9/11/2010
APPLEGATE TRAIL OUTING DIARY REFERENCES
1.
1847 Emigrant Sub-irrigated Prairie Encampment That Still Does Not Have Trees Because the
Serpentine Derived Soils Have Too Much Magnesium and Not Enough Calcium (JA-7 at JCSP).
Davis,
Charles George, The Oskaloosa Company, Last Wagon Train To Skinners’s In 1847,
Frontier Publishing, 1996.
Lester G. Hulin was an 1847 pioneer
and diarist traveling the Jacksonville Road of the Applegate Trail (Trail). His October 19th
Rogue River ford entry follows:
T[uesday] 19th In about 1
M[ile] we crossed the [Rogue] river and left it after following it about 50 M[iles] in
all, passed among the bluffs and camped after a distance of about 12 M[iles] [One
mile up Schoolhouse Creek in Cochrane Meadow west of I-5; east of I-5 is Josephine County
Sportsman Park and JA-7 at edge of meadow].
Some
of the Indians are yet following us. Their room is better than their company.
W.[ednesday] 20th. Upon leaving camp
we soon came to a fine creek [Jumpoff Joe Creek]. Then bad roads ensued (rough hilly and
sideling) [North Oxyoke Bow] but by night we were in a valley [Grave Creek] with good
camping ground at hand. Distance 8 Ms.
Hulin’s 1847 diary entries for
his milage figures fit the GLO maps for the JR from the Rogue River at Pearce Riffle to
Grave Creek.
2.
Harris Creek Ford (IV Ford No. 4) on Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) managed
lands.
EARLY PIONEER FAMILY ALONG THE SOUTHERN
ROUTE
George W. and Mary Ann Harris and
family crossed the plains by wagon train via the old Oregon Trail arriving in Oregon
August 31, 1852. They spent their first
winter in the Willamette Valley. The
following spring, George set out in search for his dream homestead. They made a donation land claim just north of the
Manzanita Rest Stop on Interstate 5. George
was born 1820 in Jefferson County, West Virginia and married Mary Ann on February 9, 1843
in Missouri.
According to a book by Percy T.
Booth, UNTIL THE LAST ARROW, B&B Publishing, Coos Bay, Oregon, 1997, Pages 201-202.:
“Leaving
Mary Ann and the children with her brother’s family, he rode south through the canyon
to the far edge of civilization – the Rogue River Valley. There he found a country unlike any he had ever
seen before. As he traveled deeper into
southern Oregon, he was amazed at the difference a hundred miles could make. Instead of gentle, flatlands and low, rolling
hills, he found layers of rugged mountains, stacked in wild confusion, with little,
secret, green valleys hidden in their folds. Cold,
clear streams rushed here and there, joined hands, and hurried westward. There was bright, warm sunshine to ripen the grain
and grow the grazing grass. And over it all
spread vast forests to furnish the logs and lumber to build the homes and heat the cabins
and cook the food. And in the forests, game
of all kinds was plentiful, more than he had ever seen—more than he had ever hoped
for. He looked at it all with amazement, for
never in his wildest dreams had he hoped to find a place so near to his liking. Five miles north of the banks of the Rogue River
along the Oregon-California Trail he found the place he had been looking for – a
mile-long meadowland almost clear of trees and growth.
It lay like an emerald dropped in a necklace of heavy timber. Little effort would be needed to clear the ground
for seeding. A happy creek wandered through
the meadow, chattering a wordless tune.”
3.
Harris Family Cabin Location along the Trail at Cairn Where Mary Harris Lost Her
Husband, Son, and Hired Hand During the 1855 Rogue River Indian War (JA-H-2A; ODOT managed
lands).
WOMAN’S
DEFENSE OF HOME SAGA OF WESTERN COURAGE
Grant
Pass Courier, April 2, 1960 (Diamond Anniversary Issue)
October
9, 1855 event
“As the relief party approached
Harris’ house, no signs of human occupancy were visible, and an air of desolation lay
upon the scene. The outbuildings had been
burned, and wreaths of smoke rose slowly from their ruins.
