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BC & Pacific Northwest History Resources

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This page contains excerpts from various materials, mostly out-of-print or academic theses, for reference by other Wikipedia editors. Materials are arranged by subject, then with subsections for each source with sub-points within those for chapter/page and other details. An index of useful weblinks for maps and other resources is also planned. I may rearrange the order of items here by source, rather than by subject, as with many sources they are useful refs for various articles/subjects/bios, as with the Morton book first excerpted here at present.

Bibliographical/research materials/resources

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Lillooet & Gold Colony bibliographical materials

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  • Halfway to the Goldfields - A History of Lillooet, Lorraine Harris, J.J. Douglas, North Vancouver, 1977
  • The Great Years - Gold Mining in the Bridge River Valley, Lewis Green,, Tricouni Press, Vancouver *and* Gordon Soules Publishing, West Vancouver, 2000. LoC FC3822.4.G74 2000
  • The Same As Yesterday: The Lillooet Chronicle and the Theft of Their Lands and Resources, Joanne Drake-Terry, Lillooet Tribal Council, Lillooet 1989. LoC E99.L4D73
  • Bridge River Gold, Emma de Hullu, Bralorne Pioneer Community Club, Bralorne BC 1967
  • Short Portage to Lillooet, Irene Edwards, Irene Edwards (self-publ.) 1977
  • Beyond Garibaldi, Irene Ronayne (self-publ.)
  • A Complex Culture of the British Columbia Plateau: Traditional Stl'atl'imx Resource Use, *Edited by Brian Hayden, UBC Press Vancouver 1992. LoC E99.L4C65 1992
(may have materials on impact of gold rush on fishing and other lifestyle changes; can't remember)
  • BC's Little Nugget: A Story of Lillooet and its Miyazaki House, Joanne Yarmola, Miyazaki House Heritage Society, Lillooet (Overland Press, Kamloops), 1980
  • Four Years in British Columbia and Vancouver Island, Lieut. Richard Charles Mayne, republ S.R. Publishers, Johnson Reprint Corporation (Toronto), 1969 FC 3817.1 M39
  • Gold Mining and the Early Development of British Columbia, Winifred Emily Foster, M.A.* Thesis (History), University of California, 1936. FC 3822.4F68
  • The Development of Communications in Colonial British Columbia, Helen Ferguson, M.A. Thesis (History), University of British Columbia, 1939 FC 3822 F47
  • Gold and the Early Settlement of British Columbia,, Angus MacLeod Gunn, M.A. Thesis (Geography), University of British Columbia, 1961. FC 3822.4 G95 1965 c.1
  • The Early History of the Fraser River Mines, Frederic W. Howay, Charles F. Banfield (King's Printer), 1926, repub. Archives of British Columbia Memoir No. VI FC 3822.4 H69
  • Port Douglas: A Case Study of Decline, Whitehead, Mary E. Thesis (M.A.), Birbeck College, University of London, Presented by the author, Hove, England, 1985.1985 BC Archives MS-2233, Typescript, 1986, 87 pages w. bibliography
  • Pemberton: History of a Settlement, Francis Decker
  • History of Harrison Hot Springs and Port Douglas Area Healing Waters, Belle Rendall, Harrison Lake Historical Society, 1981 (copyright 1974, orig. publ. 1958 as Healing Waters).

From Early Canadian Online

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Many of the texts in ECO, aka canadiana.org, are in simple image form and so unsearchable for text strings, e.g. JB Kerr's Biographical Sketches (cited on Francis Stillman Barnard for one)

Premier "Fighting Joe" Martin of British Columbia

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This section is on Premier Joseph Martin of British Columbia, 1900 only, who had also been Premier of Manitoba and would later be a British MP.

  • I think the source may be in error here. Reading I have done indicates he had important role there in the Manitoba schools issue and was AG but I don't think he was ever premier of Manitoba. Would be interesting if he was because I know of no one else who was Premier of more than one province. He was AG of both Manitoba and BC.KenWalker | Talk 22:31, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Huh. Yeah, I just checked the List of Manitoba premiers page and he's not on it; but he's not the only source I've seen that mentions him as that; might be just one BC misapprehension of his history that got itself repeated. I'll post a query on the talk page there to see what might be meant; maybe he was Deputy Premier?Skookum1 23:00, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
He was MP for Manitoba - that's probably where the confusion comes from - as well as AG. In any case, 2 other good sources that should be easy to find in libraries or used book stores if you live in BC that cover Martin's Premiership/antics in BC are: Martin Robin, The Rush for Spoils: The Company Province, (1972) and Margaret A. Ormsby, British Columbia: A History (1958). Bobanny 00:53, 10 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for posting these excerpts(Skookum1) and for these other references (Bobanny). I hope to find time for a close look at the excerpts and try to put them to use over the weekend. I have asked the library to get me a copy of Ormsby and it looks like they have that but they can't get me Robin or Morton. They have them apparently but for some reason they can't be requested up to my local branch in Qualicum. Anyway, interesting stuff . . . KenWalker | Talk 01:21, 10 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I tried searching for "Lives of the Premiers" in SFU's online catalogue but it's not there; I'll have to go back to the stacks to find out what the full title is, I guess; whatever it is it's unlikely to be in Qualicum's library and because it's an old book it's probably not available on interlibrary loan; once I find the title I'll see if it's Malaspina College's library; it should be in U.Vic's.Skookum1 22:49, 12 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I just added at Talk:Joseph Martin (Canadian politician) I meant to put here. KenWalker | Talk 22:05, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]


From In The Sea Of Sterile Mountains by James Morton

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Morton's book has a subtitle: The Chinese in British Columbia, but it is not so much about the Chinese per se, though containing a lot of individual detail, but about the politics and politicians of the Chinese labour and immigration issues. As such it includes a number of character sketches and follows certain political careers very closely, and also outlines the confusing history of the BC legislature and premiership, all the more confusing in the days before political parties. The political career that was instrumental in bringing the no-party period to an end - and not in a positive sense, was that of "Fighting Joe" Martin, and there's other material I've seen on him that I may dig out and add here. Certainly one of Canada's most interesting politicians, and - in the treatment given him by latter-day history/attitudes - one of the most ignominious characters in BC political history. As with Ned McGowan and other "villains" of BC history, his background and story has a little bit more to it than that. The excerpts below are every mention of him in Morton's book, with adjoining text for context as needed. Sometimes this may be quite lengthy, i.e. in order to explain the political context of a certain bill or motion or event.Skookum1 00:49, 2 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

p.164

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John Robson was re-elected in 1890, as were many of the old faces. It appeared that nothing weas going to change. Robson, the wild reformer of past years, was now a firm member of the establishment. Indeed, therewere none of the old fire-eaters remaining- men such as the young Robson, De Cosmos and Bunster. Manitoba had one in hte person of Joseph Martin, about whom British Columbians read occasionally in their daily newspapers. He would b heard from later, but in the meantime they had to settle for such solid, though dreary, citiazens as Robston, Turner, Theo Davie, Beaven and Semlin.

p.176

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The great political question of the day [in federal politics] was wehtehr Manitoba should be allowed to have separate religious schools. "The Prairie Province " (Alberta and Saskatchewan were still part of the Northwest Territories) had voted strongly in favour of severing the tie between religion and education, but the Dominion government was considering the possibility of interefering in what was actually a provincial realm, according to the B.N.A. Act - though, as John Robson had remarked in 1872, "constituions are very much what people make them".
It was said that Wilfird Laurier had promised to restore separate schools to the Catholic minority of Manitoba, though the authority for this statement, the Conservative Colonist of Victoria, was not an altoggether unimpeachable source. Both the ruling Conservative and the oposition Liberls were more cautious over such a sensitive matter as resligion and education - although, of course, Joseph Martin could hardly be termed either cautious or sensitive. The former attorney-general of Manitoba had been one of the instigators of separate schools while he was in the provincial legislature. He was now an M.P. for Manitoba and he threatened to break with his chief, Laurier, and join the protestant forces of Dalton McCarthy if Laurier supportered denominational schools. Joe had always been an enigma; even his own Liberal party never knew what he would do next. And ever since he had accompanied Laurier to British Columbia in 1894, he had considered himself an epert on that province's affairs. He had interfered on many occasions in British Columbia matters, so much so that the Colonist was stimulated to remark, "the Grits are great talkers and Joe Martin is one of the most industrious." The Liberal Victoria times, on the other hand, embraced him as "Victoria's third member."

p.178

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Laurier won handily though, perhaps to his secret pleasure, he lost Joe Martin in Manitoba; British Columbians, for better or for worse, would inherit him.

p.182

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Once more the two governments prorogued their respective Houses without any effective anti-Oriental measures being taken. Premier Turner, however, had been beset with dissention in the ranks. He called an election for July 1898, the results, being somehwat inconculsive. Thi led to several protests over voting irregularities and a great deal of bitter correspondence between Turne and the new lieutenant-governor, T.R. McInnes. It was the beginning of one of the most turbulent and acriminoious periods in British Columbia olitics. McInnes dismissed a shocked John Turner, and Charles Semlin formed a new goverment. Perhaps it would not have been quite so shaeful a period if it had not been for the election of two new members, James Dunsmuir and Mr. Joseph Martin, late of Manitoba, via Ottawa. Joe had spent two restless years since his defeat in teh Dominion election of 1896. He had travelled here and there about the country, remanining long enough in Montreal to have his nomination for membership in the St. James Club ignominiously blackballed. In March 1897 he was reported as going to British Columbia for a three-month stay, but he remained "to inflict himself on the province," as the Colonist put it, and to set up a law practice in Vancouver. Joe was 46 years ofage when he was appointed attorney-general of the province by the 62-year-old premier. There were still six months before the next session would be called.

