Page:The Whitman Controversy.pdf/17

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never forgotten them. (Report of the Congregational Association of Oregon and Washington for 1882, p. 18). In the winter of 1846-7 Dr. Whitman called a council of the Cayuses and told them he would leave if they wished. Two or three were in favor of his going but the great majority wished him to remain. They were conciliated. A few disliked him, treated him wrongfully, burned his mill, and at last killed him, but not all by any means, and it is a mistake to say that he had been in the Cayuse country six years without having either benefited or conciliated the Indians. Other quotations might be made from the Missionary Herald and annual reports of the American Board to show that he did benefit them in an agricultural and educational way.

Fourth—Again she says: "Admitting that he (Dr. Whitman) feared the treaty of boundary (supposed to include Oregon) would draw the line at the Columbia river, leaving him in British territory, could he hope to reach Washington before it was concluded." I can not conceive how a careful writer in the interests of truth should make this blunder—for Mrs. Victor has visited the Whitman Mission station, which is in the Walla Walla Valley, and which is east, not west, of the Columbia. It would have remained in American territory had the lines been drawn down the Columbia. Not a station of the American Board, nor even any of the Methodist missionaries, except the one which was occupied by the latter a short time at Nisqually, would have been in British territory. The Hudson's Bay Company laid all their plans for this, and strongly advised all the American missionaries to settle south and east of the Columbia, so that if they should obtain the northern part, American missions would be in American territory.

Fifth—Again she says: "To return to Dr. Whitman, and his motives in going East, we have the testimony of his associates that he had a secret motive, known to Eells, but not mentioned at the meeting of the missionaries in September. No one has ever told us what that object was, therefore we are at liberty to speculate about it. It seems to me to point to a design of establishing him self in some office under the United States in that portion of Oregon where he resided."

The statement of Dr. Eells, to which Mrs. Victor refers, says: "He had a cherished object, for the accomplishment of which he desired consultation with Rev. David Greene, Secretary of Correspondence with the mission at Boston, but I have no recollection that it was named at the meeting." Mrs. Victor quotes Dr. Eells