Dismounting, some of the party passed within the house. The spectacle that met their eyes was a terrible
one. In the room lay the body of the
ill-fated owner pierced by a bullet. The
signs of determined attack and resistance were visible in the bullet-marked doors and
walls. Whatever the termination of the
contest, could not be ascertained, and as the party felt that it would be a waste of time
to remain, the order was given to mount and push on.
As the cavalcade passed a
willow thicket not far from the now abandoned homestead a cry was heard, and a woman,
begrimed and disheveled, rushed out, leading a wounded girl by the hand, and implored the
aid of the troops. It was Mrs. Harris, who,
having with the courage of a lioness, defended her hearth and her family from the attacks
of a large party of murderous Indians, had after their withdrawal, taken refuge in the
willow copse, and there awaited the arrival of succor.
When the troops gathered about her house she had watched with anxious eyes,
too far off to distinguish whether they were whites sent to relieve her or red men bent to
complete their horrible work. Her story is
one of the most extraordinary in the whole range of frontier narrative and forms the
leading episode of the terrible massacre, which is now being recounted.
In the Harris domicile resided
five persons – Mr. and Mrs. Harris, their two children, Mary [Sophia], a girl of 12,
and David, somewhat younger. The fifth was
Frank A. Reed. When the first alarm of
Indians was given the latter attempted to escape to the woods, but was pursued and killed. His skeleton was found a year afterward.
The boy David, who was at some
distance from the house, was last seen running across the field. Subsequent trace of him was never found, but it is
supposed that he was murdered, and his body concealed.
Mr.
Harris was a few rods from the house when the red skins appeared, and in attempting to
retreat to his shelter, was fired at and mortally wounded as he stood upon the threshold
of his own door. His wife drew him into the
house and closed and barred the door, and obedient to her husband’s advice brought
the firearms – a rifle, double-barreled shotgun and revolver – and loading them,
began to return the fire of the miscreants, who remained close to the house. Her husband was dying in agony the while, and of
the two children, one, the boy, was she knew not where, but supposed with reason that he
had already met the cruel fate that impended over them all.
The child Mary, had been
painfully wounded in the arm, and the terrified sufferer climbed the ladder which led to
the attic and there remained for several hours, the mute witness of the terrible conflict.
While the Indians remained in
the vicinity they kept beyond the reach of danger from her fire, but repeatedly attempted
to cast burning brands upon the roof over her head, intending thereby to cremate all those
the house contained.
In an hour, more or less, the
husband and father breathed his last, and his bloody corpse with its wide-staring eyes and
the expression of agony into which its features were moulded, added ten fold to the
terrific nature of the surroundings which confronted the poor and despairing woman.
Through this scene of horror
she kept up such an effective resistance as she was able, discharging her firearms in such
directions and at such intervals as seemed to intimidate the savages, but probably not
succeeding in any case in hitting any of them.
Unfortunately this poor woman,
who was suffering so much from the cruelty of her assailants, was not able to revenge
herself effectually upon them, for never having fired a gun before, and gaining her
knowledge even of how to load one by the instructions of her wounded husband all she could
do was to load and fire, hoping that the show of resistance might, as it did, keep her
foes at a distance.
She steadily loaded her weapons
and discharged them though crevices of the logs of which the house was built, and the
Indians, though numerous, dared not attack the building.
They burned the outbuilding, however, first removing the horses from the
stable.
In the afternoon they decamped,
leaving the dauntless woman mistress of the field and the savior of her own and her
daughter’s life. As soon as she was
assured of their departure, she called her daughter down from the loft and with her took
refuge in the willow copse, and remained there until the arrival of the relief party, as
before said. By them she was removed to a
place of safety. “
4.
JR Ford No. 2: Tokay Creek Ford/Location of Levi Scott’s Alternate Trail Route
because the road cutters had done nothing on the anticipated
Collins, James Lyton, From Independence to
Independence, Levi Scott’s authorized and approved, handwritten biography, circa
1880’s. Roseburg: Unpublished type-scripted manuscript archived in
Douglas County Historical Museum Reference Library, 1955[?]. Pages 192-194.
“The second day
after we crossed Rogue River, we came to a place where the road cutters had done nothing,
and it was impossible for us to pass with the wagons.