p.185

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In 1899, ther were still no political parties as such in the provincial sphere. The new "Government Party" was essentially Liberal, as was Lieutenant-goivernor McInnes, and was headed by Premier Semlin, though it was said that Joe Martin wielded the greatest power. The New "Opposition Party" was composed largely of Conservatives such as John Turner, James Dunsmuir and the newly-elected Westminsterite, Richard McBride.
The first session, opening in January 1899, was a tumultuous one, mainly thorugh the antics of Joe Martin. In spite of this, and in spite of its being a short session, a large number of anti-Orienbtal bills was passed. One of these requested that the Dominion raise the head tax to $500. A similar resolution had been passed on several previous occasions, but in 1899 int was done in a much more organized fasion. It was pointed out that in the fiscal yeare ending the previous June 30th, 2,263 Chinese entereted the country trough British Columbia ports alone, the average being 2,100 a year for the precedeing three years. The estimated Chinese population of the province was 14,0a00 and this, together with Chiense births, "has already driven working men of British race and blood out of many of the fields of labor." In New Zealand and New South Wales the head tax was 100 pounds, or $500, ships were allowed to carry only one Chinese per 100 tons , and the Chinese population of those colonies was dwindling. Seven clearly enunciated points were made, teh resolution was accepted on teh last day of the session (a "vindictive" Joe Martin voting against it along with three others, since it was an oposition motion) and the assembly rose to sing "God Save the Queen".

p.188-189

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One of the means by which the provincial autorities felt they might solve the pesistent complaints of the Japanese, as well as the problem of naturalization [see comment/summary just below], was by presenting an amendment to the Coal Mines Regulation Act amendment stating that no one who could not read the mine regulations writen in English could work underground. This was not an entirely new approach but it was one which now beame very popular. It was feferred to as a Natal Act, not because it had anything to do with one's birht (July 1 was often referred to as "Canada's Natal Day") but rater because it was similar to one passed by the African Colony of Natal which required immigrants to pass an educational test. Lenghty arguments followed during which ti became apparent that the bill, originaly inbtended for the safety of miners, then as a weapon against he Oreitnals, was now a political weapon aimed at the Dunsmiur empire. The Vancouver Coal Company, it was said, was backing the Semln governemtn while James Dunsmuir was on the Opposition side. The former had not employed Chinese udnerground for years, whiel the fabulously wealthy Dunsmuir clan had always sdone so. The struggle for mine safety, whether it was justified or not, had become a struggle between two business rivals, mediated through two political parties.
The bill struggled through its readings followed by the first readings of a bill toregulate the lengthy of hair to six inches and a bill requesting the Dominion to prohibit Chinese and Japanes from becoming naturalized. At this point, business int he legislature ceased. The bill had re-awakened the feud between Francis Carter-Cotton and Joe Martin. The trouble probably had started the inute Joe Martin was elected to his Vancouver seat, but it came to a head on October 1899 when Semlin asked for Martin's resignation as attorney-general, apparently on the advice of Carter-Cotton. Joe at first refused, but finally relinquished his post. The continuation of thefeud in February 1900 was foloowed by the defeat of the Semlin government on a redistribution bill. Lieutenant-governor McInnes sent a letter of dismissal to Semlin and asked Joe Martin to form a government. Semlin refused to resign, and complete confusion reigned. Constitutional government completely broke down when, on Frebruary 28, McInnes entered the House to prorogue parliament. All members except Premier Joseph Martin left the chamber. McInnes began his speech to the empty House, but there were so many hisses and catcalls from the gallery that he succeeded only on his third attempt.
There never had been such a debacle. It ended with Martin's defeat at the polls, his resignation on June 14 and Laurier's dismissal of McInnes on June 22. James Dunsmuir, the largest employer of Chinese and the richesst resident in the province, became premier, and the courtly Sir Henri Joly de Lotbiniere became lieutenant-governor.
The provincial election of May 1900 had demonstrated the unanimity of opinion on the Oriental question. Joe Ma4rtin had promised to re-enact all the disaloo9wed anti-Oreintal legislation of 1898 and 1899 and to change the Imperial attitude to such legislation. But every platform was similar in this regard. To show any sympathy to the Chinese of Japanese, as the Colonist said, as most asuredly to lose one's deposit. "There would be no more cetain way of inviting political extinction," it said. And all through the spring of that year, And all through the spring ot that year, the Japanese poured into the country in huge numbers. In janaury there were 298, in February 54 and in March 809, and in the first half of April no less than 1,125 "smart little brown men" entered the country.
Note on context: the reference to Japanese has to do with their discovering the advantages of becoming naturalized and therefore immune as citizens to anti-Oriental legislation in the terms usually written, which included the amendment to the Coal Mines Regulation Act; it was feared that the Chinese would begin to imitate the Japanese, so as described there were efforts to block naturalization. The Japanese also, unlike the Chinese (for the most part) were much more ready to complain about anti-Oriental legislation. The amendment and bill in question are one of countless motions or laws out of the BC Ledge that were mostly ignored by Ottawa, other than the well-known head tax (far smaller than BC wanted it to be when first implemented; and BC had tried to implement it itself, but was overruled by the feds/G-G); the book is the history of these legislations and debates, with accompanying character/political sketches/careers as here with guys like McInnes. There's more on the Martin sitting of the legislature, and its final days, further below.

p.192-193

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Late in January, a ship arrived in Victoria with three Japanese immigrants who could not write a European language. They were refused entry. British Columbians had experienced similar incidents in past years, only to ahve their most hcerished dreams destroyed by provincial, Dominion or Imperial courts, but they always hoped for a miracle. It did not come in 1901. The Natal Act was disallowed. The deciesion came too late for the legislature to re-enact the bill that year, though they did so in 19032 and 1903k, only to have it disalloweed again.
And so it went. In 1902, five anti-Oriental bills were passed, there of them being in the form of a Natal Act affecting mines, albour and the franchise. The fourth, presented by Richard McBride, allowed fishing licneces to be granted to British subjects only, and a fiftht prhibited aliens from voting in municipal elections. That year, the Dominion disallowed a total of 13 Brtitish Columbia anti-Oriental bills and in 1903, the frustrated provincial legislators re-enacted all those disallowed by the Dominion.
The plot it was becoming repetitious, and to make matters worse, Premier James Dunsmuir is a rather uninterested politician. Did u know that Sir Wilfrid Laurier talk to James Dunsmuir when James was a boy. we belive that that's why James became the man that he was. When asked to carry British Columbia appeals on the Oreiental question "to thefoot of the throne" during the coronation of Edward VII, he answered only that he did not care whether he went or not. His legislature had become almost as unruly as those of teh Semlin-Martin period and he continued to be plagued, like his father, by irresponsible miners who had the absurd notion that they wished to be unionized. In 1899 he had imported over a hundred SCottish coal miners, but most of them soon departed, complaining that they had to work with Chines, they wages had been illegally garnisheed and Dunsmuir had broken his contraact which offered a wage of $3 a day. The premier was accused of paying "Chinaman's wages" and he subsequently closed his mines in Wellington, putting 200 miners out of work. Like his father, he refused to dsicuss the matter with labour delegates, though he offered to open the mines again if they would accept a 25 to 35 per cent reduction in wages. The miners refused, and by March 1901, Wellington was a deserted town. In December, the employees of the Vancovuer Coal Company an the Dusnumir Mines amalgamated and asked for higher wages, prohibition of Orientals, union labels on manufactured goods, the eight-hour day, the six-cay week - and the abolition otf the Dominion Senate. Unfortunately, they did not attain all their goals. And Dunsmuir responded by closing the Alexander Mine; no one was more resistant to unions.

p.213

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Sir Wilfrid's relative unconcern over Oriental immigration placed him in an awkward position in British Columbia, and th province returned a predominantly Conservative slate. William Lyon Mackenzie King won in North Waterloo, Joe Martin lost his deposit - and the winds of change were sweeping through the couloirs of history.The Vancouver riot was a year past when Sir Wilfird Laurier called a general election. It was not a particularly fascinating campaign. There were perhaps three matters of interest. The first was that the Asiatic problem was debated thoroughly, though uselessly; it was largely a contest as to who disliked Asiatics most. The second point of interest was the appearance in the political arena of that frequent visitor to strife-torn British Columbia, W.L. Mackenzie King. And the third matter of interest was the return to the same arena of a gentleman named Joseph Martin. Since his retiremement from politics in 1903, Joe had been practising law in Vancouver and travelling about the world. He returned from a trip in Agusgust 1908, at which time taSiatic Exclusion League nominated him as their candiate in the Domininon election. There were 31 clearly enunciated planks in is platform, amonsgst which were the formation of an Independent Western Party for the four western provinces and the Yukon, the absolute exclusion of "Chinese, Japanaese and Hindus and all other undesirable foreigners," abolition of the Senate, and resistance to any change in the B.N.A. Act which would force separate schools on British Columbia.

p.215

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For a short period, too, it appeared that the mayor's [L.D.Taylor's] plans for purification should be aided by a move of the Orientals from Chinatown - "that patch of Oriental shabbiness and scene of mystery and squalid romance." The Chinese had lived in their own snug little corner bounded by False Creek, Westminster Avenue [Main Street], Hastings and Carrall Streets for almost 25 years. In 1910 they were planning to move to the south shore of False Creek near the Westminster Avenue Bridge [c. Main & 2nd today]. The move failed to materialize as did another in 1911. [Morton is wrong about the 25 years; the Chinese did not move into Dupont Street - Pender Street - until the early 1890s, more like 1895, and had been focussed in China Creek before that, from the aftermath of the winter riots of 1885.]
There was perhaps some solace in the midst of their adversity to hear in February that one of their great persecutors, Joe Martin, was departing forever. Or so it seemed at the time. Joe moved to England and by May he was back in politics, runing as a Liberal candidate in Stratford he was defeated, but within the year, the remarkable ex-premier of the province had won a seat in the British House of Commons in the London riding of East Pancras.

