After the surrender, the Indian women began weeping and wailing in a manner truly heart-rending over the bodies of their dead husbands and fathers; but they acknowledged that the punishment was just, as they had killed the Columbia River men. But they pleaded that they were told to do it, which, if true, cannot but create a feeling of sympathy for them, the unfortunate dupes. After the slaughter and surrender, Hill mounted his horse and rode to Coloma, and the six Indian men were hurried after under a guard, and the women and children were driven after these by the rest of the thirteen Oregonians. It was 4 o’clock when Hill arrived. The six Indians were but a short distance behind, and hardly had been placed in prison, together with the Indian spy, at Winter’s mill, who was owned as a leading partner in the crime, when the remnant of the tribe, on the run, with the Oregonians galloping behind them, came into town. It was a burning day, the mercury standing at 106° in the shade, but the distance from the scene of the slaughter, forty miles, had been covered since 11 o’clock that forenoon. The town was excited beyond measure. Men and boys to the number of hundreds gathered in a circle about the Oregonians, who drove the tribe to the shelter of a spreading pine tree, in whose shade they lay stretched on the ground. There was great complaint and deep mutterings on the part of the Californians, who said, “See what you have done! We can stay here no longer. There are eighty thousand Indians in California, and now they will drive every white man from the mines.” So great indeed was the terror, that many new arrivals just up the river from San Francisco, coming to the mines from the east, turned around immediately and left. Others were scarcely dissuaded by the Oregonians themselves, or those who took their part, who declared that the trouble was now ended, if all stood together. However, it required great firmness on the part of the Columbia River men. Sutter, to whom word was sent asking if he would try the seven Indians in prison, replied that he had better not, as he could do nothing but release the men who had been captured by the murderers from Oregon. With this message from the civil authority, such as it was, the Oregonians proceeded to try the Indians themselves, disregarding Sutter entirely. But just as the Indians were being taken from prison, and were in the midst of a thick crowd of spectators, the one known as the spy made a sudden shout, and all the seven dropped on the instant to the ground and began wriggling on all fours between the legs of the astonished bystanders; the Oregon guard instantly attempted to shoot them—which created a scene of strange and almost ludicrous excitement. Two were shot at once; two were shot after they left the crowd; the other two reached the river and began swimming away, and one of these was shot as he rose on the opposite side of the stream. What became of the seventh was not known.

The women and children were of course released, but with the warning that no Indian should again work on the bars. But this did not end the trouble. Another Oregonian was killed. The Oregonians again took the warpath, with the intention of killing all the savages they saw. One was soon found and dispatched. Eleven were next found and pursued to the cabin of an English rancher named Goff, who at first made no response to their summons at his door. But as the boys began picking the mud chinking out of the logs, and threatened to fire into the room, he opened the house and delivered the Indians, who were then immediately hanged. The tribe was then traced, and although taking refuge in the tules of a swamp of a marshy lake, were attacked by the guards on horseback, and all the men, and one woman, who was fighting with the men, were killed—making in all seventy-six of the tribe that fell, the Oregonians having lost by secret murder thirty-three. The women and children were again brought back by the Oregonians to Coloma, and were furnished by them with provisions and pans, and were allowed to wash gold and support themselves. But they secretly took their leave, and were found at length in a distant canyon of the high mountains, at the limit of snow, nearly starved, but subsisting on pine nuts and the roots of wild clover, gathered by a few old men in a lower valley. It was a man named Smith who traced them, as among the tribe were his Indian wife and child. They were again induced to return to Coloma, and now in a pitiable condition, Californians injudiciously sent them a large supply of beef and flour—a sort of food to which they were unaccustomed, and of which they ate so greedily as to induce a virulent disease, of which fifty-two died, practically exterminating the tribe.

This was Rocky Mountain men’s justice that was thus dealt out in the California mines, and of the same piece as that of the Cayuse war, or that of the general Indian war of 1855-56.

It was rough and terrible, and the Indians were the victims; but the old California system was the real cause. The attempt was made to work the mines upon a system of inequality—of proprietors and peons. The Oregonians, accustomed to a system of equality, finding themselves exposed to outlawry, and not protected from the poor savagery of the Indians, struck as they could. It is to be remembered, too, that the secret murder of thirty-two men, without any attempt at meting out justice, was an enormity that no community should brook. But that it was not mere personal vengeance, but the purpose to establish the system of free labor, and to root out the contract system, or rather the peon system, was shown by the following:

