W. H. Gray

“ You that have rolled over those vast plains and slept in your Concord coaches or Pullman palace cars, have never once imagined the toil and labor of that old off-hand pioneer, as he mounted his horse in the morning and rode all day in the cold and heat of the mountains and plains, to prove that a wagon road was practicable to the waters of the Columbia River. ”

“ Have we any organization upon which we can rely for mutual protection? Is there any power or influence in the country sufficient to protect us and all we hold dear on earth from the worse than wild beasts that threaten and occasionally destroy our cattle? Who in our midst is authorized at this moment to call us together to protect our own, and the lives of our families? True, the alarm may be given, as in a recent case, and we may run who feel alarmed, and shoot off our guns, while our enemy may be robbing our property, ravishing our wives, and burning the houses over our defenseless families. ”

“ Can a reasonable man read this simple narrative with the light of history, and facts piled on facts, with the stains of the blood of our countrymen all over the country, and not trace the cause of these foul murders to their true source? While none but American traders and hunters were in the country, it was an easy matter to dispose of them, but when the American missionary comes among the natives, another element of opposition must be introduced; moral teachings must be met by religious superstitions, to secure the victim, to advance the interests of an unscrupulous trade. ”

“ Ascending to the north one hundred miles, over the same high rolling plains, you begin to find the yellow pine and larch; not in dense forests, but scattering trees, the ground beneath being covered with a species of coarse, wild grass. These woods form a delightful change to the traveler after riding for days beneath the scorching rays of a summer sun. As you near the forty-ninth parallel, the timber increases in size, quantity, and quality. ”

“ Occasionally, when a venturesome Yankee ship or fur trader entered any of the ports of the aforesaid country for trade, exploration, or settlement, this honorable company asserted its licensed and exclusive right to drive said vessel, trader, explorer, or settler from it. Should he be so bold as to venture to pass the trained bands of the wild savages of the mountains, or, even by accident, reach the sacred trading-ground of this company, he was helped to a passage out of it, or allowed to perish by the hand of any savage who saw fit to punish him for his temerity. ”

“ They claim all that is supposed to be of any value to savage and civilized man. The English nation without its Hudson’s Bay Company’s old traps and hunting-parties would have no claim west of the Rocky Mountains, yet, for the sake of these, it has almost ventured a third war with our American people in sending from its shores, instead of land pirates, under the bars and stars, the red flag of the Hudson’s Bay Company. ”

“ They have grown to such enormous proportions, and controlled so vast a country, that the government and treasury of the United States has become, in their estimation, a mere appendage to facilitate their Indian trade and financial speculations. From our recent purchases of Russian territory, it becomes an important question to every American citizen, and especially our statesmen, to make himself familiar with so vast an influence under the British flag, and extending along so great an extent of our northern frontier. ”

“ Feeble and insignificant as they were, from 1813 to 1821 the whole Indian country of North America fell under their blighting and withering influence. Divided as they were, they were able to crush all honest competition, and combine in deadly combat against their own countrymen for the supremacy of the Indian trade. Have they lost their power and influence by uniting the elements of opposition in one vast fur monopoly? ”

“ Robert Shortess possessed a combination of qualities such as should have formed one of the best and noblest of men; with a good memory, extensive reading, inflexible purpose, strong hate, affectionate and kind, skeptical and religious, honest and liberal to a fault, above medium height, light-brown hair, blue eyes, and thin and spare features. His whole life is a mystery, his combinations a riddle. He early entered with heart and soul into the situation and condition of the settlements, and stood for their rights in opposition to all the combined influences in the country. ”

“ My dear sir, this would make the Indians comfortable and happy. “We boast [says this Englishman] that we make no slaves, none at least that can taint our soil, or fret our sight; but we take the child of the forest, whom God gave us to civilize, and commit him, bound hand and foot, to the most iron of all despotisms—a commercial monopoly.
“Nor, turning from the results of our policy upon the native population, to its effect upon settlers and colonists, is there greater cause for congratulation.
“The system which has made the native a slave is making the settler a rebel. ”

“ Let us look at another sentiment of this Father Hoikin; he says: “When, oh, when! shall the oppressed Indian find a poor corner of the earth on which he may lead a peaceful life, serving and loving his God in tranquillity, and preserving the ashes of his ancestors, without fear of beholding them profaned and trampled beneath the feet of an unjust usurper.” ”