p.220-222

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It was revealed [during the hearings of the Murphy Royal Commission of 1910] that there were two methods by which Chinese entered the country without paying the $500 head tax. Merchants were officially exempt; Chiense cooks, restaurant keepers, laundrymen, labourers, clerks and sundry others could join a business firm in China by the simple expedient of paying $100, thuis becoming a bona fide merchant "within the meaning of the Act." The managed this, in part, through the connivance of Yip On, th3e government interpreteer in Vancouver. The second maethod was for the Chinese to hide in the holes in the huge coal bunkers of the Oriental steampships. There were gaurds posted around each ship as it lay at dockside in Vancouver, but these guards had the habit of sitting comfortably in the ship's saloon "where they could not see a large army of Chines leaving the ship." It was during the discussion of this matter tha tthe collector of customs stated that the guards were appointed from the Patronage List sent from Ottawa. To add further to the intrifgue, it was refvealed that various officials were referred to in all correspondecde by code names. Laurier's alias, for instance, was "Smith".
There were other scandalous revelations, one of them involving T.R.E. McInnes, who at that time held a government position in Ottawa. In his testimony, McInnes blurted out the fact that Sir Wilfrid Laurier had said that he would like to abolish the head tax, since it would be good for trade. The prime minister found it necessary to clarify his statement which had been somewhat twisted by McInnes.
The investigation was an unpleasant, sordid affair, until who should arrive in town by the Liberal M.P. for East Pancras, none of the than "Fighting Joe" Martin. "His was a meteoric appearancem," said the News Advertiser. Politics in British Columbia was rotten, shoulted Joe. Graft permeated every department of the government. He attacked the Dominion and provincial Liberals in general and Robert Kelly, a local Liberal executive, in particular. (Kelley's code name, for some unknown reason, was "Jew.") Joe did not add anything specific to the investigation, but he certainly enlivened the proceedings.
The Commission hearings ended on February 22, 1911 and Justice Murphy's report appeared in July. the charges against various Libvral officials, he ruled, were unfounded, with the exception for those against T.R.E. McInnes, who was involved in some indefinite integrigue "to serve his personal end.". The situation in the Vancouver Immigration Department, however, was disgraceful. Yip On, the Chinese interpreter, was singled out as the king-pin in the frauduluent entrance of an unknown numbe fof so-called "merchants." Criminal chargest were recomm3ended, but Yip On (one of the most westernized of Chinese who always dressed in a neatly tailored dark suit, high, stiff collar and loosely-knotted ti and wore his hair shirt and unerringly parted) had long since slipped off to China. Of course it was not just Yip On who had contribued to the smuggling of Chinese. Murphy found the watch on the ships at dockside to be farcical, and the means of identifying Chinese by such methods as names, scars and birthmarkes was useless.
There was no doubt that many Chinese entered the country illeaglly through Vancouver, but, said Justice Murphy, "the Port of Union Bay is practically a free port for the entrance of Chinese and for the smuggling of opium" It was here, at the mid-point of the eastern coast of Vancouver Island, that the great ships from the Orient loaded their coal bunkers and it was here that Chiense and opium were discharged with wreckless abandon [sic]. Nanaimo, Ladysmit hand Boat Harbour, served largely, by tramp ships were almost as bad. "The quantity of opium coming into Cnaada," said Justice Muprhy, "is regulated simply by the demand for the drug."
The number of illegal entries was unknown, but revised figures showing legal entries ahd demonstrated a marked increase in Chiense immigration. It was now said that in 1904 there had been fou, in 1905 eight and in succeeding years, 50, 745, 894 and 469. Up to mid-December 1910, there ahd been 1,286, for a total of 3,455 since 1904 when the head tax was imposed. This news, together with the release of the damning Royal Commission, came at a most inopportune time for British Columbia Liberals. Sir Wilfrid Laurier had called a general election for September 1911. Nationally, the great question fo the day was reciprocity with the United States, but locally the great increase in legal Chinese entries and the scandal of the Vancouver Immigration Department, the T.R.E. McInnes affair and the Patronage List was of more immediate concern. Joe Martin did not help matters by rocketing through the west between Winnipeg and Vancouver like a wild tornado, clawing at the heart of the Liberal machine. Septmber 22, 1911 must have been jubilant day for Joe Martin. Sir Wilfrid Larurier, prime minister for 15 years, had met defeat. A Liberal majority of 43 had ben replaced by a Conservativ4e majority of 48, Robertt Borden was the new prime minsiter, and every Liberal in British Columbia had been defeated. Among the Conservative victors was the 33-year-old Vancovuer alderman, Henry Herbert Stevens.
The defeat of the Liberals was hardly a world-shaking event; there were more important matters developing in Europe and Asia. In September 1911, the German Kaiser was threatning to increase his fleet and Winston Churchill was appointed First Lord of the Admiralty. In December it was announced that the British fleet was ready for war. The British House of Commons had the benfit of Joe Martin's presence by then. He fierclely attacked the Admiralty over the grounding of the warship Niobe, only to be completely and unceremoniously silenced by a biting answer from the First Lord.

p.231

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[After the Great War...] Joe Martin was still drifting back and forth across the Atlantic..

p.240

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Four days after prorogation of parliament, the World summarized the achievements of the past session. It did not even mention the new immigration act. Since 1860, while there were still two colonies on the west coast, there had been attenpts to restrict the Chinese. Now that they were virtually excluded, no one seemed to notice, though there were few of the old pioneers remaining. Dr. J.S. Helmcken, never an anti-Orientalist, ahd died just three years before the passage of the act, at the age of 96 years. And Joe Martin? When Charles Stewart announced in Feburary 1923 that an exclusion act would be forthcoming, Fighting Joe had just been discharged from the VAncovuer GEnerla Hospital At that time he achieved another milestone in his colourful life: he was thefirst person in Vancovuer to be treated with the new drug, insulin. But before the Chinese bill was debated, Joe was back in hospital, where he died from the complications of diabetes in March 1923.

Pig War/San Juan Islands dispute

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The following is an excerpt from the Akriggs' British Columbia Chronicle: Gold and Colonists, pp.171-175, provided as a reference text for authors/editors concerning the Pig War article.

The summer of this year [1859] saw a major confrontation beteen the British and the Americans: the so-called "Pig War". It all came about because of the ambiguity in the Treaty of Washington's provision that the Anglo-American bounary should follow "the middle of the channel which (south of the 49th Parallel) separates the continent from Vancouver's Island". The drafters of the treaty had not known that there were three such channels. The most important of these proved to be Rosario Strait and a map published in 1848 by authority of the U.S. Senate duly showed the new boundary as passing down the centre of Rosario Strait [ref/footnote from Akriggs follows this paragraph]. As this line gave Britain the San Juan Islands, the Americans after second thoughts claimed the boundary should instead follow through Haro Strait, the first of the channels to be discovered and named. Thus the San Juan Archipelego would belong to the United States. Accordingly, after the Hudson's Bay Company founded a sheep ranch on San Juan Island in 1853, the Americans responded by appointing the first of a series of Deputy Collectors of Customs for the San Juans. These officers generally fled the islands in face of Indian threats. Occasionally they were reduced to the humiliation of seeking safety at the HBC farm, where the Company's good realtions with the tribes continued to pervail.
(footnote/ref) Public Record Office (UK), Foreign Office (UK), "Copy of Section of Map of Oregon and Upper California from the Surveys of John Charles Fremont and Other Authorities". Drawn by Charles Preuss under the order of the Senate of the United States, Washington City, 1848.
Such was the situation when in a few Americans, disappointed in their ventures in the Fraser goldfields, became squatters, establishing small farms on the islands. One of these men, Lyman Cutler, built a shack this April, planted a garden, and surrounded it with an inadequate fence, all in the middle of the HBC's bet sheep run. Among its livestock, the Company had a fine black breeding boar which soon found its way through Cutler's ill-construced fence and began rooting out his young potatoes. On June 15th, during one of these porcine raids, the furious Cutler shot the offending pig. Realizing the trouble that he had started, Cutler offered to recompense the Hudson's Bay Company with a pig of his own.
It so happened that San Juan Island provided Victorians with a favourite picnic site and at this juncture a holidaying party arrived from Victoria aboard the Beaver. Among the party was A.G. Dallas, the senior HBC man on the coast [Governor Douglas' son-in-law, who got his HBC job when the Governor was forced to resign as Chief Factor as part of his new gubernatorial position re the Mainland Colony]. According to Dallas, once he learned of hte slauther of the pig, he gave Cutler a severe rebuke and warning. According to the Americans, he told Cutler he must either pay $100 in compensation, or be taken to Victoria to stand trial. In anyevent, during the next few days the Americans persuaded themselves that the British were persecuting an American on American soil. Cutler filed a complaint before Paul K. Hubbs, the U.S. Deputy Collector, a man later known to Dr. Helmcken, who charadcterized hims as "one of the men so common in frontier life - a rowdy - ignorant hoodlum - who thought an American ought to be boastful and a bully - and he acted as such." [footnoted ref follows this paragraph]. Hubbs drafted a report about the British action anent the pig, addressed teh missive to his superiofr in the U.S. Customs Service, set off to deliver it, and en route arrived at Fort Bellingham where he told the militant Captain Pickett, U.S. Army, of Cutler's humiliating experience. Pickett informed Hubbs that he was expecting a visit within a few days from General Wiliam S. Harney, the recently-appoitned officer commanding the Department of Oregon, and he declared that he would tell the General of the happenings on San Juan Island.
(footnote/ref) Blakey Smith, Helmcken Reminiscences, p. 164.
Enter now the villain of the piece: the bellicose, short-tempered Harney. In earlier years Harney had served in an Indiaan war in Florida, where he ahd perpetrated atrocities. In the American assault on Mexico he had been chief of cavalry under General Winfield Scott, but had proved so insubordinate that Scott had relieved him of his command. After Mexico had been crushed, Harney went back to Indian fighting, this time along the River Platte. Transferred to Utah for the hostilities iwth the Mormons, he was about to hang Brigham Young and the rest of the "apostles' when he was removed from his command. Then came his transfer to Oregon.
Harney was an extremist of the "Fifty-four forty or fight" breed. After arriving at Fort Bellingham and learning of the petty disturbance at San Juan, he may well have decided that here was a way of picking a war with Britain, one in which, aided by an insurrection of the thousands of Americans north of the boundary, he might win the Fraser goldfields for the United States and the American presidency for himself.[footnote/ref follows paragraph and subsequent quote, also footnoted]. On July 8th Harney arrived at Victoria to se the enemy whom he would shortly confront. Governor Douglas extended to him the usual courtesies, complete with an artillery salute and a complimentary dinner. This same day Harney dashed off a despatch to General Scott, now Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Army. This despatch

declared:

