A Survivor's Recollections of the Whitman Massacre

by Matilda Sager

Mr. Grieger[**Geiger?] and Mr. Trask were acquainted. We spent a night and a couple of days there; then went on down and camped on Tillamook Bay and hired a boat to go down the bay to the mouth of the river and I had my first glimpse of the Pacific ocean. That was the first time I ever saw any clams. The gnats were terrible. We spent a few days near the shore and then came back to Yamhill and Mrs. Gieger's father's home. We staid there a few days and then returned to our own home. In the meantime Mr. Everett Gieger had fallen in love with Narcissa Cornwall, Mrs. Gieger's sister. I was promised to marry Mr. Hazlett. The two men went away in October, back to the mines. In February they were to return and we were to be married and go back to Illinois to live. But meantime they changed their minds and concluded they would go into the stock business in the Little Shasta valley. They took up a farm there and didn't come down until May. They bought a lot of stock to drive down, two yokes of oxen and a wagon; the oxen had worked or been driven across the plains.

Even in these early times, the subject of clothes claimed some attention of the feminine mind. When I was about thirteen years old I was very anxious to have a white dress. I had never had one. Mrs. Smith had kept Joe Gale's four children during the winter, while the parents went to California to the mines. He had sent up some white goods, scarfs, shawls and so on, but I wanted a white dress. Mrs. Smith told me if I would come down and do four washings she would let me have everything to make me a dress, so I went to the river to wash and I got the goods for my dress and when I went to board with Mrs. Eells, she made the dress with flowing sleeves and three tucks in the skirt. She made undersleeves, too. The first pair of gloves I ever had I bought from a peddler, paying twenty-five cents for them. I earned most of the money that bought my wedding outfit. The wedding dress was a white one and I trimmed my own wedding bonnet. Mr. Gieger bought my shoes, which were poor leather slippers, with no heels, such as the men wore. I was very much disappointed in my shoes, for they were just like old bedroom slippers. I had my hair braided and wore a big horse-shoe comb. I had white ribbon around my wrists like a cuff. Abigail Walker, my girl chum, came over and helped me dress. The wedding day was the fifth of June and the Rev. Walker performed the ceremony. His family, Mrs. Eells and family and other friends were there. Mr. Walker was a very nervous man and when he preached he would shake like a person with a mild nervous chill. Mrs. Eells said that she could hardly keep from laughing during the ceremony, Mr. Walker's clothing shook so. I had the usual congratulations from the guests and the single men's congratulations was the privilege of kissing the bride. We had the wedding feast. Mrs. Walker came over to make the cake. She was the best cake maker in the neighborhood. She couldn't manage the cake on our stove as well as on her own, so she carried the batter in a bucket, four miles on horseback, baked it in her own stove, and brought back a fine wedding cake with green cedar laid on the plate and the cake set on that. The trimmings were cedar boughs, wild roses and honeysuckle.