At length Case decided to go up into the mines when affairs were at last settled, and the men were working without trouble or danger; he had fallen in with a certain Major Whiting, an American by birth, who had, however, been living in Mexico, and had even served in the Mexican army against the United States. This Mexican officer was now bringing up from that region a long mule train of provisions and a company of peons whom he had taken from prison at a cost to himself on the average of but $2 each, and had contracted with them to work for him at eighteen cents a day. Case reached the mines before him. When Whiting arrived he called upon Case first of all to ask what was the intention of the Oregon miners about allowing his debtors to work upon the bars. Case replied, “I speak only for myself; but I am opposed to it.” Whiting then asked him to call a meeting to determine the opinion of the miners. Case complied. Mr. Finley of Oregon City happened to be chosen chairman of this meeting, and a young man named——, secretary. The call had been made most literally by Case’s getting up upon a high rock and shouting so as to be heard all over the canyon, and then those that came first raised such a cry that it could be heard for a distance of two miles up and down, and a pistol was also fired. At such a summons, of course, the miners came to the camp in great numbers, and upon the object of the meeting being announced, resolutions were passed unanimously to allow no working of the mines except by those who were American citizens and intended to remain in the United States; thus forbidding those who were not citizens or who came simply to work and then return to foreign homes. In the face of this decision, Whiting, of course, was obliged to leave, having no inclination to meet the Oregon riflemen; and took his Mexican debtors along with him. When Case came to inform him of the action of the meeting he showed the utmost coldness, refusing to speak except to say that he knew their action already, having been present. This resolution of the miners, backed by their reputation acquired as dead-shots and no let-up, not only decided Major Whiting to leave, but those very same resolutions forwarded to the military governor, Smith, were issued by him as a proclamation. He believed that this was the only way to restore and maintain order in the mines, the will of the mountain men not being safely disregarded. A national spirit and a certain primary justice also required that American mines and privileges for which many millions of dollars had been paid to Mexico should be preserved to American citizens and worked for the benefit of this country, and not be turned over to the speculators and contractors of the whole world.

By this proclamation the Mexican and Chelano peons were required to return to their own country. The system of equality which the Oregonians rudely, but rightly represented, was established. Thousands of miners in California who never heard of this little contest which was worked out principally by a few rugged young mountain men from Oregon, began to enjoy thenceforth the free and equal opportunity of the California mines, and California thus became Americanized, and in the end a great free state. The influence of Oregon, therefore, cannot be disregarded—although the actions of the Oregon men at the time created intense feeling against themselves, and Mr. Case considers this the source of the still persistent dislike of Oregon shown by Californians; which has hardened into a sort of tradition.

RETURN HOME.

The journey overland from the Sacramento up to the Willamette was, in 1849, one long adventure; and, on three hundred miles of the distance, that of no peaceful kind. Case had had enough of sea voyaging in going to California, and when, in the early fall, he counted over his earnings, amounting to about $2,800, he said that he would go home by land. The Indians of Northern California and Southern Oregon were hostile, being declared enemies to the whites. The Oregon men had, during the previous autumn, built a road through, making a long detour from the Rogue River Valley to the borders of Klamath Lake by the old Applegate route, and thence by Lost River and Lake, the Lava Beds, and the long plateau east of Mount Shasta, to Pitt River, and then two hundred miles across the chain of the Sierra Nevada Mountains to the Sacramento. The Indians of this region had ever been of the wildest and most warlike character, regarding white men as natural enemies. The famous Modocs were a remnant of one of these tribes. The large party of the Oregonians who had passed through the previous year had, to quite an extent, overawed the natives, especially in the Pitt River Valley. The party of Case consisted of only eight men, himself being chosen captain, and they carried some $28,000 worth of dust.

Over the mountains, from the Sacramento to the Pitt River Valley, a distance of some two hundred miles, and through the Pitt River Valley, they proceeded in a leisurely manner, allowing their horses to graze at will upon the wild pea vines that grew luxuriously, and thus kept them thriving. A large number of travelers were met on the way, going to the mines, among whom was a party of strict Presbyterians from Springfield, Illinois, who always rested on the Sabbaths. It was almost universally taken by new travelers of that road that the Pitt River Valley was the main Sacramento, and they were loth to strike over the mountains as the way required.

Later upon the journey, Major Warner was fallen in with, having a party of one hundred soldiers, mostly Irishmen. With this officer pleasant conversations were held. He expressed his surprise that Case should try to go through the Indian country with but eight men, while he felt unsafe with his one hundred. But Case replied that his party was the best. They all knew the Indians were like snapping dogs, that would snap and run, while Warner’s men knew nothing of Indians. The event proved only too truly Case’s estimate. Warner with his one hundred men were subsequently attacked and all were destroyed (W. M. C.). Warner also had imbibed the California idea of Oregon. He once remarked to Case, “I understand that Oregon can never be an agricultural section.” “Why?” asked Case. “The valleys are too narrow. I am told that there are few over a thousand yards wide—that gives no room for ranches.” “The Willamette Valley,” said Case, “where I live is forty miles across, not counting the foothills. That gives room for ranches.”