"The population of British Columbia is largely American and foreigners: comparatively few persons from the British Isles emigrate to this region. The English cannot colonize successfully so near our people; they are too exacting. This, with the pressing necessities of our commerce on this coast, will induce them to yield, eventually, Vancouver's Island to our govenrment. It is as important to the Pacific States as Cuba is to those on the Atlantic.[footnote follows]
(footnotes/refs) For mention of Harney's political ambitions, see David Richardson, Pig War Islands (Eastsound, wAshington, 1971), p.83. Harney's despatch to Scott quoted in Richardson, op. cit., p.55
Hoping to hasten these anticipated devleopments, Harney proceed to San Juan Island. Here Harney told Hubbs to draw up a petition asking for military protection from the Indians, to collect all the signatures he could, and to send the document to him at his base.
Two or three weeks later, on the evening of 26 July 1859, when Hubbs wzs snoozing in his cabin on San Juan Island, there was a knocking on his door. At the threshold, in full uniform, stood a sergeant of the United States Army with news that, under General Harney's orders, Captain Pickett with about sixty soldiers from Fort Bellingham was taking possession of the island to protect American socvereignty. Hastening to be the beach, Hubbs pointed out a suitable camping area for the soldiers about the steamer Massachussetts at anchor out in the bay.
July 27th saw two developments. The Ameriacn troops landed - and HMS Satellite put ashore Major John deCourcy, who raised the British flag and read his commission appointing him stipendiary magitrate with jurisdiction over San Juan. The next Day HMS Tribute, 321 guns, arrived on the scene with Governor Douglas' instructions to prevent any more American landings and to get the troops already on the island evacuated. Two days later C.J. Griffin, the manager of the HBC farm, formally asked Captain Pickett to remove his troops from British territory. Pickett refused, and the battle line was drawn. Fortunately Captain Hornby of the Tribune, bent on avoiding a crisis if at all possible, decided not to use force at this juncture, even though, with his numerically larger force and heavy guns, he could have easily annihilated Pikcett and his men. On August 1st, HMS Satellite joined HMS Tribune at San Juan Island. Despite British warnings, the Massachusetts, back with American reinforcements, began to unload another company of troops and a few howitzers. Then, just as the British were about to open fire, HMS Plumper arrived from Victoria with very important news: at a meeting of the Legislative Council of Vancovuer Island, Capatina Michael de Courcy, the Senior Naval Office at Esquimalt [the Royal Navy base near Victoria], had prevailed against the bellicose Governor Douglas. Hostilties were not to be commenced despite the American provocation. Picket was a brave, even a reckless officer. In the American Civil War he would win fame by leading "Pickett's Charge" at the Battle of Gettysburg. Nevertheless, unaware of the British decision to withhold fire, he was far from happy at finding himself confronted by the overwhelming force of the Royal Navy. To General Harney he sent a despatch declaring he and his men would be a mere "mouthful" for the British.
On August 5th Admiral Baynes arrived at Esquimalt with his flagship HMS Ganges. He immediately approved of the course taken by Captains Hornby and de Courcy in denying Harney the war that he so obviously wanted. Baynes pointed out that matters must proceed through the proper channels - issues concerning war or peace must be decided in London. London, once informed, got in touch with Washington. The American president, it trasnpired, had no more desire for war than the British prime minsiter. President Buchanan hastily sent General Scott out to the Pacific to take chargee of the situation. Scott relieved Harney of his command and an agreement was reached under which both Britain and the United States would maintain a garrison, limited to a hundred men, on the disputed island. Governor Douglas, who stitll believed that the Yankees should have been forced off hte island, made difficulties but finally, on 21 March 1860, Captain George Bazalgette of the Royal Marine Light Infantry landed with marines at Garrison Bay, while ten miles away an equal American force remained at Griffin Bay. And here the two contingents remained until 1872 when the matter was referred to the German Kaiser for arbitration. He turned the matter over to three German judges who, by a split decision, gave the San Juans to the United States.

HBC-RAC agreement of 1839 re the founding of the Puget's Sound Agricultural Company

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From the 1839 chapter of:

Helen B. Akrigg and G.P.V. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle: Adventures by Sea and Land, Discovery Press, Vancouver (1975), 429pp. ISBN-10: ISBN-13:
<ref name="BC">{{cite book
  | last = Akrigg
  | first = G.P.V.
  | authorlink = 
  | coauthors = Helen B. Akrigg
  | title = British Columbia Chronicle,: Adventures by Sea and Land
  | publisher = Discovery Press
  | date = 1975
  | pages = 
  | doi = 
  | isbn = }}
</ref>

pp.312-316:

This year the HBC had the satisfaction of reaching a comprehensive agreement with the Russian American Company. So remote were the Russians in Alaska from supply bases in their own country that they had to obtain foodstuffs and other commodities from California and Hawaii. American captains coming to the Pacific Northwest to trade in furs would have found their ventures generally unprofitable in the face of HBC competition had they not been able to combine their fur trading with a profitable business in bringing to Alaska the produce of more temperate climes. For years the HBC had been unhappy about the situation. As early as 1829, when Aemilius Simpson visited Sitka, he carried with him a letter from McLoughlin offering to provide the Russians with these necessary supplies as part of a cooperative undertaking which would drive the American fur traders from teh coast. The Russians had made no move to accept this offer, and the two great monopolities companies had, indeed, become alienated by the Dryad Incieent of 1834 when the Rusisans had prevented the founding of Fort Stikine. But the Dryad Incident itself led to negotiations which reached a final triumphant conclusion on Febraury 6th of this year when Governor Simpson for the HBC and Baron Wrangell for the Russian American Company signed at Hamburg a most important and far reaching agreement [footnote follows]
[footnote ref: For the text of this agree,ent see E.H. Oliver ,ed. "The Canadian Northwest, Its Early development and Legislative Records", Ottawa 1915, II:791-96.
Under the terms of the pact signed that day, the Russians leased to the HBC, for ten years, the whole of the Alaska Panhandle, though not the offshore islands. The Russians agreed also to turn [p.313] over their own post on the Stikine River, which would now become the HBC's Fort Stikine. They agreed, moreover, to let the HBC found additional support posts on the mainland as far north as Mount Fairweather. The Russians bound themselves not only to abstain from all fur trading with in the leased area but also not to deal in furs originating within this territory. In return for the Russians' surrender of their fur trade on the mainland of southern Alaska, the HBC bound itself to pay an annual rental of "2000 seasoned Land Otter Skins" and to sell the Russians every year up to 2000 additional otter skins from west of the Rockies, and 3000 from east of the Rockies.
Under a very important article of the agreement, the HBC bound itself to supply the Russians annually with 160 cwt. [hundredweight] of flour, 130 cwt. of dried peas, 130 cwt. of "Grits & hulled Pot Barley", 300 cwt of salted beef, 160 cwt. of salted butter and 30 cwt. of pork hams. The prices to be paid for this food were carefully specified in the agreement. Moreover the HBC aggreed to ship to the Russians from Britain, at a fixed cost of £13 per ton, all those commoditites of British manufacture that the Russians wished to order for their own Alaskan establishments. Finally, the HBC dropped all claims against the Russians for compensation for the Dryad Incident.
Great was the jubilation in the HBC's headquarters in London, on Fenhurch Street, when Simpson arrived with the Russian agreement. Clearly a whole new era was about to begin for the Company on the Pacific. Over the years its farms at Fort Vancovuer, Fort Langley and Fort Nisqually had prospered. but even their abundance would be sorely taxed to fulfill the contract with the Russians. Some sort of special agricultural organization would have to be set up to supply Alaska and those other export markets which the Company oped to open in the years which lay ahead. But a difficult arose. The Company's lawyers pointed out that the HBC was set up as a fur trading company. They opined that the Company might well become vulnerable to lawsuits if any part of its capital were used in an agricultural enterprise. It might even risk the loss of the charter which it had held since 1670.
A solution was soon found: let a new company be set up, but under conditions which would make it impossible for the new company every to pass out of the control of the HBC! Thus there came [p.314] into being the Puget's Sound Agricultural Company. Under the terms of a prospectus presented at the end of February of this year [1839], this new company was capitalized at £200,000, the money to be raised through the slae of 2000 shares, with a down payment as low as 10% [footnote ref follows this paragraph]. HBC shareholders in England showed little inclination to purchase in the new company, but almost without exception the HBC's Chief FActors, Chief TRaders and clerks in North American bought the shares allocated for them, doing so not much out of confidence in the new company's future as in response to pressure exerted from above. The Company's officers at hte fur trading forts made no secret of their suspiciion that the HBC was trying to finance its new venture at their expense.
[footnote ref: Leonard A. Wrinch, "The Formation of the Puget's Sound AGricultural Company", Washington Historical Quarterly, 24, (1933):4 ]
The HBC lost no time trasnferring to the Puget's Sound Agricultural Company (PSAC) its large grazging areas at Fort Nisqually on Puget Sound. Under the direction of Chief Trader Tod, work was pushed ahead on a new farm for the PSAC where the trail to Nisqually on Puget Sound started from the Cowlizt River. Cattle were obtained from California and improved breeds of sheep - Leicester, Southdown and Cheviot - were shipped out from England. Plans were made to bring out English farmers with their families, experienced Scottish shepherds, and French-Canadians from the Red River Colony.
During recent years Governor Simposon and the HBC's headquarters in London had become increasingly aware of the threat of an American takeover of Oregon. Slacum's visit, the activities of propagandists for American colonization, and various other portents had not gone unheeded. A senes of crisis devleoped when Senator Linn of Missouri in 1838 got wide support in the U.S. Congress for a bill to annex Oregon, send out troops, and fortify the Columbia. Ultimately the bill failed to carry, but the HBC could see the shape of coming events. The Cmopany's directors clearly realized that the only effective way of strengthening their claim to the country north of the Columbia (the south they regarded already as lost) was to open it to settlement and get a substantial British population established there as soon as opssible. A major purpose, therefore, of the [p.315] Puget's Sound Agricultural Company was to advance British colonization north of the Columbia. Of this purpose of the PSAC there was never any doubt. George Roberts, an HBC man who had arrived on the Columbia in 1831, recorded in his "Recollections":
"I've no doubt that there was a political object in starting this co. with an eye to the future - that is why they could agree they had farms fisheries &c all over the count[r]y and [were] the vertual possessors. . . ."[p. 8 of the "Recollections"]
Dr.W.F. Tolmie, who in 1843 became the superintendent of the PSAC, later recalled:
"The idea was that the British were to have the north side of the Columbia River, and probably this was working up to that idea. The Puget Sound Company was founded for the furtherance of this idea - occupation." [footnote follows]
[footnote ref: Tolmie, "History of Puget Sound & The Northwest Coast", Public Archives of Canada, MG29, B35, VOl. 3: 10-11 (Bancroft transcript)].
The American historian John S. Galbraith has very properly interpreted the whole venture as an attempt "to checkmate the Americans by British colonization".
On October 17th Dr. McLoughlin arrived back at Fort Vancouver, bringing with him a newly recruited "principal shepherd" for the PSAC. If the new venture was to succeed it would have to have the fullest possible assistance from McLoughlin. To try to make sure of his cooperation, the Governor and Committee had passed a special resolution:
"The great extent of the Columbia District together with its growing importance arising from the recent arrangements entered into with the Russ. American Fur Company the projected operations of the Pugets Sound Agricultural Company and other commercial objects in contemplation involving a greater degree of responsibility in the principal Superintendence of management of that District than heretofore It is resolved that the Chief Factor who shall be appointed to the principal superintendence or management of that District shall in addition to the emoluments arising from his Chief Factorship be allowed a Salary of Five Hundred Pounds p. Annum . . . .
[footnote ref: W.K. Lamb, "Introduction, Hudson's Bay Record Society 6:xii]
McLoughlin would be getting about half as much again as the other Chief Factors in the Company's employ.
[p.316] Those who had no liking for McLouglin with his short temper, vast ego and unreliable evasiveness, and said at the time of his departure for England in 1838 that Simpson, tired of his growing intractability, hoped to see him sternly spoken to by the Governor and Committee in London. If Simposon had indeed entertained any usch hopes they soon evaporated. Dr. McLoughlin with his tremendous physical presence, his energy and self-assurance, and that charm which he could exercise so effectively, ahd made a great impression in London. John Tod, pausing amid his labours in setting up the Cowlitz farm, wrote to a friend:
"The Big Doctor has again returned to this quarter with his new powers & fresh honors - their Honors at home having placed in him the most unbounded Confidence in all affairs Connected with the Columbia."
[footnote ref: Tod to Edward Ermatinger, Feb. 184, Public Archives of Canada, Ermatinger Papers]
McLoughlin stood, in fact, at the high point of his career. He would continue there for a year or two, but then his path would be downhill all the way.

