Beyond the Old Frontier: Adventures of Indian-Fighters, Hunters, and Fur-Traders

by George Bird Grinnell

A few days after this the long boat was swamped off Chinook Point, and ten persons were saved by these Chinooks.

The fur traders and their property being at last ashore, they began to look about for a place where their fort should be built. The site selected was a knoll about twelve miles from the mouth of the inlet, and between Point George on the west and Tonquin Point on the east. They went about their work with dogged energy, but not cheerfully. They were glad to be on shore and free from the tyranny of Captain Thorn, but saddened by the misfortunes they had met with—the loss of the men in landing.

Duncan McDougall, an old Northwester, was in command. He was a man of great experience, but Ross calls him a man of only ordinary capacity and unfit to command men. He became famous some years later by having the credit of conniving with the Northwest Company to swindle Mr. Astor out of most of his property at Astoria.

The little company that settled down in a new country amid wholly unaccustomed surroundings had before it a difficult—almost an impossible—task.

“The place thus selected for the emporium of the west, might challenge the whole continent to produce a spot of equal extent presenting more difficulties to the settler: studded with gigantic trees of almost incredible size, many of them measuring fifty feet in girth, and so close together, and intermingled with huge rocks, as to make it a work of no ordinary labour to level and clear the ground. With this task before us, every man, from the highest to the lowest, was armed with an axe in one hand and a gun in the other; the former for attacking the woods, the latter for defence against the savage hordes which were constantly prowling about. In the garb of labourers, and in the sweat of our brow, we now commenced earning our bread. In this manner we all kept toiling and tearing away, from sunrise till sunset—from Monday till Saturday; and during the nights we kept watch without intermission....

“Many of the party had never handled an axe before, and but few of them knew how to use a gun, but necessity, the mother of invention, soon taught us both. After placing our guns in some secure place at hand, and viewing the height and the breadth of the tree to be cut down, the party, with some labour, would erect a scaffold round it; this done, four men—for that was the number appointed to each of those huge trees—would then mount the scaffold, and commence cutting, at the height of eight or ten feet from the ground, the handles of our axes varying, according to circumstances, from two and a half to five feet in length. At every other stroke, a look was cast round, to see that all was safe; but the least rustling among the bushes caused a general stop; more or less time was thus lost in anxious suspense. After listening and looking round, the party resumed their labour, cutting and looking about alternately. In this manner the day would be spent, and often to little purpose: as night often set in before the tree begun with in the morning was half cut down. Indeed, it sometimes required two days, or more, to fell one tree; but when nearly cut through, it would be viewed fifty different times, and from as many different positions, to ascertain where it was likely to fall, and to warn parties of the danger.”

The labor that they had undertaken was hard and unceasing, the climate one of constant rains and fogs, the food was merely fish and wild roots; the Indians were so troublesome that in two months three of their men had been killed by them, others wounded by the fall of trees, and one had his hand blown off by gunpowder. All this produced discontent—four men deserted and were captured by the Indians, and a little later six more deserted, but were brought back by a friendly Indian.

Food and shelter were scanty and poor in quality. Heretofore all remonstrances to the man in command had received no attention, but at last even he realized the situation and distributed tents among the sick, and made some effort to improve the food.

As time passed and the white men began to learn something of the Chinook nature, it was discovered that these people, their immediate neighbors, had been telling the more distant Indians that the white men were enemies, just as they had been telling the white people that these distant tribes were enemies. The result of this was that the Chinooks were purchasing furs from the distant tribes and selling them to the traders at a handsome profit. As soon as this discovery was made, parties were sent out to learn something of these more distant tribes, to gain their confidence and to discover what they could about the country farther off. These parties, though often in danger, finally succeeded in establishing friendly relations with those other tribes, but for a long time the impression given by the Chinooks did not wear off.