Extracts from Mr. Hines’ history.—Attempt to capture an Indian horse-thief.—Dr. McLaughlin refuses to sell supplies to the signers of the petition.—Excitement in the settlement.—Interview with Dr. McLaughlin at Vancouver.

“April 14.—Information was brought to the settlement from the Clackamas tribe of Indians, who live three miles below the falls of the Wallamet, which served to increase the excitement occasioned by the reports from the interior. It appears that an Indian of the Molalla tribe, connected with the Clackamas Indians by marriage, stole a horse from a man by the name of Anderson, and when asked by the latter if he had stolen his horse and rode him off, answered, ‘Yes, I stole your horse, and when I want another one I shall steal him also.’ To this Anderson replied, ‘If you stole my horse you must pay me for him.’ ‘Yes,’ said the Indian, ‘I will pay you for him, take that horse,’ pointing to a very poor horse which stood near by, with one eye out, and a very sore back. Anderson replied, ‘That is a very poor horse, and mine is a good one; I shall not take him, and if you don’t bring him back I will report you to Dr. White.’ ‘I am not afraid of Dr. White,’ said the Indian; ‘let him come if he wants to, and bring the Boston people with him; he will find me prepared for him.’

“Anderson not being able to effect a settlement with the Indian, immediately reported him to the agent, whereupon the latter wrote to a man at the falls, by the name of Campbell, to take a sufficient number of men armed with muskets, and go very early in the morning to the Indian camp, and take the horse-thief a prisoner, and bring him to the falls.

“Accordingly, Campbell procured five men, and went to the camp as commanded, but found thirty or forty Indians painted in the most hideous manner, and armed with muskets, bows and arrows, tomahawks and scalping-knives, and determined at all events to protect the horse-thief, and drive back those that should come to take him. Campbell rushed on to take the rogue, but met with much resistance from superiority of numbers; and finding that the enterprise, if urged forward, would terminate in bloodshed, if not in the loss of all their lives, sounded a retreat, and extricating himself from the Indians, returned to the falls. He communicated the result of his attempt to Dr. White, and the doctor started off immediately in company with G. W. Le Breton, resolved to capture the thief and bring the tribe to terms.”

This day’s proceedings are given as a specimen of the foolish conduct of Dr. White and his friends.

“April 17.—The excitement still continues, former reports having been confirmed, and all were engaged in repairing guns, and securing ammunition. A report was in circulation that Dr. McLaughlin refused to grant supplies for any consideration, to all those persons who subscribed the memorial praying the Congress of the United States to extend jurisdiction over Oregon. If this be so, the American population (as nearly all signed the memorial) will not be able to obtain ammunition, however necessary it may be, as there is none in the country except what may by found within the stockades of Vancouver. I think, however, that the report is false. Report says, furthermore, that the Klikitat Indians are collecting together back of the Tualatin plains, but for what purpose is not known. The people on the plains, consisting of about thirty families, are quite alarmed. There is also a move among the Calapooyas. Shoefon, one of the principal men of the tribe, left this place a few days ago, and crossed the Wallamet River, declaring that he would never return until he came with a band of men to drive off the Boston people. He was very much offended because some of his people were seized and flogged, through the influence of Dr. White, for having stolen a horse from some of the missionaries, and flour from the mission mill. His influence is not very extensive among the Indians, or we might have much to fear.

“The colony is indeed in a most defenseless condition; two hundred Indians, divided into four bands, might destroy the whole settlement in one night.

“In the evening of the 17th, Dr. White arrived at my house, bringing intelligence from the falls. He and Mr. Le Breton attempted to go to the falls on horseback, but in trying to ford Haunchauke River, they found the water so deep they were obliged to swim, and the doctor turned his horse’s head and came out the side he went in; but Le Breton, being the better mounted of the two, succeeded in gaining the opposite shore; and having the doctor’s letters in his possession, continued on to the falls. The doctor returned to the settlement. Le Breton returned the following day, and brought information from the five men who had attempted to take the Indian who had stolen Anderson’s horse, that soon after their retreat the Indians became alarmed and broke up in great haste; but, before they left, they informed Anderson that the horse they had stolen from him was worn out and good for nothing, and tying a good horse to a tree near Anderson’s house, they told him that he must take that and be satisfied. They then hurried away, saying that they should not be seen in that region again. It was ascertained that the Clackamas Indians had nothing to do with the stolen horse; that it was a band of the Molallas, the very same rascals that stole a horse from me two years before, and after having him in their possession several weeks, brought him down within a few miles of my house, where they encamped, and where I went with one man and took him from the midst of more than fifty grim-looking savages.”

This shows at least that Mr. Hines had personal courage.