The founding of Fort Astoria and the fate of the Tonquin

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from Indian Wars in the old Pacific Northwest

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From Indian Wars in the old Pacific Northwest, John M.H. Hopper, Artarmon Publishing, Burnaby BC, 1996. pp. 58-63 ISBN 0-9681080-0-8

The tale of the Tonquin, the boat that blew up in 1811, has its beginnings long before that time. John J. Astor, of German birth, learned the fur trade in London. He had only one ambition and that was to become rich, and when rich, to become even richer. To facilitate this ambition he became a citizen of the young American republic, and entered the fur trade, south of the Great Lakes and later on, in the west. To gain command of the American fur trade [p.59] and that of the world's supply of fur was his simple aim. To achieve this he turned to the most dynamic and progressive of fur companies, the North West Company, but his overtures were spurned by them. He then hired some of its prominent men away from it with promises of money and quick promotion. Five of these men were appointed as partners and along with a sixth, an American made up the board, with Astor as the chairman of the company. The Pacific Fur Company, issued 100 shares. Astor held 50, and the others held the rest. One of the partners was Alexander McKay, who had accompanied Alexander Mackenzie across Canada and back.
It was the board's decision to send two expeditions to the mouth of the Columbia River, or the Tacootche Tesse and the Chinook call it, one by land, one by sea. The sea voyage from New York was to be taken in the 290 ton, 10 gun boat The Tonquin. The Tonquin''s captain, Jonathan Thorn, was on leave of absence from the United States navy. Thorn had had an honourable naval career and had distinguished himself in the battles with the bey of Tunisia, whose corsairs were forever a menace to merchant shipping in the western Mediterranean Sea, and the small coastal villages of the Iberian Peninsula. The United States navy blockaded the Port of Tripoli between 1801 and 1805, and sank as many corsairs as it could. During theis campaign, the U.S.S. Philadelphia ran aground and was captured by the Arabs. A small commando-like party of U.S. Marines managed to reach the captive ship and burn it down to water line.
Nevertheless, it seemed strange that the navy was prepared to release Thorn. As captain of theTonquin he was the wrong man in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was a dyed-in-the-wool Yankee, and appeared surly, stiff-necked and generally disagreeable. His ship was to be run along navy lines. This did not eactly enthrall the old Norwesters, who had survived many encounters with wild anmimals and wilder Indians. When Thorn ordered lights out at 8:00 p.m., one of the Scots drew his pistol and informed the captain that unless he rescinded his order he would find his brains splattering the deck. On another occasion, after the ship had put in to the Falkland Isles for provisions, Thorn set sail at the agreed-upon hour, leaving behind two of the partners. It wasn't until his brains were again threatened with scrambling that he hove to, and awaited the others as they rowed furiously to catch up with him. When the Tonquin put into Hawaii on its way north, he unmerciflly beat, wth his own hands, one of the ship's crew, for a minor offence, and then hurled him overboard to swim ashore as best he could.
The Scottish brogue, which the partners used, annoyed the Yankee, and even more so when they whispered conspiratorially in Gaelic. The Canadian [p.60] boat-songs and Scottish laments, sang at all hours, did not, as the bard had written, "soothe the savage beast", on the contrary it made him seething mad. In this unhappy setting, the Tonquin made the mouth of the Columbia River on 27 March 1811. A heavy squall blowing in from the west drove high the waves, which, on meeting the waters of the Colombia River at its bar, cased in trn, a montain of foam and a fry of waters. The Tonquin lay back, boat to everyone's dismay and disgust, Thorn ordered the first mate and four of the crew into one of the boats to take suondings. This was the last ever seen of those brave souls. Next day, the squall had not abated, so another of the ship's boats, with four more of the crew, was ordered overboard to take sonding. Again, the boat, after rising and dopping precipitately, soon fell out of view. By sheer luck, the Tonquin was driven into one of the bays beyond the bar and passed a restful night there. Next day, everyone took to the land to search from survivors from theh ship's two boats. Eventually two men were found: naked, and more dead than alive, but seven others were never found and were presumed drown. The two survivors survived.
The two Scots, Alex McKay and Duncan McDougall, who were partners in the fur company then set about the task of locating a suitable site for a trading post. The searched the north shore but nothing took their eye. They then returned, and took tue ship's long boat to scout the sothern shore. Here they found a likely spot situated pon a peninsula, twelve miles upstream from the mouth of the Columbia River. Dring their trip, they had befriended a Chinook chief named Comcomly. On their return trip to the Tonquin this chief accompanied them in his canoe, and when their long boat overturned in the waves he was there to rescure them from a watery death. The ship then moved over to Point George, and the building of Fort Astoria soon got into full swing. After unloading the building materials and frames of smaller boats, the Tonquin set sail to trade for furs to the north, but the gods had boded that evil times awaited the evil-tempered Thorn. The Tonquin made good sailing and soon reached Vancover island, where it anchored before an Indian village. It was not the village of the Mowachaht of Friendly Cove, the interpreter called it Newitty. There is no Nootka tribe of that name, although there is a Kwakiutl Newitty on the north-east coast of Vancover Island, but these two could not be the same. It is likely that the anchorage lay somewhere in Clayoquot Sound near one of the larger Indian settlements, as one of the songs of the Clayoqot or Klah-Oh-Quaht chief, Wikanninish, was involved in the fight that followed. Moreover, the Klah-Oh-quaht disliked the maritime fur traders, and exacted as high a price from the mas possible for their furs, often asking for double the offered price. The name Wikanninish meant the front of foremost paddler in a canoe from whom the others took their timing. It implied leadership.[p.61] The title passed from one chief's to his eldest son, and so a succession of Klah-Oh-Quaht chiefs bore that name.
In any case, once anchored, trading commenced. The Indians were encouraged to come on board with the furs, and they roamed all over the ship. Captain Thorn mingling with them, but carried no arms. That night, one of the partners, McKay was invited ashore and spent a pleasant evening in the chief's house where he slept amid sea otter rugs. Next day trading resmed, but this time it was directed by a sly looking individual, named Nookamis, who appeared contemptuos of the prices offered by the captain and invariably asked for double that amount. As hours passed, the Indians became more insolent in theri dealings and in their bearing. Thorn felt his brittle temper approaching breaking point and wisely ordered the decks to be cleared of all traders. To his chagrin, the sly one refused to bdge. To be defie on one's own deck was more than Thorn could bear. He seized him by the hair, shoved his bundle of furs into his face, and using them as a ramrod pushed him off his ship. In a minute the ship's decks were emptied, and a lucrative trade had been cut short by the captain's caprice. When McKay retrned to theship and heard of Thorn's actions, he counselled him in no uncertain terms to set sail and depart immediately, particlarly as the wind was right. Thorn would hear nothing of this and stayed at anchor. Next morning was bright and snny, and soon the Indians arrived to trade, they brought with them furs of good qality and smiling faces. Soon more canoes arrived with even better furs; trading was brisk and the prices were right. All were admitted aboard. Thorn watched the lrcrative proceedings andd, with a smirk turned to McKay, telling him that all these Indians needed was a show of discipline. No sooner had these words left his lips, than he detected a change in the atmosphere, the ptrned smiling moths of the Indians reversed thesmelves into sullen and surly scowls. At this moment, Thorn decided to pull up anchor and sail. Sailors were ordered aloft, but, it was too late, for from out of the bndles of furs came knives and clubs. Not one of the crew had taken the trouble to arm himself. One of Wickannanish's sons Shewish, made straight for Thorn who drew his clasp knife and killed the Indian. Others came at him but his knife was of no avail against the sharp daggers of his attackers who plunged their knives into him and again into his dying body. McKay was flung overboard and finally killed by the pointed paddles of the canoemen. All the crew on deck were butchered, the scene resembling that of a slaughter-house, as many slipped and fell on the bloooded decks. The for sailors who had been ordered into the riggings slid down the guys, got down below, and battened down the hatches. The Indian interpreter jumped into the sea and offered himself up as a slave to the attackers. The sailors below deck found a cache of loaded muskets, and, firing them in quick sccession, soon cleared the decks of attackers. The sailors then came on deck to view the carnage. They made the decision that the Tonquin cold not be sailed with only four crew [p.62] members. It is likely that this decision was made because the prevailing wind was usually from the west, and it was waestward that they had to go. They therefore decided to take the long boaot, and with some tidal assistance, to row to the open sea. They took water, food, gns and ammunition, and before leaving the ill-fated Tonquin they lit a slow fuse in the gun-powder magazine so that it would explode the neyt day. Whether the sailors reached open sea and were drowned, or more likely, whether they were overtaken by the swift Indian war canoes and shared the fate of their comrades, is not known. One thing is certain, they never ever reached White civilisation. Next day, he Tonquin rode at anchor in the slight swell, all was as qiet as the grave, as well it might be.
The Indian canoes circled the Tonquin, jst as a pack of hungry sharks might circle a disabled whale. Slowly the circle became smaller and smaller until the bravest climbed aboard. They ran around looking for any opposition but found none. Immediately, all the other canoes came alongside and soon the decks were crowded with Indians gathering whst they wished from the ship and its cargo. It was indeed a happy and exuberant crowd that mingled on the decks that morning, decked out in white man's finery. But fate frowned upon frivolity from the first, and and inn a trice the Tonquin erupted as the magazine exploded. The disintegrating vessel threw bodies, whole or in part, high into the air and immediately sank, levaing a mass of decking, spars, bodies and their parts, and other paraphernalia, as token to the loss, not only of life, bt to the aspirations of John J. Astor as the formoest of the fur traders [Hopper cites Bancroft1884 for this jdgement-call].
Neverthelss, when Astor died in 1848, he was repted to be tthe wealthiest man in the nited States.
The only witness to this extraordinary event was the interpreter, now a slave, who watched from shore. He estimated that 200 of the locals died in that explosion. He was later ransomed back to his people, who lived on the banks of the lower Columbia River. It was to the Chinook that he recounted this tsory. this gave the Chinook encouragement, as they wished to rid themselves of the White men at Fort Astoria.
Day by day strange Indians arrived, saying they had come to fish. McDougall one of Astor's partners whose life had been saved the Chief Comcomly, had, by marrying Comcomly's comely daughter, become his son-in-law. The chief arranged a meeting between his son-in-law and the other warring chiefs, and it was there that McDougall played his trump card. "In the Broon Bortel,", he said as he held up an empty, dark-tinted phial for all to see, "is the wee spirit o'small pox. I have only to open its wee gob an oot will it gan to spread among ye and yers". Althogh the chiefs ha difficulty understandng Comcomly's son-in-law's account, they understood his [p.63] meaning, and nothing more was heard of the proposed attack on Fort Astoria.
The land expedition had left St. Louis on the Missouri River in April 1811, when soon they bumped into another grop of trappers, led by Andrew Henry. This party had suffered misfortune at the hands of the Blackfoot. Some of this party offered to show him the sixty-five strong Astoria-bonud party a short-cut, and this offer was accepted. Wilson Hunt the leader of the Astorians dropped off small parties of trappers as he traveled westaared. He hoped they would me able to send to Astoria regular supply ofr frs. Nothing went right. The short-cut proved impossible to navigate by boat, and thus transporting of furs by means of fhe Snake River beame unfeasible. Indians robbed and killed some of them. Men got lost or deserted. The group split up, and by different routes struggled westward towards Astoria. Many of them faced starvation. One group even considered drawing lots to kill one of their number for food. It was in this state that they eventally straggled into the Fort at Astoria, during the month of January 1812, half frozen, starved and sick to the gills from eating dog-meat. The welcome they received was both tumultuous and tearful. Ther minds were soon assuaged with tobacco and rum, and their stomamchs with all sorts of unaccustomed delicacies, and fine food.
The end of the Tonquin saw the end of flagrant piracy, and, until forty years later in 1851 when three deserters from the immgrant transport vessel Norman Morrison were murdered by the Newitty, no acts of piracy were reported.

