The Whitman Controversy/2. Myron Eells
[From the Oregonian of January 11, 1885.]
DR. WHITMAN.
Another Contribution to the Discussion Respecting Him.
A Review of the Positions of Mrs. Victor and Hon. Elwood Evans, from the Missionary Standpoint.
BY REV. M. EELLS.
Skokomish, W. T., Dec. 20, 1884.
To the Editor of the Oregonian:
In your issue of November 7th is an article by Mrs. F. F. Victor about Dr. M. Whitman. Will you have the kindness to permit me to correct some mistakes and make a few comments upon it? I will take up the points mainly in the same order in which I find them in the article.
First. Mrs. Victor says the object of Gov. Simpson's journey around the world in 1841 was "the study of the fur trade and not politics." Such a statement needs qualification as to the fact, and certainly as to the hint from it about Gov. Simpson's interest in the political question of Oregon. It is true that his main object was the study of the fur trade, but he certainly did study the politics of this country at the same time, as its politics very materially affected the fur trade. The Hudson's Bay Company to this day affirm that they hoped to obtain all of Washington Territory north and west of the Columbia river. Dr. W. F. Tolmie, formerly in charge of Fort Nisqually, told me so within a month. That was a political subject. Simpson, in his "Journey around the World," (American edition, 1847), devotes a part of chapter six to a discussion of this political question, and says (page 151): "The United States will never possess more than a nominal jurisdiction, nor long possess even that, on the western side of the Rocky mountains, and supposing the country to be divided to-morrow to the entire satisfaction of the most unscrupulous patriot of the Union, I challenge conquest to bring my prediction and its power to the test by imposing the Atlantic tariff on the ports of the Pacific." So Governor Simpson made his journey to study the fur trade and study politics, and he accomplished both.
Second—In speaking of Mr. Farnham seeing Dr. Whitman's wagon at Fort Boise in 1837 (1839), she says: "Farnham remarks that it was left here under the belief that it could not be taken through the Blue Mountains. But, fortunately for the next that shall attempt to cross the continent, a safe and easy passage has lately been discovered by which vehicles of the kind may be drawn through to Walla Walla. The italics are my own and are used to point out that the first suggestion of a safe and easy road to the Columbia river came from a member of the Hudson's Bay Company, whereas Spalding and Gray affirm and re-affirm that the company put every possible obstacle in the way of wagon travel."
What the evidence is that any member of the Hudson's Bay Company suggested a safe and easy passage for wagons to the Columbia river is what I can not see. Mr. Farnham has been styled an ardent American. He had no connection with the company. Neither in this quotation from him or in my edition of Farnham can I find any evidence that any member of that company told him of this easy passage. Mr. Farnham revised, finished and published his work after he visited Dr. Whitman.
Third—I again quote: "He (Dr. Whitman) had been six years in the Cayuse country without either having benefited or conciliated the Indians." This is a broad assertion. Istikus, a Cayuse chief, was conciliated and benefited, so that in 1843, at Dr. Whit man's request, he aided as guide to the immigrants from Fort Hall to Walla Walla; it was such a permanent conciliation and benefit that in the war of 1855-6, according to Col. T. R. Cornelius, "he furnished us scouts, which were of great use to us, and often also furnished us with provisions when we most needed them." He also rang his little bell and called his band together to worship God as long as he lived. (See Eell's History of Indian Missions, pp. 64, 237). According to Senator Nesmith, he had a clear idea of Christianity. (See his Pioneer Address, 1875). A recent Protestant movement among the descendants of those with whom he labored, now on the Umatilla Reservation, and which has resulted in a Presbyterian church of considerable numbers, is attributed by those Indians to Dr. Whitman's teachings, who say they have 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 as saying it was a secret motive. Dr. Eells says it was a cherished object, and never any where has said it was a secret motive. Mrs. Victor, quotes Dr. Eells as saying it was not mentioned. Dr. Eells, after thinking long what words he should use, says: "I have no recollection that it was named." Quite a difference, Mrs. Victor says: "No one has ever told us what that object was." Dr. Eells says it was to consult with Rev. D. Greene, Secretary of the Board at Boston, and the Missionary Herald for December, 1866, says he had missionary objects in view, and Dr. Eells, in my "History of Indian Missions," (page 163), says: "It was also expected that the opportunity would be improved for the transaction of missionary business." Yet, Mrs. Victor speculates that it was to get some government office. It was curious, if he wished to obtain some office under the United States, for him to go to Boston to consult with Rev. D. Greene on missionary business. At one time Mrs. Victor says there is no evidence that Dr. Whitman went to Washington, and at another time she thinks he went to get a government office.
