Fremont espoused not only the cause of Oregon, but also Senator Benton's young daughter Jessie, who later rendered great personal services to her husband's expedition in the Northwest.
Kit Carson was the guide of this famous expedition. The South Pass was explored, and the flag planted on what is now known as Fremont's Peak, and the country was found to be not the Great American Desert of the maps, but a land of wonderful beauty and fertility. In 1843 Fremont made a second expedition; this time from the South Pass to the Columbia country. After he was well on his way, the War Department recalled him; but Mrs. Fremont suppressed the order, in the interest of the expedition, until it was too late to reach him.
Fremont went by the way of Salt Lake, struck the Oregon trail, and finally came to the mission that Dr. Whitman had founded among the Nez-Percés (pierced noses) at Walla Walla. This mission then consisted of a single adobe house.
The British claimants of the territory, finding that American immigration was increasing, began to bring settlers from the Red River of the North. A struggle now began to determine which country should possess this vast and most important territory. When Dr. Whitman learned of the new efforts of the English to settle the country, and the danger of losing Oregon by treaties pending at Washington, he started for St. Louis, by the way of Santa Fé. This ride, often called "Whitman's Ride for Oregon," is one of the poetical events of American history. He went to Washington, was treated cavalierly by the State Department, but secured a delay of the treaties, which proved the means of saving Oregon and Washington to the United States.
So his missionary efforts gave to our country an empire that seems destined to become ultimate America, and a power in the Asian world.
III.
GOVERNOR STEVENS.
In the long line of brave American soldiers, General Isaac Ingalls Stevens deserves a noble rank in the march of history. He was born at Andover, Mass., and was educated at West Point, where he was graduated from the Military Academy in 1839 with the highest honors. He was on the military staff of General Scott in Mexico, and held other honorable positions in the Government service in his early life.
But the great period of his life was his survey of the Northern route to the Pacific, since largely followed by the Northern Pacific Railroad, and his development of Washington Territory as a pioneer Governor. He saw the road to China by the way of the Puget Sea, and realized that Washington stood for the East of the Eastern Continent and the Western. He seems to have felt that here the flag would achieve her greatest destiny, and he entered upon his work like a knight who faced the future and not the past. His survey of the Northern Pacific route led the march of steam to the Puget Sea, and the great steamers have carried it forward to Japan, China, and India.