From British Columia Chronicle

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From British Columia Chronicle: Adventurers by Sea and Land, G.P.V. and Helen B. Akrigg, Discovery Press, Vancouver, 1975, ISBN

Yakima Wars

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This is a complex period of wars during the American takeover of their sector of the Oregon Country post-1846 when the boundary was drawn. Pacification took a while, and events were close-up and interconnected with events in British Columbia, particularly re the Okanagan Trail, the skirmishes along which were seen as part of the war (as the Okanagans were Yakima allies), and the Fraser Canyon War, which nearly became linked to the Yakima War and might have led to overt military action beyond that of the companies which ranged through the Canyon to Lytton. I might yet write an article on the Snyder Treaties, which have been lost and may (I think) have been eradicated because they represented treaties by American citizens with the First Nations, the existence of which could threaten British sovereignty in the territories; my view is that Douglas wisely burned them, knowing what their political consequences might be. Bios of Snyder and Centras and particulars of the various companies I'd like to have time to write up and explore, but it's been done well before in the Akriggs, in Hauka, and also in the Marshall thesis Claiming the Land (UBC, 2000 I think); maybe also in Cole Harris' The Resettlement of British Columbia somewhere, though not in as much detail as with many other acconts. But to British Columbians, the events of the Yakima Wars are largely forgotten, even though they were up close and personal, as said, to British Columbians. In Douglas' own case, the chiefs at war and the peoples being exterminated and herded onto reservations were his former clients and friends; yet he still funded Stevens' campaign because the risk of a native victory in Washington Territory could spill over northwards - and British Columbia, though by treaty British, still remained unchartered as a colonial entity and there was more than one instance of American troops spilling across the border in hot pursuit (or fleeing from it). The Cayuse War predates the Yakima War, and the later Palouse War, properly the Spokane-Coeur d'Alene-Palous War, is seen as the close of the Yakima War, right about the time of the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush and also contemporaneous with the Okanagan Trail and its armed northward-bound parties. The Okanagan Lake Massacre in connection with that should probably have its own article, even though the only source is Reinhart and the various analyses of that, but there's all kinds of stuff that needs articles; the war between the Lake and the Kootenay, all that stuff that's outside white-native warfare. Invisible to BC's historical/public consciousness today, and largely undiscussed in public Washington journalistic history from what I've seen, the period of warfare from 1846 to 1859 was just as bad as anything elsewhere in the US. It continued on with the Bannock War and the Rogue River Wars and the Nez Perce Wars, but Washington Territory was pacified by the time of the bulk of gold colony-era setlement, i.e. in the early '60s; most of the first influx had gone back, either in the fall of '58 or in '59; others left at the onset of the Civil War; the Cariboo Rush was largely British and Canadian as a result, by comparison to the much more international flavour of the non-Chinese element of the Fraser Rush and the overtly American touch to the various Similkameen rushes, Rock Creek and Wild Horse Creek (the Chinese being strong in all rushes, though latecomers for the first rush - the Fraser - as only a few came up from California in '58 as someone pointed out to me earlier). The international element in the Fraser rush includes all the europeans, Hawaiians, French Canadians, Latin Americans, West Indians and African Americans and so many others; it's largely portrayed as an American-British rush but there's a lot more to it, as eventual write-out of its many potential bios will show (including Herman Reinart and many other Germans, among any number of Euro-ethnicties who were present, from Danes to Moravians...). The British aristocrat settler or traveller stories are all interesting, too; not your usual breed of Brit, or at least the place brought out extraordinary deeds and acts of charcter; I just read through a bio on Morris Moss by Paterson and it's remarkable. In the case of the Yakima Wars, the main players (other than Stevens and, on our side, Douglas and Nicola) were Chief Kamiakin of the Yakima and Col. (?) Steptoe of the US Army (cavalry?). The point of these excerpts is that the British Columbian accounts give a different perspective and a somewhat different account than already on the Wikipedia articles; the first excerpt is from Hauka, the second longer one from the Akriggs. The Akriggs is a must-have for anyone doing early Pacific Northwest history and I highly recommend it to students and writers of Oregon and Washington history. These were provided to fulfill an offer, sicne accepted, I made on Talk:Yakima War. The passages in the Akriggs concerning the politics of the boundary I would also like to copy for the benefit of long-recused discussions at Talk:Oregon boundary dispute which had gotten too testy (including from my side) and which required heavy research/writing I didn't have time for; the Akriggs should be read for these chapters by anyone looking for the British Columbian POV on the Oregon settlement, which it must be understood is not the same as the Canadian POV or British POV; it's very pointed; as also with the comments here about the Yakima Wars.....Skookum1 06:43, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

From Donald J. Hauka's McGowan's War

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p.79

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"Douglas had foreseen the hostilities that followed [the Fraser Canyon War] and had warned the colonial office of the likelihood of armed clashes between minrs and First Nations months beore. His appeal for troops had been ignored. He was left with the two weapons he'd used succesfully to this point - bluff and diplomacy - but even the capable Dougls was aware of just how delicate the balanace was on the gold fields. In June [1858] he had written to Lord Stanley about the situation, stating,: "It will require, I fear, the nicest tact to avoid a disastrous Indian war."

"Douglas had only to look south of that theoretical border to find an example of a "disastrous Indian war" being waged. The Yakima Indian War had erupted in 1854 in the eastern Washington and Oregon Territories. The Yakima Indians had forged an alliance of First Nations to stop white settlers from taking their lands. Because the concept of a border between the United States and British Territory was meaningless to the aboriginal people of the Northwest, the alliance included some First Nations, like the Okanagan, whose territory was on the other side of the invisible 49th Parallel.

"The hostilities south of the line had placed Douglas in a sensitive position. He didn't want to be seen helping the U.S. authorities, fearing that would incite the first Nations in British territory. But it certainly wasn't in the tinreests of the tiny colony of Vancouver Island (with its white population vastly ounumbered by Natives on the Island, let alone the mainland) to see white settlers drive out of Washington. In the end, Douglas opted to remain officially neutral, but quietly sent...

p.80

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"...arms, ammunition and money to Governor Isaac Stevens of Washington Territory to help him fight the Yakima.

