 1832, says
Equally severe were the criticisms in that joint product of youth and age, Wyeth's Oregon, where Kelley is described as a man "who had read all the bodes he could get on the voyages and travels in Asia, Africa, Europe, and America, until he had heated his mind to a degree little short of the valorous Knight of La Mancha, that is to say, he believed all he read."* Although yoimg Wyeth himself had turned back at a point several hundred miles east of the mouth of the Columbia, he boldly declared:
"I have since been well-informed that in the valley of Ore- gon, so much extolled for its fertility and pleasantness, wood to cook with is one among their scarcest and very dear articles of necessity. From all accounts, except those g^ven to the public by Mr. Kelly, there is not a district at the mouth of any large river more unproductive than that of the Columbia, and it seems that this is pretty much the case from tide water of that river to where it empties into the ocean. . . . Mr. Hall J. Kelly published about two years since a most inflated and extravagant account of that western tract which extends from The Rocky Mountains to the shore of the Pacific Ocean. He says of it that no portion of the globe presents a more fruit- ful soil, or a milder climate, or equal facilities for carrying into effect the great purposes of a free and enlightened na- tion .... Lewis and Clarke's history of their expedition had been published and very generally read; yet this extrava- gant and fallacious account of the Oregon was read by some people not destitute of a general information, nor unused to reading .... But all the world exaggerates ; not even were we of the Or^on expedition entirely free from it,
4 Kelley, Hist, of the Settlement of Oregon, 107.
5 J. B. Wyeth, Oregon. 3. The book was written by Dr. Benjamin Water- house from notes and Information" of W^eth to discourage what was thought to be the wild scheme of Westward migration.
Hall Jackson Kelley 193
although not to be compared with Hall Jackson Kelly, who never stops short of superlatives, if we may judge by his pub- lications/**
Commenting upon this attack, Reuben Gold Thwaites said "Subsequent information^ has justified most of Kelley's state- ments, here derided by Wyeth"; and Mrs. Victor declared "So completely was he sustained in his general views that we feel surprised at this day to notice how closely they agree with what is now known of this region,"* and again "Regarding settlement his writings contain some practical suggestions; indeed, without clear discrimination between design and neces- sity, and read by the light of subsequent events, some of them might be pronotmced prophetic."* Equally favorable was the opinion of S. A. Qarke, who said "Whatever were the sources of Kelley's facts they were wonderfully correct. His critics concede that he was a terse and vigorous writer who did much to make Oregon known ; that his ideas were broad and for the nation's best interests."*^ The judgment of Major Hiram H. Chittenden, however, is not without an element of truth: "He read everything that he could find relating to Oregon, believed it all, however extravagant, and retailed it to the public with whatever addition his own over-wrought imagination might suggest .... What he wrote was for the most part grossly inaccurate; but with a public quite as ignorant as. he, this was no drawback, but rather a positive advantage. Everything came from his pen clothed with the beauty of a western sun- set.""
It will be observed that no one has questioned Kelley's sin- cerity in the presentation of information. It should be borne in mind, also, that he belonged to a generation which was ac- customed to rely upon hearsay and secondary authorities to a
6 Ibid.» 5a-3,_S7-8, 60. "~ • Ea ' "'
_ -UW ^- —
Soriety. 0«kiftrr/y, n. z^,
9 Bancroft, Hist, of _ _. ^ .. .- __
Charict F. Lummis has aptly characterized as '*that gigantic historical haystack, the Bancroft histories^'* see Morris. The origin and authorship of the Bancroft Pacific states publications, Or^on Historical Society^ Quarterly, IV, 287-364.
J Thwaites, £ar(v Western Travels, AAl, 79n. Victor, Hall J. Kelley, one of the fathers of Oregon, Oregon Historical ^, Quarterly. Il, 398. 9 Bancroft, Hist, of Oregon, I, 68. As to the authorship of what Mr.
10 Clarke,' ^•^w'" Days of Oregon History. I, lio.
1 1 Chittenden, The American Fur Trade of the Far West, I. 435​degree that is intolerable to the historian trained in modern scientific methods of research. If his two early pamphlets be compared with contemporary writings on the great West, they will be found quite as reliable and quite as readable. If Kelley's early style be found defective, what is to be said of the flamboyant sentences of Benton, that other sponsor of the West? It must be confessed, however, that in his effort to be convincing, Kelley sometimes defeated his own end by references to obscure sources of information. His pamphlet, Discoveries, Purchases of Lands, &c. On the Northwest Coast, published in 1839, was criticised by a friendly Boston editor, who said, "We do not altogether rely upon Mr. Kelley's account of the old Spanish voyages. … He tells us of 'Mss in the Marine Archives at Madrid.' We believe no such archives are in existence." To this Kelley answered "that he had the authority of Mr. Slacum … for the quotation," and that he had "also other reasons for believing it correct," but neither statement is particularly convincing, and it is significant that when the substance of the pamphlet was presented to congress in Bulfinch's memorial of 1840, the reference was omitted.
Hall Jackson Kelley 195
The only one of his writings in which Kelley took pride was the Memoir on Oregon prepared for Caleb Gushing in 1839. Unlike his early accounts this was based upon observation, and it is marred by comparatively few of the unfortunate manner- isms that characterized so much of what he wrote. The writers of the Bancroft histories were most favorably impressed with it, "He certainly gives in his memoir to congress in 1839, a very correct account of the topography, soil, and climate of both California and Oregon .... H€ ... . furnished information to the government that should have been of value ; and which should have been more properly appreciated, had it been presented disconnected from the recital of his personal suf- ferings and wrongs, with which all his writings after his visit to Oregon were rendered turgid .... It seems the most sober and intelligent of all his writings .... This present paper is a temperate description of the country and what the writer saw and did there. Though not without its author's constitutional wail and his usual fling at the Hudson's Bay Company, it is a well written document."^^
In this judgment Kelley would have concurred; for in de- fending himself against the criticisms of his writings on Ore- gon, he referred to the Memoir with no little satisfaction: "Nothing very extravagant is found in it; nothing but plain truths can be found in that document ; nothing but such, in all the mass of publications from my pen, which between the years 1825 and 1832, were so freely spread over the States, to enlighten about Oregon, and to induce emigration thither ; and to open that remote region to missionary enterprise."^®
Of the half dozen memorials and petitions through which Kelley sought to obtain the aid of congress during the years 1839-66, something has already been said. There was in ef- fect but a single document of this sort, which took different form as it was revised and amplified from time to time to
15 Bancroft. Northwest Coast, 11^ 556, 5^80. There is no reason to question its accuracy." — Bancroft, Hist, of California, III, 41 in. "Not very inaccurate, con- sidering Kelle/s limited opportunities of observation." — Ibid., IV, 147.
16 Settlement of Oregon, 61. ​
196 Fred Wilbur Powbll
strengthen its appeal. Some of the materials thus presented do not appear in Kelley's other writings.
