gon, giving the Rogue River Indians settlements to strike at there, as well as along the upper Willamette.
In June of 1851 one-armed Major Phil Kearny, the nephew of New Mexico's conqueror and Frémont's nemesis, attacked and defeated a band of these Indians. But the forests were thick, the savages wily and the men available to seek them out never numerous. The battles went intermittently on, and even when the tribesmen agreed to sell the Rogue River Valley, in September of 1853, nothing had been accomplished toward establishing peace. All that really happened was that the Indians had taken the $60,000 they had been offered and withdrew until they saw fit to return.
The white population of Oregon had by then diminished for a reason not connected with gold or Indian wars. In March Congress had detached the region north of the Columbia and created Washington Territory.
Fort Vancouver, once the capital of the Pacific Northwest, had for years been of no more political importance than any other United States military outpost. As for its last Hudson's Bay Company commandant, he had followed the example of John McLoughlin by staying with the land he had hoped to help win for the British Empire rather than with the corporation which had lost control of the region. Yet it was not on the north side of the Columbia that Peter Skene Ogden took his final stand. In September of 1854 the first explorer of the river which Frémont had renamed the Humboldt died in Oregon City.
Wild Cat's Confederacy
AS A MEMBER of the United States Senate, Sam Houston had found himself confronted with two problems following the conclusion of America's war with Mexico. One sectional and one
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Questia, a part of Gale, Cengage Learning. www.questia.com
Publication information:
Book title: Bravos of the West.
Contributors: John Myers Myers - Author.
Publisher: University of Nebraska Press.
Place of publication: Lincoln, NE.
Publication year: 1995.
Page number: 303.
This material is protected by copyright and, with the exception of fair use, may not be further copied, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means.
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