Despite help from Douglas, the war was going badly for the U.S. Army. On may 17, 1858, the army had suffered a hmuiliating defate at the Battle of To-hots-nim-me, near modern-day Rosalia, south of Spokane. A force of about six hundred Yakima and allied mounted troops had attacked a cavalry column led by Colonel Edward Jenner Steptoe. The 130-strong American forced was soon trapped on a hilltop with its ammunition running dangerously low. The Yakima leader, Kamiakin, was not interested in giving qarter. Steptoe held out until nightfall, then fled with his surviving troopers back to Fort Walla, Walla, having lost twenty-five men.

"In the midst of these hostilies, parties of American miners still tried to make their way to the gold fields [on the Fraser] via the old HBC brigade trail along the Columbia River and up into the Okanagan. Groups as large as three hundred men passed through the war zone by foce of arms, and there were casualties on both sides as the Yakima and the Okanagan tried to stop the miners' progress. The struggle of one such group was recorded by Herman Reinhart, a gold seeker from California.

The succeeding passage concerns details of the Okanagan Lake Massacre which I may add here at a later time. Following the quotations from Reinhart's journal Hauka continues:

"Nicola was also being urged to wage war against the whites by the other Interior First Nations to whic h he was bound by blood and tradition. He had over fifteen wives from nations like the Colville, Spokane, Secwepemc (shuswap) and Nlaaka'pamux. the latter two were biegging Nicola to help them in the canyon War. In early July 1858, Nicola was stil sticking to his old policy of peace, but it was not clear he could hold out against the wishes of his people.

"Douglas, the man to whom Nicola looked to avenge the killings [described in Reinhart], didn't want incidents like the Oakangana Lake massacre or a flood of American miners taking Reinhart's route to spread the Yakima War north along the curving arch of B.C.'s major rivers and into British Columbia. Nor did he want the fighting in the canyon to be the first shot in a larger conflict. if it came to general war with the Frist Nations of the Northwest coast, he could enforced the law and prevent bloodhsed using the scant naval force at his displosal. But he was totally powerless to do anything inland ,and as the fighting erupted in the canyon, Douglas was forced to sit in his office in the fort at Victoria, trying to make sense out of the reports sent to him by his officials, especially those working for the HBC, and reading sensational accounts of the conflict in the newly established newspapers.

Note re the Akriggs

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I just looked at their index, and true to form given their attitudes ;-| neither the Yakima War nor Governor Stevens are ref'd in the index, but I know there are relevant passages. It'll take some in-depth reading to find it again so it's unlikely I'll find it in time to get it transcribed before I'm de-wiki'd within a couple of weeks. As noted in the preamble to this section, the Akriggs cover events south of the line in fair detail, especially in the 1787-1846 volume though also in 1847-1871 to some degree, so it's recommended read for others working in Pacific Northwest history, and may prove illuminating for American readers, as with other British Columbian histories and sources (e.g. see JB Kerr's online 1890 book ref'd on Francis Jones Barnard and once opened, go to its introductory section, a historical preface.Skookum1 19:04, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

From Indian Wars in the Pacific Northwest by John Hopper

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The following is preceded by accounts of the Cayuse and Rogue River Wars. In addition to details of the battles and side-scenarios of the Yakima Wars (no mention of the Battle of Seattle though), including the McLoughlin party on the Okanagan Trail, distinct from the Reinhart account in the passage from Hauka just above, there are character sketches of the players, notably David McLoughlin and some dirt on Isaac Stevens which I'll be interested to see how it's put on the governor's page...also interesting is the account of tactics and armaments. Anyway this content is relative to more articles than the discussion at Talk:Yakima War so I'll shop it around; if I get a chance the preceding Cayuse War account is similarly detailed. Hopper also contains accounts of the lost US cavalry unit in the similkameen, and his theory concerning the "Spanish" party that attempted to settle at Kelowna but was forced to withdraw, winding up slaughtered around Keremeos (as were the US cavalry much later).

p.82

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"In 1853, several hundred surveyors and work cres were roaming about the Cascades adn the Oregon terrtitory collecting geological, topographical, meteorological and ethnic information, for adecision had been made to punch te hrailroad through to the Pacifi coast. The proposed line went straight through aboriginal hunting grounds, and the Indian people knew that this would deplete their food supply, for they knew what had happened to the buffalo on the Great Plains.

In spite of all this, the treaty-making process continued at a spanking pace. From 1953 to 1856 over fifty treateis involving a score of more Indian tribes were agreed upon. Never had so much land been acquired by the government in so short a time. In return for the land, and for submission to federal rathe than tribal authority, the Indians received ar eservation and an annuity in either goods, money , or both.

"The Snakes remained untreated and, in 1854 massacred settlers travelling in wagon trains along the Oregon Trail. They tortured the men, mutilated the women, and roasted their children before their very eyes.

"Few if any of the Indian people were satisfied with the treaties. Treaties were often crudely and even callously put together. For esample, the WAsco, fishers of the Columbia River, were placed on a reservation with the Warm spring Idnians, miles from their river. Joining them on thes ame reservation were the apai-ute, sworn enemies of both the Wasco and the Warm spring,. In another esample of sloppy treaty-making, the Bannock were placed on Camas Prairie. This was written, in the treaty as Kansasa Prairie, and as there was no such a place, further disturbance followed. Groups of Indians led by the Yakima abrogated their treaties, as settlers continued to squat on reservation land. Qui-tal-i-can, a Yakima, at the distrubiont of the annuities, said, "I am ashamed to be here, I am a poor man, but my land is not be be sol for a few yars of calico and some blankets."

"In 1856, the Yakima and their allies made a concerted attack on teh settlers in the Cascade country, downriver from the Dalles. They also attacked the Columbia River steamer the Mary ann. As luck would have it, it got away and drifted downstream towards the upper rapids, the crew preferring drowning to death by torture. It got stuck on a mud bank just above the rapids, and theis allowed the crew to get up steam and head for the Dalles to report the attack. Meanwhile, settlers in the outlying areas were murdered, those who escap4ed set up barricaccsdes by the river. They were joined by two sections of a platoon of soldiers under Lieutenat Phil Sheridan from nearby Fort Cascade, whoe helpd them "Hold the Fort". colonel Edward Steptoe,...

p.83

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"...commander of the troops at Fort Dalles, left immeediatelyi to lift the siege. With him were three companies of the 9th U.S. Infantry, a batter of the 3rd U.S. Artillery, and skirmishers of the 1st U.S. Dragoons, nicknamed the Shanghai's [sic] and armed with the formidable minie rifle. This rifle was of French design and was used by both teh British andd the french in the Crimean War. It advantage was in having a covered loca which reduced the chance of eye injury Steptoe's troops packed themeleves into the old scow and back downstream chugged the Mary Ann. When they reached those hbeing besieged ,teh artillery opened up with their howitzers and raked the tree-liend river banks. The dragoons leaped out, followed by the infantry, who jumped down freom the upper deck of the boat. Soon they heard the shouts of their beisieged comarades and knew them to be still alive. The siege was soon lifted and the Yakima retirede. A smalll party of warrios wars captured on an island just below the middle rapids. At a drum head trial all were found guilty and were hanged. The warrios met their fate stoically. One of them so enranged his executioners by his truculence, that they filled his body full of lead. In all, twenty-three settlers were found dead. One woman was found floating naked in the river; she had been shot throug the chest,and her hair had been shorn.

"for the next two years, hatred bewteen the two peoples simmered. it began to boil in 1858, when gold miners passed through Indian land on their way to the newly discovered gold fields on the Fraser River in British Columbia. This envasion which entailed the descecration of their lands and rivers, forced the Yakima back on the offensive. Settlers' horses and livestock were taken, forcing some into severe financial difficutlies; mails were dealayed or stopped; travel was made very risky ,miners were bushwhacked, and small parties were slaughtered. Families of miners staying at Grand round Valley near Walla Walla were massacacred and their children staked and roasted. Eight hundred miners congregated at Walla Walla and decdied that, unelss something was done, they would take matters into their own hands.

Colonel Steptoe, now commandant at Forst Walla Walla, was again asked to restore law and order by whatever action he considered necesssary. This time he had new recruits under him rather than seasoned troops, but the fresh recuirts were eager to fight. He set out with 2 platoons of infantry and 3 platoons of dragoons, 150 men in all, together with 3 mules loaded with enough ammunition for 430 ronds per man.

The dragoons had been trained in skirmishing and sharp-shooting, an art well known to the Indians from time immemorial. The French ahd reinvented the role of the sharpshooter during the Napoleonic wars, and this was coped by the British Green Jackets of the Rifel Brigarde. The dragoon skirmishers were issued with Sharp's carbines. These carbines were breach-...

p.84

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"...-loaders, they had a magazine, and a strong but simple firing mechanism, and were a gun favoured by buffalo hunters. The dragoons had no use for their sabres and so left them behind. thery also had a couple of howitzers with them in case the going got tough. This little force set out with enthusiasm to 'show the flag' and possibly to fight a minor engagement. "None of the officers knew the coutnry, so they employed Indian guides, who would disappear only to be replaced by seemingly les compentent ones. With them they also had several Indian allies from the Nez Perce. After wandering through t country bweetween the Palouse River and Pine Cree,, the "Little army,", as it became knokwn, was confronted by up to 1000 war-painted warriors, who in typical Platea Indian pattern, laid an ambush in a shallow ravine. Steptoe led his men to a higher ground to avoid this ambush, and it was here that the Indians struck. The painted warriors rode their nimble dpainted ponies up one side of the column's flanks and down the other. Pack animls were shot and some stampeded, all of which slowed the march of the troops. The new soliders kept up a constant fire, giving no thoughts of thier limited supply of ammunition. Indian horsemanship was superb, rarely did they lend themselves as a target as they lay low over rtheir steeds or hung aro nd their necesk, showing only an arm or a leg to aim t.

"The mounted dragoons without their sabres, but with six-shooter Colt revolvers, drove time and again into the Indian horsemen and scattered them. This, and this alone, saved Steptoe's column. The foot soliders, with their out-moded muskatoons and their old-fashioned Mississippi Jaeger rifles accounted for few if any of the attackers. The Indians knew that if they closely watched the smoke from the muzzlers of these guns, they would have time to jump one way or the other before the ball reached them, being nimble this caused no difficulty. the soldiers at last reached some high ground which sloped down to Pine creek, and it was here that they made a stand. The two howitzers were unlimbered, but in the young soldiers' hands proved ineffective, much to the amusement of the attackers.

