A Survivor's Recollections of the Whitman Massacre

by Matilda Sager

He replied, "John is dead and the rest of them."

I said, "I don't believe it, for he was there when I went down at recess."

But he took my hand and the rest of the children followed, with the Indians bringing up the rear. When we went into the kitchen, the dead body of John laid on the floor and his blood had run and made a stream of dark, congealed crimson. He laid on his back with one arm thrown up and back and the other outstretched and the twine still around his knees. It appeared as if he had been hit and just slipped out of the chair he was sitting on. We children all sat down on the settle that was near the stove. A stove was a luxury in those days; there was one in the living room and in the kitchen, where the children sat in terror, was a Hudson's Bay cook stove of a very small and primitive make; the oven was directly over the firebox and two kettles which were of an oblong shape sat in on the side, something like the drum on the sides of a stove. The kettle of meat had been put on to cook for dinner and was still on the stove. Joe Lewis took a piece out and cut it up, put it on the lid of the kettle and said, "You children haven't had any dinner," and passed it to us, but none of us could eat.

The room was full of Indians and they would point their guns at us, saying "Shall we shoot?" and then flourish their tomahawks at our defenseless heads. One of them had on John's straw hat that he had braided from straw cut from wild grass one summer when he was working for the Rev. Spalding. Mrs. Spalding had sewed it for him. The Indian's name was Klokamus. Later, he was one of five hanged at Oregon City in the summer of 1850. The pantry was being plundered by the squaws. In memory, I can hear the rattle of the dried berries on the floor as they emptied the receptacles of them, in order to get the pans and cans to carry away. Joe Lewis went into the living room and must have gone into the parlor where mother had a large wooden chest in which she kept her choice clothing and keepsakes; he came out with five nice, fancy gauze kerchiefs of different colors, made to wear with a medium low-necked dress. He gave them to the Chief and the headmen that were in the room.

In a short time my brother Frank came into the room. He sat down beside me, saying "I came to find you. John is dead and we don't know what has become of the rest of the family; the Indians are going to kill me and what will become of you, my poor, little sister?" Word was finally passed out not to kill any of the children and we were ordered out of the house, so we went and stood in a corner where the "Indian room" made an ell with the main part of the house; the Indians were very numerous, some of them on horses and most of them armed and painted and they seemed to be waiting for something. Soon out came the immigrant women that had all fled to the Mission house for safety upon the outbreak of the massacre; as they passed us their children went with their mothers, leaving Frank, Eliza Spalding and myself standing there. They were followed by Mr. Rogers and Joe Lewis bearing a settee with the wounded Mrs. Whitman on it, covered up with blankets and Elizabeth close beside it, her arms laden with clothing. When they had gotten out of and a short distance from the house in an open space, Joe Lewis dropped his end of the settee. Mr. Rogers looked up quickly and must have realized what it meant; but he was shot instantly and fell and an Indian tried to ride his horse over him. Elizabeth turned about and ran back into the house. Then an Indian came to Mrs. Whitman and took his whip and beat her over the face and head and then turned the settee over in the mud. She was very weak from loss of blood; my sister Catherine told me and I am convinced that she did not last long after being beaten and thrown face down in the mud, with the blankets and settee on top of her.

An Indian came and stood by Frank and another one took up his stand close by and they talked together earnestly; the first one was a friendly one and he seemed to be pleading with the other to spare Frank's life, but finally the ugly one took hold of my brother and said, "You are a bad boy." Then he shoved him a short distance from my side and an Indian shot him in the breast; he fell and did not struggle and I think he died instantly as he made no movement. The Indians all went away then and the women and children that belonged in the immigrant house were gone and Eliza and I were alone. We seemed to be paralyzed and the horrors we had passed through so numbed our thoughts that we did not seem to think that we could go to the other house, as we had been taught not to go where we had not had permission. It was getting quite dark by this time, in the short November day, and we stood close together, when a friendly Indian came; he was the one that had pleaded for Frank's life and he took us by the hands and led us over to Mrs. Sander's door. She took us in and gave us some supper and one of the other families took Eliza in to give her a place to sleep.

When I had eaten my supper, Miss Bewley asked me if I would go over to the Whitman house to take food to her brother who was lying terribly ill in the little room just off the kitchen. He had seen and heard some of the awful things that had taken place during the day, but had not been molested, probably because the Indians thought him dying anyway. I told her I was afraid to go, as I would have to step over the dead bodies. Mrs. Sanders took me into a bedroom and spread a quilt on the floor and I laid down, but not to sleep until far into the night. Mr. Gillam, the tailor, had been wounded while sitting on his table sewing and had run into this room; he was suffering terribly and begging to be put out of his misery; along towards morning he was given his release from suffering.

We got up very early and ate a scant breakfast, as we knew not what daylight would bring. The Indians would surely ask to be fed as they were then sitting in the early glimmerings of light on Monument hill, chanting the Death song. The wind had blown and whistled so mournfully in the night that it had added to my fear and I never hear the sound of the wind blowing in the winter, but my mind goes back to that terrible night; and it has been 72 years since I heard it wail its requium around desolated Waiilatpu.

My four sisters and the two half-breed girls, with the wounded Mr. Kimball, were alone in the chamber of the Mission house all night, for they had made no attempt to leave when the others had gone in the afternoon. The children were all ill with measles and two were very ill—sister Louise and Helen Meek. They begged constantly for water, but there was none upstairs; the pitchers of water that were there on Monday morning had had cloths dipped in them to put on Mrs. Whitman's wounds. Mr. Kimball's broken arm pained him excessively and he sat on the floor with his head against a bed until toward morning, when he told Catherine to tear up a sheet and bandage his arm and he would go to the river for water.

Catherine said, "Mother wouldn't want the sheets torn up." "Child, your mother will never need sheets. She is dead," was his answer. He went out in the dim morning light and succeeded in reaching the river, wrapped in the blanket Catherine had put around him, Indian fashion. Meanwhile the Indians had come to the immigrant house and had told us to prepare their breakfast. While they were waiting for their meal, an outcry was made that drew us all to the north door in the Hall's room. I stepped out on the lower step and an Indian with a gun in his hand was on the upper step; we saw the figure of a man with a white blanket around him, walking near the Doctor's house; he was near the corn-crib about half way to the house, when the Indian on the step above me shot, and the man fell. It was Mr. Kimball returning with water for the fevered children. I realize that my statement is different from all the others of the survivors in regard to the killing of Mr. Kimball, but I have a clear remembrance of this tragedy, which time has not dimmed or effaced from my mind. According to some, he hid in the brush till the next day and in working his way to his family was killed as he was crossing the fence by the house. I remember the same day, about noon or later, Joe Stanfield came in and said that a "Boston man" was hiding in the brush. Some of the women wanted to investigate, but Joe said "No, don't." We thought it might be Mr. Hall, as he had gone, as I remember, early in the morning of the massacre to see if he could shoot some ducks on the river. He was never heard from or his body found, so no one knows his fate.