There was a complete revolution in trade, as remarkable as it was unlocked for two years before, when the farmers were trying to form a coöperative ship-building association to carry the products of their farms to a market where cash could be obtained for wheat. No need longer to complain of the absence of vessels, or the terrible bar of the Columbia. I have mentioned in the preceding chapter that the Henry and the Toulon were the only two American vessels trading regularly to the Columbia River in the spring of 1848. Hitherto only an occasional vessel from California had entered the river for lumber and flour; but now they came in fleets, taking besides these articles vegetables, butter, eggs, and other products needed by the thousands arriving at the mines, the traffic at first yielding enormous profits. Instead of from three to eight arrivals and departures in a year, there were more than fifty in 1849, of which twenty were in the river in October awaiting cargoes at one time.[1] They were from sixty to six or or seven hundred tons burden, and three of them were built in Oregon.[2] Whether it was due to their
- ↑ About the last of December 1848 the Spanish bark Jóven Guipuzcoana, S. C. Reeves captain, arrived from San Francisco to load with Oregon productions for the California markets. She was fastened in the ice a few miles below the mouth of the Willamette until February, and did not get out of the river until about the middle of March. Crawford's Nar., MS., 173–91. The brig Maleck Adhel, Hall master, left the river with a cargo Feb. 7, 1849. Following are some of the other arrivals of the year: January 5th, schr. Starling, Captain Menzies; 7th, bk. Anita, Hall; brig Undine, Brum; May 8th, bks. Anita, Hall; Janet, Dring; ship Mercedes; schrs. Milwaukie; Valdova; 28th, bk. J. W. Carter; brig Mary and Ellen; June 16th, schr. Pioneer; bk. Undine; 23d, bk. Columbia; brigs Henry, Sacramento, El Placer; July 2d, ship Walpole; 10th, brigs Belfast, L'Etoile du Matin; ship Silvie de Grasse; schr. O. C. Raymond; brig Quito; 28th, ship Huntress; bk. Louisiana; schr. Gen. Lane; Aug. 7th, bk. Carib; 11th, bks. Harpooner, Madonna; ship Aurora; brig Forrest; bks. Ocean Bird, Diamond, Helen M. Leidler; Oct. 17th, brigs Quito, Hawkes; O. C. Raymond, Menzies; Josephine, Melton; Jno. Petit; Mary and Ellen, Gier; bks. Toulon, Hoyt; Azim, McKenzie; 22d, brig Sarah McFarland, Brooks; 24th, brig Wolcott, Kennedy; Nov. 12th, bk. Louisiana, Williams; brigs Mary Wilder; North Bend, Bartlett; 13th, ship Huntress, Upton; 15th, bks. Diamond, Madonna; 25th, brig Sacramento; bk. Seguin, Norton; brig Duc de Lorgunes, Travillot.
- ↑ The schooner Milwaukie, built at Milwaukie by Lot Witcomb and Joseph
arriving in time to take passage. Such were the common incidents of life in Oregon before the gold products of the California mines came into circulation. Narrative, MS., 179–187.
