by 1849-50, the farm's importance had declined. The California gold rush disrupted Oregon's economy and carried off the labor force—a labor force previously decreased by the epidemics of 1847-48, as far as Indians employed at Cowlitz were concerned. The Company's foodstuffs contract with the Russian-American Company fortunately lapsed in 1850, for it could not have been fulfilled.[1] In 1847-48 there were nineteen regular employees at the Cowlitz Farm, but in 1850-51, near the end of Roberts' superintendency, there were only six.[2] Gradually the flocks of sheep and herds of cattle were shifted to Nisqually or Vancouver Island, or sold to settlers.[3]
Other events affected Roberts' position and feeling about his job at the Cowlitz Farm. He must have been aware of its decreasing function and the growing problems posed as the number of settlers in the neighborhood increased. Then his
- ↑ John S. Galbraith, The Hudson's Bay Company as an Imperial Factor, 1821-1869 (Berkeley, 1957), 162.
- ↑ Nineteen employees are listed for Outfit 1847-48, seventeen for 1848-49, eleven for 1849-50 and six for 1850-51, not including temporary help for planting, harvesting or other special jobs. See Extracts from District Statements, Hudson's Bay Company Archives, B.239/1/18, fos. 45-46, B.239/1/19, fo. 44, B.239/1/20, fo. 45, and B.239/1/21, fo. 43 (information obtained for use in this article through courtesy of the Hudson's Bay Company, London). In spite of the decrease of employees, Roberts' salary increased from seventy-five to £100. Ibid. John R. Jackson's statement about the effect of the California gold discoveries on Cowlitz Farm is in v. 2, P.S.A. Co. Ev., 18. See also the Nisqually journal entries for 1849.
- ↑ Some cattle and sheep were lost in the hard winter of 1849-50 (v. 2, P.S.A. Co. Ev., 18). When Roberts left the Cowlitz Farm in fall 1851, there were 250 cattle, 1,000 sheep and 100 hogs (ibid., 73).
While the Cowlitz Farm appears to have been operated on a much smaller scale and to hold it as a P.S.A. Company claim by the few employees stationed there from 1852-56, business increased in some respects at the Nisqually Farm. The U.S. Army post established at Steilacoom contracted for supplies of meat (v. 2, P.S.A. Co. Ev., 93), and the number of vessels in the Sound increased. (See also John S. Galbraith, "The British and Americans at Fort Nisqually, 1846-59," in Pacific Northwest Quarterly, 41 [April, 1950], 110-12.) Hudson's Bay Company headquarters was on Vancouver Island, reached by the Sound from Nisqually, rather than at the old site, Vancouver, and most of the Company posts in Oregon and Washington previously supplied from the latter had decreased in importance, been abandoned or occupied by others.
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