The next day my husband had to go to Portland on business and we went as far as Hillsboro, where I visited Mrs. Eells until he returned. Then we began to get ready to go to my future home in Shasta valley, traveling with the stock and ox team. Part of the time I rode horseback and part of the time I helped drive the cattle. We went on until we got into the Umpqua valley and it was very warm and the grasshoppers were eating up the whole country; they had eaten all the foliage on the trees. We came to the Cow Creek canyon, but the military road had not been built and we had to travel the old road in the bed of the creek for miles. It was very rough and rugged and the hills were steep. We had traveled one day to put up camp. Next day we started, but in going up a steep hill one of the oxen stopped and trembled and we thought he had got poisoned. We cut up some sliced bacon and he didn't object to eating it and licked his tongue out for more. We gave him some more bacon and still he wouldn't go. Finally we hired another team which got us through the canyon, but we concluded it was only a trick of the old ox, as he had been raised on bacon and that was all he wanted. We came to the Grave Creek hills which were very steep. We camped just as we got to the summit of them and after a rest traveled on; in just two weeks from that time two men were killed in that place by the Indians. We just missed being killed. We traveled on in the Rogue River valley which was not very much settled, save in the lower part. It showed evidence of the conflict between the white men and the Indians by the lonely graves that were scattered along the roadside. We came onto Wagner Creek where Mrs. Harris and other settlers were killed by the Indians in '55. They were harvesting some fine fields of grain as we came through the valley. The towns were all small—they could hardly be seen. There was Waitsburg, where Mr. Wait had a flouring mill, and a large log house; and at the time of the Indian trouble, the people flocked there for safety. In going through the Rogue River valley the Indians came to our wagon and were very inquisitive and even got into the wagon and frightened me; and when the men had to be away I would become very much frightened. One evening when in camp on the bank of the Rogue River, we saw across the stream some soldiers who had some Indians with them. The Indians finally took up their belongings and started across the mountains. The soldiers crossed the river and the buglar rode down to our camp and told us it would be better for us to go up to a nearby farm house; that while he did not apprehend any trouble, we would be safer there. We went up there and found seven men, including a fifteen year old boy. They had a log cabin and very kindly made all the preparation that they could for our safety. The boy was very anxious to kill an Indian, so he put seven bullets down in his muzzle-loader gun and said: "One of those bullets would surely hit an Indian."

So we traveled on to the head of the valley and across the Siskiyou Mountains into California and we camped over night on the summit of the mountains. Three weeks afterward, three teamsters camped there and were killed by the Indians. We came on down into a rough looking country—a little mining camp we called Cottonwood, where my husband had been mining. We staid there a week, then took our way on south to Willow Creek in Shasta valley, where my husband had a home for us to live in and where he was to follow the stock business. We were there about two months and a half, when the Klamath Lake Indians began to make trouble. We lived close to their trail and we were afraid of being killed and so we put up our belonging and went back to the little mining camp. I never saw the home again. We lived in this Cottonwood district near the Oregon line and raised stock, and my husband put out fruit trees and started raising a garden. In the year '60 he had to be operated on for cancer. We had to go across the Trinity and Scott mountains to Red Bluff, where we took the boat down the Sacramento river. Friends thought he would not live to make the trip. The doctors said his disease was incurable and that he would not live more than three years at best. They operated on him. I had left our ten-months old baby at home. In the June before we went down to San Francisco, our house and belongings were destroyed by fire and we went into a bachelor's house and lived there.

Many amusing incidents occurred during the long winter months in the mining districts of northern California, when the placer miners, waiting for the water to open up, found time hanging heavy on their hands. Isolated as we were, we welcomed anything that would break the monotony of life. One locality in which we lived had always given a Democratic majority and the Republican brethren of course did not take kindly to this. One year they determined to beat the Democrats in the coming election and set about it with considerable vim. As there were several men in town who did not care particularly which ticket they voted, they worked on them. I took in the situation and as all my men folks were Democrats, I decided to have a little fun and help our party at the same time. I, too, worked on those who could be influenced to vote either way. One of these persons was named Davey Crockett and he claimed to be a nephew of the famous Davey Crockett of "Alamo" fame. This Crockett was known as "Dirty Crockett," because it well described his personal appearance. He lived in a "tepee" out in the hills and hunted deer. He always wore a red cap that had the corners tied up to look like horns. He said he could always get the deer, because they would stop to look at his cap long enough for him to get a bead on them. Another of his accomplishments was his ability to catch live skunks. He offered to rid the neighborhood of them if he were paid fifty cents for each one he brought in alive. He was given the job and soon came carrying a live skunk by the tail. He said he caught them by the tail and held them so tight they could not scent him. He collected his fifty cents from two or three persons. He repeated this several times; in fact, so frequent became his appearance with a live skunk that some of the business men became suspicious and upon investigation it was found that he had caught just one skunk and whenever he wanted money he would reappear with the same skunk and collect the bounty. A Welchman, who was a staunch Republican, offered Crockett a fine rooster if he would agree to vote that ticket. To this he readily agreed. When I learned this, I went to him and offered him two dried mink skins that I had, if he would agree to vote the Democratic ticket. These looked better than the rooster, so he transferred his allegiance to the Democratic party. Four or five "floaters" seen with equally good results kept the balance of power on the Democratic side on election day.

