Page:The Early Indian Wars of Oregon.djvu/124

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

e did do.


Miss Bewley, for whom a horse and an escort was sent on that day. Up to this point it does not appear that the Umatilla Cayuses had taken any part in the outrages of Tiloukaikt s camp; and this gift of Miss Bewley to Five Crows was a bribe to secure his concurrence in future, if not his approval of the past. For although neither Five Crows nor Tauitowe consented to the murders, they, with Indian stolidity, verified Spalding s judgment of the sav age when he said in his report to White, that he " had no evidence to suppose but a vast majority of them would look on with indifference and see our dwellings burnt to the ground, and our heads severed from our bodies."

Miss Bewley had been ill from the effect of the shocks to which she had been subjected, but was compelled to make the journey on horseback, camping out one night in a snowstorm. All the comfort that her fellow captives were able to give her was the suggestion that she would be safer at the Catholic station than where she was. 7 Such was the history of the first ten days following the massacre at the mission.

We have now to account for those who escaped on that day, namely, Hall, Osborne, and Canfield. Hall having snatched a gun from an Indian, defended himself with it and reached the cover of the trees that grew along the Walla Walla river. After dark he fled towards Fort Walla Walla, where he arrived on the following morning with the story of the massacre so far as seen by him, intelligence which appears to have given very great alarm to Mr. Mc- Bean, the agent in charge. Hall was furnished with the Hudson's bay cap and coat, with such articles as would be required on his journey, and proceeded towards the Walla- inet on the north side of the Columbia. He was never .heard of afterwards.

Mr. Osborne with his wife and three children secreted themselves under the floor of their apartment, remaining there until night, when they also attempted to get to Walla

Deposition of Elaui Young : Gray's History of Oregon, 483.