[From the Oregonian of February 1, 1885.]
The Whitman Controversy.
RECOLLECTIONS OF W. H. GRAY.
To the Editor of the Oregonian:
As I am the only person now living who met Rev. H. H. Spalding and Dr. Marcus Whitman, at Liberty Landing on the Missouri river, about April 25, 1836, and as I was for many years associated with them in their missionary labors and settlement in the Oregon country, it would be thought strange if I did not come forward to defend them against a slanderer who has filled four columns of your valuable paper. I will not attempt to review the long list of false insinuations uttered by a writer so steeped in prejudice against all Protestant Christian efforts to ameliorate the condition of the native population of the country, that no effort or proof can induce her to be reasonable. This is distinctly shown by reference to Rev. Myron Eells' pamphlet, and by her first paragraph, in which she claims that she committed a fault, and to confirm that fault she put down forty-six more.
The question is one of personal knowledge of events that occurred in Oregon in 1842, and of events then about to occur in the city of Washington. It was stated in Oregon that a treaty had been signed in Washington, giving to Great Britain all of Oregon, though subsequent facts only showed that the treaty was about to be made, and that it only referred to Maine and our eastern coast. As a consequence of the statement, a citizen of Oregon hastened to Washington to learn the facts, and in case the statement was found not to be true, to inform the United States government that the time had arrived to assert its claim to Oregon, as was then being done by the opposing party, who claimed it on the ground that it had the largest number of subjects in the territory; and by opening a k practicable road, well known to him, for emigrants, so that, by outnumbering the opposing party, with American citizens, the country