The Welchman who had labored so hard to make a Republican of Crockett, gave me a write-up in the paper after election, telling how the Democrats won the day by the aid of skunk-catchers and wood-choppers, but little did I care. We won the day by using his tactics and I had considerable fun with my experience in early day politics.

The winter of '60-61 being very cold, many cattle died and this same Crockett made considerable money skinning the dead animals and selling their hides. One cold and stormy evening, quite a distance from his home, he skinned a large steer that had just died and was still warm. As he could not reach home that night, he rolled himself up in the warm hide. During the night it froze so hard that it was with considerable difficulty that he was able to cut himself out in the morning.

An Irishman named Pat O'Halloran was a prospector and miner, and like most of the early day miners, was fond of a drink now and then. He would frequently sit around the saloons watching the card games until a very late hour, or rather, early morning hour. One dark night he started for home, loaded a little beyond his capacity. Not being able to keep the road, he fell into a prospect hole. The hole was about forty feet deep and Pat went to the bottom. The next morning the ditch-tender going his rounds, heard someone calling and finally located old Pat in the bottom of the prospect hole. He went for help. The men got a windless and bucket and after some effort drew him near the surface. Now Pat was an uncompromising Democrat, and as he approached the top he noticed that a preacher, who was the leading Republican in the neighborhood, was one of his rescuers. He commanded them to lower him again and "go and get some Democrats to haul me out," saying "I don't want that black abolitionist to help me out." So they had to lower him until they could find Democrats enough to pull him out. We were eating breakfast when a man came to get my husband to assist in pulling the Irishman to the surface and he came back laughing heartily at Pat's political stubbornness. The editor of the Democratic paper gave him a life subscription to his paper and Pat lived fifteen years to read it; he then decided he had enjoyed it long enough and suicided.

We had many interesting neighbors, men and women of considerable force of character. In the early days of the gold excitement in southern Oregon and northern California a man and his wife, by the name of Redfield, located a homestead on Cow Creek. They built a house and ran a station where travelers were accommodated with lodging and food. Attacks by Indians were frequent, but they stayed and fought it out with them. In one of these attacks, Mrs. Redfield was severely wounded in the hip, but even this did not dismay them and they staid with their home and continued to fight it out. During the civil war she was a Union sympathizer and he was equally strong on the rebel side. Whenever they would get news of a Union victory, she would give a banquet and invite all their friends to celebrate; when news of a Rebel victory came, he, in turn, would give a banquet and call all the friends together. After the close of the war, he was told that he would not be allowed to vote and that if he attempted to do so, his vote would be challenged. He said, "All right"; but on election day he was at the polls. He had a long muzzle-loading gun and was known to be a sure shot. He folded his ballot and stuck it in the muzzle of "old Betsy" and handed it to the clerk, who took it without protest and no one else challenged his vote.

There was a German citizen named Haserich who was known as "Slam Bang" among the miners, because of his frequent use of those words in describing any thing or event. He was the proprietor of a billiard hall and lodging house. Being Republican committeeman one year, he called the boys in and told them that a Mr. Van Dueser, who was the Republican candidate for the Legislature, was coming to make a speech. Knowing that the boys were always playing pranks, he implored them to be "nice" and to listen attentively to what he had to say. They promised to behave, but when the old man escorted the speaker into the hall the night of the meeting, there were about two hundred men there, each with his face blackened and wearing a high paper collar. The meeting proceeded without disturbance, but the speaker was not to get away in peace. The horse he had hired was one that had been trained to stop in front of every saloon and sit on his haunches. This he did as usual and the boys had their fun in assuring the dignified speaker of the evening that his horse wanted a drink before he would pass the saloon.