[288] Donald Manson, born in Scotland in 1800, entered the Hudson’s Bay Company at the age of seventeen, and was sent out to York Factory. Three years later, at Winnipeg, he met Dr. McLoughlin and in 1823 accompanied him to the Pacific department. At first assigned to an exploring expedition under charge of Samuel Black, he reached Vancouver January 6, 1825, and aided in completing its works. Two years later he accompanied the expedition that founded Fort Langley, and was afterwards sent to restore the trading post of old Fort George, at the mouth of the Columbia. In 1829 Manson was placed in charge of Fort McLoughlin, on Millbank Sound, and there remained for ten years, after which a well-deserved furlough gave him the opportunity to revisit Scotland. Returning to the Pacific, he was sent (1841) to succeed Samuel Black at Kamloops, and to punish the latter’s murderers; the following year a like task was assigned him at Stikeen. In 1844 Manson was placed in command of New Caledonia, with headquarters at Fort St. James, a position ably filled for fourteen years, when he retired from the service and settled near Champoeg, in the Willamette valley, where he died January 7, 1880. He married (1828) the daughter of Etienne Lucier, first settler of French Prairie, and had a large family of children. See interview with his daughter in Oregon Historical Quarterly, iv, p. 263; also Oregon Pioneer Association Transactions, 1879, p. 56.—Ed.
[289] For Fort Walla Walla see our volume xxi, p. 278, note 73. The clerk in charge was William B. McBean (not McBride), an educated half-breed born in 1790 on the eastern side of the Rockies. In 1825 he was a subordinate at Fort Alexandria; from 1836 to 1842 in charge at Fort Babine. Thence he was sent to Fort Connolly (1842), and next (1845) succeeded Archibald McKinley at Walla Walla. He attained an unpleasant notoriety in connection with the Whitman massacre, because of his Catholic proclivities, and his tardiness in aiding the survivors; but most of the charges against him were unfounded. In New Caledonia he had a reputation for being despotic and wily, also somewhat fanatical in religious matters.—Ed.
[290] For the Lewis River see our volume vi, p. 277, note 86. The crossing must have been made not far from the boundary line between Walla Walla and Columbia counties on the south side of the river, and that between Franklin and Whitman counties on the northern bank.—Ed.
[291] The Paloos were a Shahaptian tribe, nearly related, as De Smet says, to the Nez Percés. Their habitat was the north bank of Lewis River, from the mouth of Palouse River to that of the Lewis. Lewis and Clark called them “Palleotepellows,” and credited them with 1,600 souls. In 1854 there were five hundred extant in three bands. They took part in the wars of 1855-58, but were thoroughly cowed by Colonel George Wright’s invasion of their territory. In 1860 their agent reported that the remnant of the tribe had intermarried and settled among the Nez Percés, on the Lapwai reservation in Idaho, and after that their separate tribal existence lapsed.—Ed.
[292] Now known as Palouse River, the largest northern tributary of the Lewis, below the Clearwater. Rising in eastern Idaho, it flows west and then south—through a considerable cañon in its lower course, forming falls over a hundred feet in height, about seven miles above its confluence with the Lewis.—Ed.
[293] For Spokane River, see our volume xxvii, p. 366, note 185. De Smet probably crossed the river not far from the present city of Spokane.—Ed.
[294] Of these two upper branches of the Cœur d’Alène, St. Joseph’s has retained its name. Rising in the Bitter Root (not now called Pointed Heart) Mountains it flows northwest into the southern arm of Cœur d’Alène Lake. The St. Ignatius is now known as the Cœur d’Alène River; and through its valley runs the Northern Pacific Railway. See our volume xxvii, p. 365, note 184.—Ed.
[295] Mrs. S. Parmentier of Brooklyn, a liberal donor to Father de Smet’s missions, to whom the following letter is addressed.—Ed.
[296] Apparently this was the present Blake’s Lake, in northern Spokane County, which discharges by the West Branch into Little Spokane River. No other lake north of Spokane River appears to answer to De Smet’s description. Blake’s is about three miles long and a half mile wide, and is in the forest region.—Ed.
[297] Probably Spokane Falls, the site of the modern city of that name.—Ed.