Sixth—A hint is given by Mrs. Victor in the letter which I published in my pamphlet from Dr. Whitman about the secret service fund, something might be omitted about the fund. She says: "The letter, as published, has some omissions, therefore it is not quite clear how the fund was to be used." I will here say that nothing was omitted in that letter as published that had any reference to that fund. The omissions referred only to trivial matters, some of them private, or to subjects which did not relate to the subject under discussion and which would not pay for printing. If Mrs. Victor or any one else wishes to know what those omissions are I will inform them. All that I know about that secret service fund is what is stated in that letter of Dr. Whitman and the one by his brother-in-law, as published in that pamphlet.
Seventh—About the motives which induced Dr. Whitman to go East, she says: "Dr. Whitman entered into the deceit, pretending to McKinlay, his warm friend at Walla Walla, that he was going on this journey solely to prevent the breaking of the mission at Lapwai. He even solicited a letter on the subject from McKinlay, to be presented to the Board in Spalding's behalf. To the missionaries, he said he was going East to prevent Oregon from falling into the hands of the British. To the Board, he said he had come to try to induce a few Christian families to return with him and settle about the mission. To the Secretary of War and his family friends, he confided a plan for keeping the Indians quiet by giving them sheep for their lands."
Mrs. Victor does not seem to comprehend the fact that Dr. Whitman could have more than one motive in going East, and that if he had told one person one thing and another person another, he might not have intended to deceive them. It is not certain, however, that he did even this. I ask for the evidence that Dr. Whitman said to Mr. McKinlay that he was going East solely to prevent the discontinuance of the mission at Lapwai. In the Seattle Intelligencer of April 30, 1881, is an article by Governor Evans on the same subject. He tries to prove as plainly as possible that Dr. Whitman went East to save the southern branch of the mission, especially Lapwai, and quotes from a letter of Mr. McKinlay to prove this, but the letter does not state, nor does Governor Evans anywhere say, that he said he was going solely for this purpose—a great difference whether the word solely is used or not. Whether he stated to Mr. McKinlay that he was going for political purposes seems to be an open question, some persons affirming it (see Eell's pamphlet, p. 12), and I have never seen this statement denied, though Mr. McKinlay does deny that Dr. Whitman was ever taunted in his house on political subjects.
Nay, it is plain that it was publicly known on this coast in the winter of 1842-3, that Dr. Whitman went East with the intention of bringing an emigration to this coast. Hines' History of Oregon was published in 1851, though evidently written before the death of Dr. Whitman in 1847, as it makes no mention of that event. At the beginning of chapter nine in that book is the statement that "the arrival of a large party of emigrants about this time (1842), and the sudden departure of Dr. Whitman to the United States with the avowed intention of bringing back with him as many as he could enlist for Oregon, served to hasten them to the above conclusion," i.e., that the whites had laid "a deep scheme to destroy them and take possession of their country." Mr. Hines also says that a letter was received by the Methodist Mission of the Wallamet from Rev. H. K. W. Perkins of The Dalles, which gave the information that the Nez Perces dispatched one of their chiefs in the winter of 1842-3 "on snow-shoes to visit the Indians east of Fort Hall for the purpose of exciting them to cut off the party of emigrants that it is expected Dr. Whitman will bring back with him to settle in the Nez Perce country." Dr. Eells' statement about Captain Grant's attempting to turn back Dr. Whitman from Fort Hall tallies with this statement—thus I fail to find evidence that Dr. Whitman deceived Mr. McKinlay.
