The west shore., January 01, 1889, Page 22, Image 23

THE WEST SHOBE.
22
wtfB simply a far trader and was not engaged in a
voyage of exploration or discovery, as were Cook and
Vancouver. No agreement as to the boundary line
could be reached, and in 1827 a treaty was signed ex
tending the period of joint occupation indefinitely, to
be terminated by either party upon giving a year's
notice.
During this time, and for fifteen years thereafter,
subjects of Great Britain had almost sole possession
of the Columbia region, having established posts on
all the chief tributaries of the Columbia. To be
sure, several parties of American trappers made
strong efforts to establish themselves, especially Cap
tain B. L. E. Bonneville and Nathaniel Wyeth, the
latter representing a Boston trading company, but so
complete was the hold of the Hudson's Bay Com
pany upon the allegiance of the natives that these
American intruders found it impossible to do busi
ness with them, and were compelled to abandon the
effort In 18.11, however, began a new era. A new
element was then introduced, which paved the way
for complete American ascendency. Rev. Jason Lee
and a party of assistants were sent out by the board
of missions of the Methodist Episcopal church, and
founded a mission in the Willamette valley, but a
short distance from the present site of the city of Sa
lem. From the mission school then established has
been evolved the Willamette university, located at
Salem, ono of the leading educational institutions of
the state, Only two years later the American Board
of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, representing
the Congregational and Presbyterian denominations,
dispatched a missionary party, at the head of which
waa Dr. Marcus Whitman, who, with his devoted
wife, fills a martyr's grave on the spot where he la
bored so long for the welfare of those who took his
life. This mission was established at Waiilatpu, in
the Walla Walla valley, near the border line of Ore
gon and WhHhington as now constituted. Other mis
sions were founded in Oregon and Washington as
branches of these two, and in 1838 the Catholics en
tered tho field The representatives of this sect were
British subject and made their headquarters at Fort
Vancouver, pursuing their missionary labors zealous
ly throughout the entire region dominated by the
Hudson's Bay Company, and founding subordinate
missions in many widely separated localities. Be
tweon them and the Protestant missionaries a bitter
hostility soon sprang up, and the ignorant savage
was pulled hither and thither and given to under
stand that ho was the bone of contention between two
religions, tho representatives of each of which de
clared by word and deed that tho other was false, In
the work of proselyting, the Catholics were the most
successful, and the Protestant missions, as such were
discontinued within ten years, though not fully
until the noble Whitman, with his wife and eleven
others, was murdered by his savage and misguide
charges. If the " blood of the martyrs is the seed of
the church," then ought the church reap a rich bar.
vest in this land of the Columbia. At all events it
was the seed of the state, for the missions were the
foundation upon which American settlements were
established, and from these grew the state.
As soon as the missions were founded, they be
came the nucleus about which a few Americans gathered-
Some of these men were independent trap
pers who had becom9 enamored of the lovely WiL
lamette valley, and had come here to settle down
from their life of danger and excitement. Some of
them were sailors, who had concluded to abandon the
sea and dwell in this land of plenty, while still others
were of that restless, roving class who had, by one
avenue or another, reached this region in advance of
the waves of immigration which swept into it a few
years later. Including the arrivals of 1840, there
were in the fall of that year one hundred and thirty
seven Americans in Oregon, nearly all in the Wil
lamette valley, about one-third of whom were con
nected with the missions in some capacity. There
were also sixty Canadian settlers, former employees
of the Hudson's Bay Company, who had left the ser
vice of the company and settled in the Willamette
valley. In this enumeration the officers and em
ployees of the Hudson's Bay Company are not in
cluded. Now again a new element made its appearance,
the genuine emigrant in his white-topped wagon,
though, as a matter of fact, the wagons of the first
two years failed to complete the journey. Then be
gan that steady stream of young and vigorous life
which has annually flowed into Oregon for nearly
half a century, the end of which will not be seen for
many years. Deep and moving causes existed for
this living stream to force its way through rocky bar
riers and alkali deserts, and cut a deep and lasting
channel to Oregon. Trappers returning to St Lom
had Bung the praises of the lovely and fertile Talley
of the Willamette, where wiiter was unknown and
the grass remained green the year round. The west
era frontiersman caught up the refrain as it pa
from cabin to cabin, and in a few years the tale
an old one with the hardy pioneers of the west
publication of a book by Dr. Parker, a missionary
who visited Oregon in 1835, of a historical andd
scriptive work by John Dunn, of the charming
ratives of " Bonneville " and "Astoria," by Wash
ton Irving, and especially of a letter written by B
ert Shortess, who had come out in 1830, combwj
with a general financial depression in the weak