It is no easy task to characterize Kelle/s three f cmnal pam- phlets, tfie History Of The Colonization Of Oregon, the Nar- rative Of Events And Difficulties, and the History Of The Settlement Of Oregon. All were written after he had passed middle age, and after f^ysical and mental suffering had un-. manned him. They were addressed to that understanding and sympathetic public which Kelley's faith in humanity assured him would grant him the recognition and the material reward he craved. It was a generation which knew little of those early years in which he had attempted so much and accom- lushed so little; a generation that was witness of that great movement that so rapidly peopled the valleys of the West.
When the History Of The Colonization Of Or^;on ai^>eared, Oregon was a regfularly constituted territory and the "gold rush" was turning the minds of the whole country toward the Pacific Coast, which was better known because of Kelley and the men whom he had influenced. When the Narrative Of Events And Difficulties appeared, the tide of emigration to the Northwest was at its height, Or^on was looking forward to statehood, and Washington was at the beginning of its territorial stage. Both pamj^ets were exceedingly well timed. To Kelley all that was needed was to get the facts before the public. With the idea of presenting the truth as he saw it, he bared his very soul to the reader, telling of his great plans, his high hopes, and the obstacles that had been too much for his powers. In the History Of The Settlement Of Oregon, "he poured himself out on paper," as Bancroft has it,^^ in a final attempt to convince a generation to which the settled West had become an accepted fact "Quite half a century has elapsed since the ccmception of my Oregon enterprise" ; he said in the preface, "although thirty years have rolled away since its achievement, and yet my countrymen seem to know nothing abouit — ^andwhy? This question I shall shortly answer ....
17 Bancroft, Northwest Coast, II, ss6n. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 197
"I desire my countrymen should know how much I have expended in time and property; and what I have suffered to settle Oregon, and to make it an integral part of my country's domain. I have truly paid from my substance, and from the comforts and endearments of life, a great price for that land, though a goodly one it is, and have freely possessed the nation of it Were my country duely apprised of the facts in the case, they would no bnger turn a deaf ear to the wrongs I have suffered, and the rights of which I have been defrauded, as they have done for the last thirty years; but, would at once return to me all, and even more than I claim ; both as a recompense for my services, and as a testimonial of their gratitude for the countless blessings those services have ren- dered and are rendering to the coimtry ....
"With the explanations I will be able to make, the reader can more understandingly form opinions of my capabilities and usefulness, and of the contempt so imivcrsally cast upon me ; and can better judge of the suffering condition to which persecutions and afflictions, endured for nearly half a century have reduced me — such as are, probably, without parallel in the present age of the world."^
Naturally self-centered, his style was egotistical to the ex- treme. "I am Hall J. Kelley; that is my name; am what edu- catiixi, habits, and the grace of God have made me.*'*^ Did Walt Whitman ever sound his "barbaric )rawp" louder than this? "I am not 'distressed' — h(K/e never been * distressed ;' "^ he protested after telling of "persecutions and afflictions" of nearly half a century, thereby unconsciously giving testimony to die fact. He wrote much of himself because he was the only human being he ever really knew. "I have said much concerning self, and now find it indispensable to say more With as little self-esteem as self-respect, I shall be able, to describe the powers and qualities of my mind ; and to satisfy, that it is not strictly true that I am 'without mind to do any-
i8 Ppw I-3-
19 lud, 7.
ao Ibid., 3. ​
198 Fred Wilbur Powell
thing.' For natural endowment, I have nothing to boast of, yet, the operations of my mind, I think indicate sanity, and such gifts as ekvate character, as high above the characters of my groveling enemies, as the clouds are above the ground."*^
"Being an educated man and an enthusiast, writing was easy," said Bancroft ; and again, "Indeed, all of Kelley's works are well written. His command of language was far above the average.**^ But on these points Kelley's word is quite to the contrary and much nearer the truth. "I never had skill at composition; my thoughts being always occupied in other business. My aspiration has been, more to the attainment of preeminence as an architect than as a painter. For the busi- ness of the former, I think I have been measurably qualified with science and skill ; while in that of the latter, have been an ordinary performer."^ He introduced his Geographical Sketch with a statement that he was fully conscious of his literary limitations, and declared that he attempted only "to impress the public mind with simple and unadorned facts,*' since he was not "possessed of that free and imperial com- mand of words, which is the peculiar felicity of a few."** Upon several occasions he expressed regret that he was unable to adorn his composition "with the ordinary embellishments of rhetoric." Thus in his old age, he said, "My head is confused, and that continually ; and I cannot help it. Thoughts, at times, enter the mind disorderly. That which should come first comes last, and the last first; and they are a long while in coming. Utterance is stammering. Language is broken and diffuse, without imagery or beauty, or any rhetorical embellish- ment It is impossible for me to condense it and render it concise and perspicuous. My compositions abotmd with errors. I copy and copy, again and again, and sometimes the last copy is worse than the first."
He therefore took to dictation; and his last work. The History Of The Settlement Of Oregon, was prepared in this
ai n>id., s-6.
aa Bancroft* Northwest Coast, II, 556n. 55811.
2$ Narrative of Evenis and DifficulHes, postscript.
a4 Pp. 3-4. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 199
manner. The result was hardly more satisfactory, for we are told of the inattention and carelessness of youthful amanuenses." On account of his extreme debility and nervous irritation he was able to dictate "only in the fore part of the day, not every day, and not more than two or three hours in any day."** In the preface he attempted "to explain con- cerning inadvertent expressions, digressions, curtailed state- ments, sayings, and the abrigment of the book, and errors of composition with which it abounds. It is seldom that I can find a person able and ready to write ; at times the amanuensis is turned from me. For weeks, or months, no one can be found to serve me; and I am left without help. Portions of the manuscript prepared for the press, and supposed to have been sent to it, are wanting in the book. This mistake is owing in part, I think, to the inattention of the young and in- experienced amanuenses. These things have caused delay, "^ a delay of two years. In the body of the text is this interpella- tion:
"I am in haste to finish the dictation of this book, and to have it in print and before Congress the present session. . . . It was commenced more than a year and a half ago, and yet not 80 pages of it are in print. Constant vexations, 'troubles on every side' cause the delay; they enfeeble the pen and unfit my mouth for speech, of course for the dictating of the composition of the book. Persecutions and afflictions of forty years' continuance have nearly worn me out, and I may not last to see, in print, the Appendix, the most instructive as it regards my biography, and perhaps the most interesting por- tion of the book."*^
Yet he continued his labors through fifty more pages, con- cluding with the following paragraph:
"Here is the end of the book for the present. When it is in the hands of the Congressional Committee, to whom was referred the petition, should my life be spared, and should I
as SHtUment of Ortgon, x6. al P. iv. J7 Pp. 76-7. ​
200 Fred Wilbur Powell
remain qualified for the task of further dictation, I shall pro- ceed to prepare the appendix, which, I think, is calculated to be as instructive and interesting to readers as the other por- tions of the book."^
The appendix was never printed. It does not matter, particularly, for Kelley had already written himself out. The foregoing quotations show how difficult a task it was for him to prepare his manuscript, and how confused was his mind. Further evidence on this point a{q)ears in the Narrative Of Events And Difficulties. This pamphlet bears the date 1852 on the title page, yet the preface was written in March, 1854, and the memorial of 1854 appears in the appendix. In this appendix also appears all the matter originally ap- pended to the History Of The Colonizatk>n Of Or^;on, with the original pagination, and a "supplemental index" or rather table of contents containing several references to materials which do not appear in the supplemental appendix. The sup- plemental appendix is concluded with an unpaged postscript, and pasted on the inside of the cover is a "Notice" which reads:
"Intense anxieties about affairs at Washington, about claims on the country, and about enemies oiqx>sing these claims ; and severe exercise with the pen for the last two or three months, have so amazed the brain of the author as to require im- mediate rest of his eyes and mind, and a suspension of the enlarging of the Supplemental Appendix of this book, until some better state of his health."