From Dr. Eells' statement in my pamphlet it is plain that Dr. Whitman told the missionaries that he wished to go East for national purposes and for the good of the mission, as already stated. There was no deceit in this.
The American Board at Boston, according to the statement of Mr. P. B. Whitman, a nephew of the doctor, "censured him in very strong terms for leaving his post of duty on a project so foreign to that which they had sent him out to perform; also informed him that they had no money to spend in opening the western country to settlement." (See my pamphlet, p. 12). According to the annual report of the American Board for 1843 (p. 169), on ac count of the visit and representations of Dr. Whitman, the order for the discontinuance of the southern branch of the mission was countermanded —so the Board was not deceived.
According to the evidence of Dr. Eells, the Mission expected that he was going both on missionary and political business—so they were not all deceived. Hence all these facts show that Dr. Whitman was not the deceiver Mrs. Victor attempts to make him.
Eighth—Again she says that he wished to bring out Christian families, "which measure he thought would have a beneficial influence on the Indians, and discourage Catholicism, of which he expressed a dread, although there was not, at that period, a priest of the Romish church in the Walla Walla Valley." These facts are literally as she states, only she insinuates strongly that Dr. Whitman had no need to dread the coming of the Catholics. He, however, knew that there was reason for him to dread them, and their own statement agrees with his idea. They say (History of Catholic Missions in Oregon, p. 64): "It was enough for them"—the Catholic missionaries—" to hear that some false prophet had penetrated into a place, or intended visiting some locality, to induce the missionaries to go there immediately to defend the faith and prevent error from propagating itself." And when they won the Indians from the Methodists at Nisqually and other places, they were not slow to boast of it. (Ibid, p. 89). There was reason for Dr. Whitman to dread them.
Ninth—In speaking of Dr. Whitman's leaving his station October 3, 1843, instead of on the 5th, as was his first plan, Mrs. Victor says: "I have pointed out that he told contradictory stories to several persons. When his associates from the Spokane, who were opposed to his going, and thought he ought to ohey the Board, left Wai-i-lat-pu for home, he promised them to wait until the 5th of October before starting, and to take their letters and written re ports. Instead of this, however, he started on the 3d, and when the courier arrived he was two days on the road to Fort Hall. * * * What did he fear in the reports of Walker and Eells that he thus gave them the slip?"
Had Mrs. Victor been (as it seems to me) as earnest to find out the truth as she has been to secure evidence against Dr. Whit man, she would not have made this mistake. There is nothing in the statement of Dr. Eells that his letters failed to go. That is an inference drawn by Mrs. Victor. Dr. Eells only said that Dr. Whitman went on the 3d instead of on the 5th, as was the first plan. He also says that Mr. Walker and himself prepared and forwarded their letters "seasonably" to Waiilatpu. In another published statement, Dr. Eells says: "Probably events transpiring in the intervening time hastened his departure so that he left on the 3d of October." (Eells' History of Indian Missions, p. 164). Dr. Eells has never complained that Dr. Whitman gave him the slip. Only Mrs. Victor thus complains. I asked Dr. Eells if his letters arrived at Dr. Whitman's before the Doctor started and his reply was, "yes." His courier reached Walla Walla "seasonably"—before the 3d—and Dr. Whitman did not "give him the slip."
