EARLY EVENTS AT FORT VANCOUVER 1812-1829
AND had this handful of whites lived always unmolested in the heart of barbarism? Not always. There was a time, after Astor's people left, when the Cascade Indians levied toll like the robber barons on the Rhine, a time when sixty well-armed men guarded every caravan, a time when the brigades made the portage at the Dalles with a lighted match above a loaded cannon. In a dim corner of the furroom there hung a chain armor worn by a Northwester in the early times. One hot night when he took it off, the skin came with it.
Long after McLoughlin came in 1824, the river bristled with danger. Once the Dalles Indians, the banditti of the Columbia, united to make him pay tribute. One dark night in 1829 their war canoes dropped noiselessly down upon the fort. But the sleepless watch was on the walls, the guns were set. Chief Kesano, a friendly Multnomah, rallied his tribe to aid the traders. All night the savages blew their shells and beat their drums. The next morning Dr. McLoughlin called a council. One by one the hostile chiefs were admitted. Douglas was there, and Pambrun, and Kesano with his sub-chiefs. McLoughlin had men concealed, ready to fire at a sign of treachery. The chiefs were sullen when into their midst came Colin Fraser, a six-foot Highlander in Scottish kilt
