174 Fred Wilbur Powell
alizing Congress on the subjects of the railroad, and the civil- ization of the Indians in the United States' territories. It was thought, that working in the conspicuous position of a chief engineer, two or three years, in a southern climate, would lim- ber the limbs for operations in a northern ; and the work itself would render honorable testimony to my capabilities; and be ccMnmendatory letters to men in the council of our nation.
"Accordingly I went to Washington, in the close of 1838, hoping, under the government auspices, to make myself useful, in opening to the world a railroad thoroughfare between the two great oceans. I conferred with Mr. [Charles F.] Mercer [of Virginia], Chairman of the Committee of the Senate [house of representatives] on Roads and Canals, who said, a report would be made favorable to the enterprise. Such a report was submitted and accepted; but no appropriation was made, and nothing further done by Congress upon the subject."^*
The matter of a transcontinental railroad also engaged his attention.
"Reference to that project is made in my Geographical Sketch of Oregon, printed [written] in 1829;^** and in the Memoir to Congress, in 1839, relative to the statistics and topography of that territory .*• It has often been mentioned to
I A Narrative of Events and Difficulties, 741 Settlement of Oregon. 8. No record of such a report has been found. As to Keller's qualifications as an engineer, we have the f^ollowing testimonial of George B. Emerson of Boston, whose judgment was endorsed by Edward Everett: "From natural taste and adaptation; from the most extraordinary experience of the work, in every form and variety: from practical skill and acquaintance of all kinds of ground and all modes of operation, Mr. Kelley is singularly well qualified to under- stand, superintend, and execute the work of a survey for any railroad or other improvement, public or private." — Ibid., 75. See also Kelley, "Beloved Brehren, Jan. 14, 1870. Ms.
15 "The settlement of the Oregon country, would conduce to a freer inter- course, and a more extensive and remunerative trade with the East Indies. . . . Such an extension and enjoyment of the East India trade, would provoke the spirit of American enterprise, to open communications from the Mississippi valley, and from the gulf of Mexico to the Pacific ocean, and thus open new channels, through which the products of America and the Eastern world, will pass in mutual exchange, saving in every voyage, a distance of ten thousand miles: new channels, which opening across toe bosom of a wide spread ocean; and intersecting islands, where health fills the breeze and comforts spread the shores would conduct the full tide of a golden traffic, into the reservoir of our national finance." — Pp. 79-80. In "Beloved Brethren," Dec. 4, 1860, Kelley said that he projected such a railroad in 1831, and that in 1836 he and P. t*. F. Degrand were associated in the movement.
16 'These were the objects to whose accomplishment I looked forward, and from which I confidently anticipated many benefits: ... a certain and speedy line of communication overland from the Mississippi to the Oregon, by means of which the Eastern and Western worlds shoula be united, and meir wealth interchanged and increased." — P. 48.
