Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 5.djvu/146

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136
W. B. Dillard.

H. Noble, and Charnel Mulligan, who settled near Mr. Skinner; while Abrain and Louis Coryell settled near the junction of the Coast and Middle Forks. Their cabin, which was finished November 3, 1847, was the last house along the road till one reaches the Sacramento Valley. The next, year L. ('oryell and D. Hasty put in a ferry on the Umpqua. They expected a large immigration, but were disappointed, though they had a good trade in ferrying miners on their way to the gold fields in California. In May Coryell sold out to a Mr. Hend ricks and went to the gold fields, where he remained a few years, when he returned to Lane County, where he still resides, an honored resident of Crow.

In this year John Diamond and M. Wilkins settled near where Coburg now stands, Jacob C. Spores settled at the place afterwards known as Spores Ferry, while James Chapin settled one and one-half miles of where Cottage Grove now stands.

Other settlers of this year were: Cornelius Hills, E. W. Griffith, W. S. Davis, Ephriam Hughes, George Gilbert. A. O. Stevens, Isaac Stevens, J. Ware, —— Snook, R. J. Hills, and Luther White.

In the early '50's J. Diamond, in company with four other men, while viewing a road up the Middle Fork over the Cascades scaled a lofty peak called Diamond's Peak, in honor of the first white person who reached its snowy summit. These early settlements were made the nucleus around which future immigrants settled. These pioneers had few of the necessities, and none of the comforts, of life, but what little they had they were ever ready to divide with the weary traveler, and the cry of sickness, hunger, or distress was quickly responded to. They had endured many hardships and privations, but were eager to make life pleasant for those who came after them.

The immigration of 1848 more than doubled the population of the county; all of whom settled near some former settler, except the Fergusons, Richardsons, Browns, and Hintons, who formed the first settlements on the banks of the Long