So the train was brought to a halt. I
went forward, and after searching for a long time I found a place where we could pass by
cutting through the thick bushes for about a furlong.
The place where the horse trail passed was too rough, and could not easily
be made passible for wagons. We went to work
on the line I had blazed out, and cut our way through the woods, which brought us out near
the Tetalum, or Louse Creek, as it is now called, by the realistic and unpoetical people
who live along its banks.”
5.
1846 & 1847 Rogue River’s Pearce Riffle Ford (JR Ford No. 1; Josephine County
managed Pearce Riffle Park).
Collins, James Lyton, From Independence to
Independence, Levi Scott’s authorized and approved, handwritten biography, circa
1880’s. Roseburg: Unpublished type-scripted manuscript archived in
Douglas County Historical Museum Reference Library, 1955[?]. Pages 192-194.
“We traveled down
Rogue River about forty or fifty miles, and crossed it at a place where the ford was
rather deep and rough. It is a swift,
turbulent, and rapid stream, and there are not many places where it can be forded with
safety, even late in the fall when it is at its lowest stage.”
Talbot Carter with Scott on the 1846
train wrote:
". . . we forded the
river, a swift, ugly stream with the water in the wagon beds in some places, but all got
safely over . . ."
Davis, Charles
George, The Oskaloosa Company, Last Wagon Train To Skinners’s In 1847, Frontier
Publishing, 1996.
Lester G. Hulin was an 1847
pioneer and diarist traveling the Jacksonville Road of the Applegate Trail (Trail). His
October 19th Rogue River ford entry follows:
“T[uesday] 19th
In about 1 M[ile] we crossed the [Rogue] river and left it after
following it about 50 M[iles] in all, passed among the bluffs and camped after a
distance of about 12 M[iles].
W.[ednesday] 20th. Upon
leaving camp we soon came to a fine creek [Jumpoff Joe Creek]. Then bad roads
ensued (rough hilly and sideling) [North Oxyoke Bow] but by night we were in a
valley [Grave Creek] with good camping ground at hand. Distance 8 Ms.”
Hulin’s 1847 diary entries for
his milage figures fit the GLO maps for the JR from the Rogue River at Pearce Riffle to
Grave Creek.
6.
1846 Rogue River’s Vannoy Creek Ford (IV Ford No. 1; private property -
Riviera Mobile Park).
The Text for the Historical “Fort
Vannoy” Sign.
“FORT VANNOY
Ford
across Rogue River 1/4 mile south of this point, was used by Hudson’s Bay Company
trappers as early as 1827 - by the U.S. navy Wilkes Expedition, 1841 - by pioneers on
Applegate Trail.
Mr.
Long built first permanent non-Indian dwelling in the Rogue River near the ford in 1850,
and started ferry service. James Vannoy and
James Tuffs bought ferry in 1851. Vannoy took
up donation land claim in 1853.
In
1853, four Indians accused of killing seven miners on Galice Creek were tried, convicted
and hanged within 30 minutes. In 1855 a crude
fort was built serving as HQ for Oregon volunteers during Indian War.
Josephine
County Historical Society
Cooperating
with Oregon State Highway Dept.”
The historical “Fort
Vannoy” sign is north of the Rogue River and south, and in the right-of-way, of Lower
River Road, Josephine County, Oregon. It is
¼ mile west of the junction of Hunt Lane and Lower River Road and ¼?? mile east of the
junction of Upper River Road and Lower River Road.
REMINISCENCES OF EXPLORATION PARTY
Applegate, Lindsay - Notes and Reminiscences of
Laying Out and Establishing The Old Emigrant Road into Southern Oregon In the Year 1846.
(p. 17-18)
“We
found everything all right on the morning of the 27th, although the Indians had
hovered around us all night, frightening our horses a number of times. From the tracks we could see that they approached
very closely to our encampment. Making an
early start we moved on very cautiously. Whenever
the trail passed though the cuts we dismounted and led our horses, having our guns in hand
ready at any moment to use them in self-defense, for we had adopted this rule, never to be
the aggressor. Traveling through a very
broken country the sharp hills separated by little streams upon which there were small
openings, we came out at about noon into a large creek, a branch of Rogue river, now call
Grave creek, on which we rested about two hours. During
the afternoon our course was over a more open country—through scattering pine and oak
timber. Towards evening, we saw a good many
Indians posted along the mountain side and then running ahead of us. About an hour by sun we reached a prairie of
several hundred acres, which extends down to very near the bank of Rogue river. As we advanced towards the river, the Indians in
large numbers occupied the riverbank near where the trail crossed. Having understood that this crossing was a
favorite place of attack, we decided as it was growing late, to pass the night in the
prairie. Selecting a place as far from the
brush as possible, we made every preparation for a night attack.”
