might be trouble at home. Under all the circumstances, Douglas did what was undoubtedly the wisest thing; he accepted the security of the governor and two of the commissioners, Applegate and Lovejoy and advanced the means to equip and put in the field the first company of Oregon riflemen, at a cost of about a thousand dollars.
On obtaining these supplies, the volunteers proceeded without unnecessary delay to the Dalles, where they were to remain in charge of the mission property until reënforced.
But one company of less than fifty men could not make war upon several powerful tribes, likely to combine at the first intimation of hostilities on the part of the Americans. The business of the loan commissioners was, therefore, only begun. On the 13th of December they addressed a letter to the merchants and citizens of Oregon, in very much the same language in which they had addressed the Hudson's Bay Company.[1]
The success attending the labors of the commissioners was entirely inadequate to the demand for means to put in the field five hundred men in the winter season, the amount secured being only $3,600,[2]
- ↑ It differed only in the concluding paragraph: 'Thought the Indians of the Columbia have committed a great outrage upon our fellow-citizens passing through their country and residing among them, and their punishment for these murders may and ought to be a prime object with every citizen of Oregon, yet, as that duty more particularly devolves upon the government of the United States and admits of delay, we do not make this the strongest ground upon which to found our earnest appeal to you for pecuniary assistance. It is a fact well known to every person acquainted with the Indian character that by passing silently over their repeated thefts, robberies, and murders of our fellow-citizens, they have been emboldened to the commission of the appalling massacre at Waiilatpu. They call us women, destitute of the hearts and courage of men; and if we allow this wholesale murder to pass by as former aggressions, who can tell how long either life or property will be secure in any part of the country, or what moment the Willamette will be the scene of blood and carnage? The officers of our provisional government have nobly performed their duty. None can doubt the readiness of the patriotic sons of the west to offer their personal services in defence of a cause so righteous. So it now rests with you, gentlemen, to say whether our rights and our firesides shall be defended or not.' Or. Archives, 323–5; Victor's River of the West, 429–30.
- ↑ Of this $1,000 was obtained from citizens, $1,000 was a loan from Mr Roberts, superintendent of the Oregon Methodist Mission, and $1,000 from