Tenth—Again I quote: "At Fort Hall the Hudson's Bay Company's agent advised him to take the southern route, and furnished him another guide to Fort Uintah and so on." As if the Hudson's Bay Company helped him on his journey. I ask for the evidence of this statement. As far as I know Mr. A. L. Lovejoy, Dr. Whitman's traveling companion, has given the only account extant of that journey. He says: "We left Waiilatpu October 3, 1842; traveled rapidly, reached Fort Hall in eleven days, where we remained two days to recruit and make a few purchases. The Doctor engaged a guide and we left for Fort Winter." According to the statement of Dr. Eells. (History of Indian Missions, p. 168). "At Fort Hall Captain Grant, then in charge, in order to prevent Dr. Whitman from going East, falsely said that the Pawnees and Sioux were at war with each other and it would be almost certain death for him to proceed. Determined to go, he changed to a more southern route; but the statement, though false, most likely proved the salvation of Dr. Whitman, as, on account of the severity of the winter, he would probably have perished had he traveled the contemplated route. So Captain Grant tried to stop him, and I have seen no evidence that he furnished Dr. Whitman a guide.
Eleventh—Again she says: "Was it then that Whitman was planning to enrich himself at the expense of his missionary character that he practiced so much strategy? To me this seems to be the solution of the puzzle." Mrs. Victor seems to have an idea that Dr. Whitman was selfish and hypocritical, although she never saw the man. It would be well before attempting to defame the character of a man, now dead for thirty-seven years, to have proof of it which she can give. I have already shown that he did not practice the strategy with which she charges him. Hon. J. W. Nesmith does not agree with her. In an address before the Pioneer Society of Oregon in 1880, he says: "I regarded him as a quiet, unassuming man, and of great purity of character, utterly destitute of cant, hypocrisy, sham and effeminacy, and always terribly in earnest." Those who knew him best agree with the above. This is the first time I remember to have read any such charge against Dr. Whitman.
Twelfth—She says: "On reaching the frontier he found, as he had expected, numerous companies preparing to emigrate. He put himself in communication with those on his line of travel near St. Louis, and answered their numerous questions encouragingly. Further than this he had nothing to do with raising an immigration for Oregon."
Mrs. C. B. Carey says it was a pamphlet which Dr. Whitman wrote that induced her to come that year. Mr. John Zachrey says the same about his father, who came from Texas. Mr. J. C. Prentiss says he [Dr. Whitman] did all he could to induce immigration from New York. (Eells' pamphlet, pp. 30, 34.) And yet Mrs. Victor says he only encouraged those on his line of travel near St. Louis, and this was all that he did.
Thirteenth—Again I quote: "It is further claimed that Whitman piloted the immigration of 1843 to Oregon. Like the other claims, this one dissolves on investigation." Afterwards she acknowledges that he did something to find the road from Fort Hall to Grand Ronde, in common with his traveling companions, " all of them." If this latter statement is true, it is too much to say that this claim dissolves on investigation. It is true that John Gaunt was their pilot to Fort Hall, to which wagons had often come, and where all emigrant wagons had stopped. This was the easy part of the route at that place. Captain Grant attempted to prevent all wagons from coming to Oregon in 1843. Dr. Whitman assured the immigrants that they could bring their wagons to the Columbia, and Dr. Whitman won. After leaving Fort Hall, through the difficult and unknown part, Dr. Whitman was with the first immigrant wagon, the pilot to Grand Ronde, from which place he engaged some of those Indians whom he had "never conciliated "to find the route over the Blue Mountains. Thus he did pilot the immigration over the most difficult part of the route. Says Hon. Jesse Applegate, in his "Day with the Cow Column of 1843": "To no other individual are the emigrants of 1843 so much indebted for the successful conclusion of their journey as to Dr. Marcus Whitman."
Fourteenth—"According to Mr. Applegate," says Mrs. Victor, "Mr. Remeau, of the Hudson's Bay Company, furnished a complete way-bill of the route, with camping places." But Mr. Applegate was in the "cow column," or latter part of the immigration, and what good did this way-bill do when Dr. Whitman's ad vice in reference to taking wagons to the Columbia had prevailed over Captain Grant's doubts; when the wagons of the first part had gone, and when, according to Mrs. Victor, even they had to leave Mr. Remeau's route at the most difficult places, as it was the pack train? This seems to imply that the Hudson's Bay Company helped the immigration from Fort Hall. Hon. J. W. Nesmith (Pioneer Address, 1875), Governor P. H. Burnett ("Recollections of an Old Pioneer," page 117), and Mr. J. G. Baker, in a letter to the writer, all of that year's immigration, say that Captain Grant did all that he could do to induce them to leave their wagons at Fort Hall, or else to go to California. Gov. Burnett calls Fort Hall "the most critical part of the journey," and Mr. Nesmith says, "Happily Whitman's advice prevailed over Captain Grant's." According to Palmer's history, the same game was tried at Fort Hall with the immigration of 1845.