“In selecting our camp on
Rogue River, we observed the greatest caution. Cutting stakes from the limbs of an old oak
that stood in the open ground, we picketed our horses with double stakes as firmly as possible. The horses were picketed in the form of a hollow
square, outside of which we took up our positions, knowing that in case of an attack there
would be a chance of losing our horses and that would be a complete defeat. We keep vigilant guard during the night, and the
next morning could see the Indians occupying the same position as at dark. After an early breakfast we began to make
preparations for moving forward. There had
been a heavy dew, and fearing the effects of the dampness upon our fire-arms, which were
muzzle-loaders, of course, and some of them with flint-locks, we fired them off and
reloaded. In moving forward, we formed two
divisions, with the pack horses behind. On
reaching the river bank the front division fell behind the pack horses and drove them
over, while the rear division faced the brush, with gun in hand, until the front division
was safely over. Then they turned about, and
the rear division passed over under the protection of their rifles. The Indians watched the performance from their
places of concealment, but there was no chance for them to make an attack without exposing
themselves to our fire. The river was deep
and rapid, and for a short distance some of the smaller animals had to swim. Had we rushed pell mell in the stream, as parties
sometimes do under such circumstances, our expedition would probably have come to an end
there.”
Overland in 1846 – Diaries and Letters of The
California-Oregon Trail, Edited
by Dale Howell Morgan, Vol. I, The Talisman Press, Georgetown, Calif. 1963. Page 185-Diary of Virgil Pringle and Notes - page
395.
“Friday, October 16
– Cross Rogue River about 4 miles from last camp.
Ford good. Camp on right
bank”
Garrison, A. Henry, Reminiscences of A. H.
Garrison, His Early life, Across the Plains And Of Oregon from 1846 – 1903,
Oregon Historical Society manuscript 874, 1906. Pages
22-23.
“From here we went down
the river to the ford, near where Grants Pass is located.
Before we got to the ford, Captain Vanderpool took fifty men, and went ahead
of the wagons to look out the ford, and to clear it of Indians if there should be any
there to give us trouble in crossing the river. On
coming to the ford he divided his men, sending one party across the river, while the rest
remained behind to give the advancing men protection if need be. When the {wagon train} was approaching the far
bank, the Indians showed themselves but they done no damage, as they were driven back into
the woods by them who remained behind. When
all had crossed the river they scoured the {woods} thoroughly, but no Indians could be
found, but blood was found, showing some of the savages did not escape with a whole hide. The men remained and held the ford until all was
over.
After crossing the river we made
camp, Father placed out the guards, after doing so, he was going around the guard line,
when he heard a gun fire, and a man began calling for help, Father ran, gathering the men
on guard as he went as was soon upon at the scene of trouble, as he got there quite a
company of men arrived from camp led by the Captain.
The trouble was this, Mr. Pool, the man in trouble had sat down by the side
of a big log, while so sitting he saw an Indian put his head from behind a tree and shot
at it, as soon as he had fired, he discovered there were Indians all around him, he threw
himself under the log, and raised the shout for help, it was luckey for him that the
savages did not rush on him, they contented themselves by shooting arrows at him, but as
where the ground was depressed, they shot their arrows in the log above his boddy. As the men approached the savages ran, and when
the savage that Pool had shot at, all that could be found of him was a lot of blood and
brains that was where he had fallen.
From here to Grave (now Leland) Creek
Miss Crowley died from the affects of the poisoned arrow,
from
here to Cow Creek, where the savages made a slight attack on the camp, they shot a few
arrows
into
camp, but a few volleys from our rifles in the woods silenced them, but they kept such a
whooping
and yelling a short distance from our camp, that there was but little sleeping in camp
that
night.”