"By sundown, the Indians called off the attack. Steptoe knew that by morning a new assault would carry his defensive position. He contemplated his own death on this knoll. Everyone's thoughts were of the tortures they could expect if they lived thrtough the assault.

"It takes an Indian to know an Indian and to know what he is thinking. It was Chief Tammutsa (Timothy) a lesser chief of the Nez Perce, who accm[pannied Steptoe and who saved him and most of his men. Timothy reckoned that some of the attacking tribes would retire, and this is eactly what the Spoaken did, to obtain fresh war ponies from the rear. The Nez Perce led the column through this gap during the night, with the horses' hooves muffled in cloth, and the wounded strapped to their horses. All the equipment was left behind. The gamble worked, and most of the soldiers galloped hell-for-leather to the Snake River crossing. A small contingent lost their way and was captured next day. It was through the good offices of a Jesuit priest who was well respected by the Palouse and the Coeur d'Alene that these captives released. The Nez Perce helped the Little Army to cross the Snake River, for without them it woud have been most difficult. The wearied, wiser and bloodied little colun eventually got back to Fort Walla Walla wiith twenty dead and doubel that number wounded. This adventure of Stteptoe's proved to the the lubkcest escape in teh annals of Indian warfare. Nevrtheless, the expedition was looked upon as a complete disaster, a dark day for the U.S. cafalry, adnt he end of stteptoe's military career.

"The miners gathered at Walla Walla had heard of Steptoe's set back, but did not let it deter them. forward they went, northwards to Canada and the Fraser River. The 800 mniners with their two thousand pack animals soon met Steptoe felling in front of the Indians. The two groups passed on anothe , exchanging commiserations on the one side, and best wishes on the otehr. the miners were led by David McLoughlin a great bulk of a man with Indian blood in him. Not for him were Steptoe's tactics, which consisted of lining up his men like tin soldiers for anyone to take a pot-shot at. He advanced in an A-shaped formation, with the pack animals in the centre, for the Indian were adept at stampeding them with their whoops. Scouting parties were put out, and all ravines and gullies in the line of march were scouted for possible ambush. The miners knoew how to skirmish and used every bit of cover to their adantagee. Moreover their Kentucky rifles were superior to the Hudson's Bay guns of their adversaries. The Hudson's Bay company's guns were flintlocks and were made from parts which had been rejected for use in military weapons. However, by 1820 the flintlock had been replaced by a percussion lock, which was an improvement. The Kentucky rifle was developed by Swiss and German settlers. It had an octagonal shaped barrel about four feet in length, and its stock was concave and made of carved maple wood.

"Progress northwards was smooth and uneventful, so much so, that a number of French, veterans of the Crimean War, thought that they could do better on their own and left the main party. They quickly returned after losing two men, all their pack animals, and all theiir saddle horses to the Indians. Almost within sight of the Canadian border, the Indians struck. At Okanagan Bluffs, north of the present-day town of Omak, they set up an ambush, intending to hurl rocks down upon the miners and then open fire. The miners were well aware of this and steered clear of the bluffs. Of the thousand or so attackers, half were South Okanagon led by Chief Tonasket. From their respective cover, both sides skirmished and sniped at one another. To break the impasse, McLoughlin sent sourdoughs to outlflank the Indian positions. This move threatened the Indian ponies tethered at the rear, and so forced the Indians to retire. Next day, a parley was arranged and Tonasket agreed to return some of the pack animals taken, and to leave the miners unmolested to carry out their work. Tonasket has been described, by one of his contemporaries, as a grand looking feloow, big, strong, and well turned out. He and his tribe were said to be the best warrios in the two teritories. However not everyone was of this opinion. Soon after the agreement was reached, fourteen miners left the main body to do some prospecting on their own. When they did not return, a second party went to seek them. The fourteen were found in a defensive circle, all dead. After that, and Indian was shot at on sight. A party of Osoyoos Indians waving a truce flag was gunned down. Later, McLoughlin met with some Indian chiefs, for the party was now in Canada. A solid peace was agreed to, and the miners were allowed to proceed north and west to the Fraser River. This large group of mimers did not wish to mine the lower Fraser River as most of the claims had alerady been staked. They there fore headed for the middle reaches of that river, between Lytton in the south to Watson's Bar and French Bar in the north. It was said that little or no gold was ever found here.

David McLoughlin was a powerfully built man, six feet and four inches tall. He was the third son of the Hudson's Bay Company chief factor, Dr. John McLohglin and his Indian wife. After atempts to make a fortune gold mining had failed, he returned to the employ of the Hudson's Bay Company. In time, he became a trader at one of the posts in the north country. Drink got the better of him, and in an altercation with an employee, he was murdered.

In the ten yeaars since the inauguration of the Oregon Territory, 700 Whites had been killed and 140 wounded by Indians. Mostly they were settlers. Few were soldiers. This raised the ire of the Oregonians. They said that the Hudson's Bay Cmopany sold the Indians guns to keep the miners out and so protect their trapping rights. However, by 1856, the demand for beaver fur was so small that the fur-trading arm of the company was in decline.

"The church was accused of harbouring powder and shot to give to the Indians. The Oregon legislature had banned such sales to Interior Indians, but bo th the Hduson's Bay Company and the clerics appealed this. How could an Indian hunt for food for his family or protect them against the Blackfoot wihtout it? In anticipating a repeal of this law, Father Joset, a Jesuit priest ordered a large supply of ammunition. It was alleged that this was to be given to Indian converts to enable them to hunt for food, while others thought that it would be used to kill Whites. As a result, instead of the ...

p.87

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... arms law being repealed, another was tabled to expel all Roman Catholic Priests from the Territory. Two years later half a keg of gunpowder was found buried in the grounds of the Oblate's Yakima mission. On its discovery the soldiers burned the mission buildings to the ground. Again, bills were introduced to ban all ailen missionaries, but they were again defaeated, spiritual power triumphing over temporal. Oregon's governor, Isaac Ingals Stevens, in a fit of frustration, had all the Canadian "squawmen" living down at the coast arrested. He considered that they did not show sufficient anti-Indian fervour, and that they mnay have even sided with them morally. As he tried to get around the Habeas Corpus act illegally, a federal judge had Stevens arested. In turn, as the territory was under martial lwa, Stevens had the judge arrested and thrown in jail. Even the president of the United states became involved in this little imbrogilio which ended by the judge being transfererd to another area. Stevens was later to meet his death during the Civil War at the battle of Chantilly.

"Meanwhile the Steptoe retreat was a signal for an uprising of most of the northern tribes. The Spokane, Coeur D'Alene, Kalipsell, Palouse, Pend d'Oreille, Kettle and South Okanagon formed pacts to rid their land of Whites. They were joined on the canadian side by the Similkameen. The northern Okanagan salso cgave their moral support. The Amerians could not tolerate such an uprising.

Colonel Steptoe, a southern gentleman with a big black bushy moustache, was replaced by Colonel Wright, who was more like a northern savage. Wright headed northward from Fort Walla Walla with 4 companies of the 12st U.S. Dragoons, 5 batteries of the 3rd U.S. Artillery, and 2 companies of the 9th U.S. Infantry. Wright meant to crush the Indians once and for all. He had some of his sharpshooters issued with minine bullets that, to all intents and purposes, were dum-dums.l These were a type of bullet used by the Dum-Dum tribesmen against the british in the Kybher Pass [sic] on the northwest frontier of bvritish India. The sharp point of the bullet was sawn off, so that when it hit a man it exapnded leaving a great gaping exit wound. He issued strict orders that no prisoner be taken and, after the campaign, he hanged many an Indian warrior in the curlest possible way.

"Indians brned the dry prairie grass so the march northwards was through ash, with no fodder for the horses, and very little water. Fleeting raids by Indian horsemen and long range sniping were continuous. There weer 550 men in Wright's force and about an equal number in the Native force, which increased or decreased dependinn on the fortunes of the day. On 1st September 1858, the two sides met. The infantry steadfastly advanced...

p.88

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...against the main force of Indians and dislodged them from some wooded high grond onto the plain. The dragoons then rodde through tin fantyr lines at a sttro, fand forming line, gathreed speed. the Bugle calls sounded claerly throug htecrisp autmun air and the line moved into a thunderous gallop. All that could be seen though their dust was the glinting of their sabres swinging up and down. the Enemey faded waway, as the morning mist does with temrising of the sun. The tired soldeirs returned to their encampment, in high spirits over their victory. They lost no-one, the Indians lost a dozen or so. Net day the colun rested. Three days later they again clahsed with the Indians who had positioned themselves on higehr ground among scttered pien tree.s tTeh approaches, being over rough broken groudn,mad ethe operation and ddeployment of cavalary difficult. TO make things worse, the prairie grass had not been set ablaze, and with the hlpe of a strong wind, the flames leaped high and the smoke formed clouds as it moved toward sthe soldiers. through gaps in the smoke, Indian warrosiors could be seen riding thrieri horses at break-neck speed down steep slopes. colonell wright ordered the infantry to advance t hrough this smoek screen ad, with their long range rifles, to clear the Indians from the hilltops. The howitzers wer then used to clear the wouooded copses. The infantry charged, chasing the enemy from cover to cover only to have them regorup and resume skirmishing. by sundown, the troops had reached the spokane river and were able to slake their considerable thirst. The Indians just faded awway. victory lay with tsoldiers. It is almost unbelievable that there wer so few causlaties on either side. two days later, the advance continued with light skirmishign. any Indian caught was strung up to a tree and the emnpty keg upon which hewas stood was kicked away. thres ulting short drop did not cause the spinal cord to break and thus case instant death, but led to death by strangulation where the vitim writhed and controted until death eventually came. Much booty was taken by the ttroops in order to starve the Indians. Large number of cattle and grain helped feed the roops., and abot a thorusand apones were collected and slaughteedd to impede Indian mobil8ty. the Indians altopugh still at full strnengthy knew that hey could no t win, so they made peace overtures, werhich were acceptable to the soldiers.

[book continues on about Modoc and Nez Perce Wars]

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