And as brothers live together.”
—“Hiawatha.”
The natives of the Pacific Coast are represented by some historians as a fierce, savage, warlike race. At one time they were a numerous people, but their own bloody and ferocious wars were the means in years gone by of greatly reducing their numbers, and the ravages of the white man’s diseases and fire-water have so far completed the work that some tribes have become almost extinct.
In very early days the white traders had several encounters with the natives, and the account is preserved of the Indians of the west coast of Vancouver Island surrounding and capturing two vessels, one the Boston, at Nootka, and the other the Tonquin, at Clayoquot. The latter was afterwards blown up, it is thought, by some imprisoned members of the crew, and hundreds of the captors who swarmed her decks were killed. Another vessel, the Atahualpa, was also taken by the Indians of Millbank Sound, and four of the crew, including the captain, were killed. The vessel was, however, recaptured by the remaining members of the crew, who sailed away in safety.
Their tales of war among themselves are thrilling and often very exciting. They boast of sweeping out whole tribes at once; of wading ankle deep in blood! of taking many slaves and killing and scalping the rest. Chiefs from the north would sweep down south in their great war-canoes and pick a quarrel with a southern tribe over some trifling matter, then enter into bloody conflict with them, take many slaves, and hasten back to the far north to sell them, and thus enrich themselves.
The southern people fought among themselves, or, headed by some vicious chiefs, would make trips up the Fraser River or into Puget Sound, returning after a successful foray with the slaves taken in the fight, or more likely kidnapped at their fishing or berry-picking grounds.
The northerners were not always successful in making the trip home with their booty. The Cowichans would gather at Dodds’ Narrows and Active Pass, or at Cowichan Gap, and set upon the victors, often turning their victory into defeat. If they escaped the Cowichans they still had to run the gauntlet of the Yu-kwul-toes, the most to be dreaded of the whole coast tribes, and many a Tsimpshean, Hydah or Kling-get war party has found its death trap at Seymour Narrows or the Yu-kwul-toe Rapids.
On one occasion a party of northerners, on their way home through Dodds’ Narrows, about seven miles south of Nanaimo, had a battle with some Nanaimos, whom they defeated, killing eleven warriors. Striking off the heads of their slain enemies they took them with them, leaving the bodies, which were afterwards discovered by their friends. A short time after, in retaliation for the deed, on the south side of Salt Spring Island a canoe load of seven northern people were all butchered in a most shocking manner; stones were tied to their necks and they were sunk in the sea. Not reaching Victoria at the time expected, their friends instituted a search along the coast. I was then living at Nanaimo, and in the course of my work made frequent visits to Chemainus and Salt Spring Island, Cowichan and Saanich. On my next trip down the coast I was asked by the authorities to make inquiries regarding the lost ones.
After preaching to the Indians at Chemainus I referred to the murder, and warned them, if they knew who the murderers were, not to conceal them, as sooner or later they would be found out.
Several days after, on returning from Salt Spring Island, I met young chief Lis-tcheem, of the Chemainus tribe, who had come out some three or four miles in a canoe to meet me. Approaching in that cautious, suspicious manner which only an Indian will manifest, he came alongside and, speaking in an undertone, said: “Missionary, I want to say something that I don’t want my people to know. You told us the other day that we must not hide the murderers. Now, a party of our people have just returned from Victoria with a great deal of new property, and they seem to have money. We don’t know where they got all this money. I suspect they are the party who murdered the people you spoke of. They are now camped on the Chemainus River. But don’t tell the people that I told you.”