Fifteenth—Mrs. Victor gives a synopsis of Governor Simpson's journey around the world, the date of his starting, and also of his being at Vancouver, November 30, 1841, and adds: "It will be seen from these dates how impossible it was that the head of the great fur company should have been where he was said to have been, or doing what he was said to have been doing. I once wrote to George P. Roberts, the factotem of the business of the company in Oregon, and who was familiar with all the correspondence during a period of fourteen years, concerning Simpson's visit to Washington, and he wrote me in return that Simpson never was in Washington, so far as he knew, although he had agents there during the period when the company was endeavoring to get an award for their lands in Oregon after the treaty."
According to Governor Simpson's book, he reached London, on his return home, October 29, 1842, and, hence, it was not impossible for him to have been in Washington by February or March, 1843, the time Mr. Gray alleges he was there. Dr. Whitman almost crossed the continent after October 29, 1842. A letter just received from Dr. W. F. Tolmie of Victoria, formerly in charge of Fort Nisqually, and dated December 15, 1884, says: "Mrs. Victor is decidedly mistaken in stating, on the alleged authority of George Barber Roberts, recently deceased at Cathlamet, W. T., that George Simpson, afterwards Sir George, was never at Washington, D. C. Recollect having heard that he had been there, diplomatizing for the company. Can not recall to mind in what year. The British government of those days was, as usual about American matters, very ignorant, and as regards Oregon, in the midst of their other manifold responsibilities, very careless. Barber Roberts, a subordinate clerk at Vancouver until late in the forties, was afterwards locum tenens for the company at Cowlitz farm, Lewis county, W. T., when, through influx of settlers, it had ceased to be of any profit to the company. It was not the custom of the leaders of the Hudson's Bay Company to let their business, in its intricacies, be known to persons in the position held by the late Mr. Roberts."
This does not prove that Governor Simpson was in Washing ton in the winter of 1842-3, but it does show three mistakes in this paragraph: First, that Governor Simpson could not have been in Washington at the time claimed; second, that Governor Simpson was never in Washington; third, that Mr. George B. Roberts, a subordinate clerk, was the factotum of the business of the company in Oregon.
Sixteenth—In speaking of the proofs of Dr. Whitman's going to Washington, she says: "One proof is a letter by S.J. Parker, son of Rev. Samuel Parker, who says Whitman wished his father to go to Washington with him, but he is not sure his father went. How then can he be sure that Whitman went? If Mr. Parker is right, how about the story that the Doctor went immediately to Washington in his soiled buckskins?"
In the pamphlet from which the evidence is taken, Dr. S.J. Parker says: "My first memory was, as I wrote to Hon. Elwood Evans, of New Tacoma, Washington Territory, that both went, in a day or two, to Washington, but in this I may be mistaken as to my father. I know that Dr. Whitman went either the next day or a day or two after he came to see my father." Dr. Parker was then 24 years old. He says he has forgotten as to one thing, but has not as to the other. Mrs. Victor concludes that he has forgotten as to both, because he has forgotten as to one. According to that reasoning neither Mrs. Victor, nor myself, or any body else, remembers any thing. We all forget some things; therefore, we forget every thing, according to Mrs. Victor. We all know that such reasoning is false; that we forget some things, and remember some distinctly.
