THE PREFATORY NOTE TO THE NESMITH DIARY.
It has come to the notice of the Editor of the Quarterly through anonymous and signed letters that exception is taken to an expression in the prefatory note to the Nesmith diary. They animadvert upon a casual statement that the migration of 1843 was led by Dr. Marcus Whitman. Mr. McArthur, who prepared his grandfather's diary for publication and who wrote the biographical note, made this reference to Dr. Whitman in connection with the migration of 1843 just as he had in the preceding lines used the name of Dr. Elijah White in connection with the migration of 1842, solely to indentify the migration more clearly than the abstract date would suffice to do. Under these circumstances it did not occur to the Editor there could be read into this expression an implied claim, or hint even, that the migration of 1843 was worked up and organized by Dr. Whitman. As a matter of fact, Dr. Whitman was that year retracing a large part of the emigration route the fifth time, so his counsel to the leaders of the migration of 1843 at certain stages of the route, as documentary evidence confirms, must have been quite important.
Furthermore, the Editor of the Quarterly feels that after having published hundreds of pages of prime sources for this period of Oregon history, and after having personally searched through many files of eastern newspapers of this period and having copied for publication much new material to aid in arriving at the whole truth in this matter, that he might fairly receive credit for being without serious bias on the issues of this unfortunate controversy. He had hoped, too, that all sensitiveness had disappeared as the verdict on the main issues was rendered years ago. Nevertheless, he regrets exceedingly that the expression used has disturbed the thought of any of the readers of the Quarterly.