“ None but a bigot or a Jesuit will pretend that such instructions tend to enlarge, to elevate, or civilize the savage mind. We have only to look to countries grown old under just such teachings, to see its legitimate results.
From the Roman Catholic works before us, on the Oregon missions, embracing over eight hundred pages, one would conclude that over forty different tribes who have been visited by these Jesuits, in the territory of the United States, were all converted and Christian Indians, ready to shout, “Glory to God in the highest,” and peace all over our Indian country. ”

“ We come now to learn all we can of a something that has assumed the name of Puget Sound Agricultural Company, and under that name, through the paternal influence of a bastard corporation, presumes to ask an immense sum of the American government, whose country they have used all their power and influence to secure to themselves, by acting falsely to their own. ”

“ Whereas the people of Oregon, now occupying one of the most beautiful and interesting portions of the globe, are placed in the most critical and responsible position ever filled by men, owing, as they do, important duties to themselves, to their country, to posterity, and to mankind, as the founders of a new government and a young nation ”

“ How absurd it is for our government to spend millions of dollars to form treaties with Indians who are constantly visited by these foreign Indian traders and teachers, emissaries of a foreign power, who never breathed an honest breath or spoke a truthful word! ”

“ Now, fellow-citizens, let us look calmly at our true situation. We are two thousand five hundred miles from any point from which we can receive the least assistance by land; and seventeen thousand miles by water. A portion of our community are organized and ready to protect themselves, and to defend all their rights and interests. Another organization of a religious character is in our midst,—I should say, two. They each have a head—an executive. How is it with us? Who is our head in all that pertains to our civil liberty, rights, and property? ”

“ It is difficult to understand why our American government is so tolerant and generous to a foreign monopoly that has invariably sought and accomplished the destruction of its fur trade on its western borders, and used its entire influence against American institutions and citizens; not hesitating to incite the Indians to the most inhuman and brutal murders. ”

“ We are asked to evince our influence for our country’s good, by withholding our hand from any young man who refuses to turn out in defense of our honor and our country’s right.
“In reply, we hereby, one and all, of our own free good will, solemnly pledge ourselves to comply with that request, and to evince, on all suitable occasions, our detestation and contempt for any and all young men, who can, but will not, take up arms and march at once to the seat of war, to punish the Indians, who have not only murdered our friends, but have grossly insulted our sex. ”

“ Dilapidated fences are passed, rude Indian houses made of ‘shakes,’ fields of wheat and vegetables overrun with weeds, and at last, making the one hundred and forty-sixth crossing of the river, you halt your hungry and jaded horses in front of the rudest piece of architecture that ever supported a cross or echoed to the Ave Maria of the Catholic faith. ”

“ We purpose to go no further back than the beginning of the war, and to let the facts which we shall name speak for themselves. If they have no other lesson, they will, at least, show that Rome, during our terrible struggle for national existence, was true to her ancient history and traditions, as the enemy of civil liberty and the friend of the oppressor the world over. ”

“ One of them fell by the ruthless hand of the sectarian savages, pierced by Hudson’s Bay balls from Hudson’s Bay guns. The other was carried, in a Hudson’s Bay boat, to the protecting care of the American settlement; and for what purpose? That the savage might remain in barbarism; that the monster monopoly might receive its profits from the starving body and soul of the Indian; that civilization and Christianity, and the star of empire might be stayed in their westward course. ”

“ Show me the man who denies it, and I will show you a man devoid of moral perception, destitute of the principle of right dealing between man and man; yet this same Hudson’s Bay Company claim credit for saving the thousands of men they had robbed of their hard cash, in not allowing a few sacks of old flour and a quantity of damaged bacon to be sold to exceed one hundred per cent. ”

“ The Indian wars that followed, and that are kept up and encouraged along our borders, and all over this coast, are the legitimate fruits of the “DEADLY HATRED” implanted in the mind and soul of the Indian by the Hudson’s Bay Company and their allies, the priests. There is an object in this: while they teach the Indians to believe that the Americans are robbing them of their lands and country, they at the same time pretend that they do not want it. ”

“ It is obvious that to the American missionaries our nation owes an honorable record, and the names of Dr. Whitman, Rev. J. Lee, Mr. C. Shepard, Mr. C. Rogers, Rev. Harvey Clark, Mr. A. Beers, and Dr. Wilson, and Mrs. Whitman, Mrs. Spalding, Mrs. Lee, Mrs. Leslie, Mrs. Beers, and Mrs. Smith, among the dead, and many others still living, should find a prominent place in the catalogue of noble men and women who not only volunteered to civilize and Christianize the Indians, but did actually save this western golden coast, to honor and enrich the great Republic in the time of her greatest peril. ”