Page:The Early Indian Wars of Oregon.djvu/120

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.



far into the night. Thus closed the first scene in the tragedy.

The killed on the afternoon of the twenty-ninth of November, 1847, were: Dr. and Mrs. Whitman, Mr. Rog ers, John and Francis Sager, Mr. Gilliland, Mr. Marsh, Mr. Saunders, and Mr. Hoffman. The escapes were: Mr. Osborne and family, who, at the first sound of the out break, hid themselves under the floor of the room they occupied, where they remained until night, when they left the house under cover of the darkness, and made their way to Fort Walla Walla, barely escaping starvation ; Mr. Canfield, who hid himself, and fled to Lapwai; and Mr. Hall, who snatched a gun from an Indian, and although wounded, reached the cover of a thicket, whence he set out after dark for the fort, reaching it at daybreak on the thirtieth. There he insisted on going to the Wallamet, and being furnished with clothing and a boat, started on his perilous journey, and was never heard of more making the tenth victim of the tragedy, unless Mr. Kim- ball came before.

In the confusion of events at the close of the first day Mr. Kimball and the four sick children left in the attic were forgotten, remaining without food or water until the next day, when the sufferings of the children, as well as his own, induced him to venture in search of water, and he was discovered and shot. On the same day, James Young from the sawmill, with a load of lumber for the mission-house, was also killed. Two young men, Crockett Bewley and Amos Sales, through some unaccountable leni ency of the Indians, they being sick in bed, were spared until the following Tuesday, December eighth, when they were killed with revolting cruelties. The youngest of the Sager children and Helen Mar Meek died of neglect a day or two after the first murders, making the number of deaths from Indian savagery fifteen.

The two Munson boys and a Spanish half-breed boy, whom Dr. Whitman* bad. raised, were separate