7. Haines
Apple Tree Historical Marker Along Trail Where Haines Family Lost Their Lives During 1855
Rogue River Indian War (IV-H-6).
A FEW NOTES OF THE LIFE OF DAVID H.
SEXTON, A PIONEER OF 1847
Written by Charles D. Sexton, only child of David and Caroline Sexton.
Date:
October 9, 1855
“The
Volunteers next went to the Haines home, which was located about where the townsite of
Merlin is now. The Haines family consisted of Mr. Haines, his wife, and four little
boys, and one girl named Mary, who was about twelve years of age.
When the Volunteers got to the Haines farm they
beheld a sight never to be forgotten even by the bravest of men. Mr Haines had been
murdered and scalped, and then his body thrown across a bench in the house.
Three of the little boys near the door on the outside of the house, their heads split open
with a tamahawk. The fourth boy, the baby of the family, lay at the east corner of
the house. The Indians had taken him up by the feet and had beaten his head off
against one of the logs of the house. The top of the little fellow's head lay at a
short distance from the body. The boys had not been scalped.
When my father beheld this sight he turned to
his captain and said. "Captain, I have been on the frontier a long time, I have
seen some hard sights, but I believe that this is the worst sight I have ever seen.
Haines and I were friends, I promise his dead body I will get revenge out of
the Indians."
They could not find Mrs Haines or the daughter.
They buried Mr. Haines in one grave and the four little boys in another, in
front of the house, under three large pine trees.
The Indians made Mrs Haines and little Mary
Haines prisoners, and took them down Rogue River to Hellgate, where they scalped the
little girl and through her body over the bluff into Rogue River.
They took Mrs Haines on down Rogue River, and
then scalped her and threw her body also into the river, but my father was never able to
find out the point where this was done.”
8.
Trail Through the Emigrant Pleasant Valley Cemetery (PVC) in 1855 (four PVC
brochures).
9.
1855 Verified Survey Illinois Valley Route of Trail with Swale (IV-6 & IV-7).
10.
Widow Niday House Location along the Trail Burnt During the 1855 Rogue River Indian
War (JA-11, JA-12, & JA-H-3).
A FEW NOTES OF THE LIFE OF CAROLINE
SEXTON
Written by Charles D. Sexton, only child of David and Caroline Sexton.
“In 1854 Mr. Niday located a
donation claim near the present site of Hugo. In April 1855 Mr Niday died leaving my
mother in an unsettled wild Indian country with three small children, one a baby eight
days old. On the morning of October 5, 1855 the Rogue River Indians again went on
the war path. On that day occured the greatest mruder and butchering of the early
Pioneers that Southern Oregon ever knew. The details I do not care to enter into at
this time. My mother and family had just finished their breakfast. Mother came
to the door loking south along the Jump off Joe valley. She saw smoke arrising from
the scattered farm houses and knew the Indians had broken out and were killing the
settlers and burning their property. She commenced immediately to prepare for
defence, gathering together her guns and baring the doors and preparing to sell her life
as dearly as possiable. About the time she had every thing completed four men who
had botten away from the Indians came running by and she asked them to help her away.