This, he went on to explain, cut off matter on the history of the Sandwich Islands, remarks on the North American Indians, and a "dissertation on Christianity," all of which, perhaps, we may well spare.
Considering the circumstances under which they were writ- ten, these pamphlets of Kelle/s, while without semblance of order and of a most uneven style, are surprisingly informing and accurate. Typographically they are wretched. Thus
a% P. laS. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 201
Slactun's name usually appears as Slocum/' and McLoughlin's as "McLaughlin,"— this is the text of a man who resented reference to himself as "Kelly." Again, the date of Kelley's transcontinental railroad project appears "as early as 1849," when it is obvious that 1829 was meant. As to their au- thenticity, it may be said that they compare favorably with much that has been written of Oregon and the Northwest. Of one thing we may be sure, Kelley based his writings upon materials which he believed authentic, and when he relied upon his memory he said so, as he also did when his memory failed him.
Everj^ing that he wrote, however, was encumbered with denunciations of the Hudson's Bay company and with religious phraseology ad nauseam. Eliminate these, and his writings have real value. But to Kelley, the infamy of the company was as real as the basis of his religious faith, and his denuncia- tion of the one was as fervent as his worship of the other. He did not consider it necessary to apologize for either. In- deed, upon the latter point, he naively said :
"Some of my skeptical friends, who never examined my works, nor the 'fruit of the Spirit,' say to me, — ^'you talk too much in your book about religion. You will expose yourself to public ridicule.' My reply to them is, You think too little about religion. 'I am not ashamed to own my Lord.' 'I glory in this, that I know God,' and 'know Christ Jesus and him crucified,' and am a 'servant of Christ according to the will of God.'"»
This was not the sort of statement with which to impress the authorities at Washington, but Kelle/s religion was a very real thing to him, a part of his very self. His whole life was based on faith, — faith in God, faith in Oregon, and faith in his fellow men.
99 Settl^meni of Oregon, 124.
CHAPTER TWELVE The Man Kelley and His Place in History
"How inexpressibly comfortable to know our fellow-crea- ture;" wrote Carlyle, "to see into him, understand his goings forth, decipher the whole heart of his mystery: nay, not only to see into him, but even to see out of him, to view the world altogether as he views it . . . !" If we cannot understand what manner of man Kelley was, it is through no fault of his, for in his voluminous writings his personality is reflected with all the clear outlines of reality. We see him first as a serious- minded boy of studious and pious habits of thought; then as a school teacher while still in his 'teens. The sports of boy- hood were not for him; instead, he read and studied, — even ​by moonlight! There was so much to learn; so much good to do ! To him, life was indeed earnest. We are told nothing of his father's influence; his character seems to have been built upon his mother's teachings. Oh, Polly Kelley, why did you not implant in your son a sense of humor, — a sense of relative values? One wonders if he ever laughed, or even smiled. To him the world was a formal place, peopled with good men, with a scattering few "through whom evil must come." The former were either "distinguished," "enterpris- ing," "understanding," or "learned," while the latter were characterized in terms that were of another order. Rarely did he mention a person without employing an adjective, complimentary or otherwise. He was a master in the use of epithets.
It is not surprising that this self-centered and serious- minded man was involved in personal difficulties with his im- mediate associates; for he was as obstinate as George III, as ponderous and immovable as his own New Hampshire hills. In his mind there was no room for doubt as to the side upon which the right lay, or as to his position on that side. But if he was elephantine in his intellectual processes, he was ​
204 Fred Wilbur Powell
far from pachydermatous in his feelings; and his hurts were faithfully recorded, whether it was an injured little finger or a plan that was unjustly assailed. The only exception seems to be his dismissal from the Boston schools. His domestic relations were clearly reflected in the title chosen for his letters to Mrs. Kelley: "Letters From An Afflicted Husband To An Astranged Wife." He was the afflicted one, he would have us believe! But there are those who will have little difficulty in aligning themselves upon the side of that un- fortunate woman. Who can read of that farewell scene at Bradford without sympathizing with her? She "looked sober, it appears, "and probably felt sad," and well she might; for her home had been broken up because of a vision.
Late in life Kelley undertook to analyze his character and his conduct, and we find in his writings many such statements as these :
"I have testified against the powerful worldlings belonging to the British and American Fur Companies, and the East India Merchants doing business on the N. W. Coast; and so testifying, have incurred the implacable hatred of those men. Their policy, then, as now, was to represent me as stupid, ignorant and crazy. The friends of my late bosom companion, prior to my visit to Oregon — to turn from, and against me, the loved ones of my household, called me an idler arid a spendthrift; as one spending his time foolishly, and his money for that which is naught, and as having neither mind nor means to do an3rthing.
"I do not believe these evil sayings of my enemies. I am not, nor have I ever been, an ignorant or crazy man, an idler or an idle schemer. My worics, and the fruit of the spirit, tes- tify to what I am. I do believe that I have as much as an ordinary understanding. I have at the present, now in old age, when 'waxen in decay,* as much as when fifty years ago, I conceived and planned the settlement of Oregon, as when, thirty-five or forty years ago, I planned so largely for internal improvements and the founding of benevolent institutions, and, ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 205
as when the wise and prudent about me were wont to say of me, *He is living thirty years in advance of the times' ....
"Persecuting enemies take every advantage of my physical infirmities to bring me into low repute with friends and coun- trymen ; which circumstance renders it highly needful I should explain concerning them. My infirmities are what render my external appearance unfavorable to right perceptions of me. I will now proceed to explain as to the cause and nature of the great calamity I have so long suffered ....