Seventeenth—In the same connection she says: "The second proof is a letter produced from Hon. Alex. Ramsey, who fancies that he remembers meeting Whitman at a certain boarding-house on Capitol hill. This does not tally either with the story of the Doctor's buckskins, which would hardly be allowed in such society. I am convinced, however, that Mr. Ramsey met some Oregon man, probably Dr. White, the difference in names being slight, and in dates but one year." She can not think that Dr. Whitman went to Washington, because Mr. McKinlay and Mr. Applegate knew nothing about it. Governor Ramsey says in his published letter (Eells pamphlet, page 16): "I was first elected to congress from Pennsylvania in October, 1842. For technical reasons the election went for naught, and I was re-elected in 1843. In the winter of 1842-3 I visited Washington, and called upon Mr. Joshua Giddings who was at that time boarding at Mrs. ——, on Capitol hill, in what was then called Duff Green's row. The building is still standing. When so visiting, Mr. Giddings introduced me to Dr. Whitman, who talked to me and others of the difficulties of his journey, of the character of the country, Indian affairs, British encroachments, etc." He remembers that in the winter of 1842-3 he went there, because he was at that time first elected to congress, Mrs. Victor is satisfied that he is mistaken, and went a year before and met Dr. White. Who knows the most about it, Mrs. Victor or Governor Ramsey?
Those buckskin pants seem in several places to trouble Mrs. Victor. According to testimony Dr. Whitman was somewhat care less about his personal appearance, so Mr. Gray states in his history. and Mr. Hinman agrees thereto (Eells pamphlet, p. 14). But it is evident to all that improbable things are constantly occurring. Such reasoning reminds me of a book entitled "Historic Doubts as to Napoleon Bonaparte," which was intended as a satire on the doubts which some have expressed as to the works and existence of Christ, in which the writer attempts to show that much of what it is claimed Napoleon did was very improbable, and that the witnesses were either deceived, mistaken or unreliable, and at last he closes by saying that from such reasoning it is not probable that Napoleon ever lived. Still fhe world will always believe that Napoleon did live and perform many of the improbable things attributed to him. And it is no evidence that Dr. Whitman did not do some things attributed to him because they are improbable, when good witnesses testify that he did. It does not seem probable that Mrs. Victor should make the Columbia run east and south of the Whitman mission, but she has done so. Dr. Whitman's improbables are no more improbable.
Eighteenth—Further, she says that "if Dr. Geiger sent provisions to Dr. Whitman at Fort Hall, he must have sold them; [What if he did?] as according to several of the immigrants, he still depended on them for food, as he had done all the way." Mr. Applegate states, according to Mr.s. Victor's article, that they hauled his [Dr. Whitman's] provisions across the plains for him. Then he depended on them for the hauling of them, and not for the pro visions, and this only as far as Fort Hall. Says Mr. J. B. McLane, in a letter to the writer: "The Indians had brought considerable flour to him at Fort Hall, and the morning we left there he distributed all the provisions he had to the needy immigrants, except about fifty pounds, for five of us were in his mess, and the only ones who went ahead of the wagons. I was the driver of the light wagon. I must state another fact, that we picked up some beef bones the morning we left Fort Hall, and a young calf that was dropped that morning, and of course it was too young to travel, and it was knocked in the head and put in my wagon for us to eat, but I lost that calf out before we arrived at camp—it was rather too young for us." So, instead of depending on the immigrants for food, he only depended on them for the hauling of it, and furnished them provisions when they most needed them and where it was very difficult to get them, if not impossible, had it not been for Dr. Whitman, while he, himself, in order to do this, was willing to live on beef bones and veal too young even for the immigrants.Nineteenth—A large part of the first portion of the article is devoted to stating the amount of information obtained by the Government about this coast, which I do not deny. Her inference is that Mr. Webster "understood the Oregon question." I quote: "If any one supposes that the man who aspired to the presidency in 1836 was ignorant of these indications, he is not only misinformed but uninformed." "And just at this period (1843) we are told that the Government at Washington, and especially the Secretary of State, were in deplorable ignorance of the subject. 'Would it not be justifiable to impute the ignorance to their calumniators?" This is the question, did Webster understand the Oregon question? It is not certain proof that Mr. Webster understood it because there was information in Washington. Some people there did understand the question tolerably well, and some did not who ought to have done so. The question is about Mr. Webster. As late as 1846, when the value of Oregon was far better known than in 1843, Mr. Webster said in the Senate while defending his part in the Ashburton treaty of 1842, which settled the northeastern boundary: "Now what is this river St. John? We have heard a vast deal lately of the value and importance of the river Columbia and its navigation, but I will undertake to say for all purposes of human use the St. John is worth a hundred times as much as the Columbia is or ever will be." (Webster's Speeches, Vol. V., p. 102).