The indians had shot ones hat off and anothers bridle reins into. One of the
mens name was Judge Walton of Eugene the other men I do not know their names. Mr
Walton said to my mother have you any way to get away from here, and whe said no all I
have is my race mare in the barn. So he said to her so much the better you will need
a race horse to out run those Red Devils. The other three men began to get uneasy
and scared and started to go on. Mr Walton seeing this drew his six shooter and told
them to halt. I will shoot the first man who attempts to leave. Now there is
three of you and here are three little children, each one of you take a child and go and
it will not be good for the man who fails to take the child to the fort I will bring the
woman with me or the Indians will get my scalp. By this time everybody had left the
place except my mother and Mr. Walton. He said to her have you any money in the
house. Yes I have two thousand dollars in buckskin sacks in the trunk. He said
go and get your money. She went into the house but the trunk was locked and she
could not find the key. She came out of the house again and Walton said to her did
you get the money now. I can't find the key. Get that ax laying there and break open
the trunk. I will watch if I hollor you come. They expected the Indians
any minute. With the aid of the ax she broke the trunk open and got the two
bags of gold dust and ran out of the house and gave them to Walton. He said now get
on that horse and we will go. Don't attempt to ride sideways, get on there squaw
fashion. As they left the house Walton looked down the road and said here come the
Indians I think about two or three hundred as near as I can guess. Now came the ride
for life to fort Leland, a distance of 5 miles over a rough mountain trail. Now my
mother and her family that escaped being murdered by the Indians went from fort Ben
Halstead above where Grants Pass now stands to her place near Hugo. The fact that my
mother was on a race horse it ran away with her and Walton was soon left behind. She
passed the other 3 men that had the 3 children about where Mr. Ward lives. The man
said to her can't you stop that horse she said no it is running away with me and they
replied keep her in the trail and when you get to the fort tell them we are coming, and
that they are close after us but after she reached the top of the Grave Creek hill she
succeeded in getting the horse stopped and jumped
off to tighten the saddle and in doing so she broke it. She waited till the men came
up and told them that they would have to fix her saddle. They said to her no
the Indians are to close. Throw that saddle off and jump on there bare back and come
on. She threw the saddle to one side climbed on the mare bare back and took off
after the men down the mountain just as she started the Indians fired upon her but luckly
did not hit her. The Indians fired on them several times during the chase down the
mountain but did not succeed in hitting any of them and they reached Fort Leland in
safety. The Indians surrounded fort Leland and fired on the fort all day and all
night. Just at daylight a company of volunteers came from Jacksonville and drove the
Indians from fort Leland. With the volunteers was an Indian scout by the name of
Hank Brown. He walked into the fort and said to my mother were you scared yesterday
when the indians were after you. She said yes Hank I wish they were all dead.
Just then he threw seven long haired Indian scalps into her lap saying there are seven
good Indians, my part of last nights fight.”
11.
1846 Site at Grave Creek Where Martha Leland Crowley Is Buried (Leland Creek that
became Grave Creek is named for her, Drive-by at JA-17).
Overland in 1846 – Diaries and Letters of The
California-Oregon Trail, Edited
by Dale Howell Morgan, Vol. I, The Talisman Press, Georgetown, Calif. 1963. Page 185-Diary of Virgil Pringle and Notes - page
395.
“Monday, October 19
– Move one mile to a camp, having none last night, and spent the day burying Mr.
Crowley’s daughter, who died yesterday evening, age about 14 years. 1 mile”.
12. Approximate
1846 location where the emigrants encamped for the night on the north side of Mt. Sexton
where Martha Leland Crowley, 16 years old, died of Typhoid Fever (JA-16 Overlook from
I-5).
Overland in 1846 – Diaries and Letters of The
California-Oregon Trail, Edited
by Dale Howell Morgan, Vol. I, The Talisman Press, Georgetown, Calif. 1963. Page 185-Diary of Virgil Pringle and Notes - page
395.
“Monday,
October 19 – Move one mile to a camp, having none last night, and spent the day
burying Mr. Crowley’s daughter, who died yesterday evening, age about 14 years. 1
mile.”
1846
– [In reminiscences about the 1846 journey via the Applegate Trail, Talbot Carter
recalled the death of Martha Leland Crowley at Grave Creek.]
“Soon
a wagon appeared, with weeping and lamentation amoung its occupants. It was soon learned that an estimable young lady
by the name of Crowley, who had been afflicted with typhoid fever, had died…..
When
morning came we found we were a few hundred yards from a small stream….Two years
afterward I passed that way, enroute to the California gold mines and, sorrowful to
relate, the Indians had exhumed the body….[Later] the mother came to where I was
stopping, to inquire if the reports were true…..I told her it was true.”
1846
– [Lucy (Henderson) Deady, also a member of the 1846 emigration, recalled the death
of Martha Leland Crowley and her burial at Grave Creek.]