“On the 20th of April a letter was received in the settlement, written by H. B. Brewer, at the Dalles, which brings the latest intelligence from the infected region. This letter states that the Indians in the interior talk much of war, and Mr. Brewer urges Dr. White to come up without delay, and endeavor to allay the excitement. He does not inform us that the Indians design any evil toward the whites, but says that the war is to be between themselves, but that the Boston people have much to fear. As the doctor, in his visit to the interior last October, left an appointment to meet the Wallawalla Indians and the Cayuses, in their own country, on the 10th of May, and believing that a great share of the excitement originated in a misunderstanding of the Indians, he came to the conclusion at all hazards to go among them. At the solicitation of the agent, I determined to accompany him on the expedition.

“The great complaint of the Indians was that the Boston people designed to take away their lands, and reduce them to slavery. This they had inferred from what Dr. White had told them in his previous visit; and this misunderstanding of the Indians had not only produced a great excitement among them, but had occasioned considerable trouble betwixt them and the missionaries and other whites in the upper country, as well as influencing them to threaten the destruction of all the American people. Individuals had come down from Fort Wallawalla to Vancouver, bringing information of the excited state of things among the Indians, and giving out that it would be extremely dangerous for Dr. White to go up to meet his engagements. Their opinion was, that in all probability he and the party which he might think proper to take with him would be cut off. But it was the opinion of many judicious persons in the settlement, that the welfare of the Indians, and the peace and security of the whites, demanded that some persons qualified to negotiate with the Indians should proceed immediately to the scene of disaffection, and if possible remove the cause of the excitement by correcting the error under which the Indians labored. Accordingly Dr. White engaged twelve men besides myself, mostly French-Canadians who had had much experience with Indians, to go with him; but a few days before the time fixed upon to start had arrived, they all sent him word that they had decided not to go. They were doubtless induced to pursue this course through the influence of Dr. McLaughlin and the Catholic priests.”

Most likely, Mr. Hines, but you seem to be afraid to express a decided opinion, even after they have accomplished their object.

“When the day arrived for starting, we found ourselves abandoned by every person who had engaged to go, except Mr. G. W. Le Breton, an American, one Indian boy, and one Kanaka. With the two latter the doctor and myself left the Wallamet settlement on the 25th of April, 1843, and proceeded on horseback to the Butte, where we found Le Breton in waiting for us. He had provided a canoe and a few pieces of pork and beef for our use on the voyage.

“Here we met a letter from Dr. John McLaughlin, at Vancouver, discouraging us from our undertaking in view of the difficulties and dangers attending such an expedition; but we had counted the cost, and were not to be diverted from our purpose, though danger stared us in the face. We supposed that if the Indians entertained any hostile intentions against the whites in general, there could be no better way to defeat their purposes than to go among them; convince them that they had no grounds of fear; and that the whites, instead of designing to bring them into subjection, were desirous of doing them good. Prevented by one thing and another from setting sail, on the night of the 27th we slept on a bank of sand at the Butte, and next day proceeded in our little canoe down to Wallamet Falls, where we continued until the 29th. Here we received another package from Dr. McLaughlin, giving us information that Rev. Mr. Demerse, a Catholic priest, had just come down from the upper country, bringing intelligence that the Indians are only incensed against the Boston people; that they have nothing against the French and King George people; they are not mad at them, but are determined that the Boston people shall not have their lands, and take away their liberties.

“On receiving this intelligence from Mr. Demerse, Dr. McLaughlin advised the Frenchmen, who had engaged to go with Dr. White, to have nothing to do with the quarrel, to remain quiet at home, and let the Americans take care of themselves. He also expressed, in his letter, the opinion that all the people should remain quiet, and in all probability the excitement among the Indians would soon subside.

“Not seeing sufficient reason to change our course, on the morning of the 28th we left our hospitable friends at the falls and continued our course down the Wallamet toward Vancouver. At noon we had sailed twenty miles, and stopped for dinner within five miles of the mouth of the Wallamet, on a low piece of ground, overgrown with luxuriant grass, but which is always overflowed at the rise of the Columbia, or about the first of June. Weighed anchor after dinner, and at four o’clock, P. M., arrived at Vancouver. Called on Dr. McLaughlin for goods, provisions, powder, balls, etc., for our accommodation on our voyage up the Columbia, and, though he was greatly surprised that, under the circumstances, we should think of going among those excited Indians, yet he ordered his clerks to let us have whatever we wanted. However, we found it rather squally at the fort, not so much on account of our going among the Indians of the interior, as in consequence of a certain memorial having been sent to the United States Congress, implicating the conduct of Dr. McLaughlin and the Hudson’s Bay Company, and bearing the signature of seventy Americans. I inquired of the doctor if he had refused to grant supplies to those Americans who had signed that document; he replied that he had not, but that the authors of the memorial need expect no more favors from him. Not being one of the authors, but merely a signer of the petition, I did not come under the ban of the company; consequently I obtained my outfit for the expedition, though at first there were strong indications that I would be refused.

“We remained at the fort over night and a part of the next day, and after a close conversation with the gentleman in command, were treated with great courtesy.”