"Besides the calamity and other evils contributing to ugly external appearances, I am, as has been already explained, slow of apprehension, much slower, probably, than was Moses, who found a like difficulty with me, in expressing his thoughts, much slower than Goldsmith .... At times of hig^ ner- vous irritation I lose the physical ability of expressing my thoughts .... As a legitimate result of this evil, I am also diffident. This adds very much to imfavorable outward ap- pearances. Sad, very sad, were these appearances between the years 1829 and about 1852 .... I became terribly per- plexed, and was driven, at times, to high mental excitement, doubtless to a near approximation to insanity. Was then more than in previous years, liable to foibles, inadvertences, and im- proprieties of conduct. In those years, at every attempt to perform before the public, to lead in devotional exercises at public gatherings, was a failure; diffidence at such times was more humbling and mortifying than ever. Often was I put tD shame. After the last mentioned year, the outward appear- ances began to wear a more favorable aspect. I recovered from perplexity .... I think my head and heart are full of thoughts, original, great and good ....
"A word further as to the condition and evils to which I am now reduced. Having nearly lost my eyesight, I am unable at the present time to distinguish by the features one person from another at six feet distant from me ; and am unable to read manuscript or even print, unless it be in large type, and not that without distress in the optic nerves, and a degree of ​
206 Fred Wilbur Powell
pain in the head. In every instance, if the reading is ever so short, even a dozen pages, the eyes tire, and the head becomes confused, and I am slower of speech and tongue, and utterance is more stammering."^
"The ways of a righteous Providence are inscrutable to mortals. In all my past career they have seemed particularly and wonderfully merciful, yet mysterious. I talk of great achievements, yet am I one of the least of the instrumentalities employed in the spreading of knowledge, and the advancing of the work of the Redeemer's kingdom. When feeling the strongest, I am made sensible of weakness; when proud, am made humble. Once, I increased in riches, 'grew fat and kicked against the Lord,' and my adversaries came, and took away my possessions. Confident in my abilities to declaim and, other- wise, to hold forth before the public on the side of philan- thropy ; and, great diffidence came upon me. After some mor- tifying failures, I learned to be silent, was more wise, cared less to make an outside show, and more to make faith and ivorks my worth, I began to boost of what my communica- tions with intelligent and public-spirited men, and my books and tracts, spread about the land, were effecting in the field of benevolent enterprise, withholding from the mighty and Beneficent God too much of the praise due him; and I was smitten by the hand of the Lord; and came, comparatively, dumb before the people . . . ."^
"I live on, like some aged oak, lonely, on some bleak summit, withstanding storms and tempests, and smitten by thunder- bolts, a branchless trunk. By the help of God I live ; suffering poverty, the loss of health, and the bereavement of companion and children, and a persecution, terrible, and, in respect to dura- tion and the number of powerful and cruel perpetrators, doubt- less unparalleled in this age and country."'
Enough, perhaps more than enough, has been presented to show Kelley's attitude toward himself, with all its variations.
1 Kelley, Hist, of tht Settlement of Oregon, 4. U. iSc^-
2 Kelley, Narratwe of Events and uHficulHes, posttcnpt.
3 Ibid., 66. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 207
What of the attitude of historians? Naturally the estimates differ widely. The least sympathetic is that of Bancroft :
"The Boston school-master is a character the historian is not particularly proud of. He is neither a great hero nor a great rascal. He is great at nothing, and is remarkable rather for his lack of strength, and in staggering for fifty years under an idea too big for his brain. He was a bom enthusiast and partisan, one of a class of projectors more capable of forming grand schemes than of carrying them to a successful issue. . .
"Had the school-master possessed an evenly balanced, prac- tical mind, or had his early training been more of the counting- room, and less of the school-room, he might have made his mark, high and ineffaceable. To one who had the means, and knew how to employ them, it was then no difficult task to colonize Oregon, lay the foundations of a prosperous com- monwealth, amass wealth, and convert the savages swiftly to heaven all at once. But there must be means and skill to handle them."*
Despite their objectionable tone these statements are worthy of attention, though one may well question whether the coloni- zation of Oregon could have been accomplished so easily. The words of Clarke, Lyman, and Temple, as quoted below, give a much truer picture of the man :
"Let us concede in advance that the man had radical faults of character, that he was conceited as to the value of his labors and to some extent imreasonable in his pretentions, but, when this is all said, he must have been a man of force and definite purpose to expend twenty years of the prime of life in the attempt to preserve the American title to the territory of Ore- gon at that early day, and to entertain schemes for the settle- ment and development of that vast region .... He was both an enthusiast and a zealot, and — ^to his misfortune — was not a clear-sighted business man."**
"Kelley was undoubtedly one of those minds ideal rather than practical, who give suggestions wljich more executive per-
4 Bancroft, Hist, of thg Northwest Coast, II, S44-5t SSSn.
5 Clarke, Pioneer Days of Oregon History, I, 368-9. ​
208 Fred Wilbur Powell .
sons readily pick up and carry out without even thanks to the giver .... All these [educational and benevolent] efforts, requiring the confidence of the public, and of educated persons, show a mind of fine order, highly progressive and probably erratic; but still neither unsound nor impractical. That he gradually withdrew his efforts from these valuable and congenial labors to take up the study of Oregon, and pro- mulgate what proved to be the only practical way to-4naintain the interests of Americans here, is a work for which Oregon at this late day, and all the Union, should feel grateful, although in his actual movements he shows the more or less hesitating grasp of a man bom a thinker rather than an actor."*
"Of the character of Mr. Kelley it is not easy to form a satisfactory estimate. He was a many-sided man. In certain directions, he was a learned, but in whole, was not an edu- cated man. His mind was active, but appears not to have been well balanced. His sympathies were large, but liable to be misdirected for want of cool judgment. He $aw things in their individuality, not in their relations. What appeared to him to be desirable and philanthropic he pursued with en- thusiasm, and without counting the cost. The goodness of his motives were never called in question, but his zeal was often 'without knowledge.' In a word, he was the creature, not the creator of circumstances .... The incidents narrated, show a natural tendency to depend on dreams and impulses, rather than on sober judgment, and calm forethought. Perhaps his main defects were lack of knowledge of men, and lack of financial ability, which two lacks account for his ill-success in life."^
These appraisals of the man agree with his own statement that his head and heart were full of thoughts, great and good ; but they say nothing as to his originality. Frcrni the record of his whole life, it is difficult to single out an instance in which he exhibited originality. As a school teacher he developed not
6 H. S. Lyman, Ha*, of Oregon, III, 72-%.
7 Templ«, Hist, of tht Town of Palmer, 268-9. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 209
his own system but Lancaster's ; in proposing the settlement of Oregon, he acknowledged his indebtedness to Jefferson ; in the movement for industrial educaticm, he was an advocate, not an originator; his plan for the form of government of Or^jon was based not on any ideas of his own, but on the laws estab- lishing the territory of Michigan; as a scientist he dabbled in many fields and made shrewd and more or less accurate ob- servations, but he originated nothing. His attempt to devise an improved system of land surveying was never carried far enough to entitled him to credit as an originator.