“One
of the emigrants in our party was named Crowley. He
had lost several members of his family by death while crossing the plains, and at one of
our camps another member of the family, a daughter, Martha Leland Crowley, died. Theodore Prater and Mrs. Rachel Challiner and some
others from our wagon train helped bury her. They
buried her beneath a big pine tree on the banks of a small stream which they christened
Grave Creek, and which still bears that name. The
oxen were corralled over her grave so the Indians would not dig her up to get her
clothing. Colonel Nesmith saw the grave in
1848 and said it had been opened and that a number of human bones were scattered about. The bones were reinterred and the grave again
filled in. Mrs. Crowley, the girl’s
mother, later married a Mr. Fulkerson of Polk County.
My husband, Judge Deady, used often to stop at the Bates Stage Station, on
Grave Creek, near where Miss Crowley was buried. It
was called the Bates House, but was later renamed the Grave Creek Tavern. The 1854 the territorial legislature changed the
name of Grave Creek to Leland Creek and the hotel’s name was changed to the Leland
House.”
Collins, James Lyton, From
Independence to Independence, Levi Scott’s authorized and approved, handwritten
biography, circa 1880’s. Roseburg: Unpublished type-scripted manuscript archived in
Douglas County Historical Museum Reference Library, 1955[?]. Pages 192-194.
“The
next morning we moved up a little, and crossed the main creek, where we stopped to bury
the dead girl. Mrs. Tabitha Brown, a generous
and noble-hearted widow lady, who afterwards founded the College at Forest Grove in the
Tualatan Plains, gave the upper side-boards of her wagon to make a coffin. We dug the grave in the middle of the correlle, or
circle of the camp, and after depositing the remains, we filled it up level with the
surface of the ground, replacing the sods which had first been carefully removed so as to
give it the appearance of the natural, unbroken ground as much as possible. We then corralled all the stock so that they
should tread over the grave, and when we got ready to start, drove all the wagons, one
after another over it, in the hope of so obliterating all traces of it as to prevent the
Indians from finding, or disturbing it.”
13.
310' segment of the Trail at Mt. Sexton Summit Improved as a Military Road by Major Alvord
in 1853.
Collins, James Lyton, From
Independence to Independence, Levi Scott’s authorized and approved, handwritten
biography, circa 1880’s. Roseburg: Unpublished type-scripted manuscript archived in
Douglas County Historical Museum Reference Library, 1955[?]. Pages 192-194.
“Three days from here we struck
the head of a small branch running into Grave Creek which we followed down to its
junction, through heavy timber and thick bushes. The
road had been so poorly opened that the train was frequently compelled to stop and remove
obstacles that ought to have been cleared away by the party in advance of us.
As we came down this branch Miss
Leland Crowley died. The wagon in which the
sick girl lay stopped while she was dying, and those behind could not pass. This made a breach in the train, as those in front
still continued to advance without noticing that those in the rear were delayed.
This circumstance, perhaps, caused
the Indians who were constantly skulking in the woods near us to become more bold and to
venture upon us more closely. They shot one
of the oxen of Virgil K. Pringle as it stood in the team with an arrow, wounding it so
that the animal soon died. Yet the savage who
aimed the arrow from the thick bushes by the roadside was so completely concealed that he
was not seen at all, for it was late in the twilight of the evening.
About the time that Pringle’s ox
was shot on the right hand side of the road, one of the teamsters noticed that his dog
turned up his hair and snuffed towards the thick bushes on the left hand side, where the
drivers stood. On looking in the direction
indicated by the dog, he saw an Indian about fifteen paces from the road, with a gun
resting on top of a large log and pointed towards him.
He hissed on the dog, at the same time springing into the wagon to get his
rifle. At his bidding his own dog and two
others dashed at the Indian, who finding himself thus suddenly assailed and by such a
formidable and unlooked for force, fled precipately into the thick forest, and instantly
disappeared from sight.
But the resolute dogs pressed upon
him, and soon caught him, for we could distinctly hear what seemed to be a life-and-death
struggle between them for a few minutes, about a hundred yards away in the thicket. After the struggle had gone on for five minutes or
more, it ceased, and the dogs came back to us. One
of them was severely, but not mortally, wounded with an arrow which was sticking in his
side. We supposed that they had either
killed the Indian, or that he had been succored by some of his comrades. At the very least, he must have been fearfully
mangled by the dogs.
When
Miss Crowley was dead, the rear part of the train moved on again, and came into its place
in the camp after dark.”
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