As constituting a vivid narrative in the history of the Vigilantes, we include here a historic sketch by Prof. Henry L. Tolkington of the State Normal School of Idaho. It appeared in the Lewiston Tribune of August 19, 1917. It will constitute a part of a book now in preparation by Professor Tolkington entitled "Heroes and Heroic Deeds of the Pacific Northwest."
While the conclusion does not occur within the limits of Old Walla Walla County, it is a part of the same story and is intensely characteristic of those times.
CHAPTER III
POLITICAL HISTORY TO TIME OF COUNTY DIVISION
In previous chapters we have presented the facts in relation to the first attempt at organization of Walla Walla County in 1854, prior to the period of great Indian wars. We took up again the reorganization and development in 1859 with the incoming of permanent population. We also mentioned the first charter and the inauguration of permanent city government. In the chapter dealing with the beginnings of industries we showed the first locations at the different points which have become the centers of population in the four counties.
It remains in this chapter to take up the thread with the growing communities and the government over them which composed the old county down to 1875, when Columbia County was created, embracing what are now the three counties of Columbia, Garfield and Asotin, and thus reducing Walla Walla County to its present limits. After that we shall trace the story of the successive subtractions of Garfield from Columbia and then Asotin from Garfield.
The authorities to which we have had recourse are first the county records, so far as available; second, the files of the newspapers covering the periods; third, Col. F. F. Gilbert's Historic Sketches, published in 1882, to which frequent reference has been made and which seems in general to be very reliable; and fourth, the memory of pioneers still living or from whom data were secured prior to their death. In respect to the public records it may be said that a destructive fire on August 3, 1865, of which an account is given in the Statesman of the 4th, destroyed the records, though the more important ordinances and other acts of city and county government had appeared in the Statesman and from that source were replaced.
The most important events in the political history were connected with, first, the county, its legislative and local officers, and the chain of circumstances going on to county divisions; second, the city government and the movement of laws and policies through various reorganizations to the present; and third, the place occupied by the old county in relation to state and national affairs.