All agree that Kelley was a man with a distorted perspective, who was singularly out of touch with his fellows. To such men as Foster and Lovett, he was an easy victim; and to the sailors on the Dryade as well as the boys in Three Rivers he must have appeared as one who invited annoying attacks. Suf- fering arrest, entangled in frequent law suits, and losing prop- erty at every turn, he bltmdered his lonely way through life. He came into contact with many men of prcxninence, — Bul- f inch, Everett, Webster, Linn, Gushing, Lancaster, to mention only a few ; yet he seems to have had no real friends. Every- where he seems to have been regarded as a bore, even by those who sympathized with him. Wyeth's letters show that he lost respect for Kelley upon close contact, and his attitude at Fort Vancouver can be explained only by the fact that he was en- tirely out of patience with the man. Indeed, it is difficult to read Kdley's narrative of his long journey to Oregon without impatience. Why did he encumber himself with so much bag- g^age, — tracts, scarlet velvet sashes, combs, etc.? Why did he allow himself to be left alone in the wilds of Mexico on account of a lame mule and a load of worthless trinkets? His route from New Orleans to San Diego was marked with his be- longings, lost, abandoned, stolen, or given away ; and yet he arrived on the Columbia with enough baggage to worry about. Whenever he lost anything, whether it was the hind wheels of a wagon or a cane, the fact was duly set down and often with a statement of the amount in terms of money. These items he ​
210 Fred Wilbur Powell
finally consolidated in a statement of his account against the public under the head "Expenditures and Losses in Time and Property— The Public To Enterprise, Dr.", the total being $132,250.«
If we attempt to state Kelley's account in terms of public service we must enter some items at merely nominal values for lack of information; but with all necessary qualifications, there would seem to be a considerable balance on the side of Kelley, whose claim to distinction may be set forth as follows :
The American Qaim to Oregon. — From a wide range of sources Kelley collected materials on the question of title to the lands on the Northwest Coast and presented the facts in pamphlets, in newspaper articles, in memorials to congress, in public lectures, and in private conferences. Many of his state- ments of fact have been properly challenged, and his emphasis upon the matter of the Kendrick land purchase may have weakened his argument; yet his constant agitation served to keep the issue alive until the national government found it expedient to take final action. Whether Kelley's efforts di- rectly influenced congress in any way is doubtful.
The Occupation of Oregon Proposed. — For many years Kelley claimed that he had been the first to propose the occu- pation of the Oregon territory by American citizens, and this claim has been generally accepted by historians, with the exception of Bourne, who said:
"Mr. Kelley's claims for himself seem greatly exaggerated,
8 Eleven years, up to 1836, at $2,000 per year $22,000
Fifteen years, up to 1852, at $1,500 per year 22,500
Publishing books and tracts 500
Travelling for the purpose of lecturing 200
Expenses at Washington 500
Two shares of the Oregon stock, and five certificates 300
Loss on the brig "John Q. Adams'* 300
Loss at Three Rivers 300
Loss at New Orleans 300
Loss at Vera Cruz 1.150
Loss by robbers, near Salamanca 200
$48,250 Interest ... to 1852, about 84.000
Amount, $132,250
— Norrativf of Evfnts and Difficulties, 7. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 211
and the dates of his published writings on the Oregon ques- tion indicate, I think, that instead of influencing Floyd to champion Oregon he himself reflected the movement initiated by Floyd .... To one freshly approaching the subject the work of Floyd for Oregon seems immensely more important than Hall J. Kelley's to whom more space is usually allotted in Oregon histories .... It is sufficiently clear, I think, that a man of such antecedents and connections was not de- pendent upon the Massachusetts schoolmaster either for in- formation or stimulus."*
Kelley, however, did not claim that he had influenced Floyd, and he yielded to Benton the distinction of having been the first to propose the occupation of Oregon. In 1849 he said :
"I was not aware that any person in existence entertained thoughts of occupying the banks of the Columbia with an American population, till 1822 [1820?], when the subject was discussed in Congress. Afterwards, I came to the knowledge, that the Hon. T. H. Benton had previously, perhaps earlier than myself, conceived plans for that purpose; that he had written upon the subject, and conversed much upon it, and moved Governor Floyd to bring it into the National Leg^sla- ture."i<>
The Occupation of Oregon Accomplished. — "The Oregon enterprise was one of my own getting up and carrying through. The wise confessed it to be magnificent and benevolent. The best part of my life was exclusively devoted to it; and the whole of my substance and earthly comforts were sacrificed to consummate its accomplishment ; and, it resulted as at its con- ception I supposed it would, in making Oregon and California the abode of Civilization ; and both integral parts of the United States' domain; and in extending more widely the blessings of Christianity."*^ This was Kelley's claim.
The reference to California was probably based upon the
9 Bourn«, Aspects of Oregon history before 1840, Oregon Historical Societx, Quarterly, VI, 260-3. ^ , «
10 Kelley, Hist, of the Colonisation of Oregon, 5. See also Thornton, Ore- gon and California, IL X4-Sn- .^. . .
11 Narrative of Events and D%ft%cnlt%es. 68-9. ​
212 Fred Wilbur Powell
shadowy claim to having indirectly influenced Sutter to locate at Sacramento. As to Oregon, however, the claim is better grounded. That Wyeth went to Oregon because of Kelley's efforts is an established fact ; that the Lees went as a result of his agitation is almost certain; and Kdley himself induced Ewing Young to accompany him to Oregon, where he re- mained as a settler. Calvin Tibbetts was the only man whose enrollment on the books of the American Society was fol- lowed by emigration and settlement ; but some of the men who went out with Wyeth on his second expedition became settlers, as did those who were members of Young's party. It was Young^s death in 1841 that led to the first movement for an organized government among the American settlers. The name of Webley Hauxhurst, one of Young's party, with that of Calvin Tibbetts appears on the list of those who voted in favor of organizing a provisional government in 1843; and Joseph Gale, also of Young's party, served on the first execu- tive committee, 1843-4, which was elected to enforce the laws before the organization of the provisional government.^
The settlement of Oregon was not accomplished by New Englanders," as Kelley had planned, but it was accomplished as Uie result of the movement which he started.
The Origin Of The Word Oregcm And Its Application To The Pacific Northwest. — ^"Who first accounted for the Indian name of the 'Great River of the West,' (Oregon) and applied the same to the country watered by that river? Who ac- counted for the name both of the Indian tribe and the river called KUmookf Who accounted for the name of Mexico? Humboldt did not. Who accounted for the name of many of
I a Himes, Organizatioo of Oregon provisional gorernment, Oregon Blue Bock, 19x5-6: X4-6.
