[VI]
HOW MARCUS WHITMAN SAVED OREGON
The Hudson's Bay Company, whose business was to buy skins and furs from the American Indians, had located a trading-post at Fort Walla Walla, in the country of the Cayuse and Nez Percés Indians. This was in what was known as Oregon Territory in 1842, although it is now near the southeast corner of the state of Washington. Here was a very primitive settlement, the frame houses of a few white men and the tents of Indians. Very little effort had been made to grow grain or fruit or to raise sheep or cattle, since the Hudson's Bay Company wanted the Indians to be continually on the hunt for furs, and discouraged them from turning into farmers. Besides the traders and the Indians there was a small missionary camp near at hand, located on a beautiful peninsula made by two branches of the Walla Walla River. This place was called by the Indians Wai-i-lat-pui, meaning the region of rye grass. Beyond the fertile ground on the river's banks were borders of timber-land, and beyond them plains stretching to the foot-hills of the great Blue Mountains. In 1842 this wonderful country was free to any who cared to come and settle there, but as yet very few had ventured so far into the wilderness.
The chief man at the missionary camp, Dr. Marcus Whitman, was called to Fort Walla Walla on the first day of October, 1842, to see a sick man. He found a score or so of traders and Hudson's Bay clerks, almost all Englishmen, gathered there, and accepted their invitation to stay to dinner. The men were a genial company, and had already taken a liking to Whitman, who was frank and amiable, and an interesting story-teller. Gradually the conversation at the dinner table came round to a subject that was vastly important to the men present, although the outside world seemed to be paying little attention to it—to which country was this great territory of Oregon to belong, to the United States or to England? The general opinion appeared to be that under the old treaties it would belong to the country that settled it first.
In the midst of the discussion there was the sound of hoof-beats outside, the door of the company's office was flung open, and an express messenger ran into the dining-room. "I'm just from Fort Colville!" he cried. "A hundred and forty Englishmen and Canadians are on the march to settle here!"
There was instant excitement. A young priest threw his cap in the air, shouting, "Hurrah for Oregon—America's too late; we've got the country!" The traders clapped each other on the shoulder, and made a place for the messenger at the head of the table. As he ate he told them how he had ridden from the post three hundred and fifty miles up the Columbia River to let all the fur-traders know that the English were on the way to colonize the country.
Marcus Whitman smiled, and pretended to enjoy the celebration; but in reality he was already considering whether he could not do something to save this vast and fruitful region for his own nation. It was an enormous tract of land, of untold wealth, and stretching over a long reach of the Pacific coast. As he considered, Whitman heard the Hudson's Bay Company's men grow more and more excited, until they declared that they intended to take possession of all the country west to the Pacific slope the following spring.
The missionary had been expecting this struggle between the English and the Americans for the ownership of Oregon, but had not thought it would come to a head quite so soon. He left the men at Fort Walla Walla as early as he could, and rode back to the little settlement at Wai-i-lat-pui. There he told his wife and friends the news he had learned at the trading-post. "If our country is to have Oregon," he said, "there is not a day to lose."
"But what can we do?" the others asked him.
"I must get to Washington as quick as I can, and let them know the danger."
His friends understood what that meant, a journey on horseback across almost an entire continent, through hostile Indians, over great rivers and mountain ranges, and in the depths of winter. Some one pointed out that under the rules of the American Mission Board that had sent them into the far west none of their number could leave his post without consent from the headquarters in Boston. "Well," said Whitman, "if the Board dismisses me, I will do what I can to save Oregon to the country. My life is of but little worth if I can save this country to the American people."