Mrs. Victor tries to get around this by saying that she admits "that Webster was conservative and diplomatic. He knew as well how to throw dust as another. But it was when he came to act you could rely upon his securing American rights," which means, I suppose, that Mr. Webster said one thing and did another; that he deceived the people; that he lied. I am not willing to at tribute such actions to Mr. Webster, but would ask who are his calumniators?
Moreover, Twiss, an English writer, in his work on the Oregon Territory (p. 274, edition of 1846), says: "It would be idle to speculate on those future destinies (of Oregon) whether the circumstances of the country justify Mr. Webster's anticipations, that it will form at some not very distant day an independent confederation or whether the natural divisions of Northern and Southern Oregon are likely to attach ultimately, the former by community of interest to Canada, and the latter to the United States."I acknowledge the truth of Mr. Webster's statement that the United States "had never offered nny line south of forty-nine degrees, and she never will." I know that Dr. Whitman could not affect the Ashburton treaty, which was signed six months before he reached Washington, and that other parties besides Mr. Webster made the Oregon treaty in 1846. I acknowledge that there are some difficulties in the way of accepting and reconciling all the statements of all parties. I am waiting for more light. As many seeming difficulties in the Bible, where that book and secular history have seemed to conflict, have been reconciled by the discoveries of the last fifty years, so I am waiting for more light on the subject under discussion. Much has come to light during the past few years, so that even Mrs. Victor has changed her opinion.
Although I am not as well acquainted with the making of treaties as with some other things, yet it seems to me that there is a possibility of reconciliation. Mr. Webster and Lord Ashburton were authorized, if I mistake not, to include the Oregon boundary in the treaty of 1842, but did not do so, because they thought that the Maine boundary was all they could manage. Naturally, Mr. Webster's thoughts would be on the subject, even after the treaty of 1842 was made. If he felt about Oregon as he said he did in his speech of 1846, and as Mr. Twiss says he did, he would be willing to part with Northern Oregon for a little, and may have had some preliminary papers signed with agents of the Hudson's Bay Company, or of the English government, so that if the subject should come up in an official way, he would be committed. Or he might have written some letter to President -Tyler embodying his views of the subject, and so could truthfully say when Dr. Whitman appeared in a somewhat uncouth way, and when Mr. Webster did not want to be troubled with the subject," The papers are signed." And so when President Tyler knew that the emigration of 1843 was a success, he used his influence against this plan so successfully that the papers have been suppressed. I do not say that this was done, but can not see why this or something similar may not have been, and if so, all the statements can be reconciled. This seems to me to be far better than to accuse the missionaries of getting up a story—men who have hazarded their lives for the good of others; or Dr. Whitman of "deception, self-conceit, ignorance and falsifying," a man of whom his cotemporaries, both missionary and anti-missionary, speak very highly, and whom they never have accused of such things; or Secretary Webster of ing dust and lying, even when, according to the N. Y. Independent of January, 1870, he said to a personal friend that "it is safe to assert that our country owes it to Dr. Whitman and his associate missionaries that all the territory west of the Rocky Mountains and south as far as the Columbia river, is not now owned by England and held by the Hudson's Bay Company." We can at least afford to wait and be charitable.
Is it not a fact that when a writer, as Mrs. Victor claims to be, "in the interest of truth," makes such mistakes, disposes of witnesses in so curious a way, and draws such strange conclusions as are shown in this article, it can not be claimed that her article has any great historical weight.