>f Oregon's pioneer population, 6 per cent came . from the Middle West, 33 per cent, from Sooth md II per cent from aa foreign countries, the om the British Isles, Canada and Germany." — r of politcal parties in Oregon, Oregon Historical "W^eth as a New Englander is hardly to be the impending pioneer moTcment It came from Correspondence and Journals of Nathaniel J. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 213
the places, tribes, of rivers, and animals, on the western side of North America? ... I claim to have been him who has accounted for them. I have alc«ie done them."^*
We need not concern ourselves with the whcJe of this claim. _ Our interest is in the word Oregon, "whose origin has baffled modern investigation,"" and upon this point neither of Kel- le/s statements are convincing.
In the matter of the application of the name of the river to the territory, Kelley's claim rests upon somewhat better grounds. "The country, in those days [before 1830], was known as the 'North-West Territory,' 'Columbia River,' and as the 'River Oregon.' His first step was, therefore, to en- lighten the pubUc concerning a country marked on all maps as 'unknown,' without a distinctive a^^llation, till the one it now wears was made familiar to the public mind by his writings and correspondence."^^ Upon this point there is sufficient evidence upon which to deny Kelley's claim to priority, and also to determine beyond question the person to whom the honor belongs. Upon the evidence of Floyd's second Oregon bill, which was introduced on January 18, 1822, we must give to Floyd the distinction of having first pix>posed that "all that portion of the territory of the United States north of the forty-second degree of latitude, and west of the Rocky Moun-
14 SettUtnent of Oregon, 12. "Oregon, the Indian name of this river, was traced by roe to a large river called Orjon in Chinese Tartary, whose latitude corresponds with that of Oregon, in America. The word KUlamucks, the name of a tribe a little south of the mouth of the Oregon, was, also, traced to a people called Killmuchs, who anciently lived near the mouth of the Orjon in Asia. It is evident that the Oregon Killmucks were among the early settlers of North America, ^nd brought with them manv of the proper names used by our Indians. The word Mexico (Mecaco) is identified with the name of the smcient capital of Japan. Identifications of bothproper and common names are numerous.^ — Ibid.. 88n. Another guess was: '*The name of Oregon is derived from or-gano. the Spanish word for wild marjoram, the oreganum vulgar e of Linnaeus, which grows abundantiv in the western part of the disputed territory.*' — Kelley, Oregon. Palmer Sentinel. April 33, 1846. This subject, which lies within the neld of geography rather than history, is discussed m detail in Bancroft, Hist, of Oregon, I, i7-as.
15 Bonnie^ The travels of Jonathan Carver, American Historical Review, XI. 2I8.
16 Kelley, Petition, 1866; 2,
17 17 cong. I sessw H. bill 47, sec. 4​
214 ' Fred Wilbur Powell
tains, shall constitute a territory of Oregon."*^ This was first emphasized by Bourne.^®
But if Kelley was not the first to apply the name, he was the most active in making* it known to the people, which in itself was a real public service, although not of major im- portance.
The Presidents' Range. — In his Memoir of 1839 Kelley said "The eastern portion of the district referred to [southwestern Oregon] is bordered by a mountain range [the Cascades], running nearly parallel to the spine of the Rocky mountains and to the coast, and which, from the number of its elevated peaks, I am inclined to call the Presidents^ range. These iso- lated and remarkable cones, which are now called among the hunters of the Hudson's Bay Company by other names, I have christened after our ex-Presidents, viz.: 1. Washington [St. Helens], latitude 46 deg. 15 min. ; 2. Adams [Hood], latitude 45 deg. 10 min.; 3. Jefferson, latitude 44 deg. 30 min.; 4. Madison [Three Sisters], latitude 43 deg. 50 min.; 5. Monroe [Diamond or Thielsen] , latitude 43 deg. 20 min. ; 6. J. Q. Adams [Pitt or McLxDughlin], latitude 42 deg. 10 min.; and 7. Jack- son [Shasta], latitude 41 deg. 40 min.^*
Some contemporary writers, notably Famham and Green- how, were inclined to favor this suggestion; but Mount Jef- ferson alone has retained its name, and Mount Jefferson was originally named not by Kelley but by Captain William Clark. Thus it is possible to determine the source of Kelle/s idea of a Presidents' range.^ There is a Mount Adams in southern Washington, and its name may be the indirect result of Kel-
i8 Bourne, Th« travels of Jonathan Carver, ut supra, 288n; Aspects of Oregon history before 1840, ut supra, 265-6. On January 13, 1823, Kfallary of Vermont proposed an amendment lo the Floyd bill which provided amonR other things that the "tracts of country, in the section described is hereby declared to be the Territory of Oregon." and on January 24 when Walker of North Carolina moved to amend Mallary's amendment by substituting Columbia for Oregon, Floyd objected and the motion was lost. Floyd then proposed and Mallary accepted a substitute which differs only in a few unimportant particulars from the original wording. — 17 cong. 2 sess. Annals of Congress, XL, 601. 678-0. In the course of the debates on his bill Floyd used the terms *'the Oregon ' and "Oregon** interchangeably to describe the territory. See Ibid., 408^.
19 Pp. 53-4.
20 There is a "Presidents' range in Kelley's native state. New Hampshire. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 215
ley's suggestion, but Kelley 's Mount Adams was south of the Columbia.
Internal Improvements Proposed. — That Kelley had little if any influence in the movement for a transcontinental rail- road, is the conclusion to which one is forced after an exami- nation of all available materials. When we consider the diffi- culties that attended the accomplishment of that great work, the words of Kelley, as quoted below, are interesting only as they tend to show how little he appreciated the magnitude of the task and the sort of men needed to engage in it :
"Had enemies let me alone, the road would have been graded from one end to the other before this [1854] ; and Oregon be- fore the year 1840, would have teemed with a population from our own blest country ; and Alta California would have become the possession of the United States earlier than it did ; and have cost less money and no blood ; and that whole country, dark as it was, ere this day, would have been changed to shining fields and flowery gardens; and society there, would have been dressed in lovely attire, and robed in charms of moral beauty. . .
"My thoughts are still on the execution of these desirable and heaven-suggested improvements, and on the resources which the road would open to the people of this country for wealth and knowledge and national superiority. Should health and strength ever again be equal to so great a labor, and my enemies lessen the cords that bind me hand and foot, the two projects, Indian and railroad, remaining unaccomplished, I shall engage in them with what science and skill I possess, and with my accustomed zeal and perseverance, hoping to add them to the list of my achievements."^
This is Kelley at his worst. Nor was his claim on this ac- count limited to railroads. "I planned for Internal Improve- ments — a canal from Charles River (Boston), to the Connecti- cut River, as surveyed by L. Baldwin, and a ship-canal from Barnstable to Buzzard's Bay."^ The Massachusetts canal was
J I Narrative of Events and Difficulties, 70-72'
22 Settlement of Oregon, j. As to the former Kelley said that he "Made a cursory survey of eight or ten miles of the route, this ... at my own ex- pense, and that he presented a petition to the legislature. As to the latter he declared that "about the year 1825^' he made a cursory survy of the route for the ship canal, also at his own expense. — Kelley, "Beloved Brethren," Nov. 14, 1869, ​
216 Fred Wilbur Powell
projected in 1791 by General Henry Knox, who obtained a charter in 1792. The project was revived by Governor Eustis in 1825, and a special commission was appointed to make an examination of the practicable routes through to the Hudson river at the terminus of the Erie canal. The Cape Cod canal was first proposed in colonial times, and it was everybody's project. It would seem that Kelle/s contribution, such as it was, was negligible.
It remains to consider the various estimates which have been placed upon Kelley's public services by the writers of history. The laudatory accounts which appeared in the news* papers of Boston from time to time after 1839, like the testi- monials which were appended to Kelley's memorials and pe- titions, may be safely ignored, for most of them were probably written at his solicitation. It must be borne in mind in con- nection with the excerpts which follow that many of them were written in the belief that to Kelley belonged the distinction of having been first in the field to suggest the settlement of Ore- gon — an honor which he specifically disclaimed.
"Though Mr. Kelley did not succeed in his object of the direct establishment of a colony on the Columbia, either for want of adequate personal influence and resources, or because his project was in advance of the time, or in consequence of the obstacles thrown in his way by interested individuals, still he is entitled to honorable mention for the exertions he made and long persisted in; and perhaps the American settlement, actually effected on the Wallamet, by Mr. Lee . . . may owe its conception to the publications and suggestions of Mr. Kelley .... These and other advantages of the settlement of Oregon were as clearly seen by Mr. Kelley then [1830], as they are now by the country at large. But he suffered the too common fate of those who conceive a great idea, and dedicate themselves to a great d)ject, in anticipation of the progress of knowledge and opinion around them. Their discoveries or plans OHiflict with existing interests; their just views are met with misconstruction, and often with ridicule; their zeal is ​wrecked on petty obstacles, thrown up by the ignorance or injustice of their misjudging contemporaries; and it is not until later times, or it may be another generation, that full justice can be done to the enthusiasm, and due allowance made for the exaggerated feeling, which the contemplation of an elevated purpose kindles in their breasts."
"And yet the occupation of Oregon was not without its knights of La Mancha, whose brains became somewhat turned, and that by difficulties more imaginary than real . . . A fanatic in religion, he became fanatic in his scheme of settlement. All the powers of piety and avarice were employed by him in the attempted execution of plans which grew more wildly dear to him as the years went by and failure became more apparent . . .
"If we measure his merits by his claims we must make him at once owner and king of Oregon. Nevertheless his writings did exercise influence, not as great as if they had been moderate, yet exceedingly weighty in those momentous questions so shortly to arise . . .
"With regard to the services which Kelley rendered the United States, or Oregon, it would be difficult to estimate the value. That his published articles and public lectures were the first to call attention to the feasibility of settling the Pacific coast by an overland emigration there can be no dispute . . .
"There are more than one in California like Vallejo and Alvarado, prominent in the affairs of the nation, who have seen cities rise from under the chaparal of sand-hills, and palpitating civilization fill the valleys where once they lassoed grizzly bears and chased wild men and women into the mission conversion pens; there are among the fur-traders those who have seen the rise of settlement and the wonders of progress in the Northwest; but there has been none like poor Kelley who laid upon the altar of his enthusiasm more than half a century of ​
218 Fred Wilbur Powell
life, who among the first to start the cry, never ceased halloo- ing until his wilderness was a state ....
"All his influence to a very fair extent I am disposed to ac- cord him. Had I been congress I would have given the old schoolmaster^ something to sweeten his second childhood's cup withal, and I would have praised and petted him somewhat in an official way, for he did more than many a well paid officer of the government. But when a human being breaks forth in insensate twaddle like this, 'Let me then be known by the work divinely appointed unto me to do, by the manner of life which the Lord Jesus revealed unto me in visions in my youth, by the eventful, extraordinary, and useful life, which God, ac- cording to his foreknowledge, did predestinate,' I do not much blame the republic for giving the poor fellow the cold shoul- der.^
"The history of human progress shows that great move- ments frequently receive their initial impulse from the most visionary and impractical of men. Perhaps the very quality of being visionary — prone to see visions — makes possible a forecast of results which lack of practical ability in the indi- vidual could never accomplish. John Brown did as much as any man to give direction to public thought in favor of the emancipation movement of the United States ; but a man less qualified than he to bring that movement to a successful issue could scarcely have been found. So with the vital question of the Northwest — the long-disputed Oregon question — it was preached, published, and kept before the public for many years by a man who proved himself wholly unfit to carry out his own schemes. This was a Boston schoolmaster. Hall J. Kelley . . .
"His crusade was a successful one in helping to turn men's minds to a subject of far-reaching importance, and in this respect the American people owe to his memory a debt of grati- tude. Although he never achieved the distinction of martyr- dom in the cause which he so boldly and persistently cham- pioned, he will stand in history as the John Brown of the
24 Bancroft, Northwest Coast, II, 543, 554*5i 559n. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 219
movement which saved to the United States a part of its right- ful domain upon the Pacific."^
"Hall J. Kelley may properly be called the father of the Oregon emigration movement."^^
"Sharing the fate of all idealists, he was a generation in advance of his day. All that he hoped for Oregon was des- tined to come to pass, and largely through his mad propa- ganda. His pamphlets and his newspaper [articles] generated a romantic enthusiasm for the vast realm beyond the Rockies so rapidly slipping from American control. His suggestion that every colonist should receive a grant of two hundred acres of arable land appealed with irresistible force to the homeless and unemployed of the eastern cities, and furnished the foundation for the Donation Act."[?]2^
"It is impossible to show any other American at so early a period not only devoting himself to the intellectual labor of discussing the Oregon question, and to promoting colonization societies, but who undertook and overcame without support, the cost and perils of immigration with the sole object of verifying his teachings to the country .... It is only jus- tice to agree with him that he set on foot by his writings the immigration movement to the shores of the Pacific in all its forms, whether missionary, commercial, or colonizing ....
"If we compare the unprotected services of a Kelley with the paid and protected services of Lewis and Clark, we have to acknowledge that a debt of appreciation and public recog- nition, at least, is due to the Yankee schoolmaster who spent the best years of his life in teaching the United States govern- ment and people the value of the Oregon territory."^
"I consider that the real contest for Oregon was between the
25 Chittenden, The American Fur Trade of the Far W-'tfj*, I, 434-5- a6 Thwaites, Early Western Travels, XXI, 24^. 27 Coman, Economic Beginnings of the Far West, II, 132-3.
2B Victor, Hall J. Kelley, one of the fathers of Oregon, Oregon Historical ^ Society. Quarterly, II, 39. ​
220 Fred Wilbur Powell
date of arrival of Hall J. Kelley, Ewing Young, and the free- men who came with them, or near their date and 1846."**
"Hall Jackson Kelley, a school teacher qf Boston, began a work in behalf of Oregon that Oregon has never yet acknowl- edged or recognized. Kelley was an eccentric man, an en- thusiast, one of those who seize a single idea and devote their lives to it .... He it was, beyond all question, who first urged the settlement of Oregon, insisted upon its practicability and set forth the importance and value of the Oregon coimtry to the United States. Many with whom he came in contact re- garded him merely as a bore or troublesome fellow, and this impression was deepened by a tone in his speech and writings which was regarded as a religious cant ....
"This strange eccentric man can almost be called the prophet of Oregon, the father of migration to Oregon, the man who hastened the fulfillment of Oregon's destiny."**
"The largest results of Wyeth's enterprise are rather to be looked for in the contribution he made in various ways to the furtherance of other enterprises than his own.
"Substantially the same may be said of the enterprise of Hall J. Kelley, the leading promoter of one or more of the emigration societies already mentioned. He contributed ma- terially to the ultimate settlement of the territory by his per- sistent and widespread agitation in the East, and later in some measure by bringing into the Willamette Valley a small band of men, some of whose number became permanent settlers/*"
"We envy none who can look on the story of Hall J. Kelley with contempt. . . . Continually, as I study the features of that early time, I trace the primal influences to Hall J. Kelley as having given them birth. Oregon can afford to kindly remember him for the good he tried to do— and really
29 Minto, The young homesecker, Oregon Historical Society, Procetdimgs, 1900: lao-i.
30 Scott, Annual address, Oregon Pioneer Association, Trwisactiotu, 1890, 9: 33, 35.
31 Wilson, The Oregon question, Oregon Historical Society, Qnarttriy, I, S23-4. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 221
accomplished as results have shown. He alone was stirring the cauldron of Fate, and did and said what had momentous re- sults. It is more kindly to place a stone upon his cairn than to throw any slur on one who suffered and lost so much.
"Hall J. Kelley had wonderful prescience and judgment in discerning facts and drawing conclusions .... This vis- ionary, whose life was a disappointment, because he attempted too much« laid the foundation for all that as finally accom- plished. It was surprising that he accomplished so much and was so reliable.
"Kelley's work was far reaching. His life work was as the finger of fate pointing the way, and his labors reached fruition while he was neglected and his services forgotten ....
"I have been struck with the fact that Kelley was the special providence inspired at the earliest time to appreciate the value of this region^ when Congress ignored it and the nation was ignorant of its value. Eliminate from that period this single feature and it is doubtful when American occupancy could have been eflFectiye. The very man, who discovered gold in California was one who came from Oregon, drawn there by the facts stated. Before the century shall have passed, through which he so ardently labored and so bitterly suffered, it will not be too late to accord to him the merit he deserved and plant this modest laurel on his forgotten grave.'*®
"To him, more than any other one person, in my judgment, may be justly attributed the subsequent occupatkm of the country by emigrants from the United States — ^and Oregon should in some way worthy of the subject and herself yet acknowledge and commemorate that fact.**"
"To him, without doubt, is to be attributed much of the subsequent wave of interest which swept on toward American immigratbn. At first, a New England college man, educator, and social theorizer, and then a leader of the pioneer movement
3a Ckrke, I, 274-6. , .
33 Dcady» Annual adilreat, Oregon Pioneer Association, Transactions, x^yy-^A​
222 Fred Wilbur Powell
to Oregon, Hall J. Kelley is worthy of permanent remem- brance."^
"Some of the Oregon historians have been disposed to be- little Kelley's work for Oregon ; but they only expose their own want of knowledge of the subject .... There is not a church history or a church docimient that has ever been printed that had the justice to give Kelley what was due to him . . . . Unappreciated and misunderstood, by some called a fanatic, by others a crank, and by the Hudson's Bay Company treated as a horse-thief, the ghost of Hall J. Kelley appears and disap- pears through the shifting scenery of Oregon's strenuous his- tory with such kaleidoscopic presentment as almost baffles de- scription .... Hall J. Kelley is justly entitled to have his name enrolled among those who saved Oregon to the people of the United States."*^
"He gained a place in history and his name is gratefully mentioned as the earliest and one of the truest friends of the 'Americanization of Oregon.' No history of Oregon can be written that does not thus record the name of Hall J. Kelley."**
Kelley complained that his name had been suppressed in the books and reports on Oregon written by Lee and Frost, Green- how, Slacum, Howison, and others. Had he lived to read the estimates here reproduced, he might have been satisfied; for it is now acknowledged that his figure bulks large among those who have lived and labored for Oregon. A number of sugges- tions have been made as to a proper memorial to his name. So far as is known Kelley street in Three Rivers is his sole memo- rial, and this is no small distinction in a village which has g^ven to its streets such singularly unimaginative appellations as Main, Front, and High. The map of the Northwest Coast is sprinkled with the names of Lewis, Qark, Jefferson, Astor, Benton, Linn, Polk, Whitman, McLoughlin, and others who figured in the early history of the Oregon country. Oregon
34 W. D. L]nnian, The Columbia River, i6i.
35 Gaston, Hwf. of Oregon. I, 115-6, a68, 272,
36 H. K. Bines, Hist, of Washington, 105. ​
Hall Jackson Kelley 223
has recently dedicated the McLoughlin Home at Oregon City and reinterred the body of Jason Lee at Salem. The body of Kelley lies in his boyhood home in Gilmanton, and there it should remain. Above it might well be placed these words of Stevenson, which read as if they were written with Kelley in mind:
"Here lies one who meant well, tried a little, failed nmch: — surely that may be his epitaph, of which he need not be ashamed. Nor will he complain at the summons which calls a defeated soldier from the field ; defeated, ay, if he were Paul or Marcus Aurelius : — but if there is still one inch of fight in his old spirit, undishonoured. The faith which sustained him in his life-long blindness and life-long disappointment will scarce even be required in this last formality of laying down his arms. Give him a march with his old bones ; there, out of the glorious sun-colored earth, out of the day and the dust and the ecstasy — ^there goes another Faithful Failure !"
(To be concluded)
* ↑ Temple, Hist, of the Town of Palmer, 266.
* ↑ Mr. Kelley's pamphlet, The Oregonian and Indians' Advocate, I. 180. "Our object the elevation of the Indian race—our means a Christian settlement in Oregon. Published under the direction of the Committee of the Oregon Provisional Emigration Society." Lack of confidence in the statements in this pamphlet is also expressed in Bancroft, Hist. of the Northwest Coast, I, 105n.
* ↑ Ibid., I, 22.
* ↑ 26 cong. I sess. H. doc. 43.
* ↑ Cushing, Discovery beyond the Rocky mountains, North American Reviews, L, 122–3 (1840).