The Native Races (Vol. 1-5). Hubert Howe Bancroft
were held, with lordly state, at Fort William, on the shore of Lake Superior. The company consisted of twenty-three partners, and employed over two thousand clerks and servants. It exercised an almost feudal sway over a wide savage domain, and maintained a formidable competition with the Hudson's Bay Company, with which they were for two years in actual war. In 1813, they purchased, from the partners of John Jacob Astor, the settlement of Astoria on the Columbia River. In 1821, they united with the Hudson's Bay Company; and the charter covering the entire region occupied by both was renewed by act of Parliament. In 1762, some merchants of New Orleans organized a company which was commissioned by D'Abadie, director-general of Louisiana, under the name of Pierre Ligueste Laclède, Antoine Maxan, and Company. Their first post occupied the spot upon which the city of St. Louis is now situated; and, under the auspices of the brothers Chouteau, they penetrated northwestward beyond the Rocky Mountains. In 1808, the Missouri Fur Company was formed at St. Louis, consisting of the Chouteaus and others; and an expedition under Major Henry was sent across the Rocky Mountains, which established the first post on the Columbia River. Between the years 1825 and 1830, the Rocky Mountain Fur Company of St. Louis extended their operations over California and Oregon, but at a loss of the lives of nearly one half of their employés. John Jacob Astor embarked in the fur trade at New York in 1784, purchasing at that time in Montreal. In 1808, he obtained a charter for the American Fur Company, which was, in 1811, merged into the Southwest Company. In 1809, Mr. Astor conceived the project of establishing a transcontinental line of posts. His purpose was to concentrate the fur trade of the United States, and establish uninterrupted communication between the Pacific and the Atlantic. He made proposals of association to the Northwest Company, which were not only rejected, but an attempt was made by that association to anticipate Mr. Astor in his operations, by making a settlement at the mouth of the Columbia River. In 1810, the Pacific Fur Company was founded by Mr. Astor, and an expedition dispatched overland by way of St. Louis and the Missouri River. At the same time a vessel was sent round Cape Horn to the mouth of the Columbia; but, their adventure in that quarter proving unsuccessful, the company was dissolved, and the operations of Mr. Astor were thereafter confined to the territory east of the Rocky Mountains.
THE GREAT NORTHWEST.
Samuel Hearne, an officer of the Hudson's Bay Company, was the first European to reach the Arctic Ocean through the interior of the continent. He descended Coppermine River to its mouth in the year 1771. The Upper Misinipi River was first visited by Joseph Frobisher in 1775. Three years later, one Peter Pond penetrated to within thirty miles of Athabasca Lake, and established a trading post at that point. Four canoe-loads of merchandise were exchanged by him for more fine furs than his canoes could carry. Other adventurous traders soon followed; but not long afterwards the inevitable broils which always attended the early intercourse of Europeans and Indians, rose to such a height that, but for the appearance of that terrible scourge, the small-pox, the traders would have been extirpated. The ravages of this dire disease continued to depopulate the country until 1782, when traders again appeared among the Knisteneaux and Tinneh. The most northern division of the Northwest Company was at that time the Athabascan Lake region, where Alexander Mackenzie was the managing partner. His winter residence was at Fort Chipewyan, on Athabasca Lake. The Indians who traded at his establishment informed him of the existence of a large river flowing to the westward from Slave Lake. Thinking thereby to reach the Pacific Ocean, Mr. Mackenzie, in the year 1789, set out upon an expedition to the west; and, descending the noble stream which bears his name, found himself, contrary to his expectations, upon the shores of the Arctic Sea. In 1793, he made a journey to the Pacific, ascending Peace River, and reaching the coast in latitude about fifty-two. The first expedition organized by the British government for the purpose of surveying the northern coast, was sent out under Lieutenants Franklin and Parry in 1819. During the year following, Franklin descended Coppermine River, and subsequently, in 1825, he made a journey down the Mackenzie. In 1808, D. W. Harmon, a partner in the Northwest Company, crossed the Rocky Mountains, at about the fifty-sixth parallel, to Fraser and Stuart Lakes. The accounts of the natives given by these travelers and their companions are essentially the same, and later voyagers have failed to throw much additional light upon the subject. John Meares, in 1788, visited the Straits of Fuca, Nootka Sound, and Cook Inlet; and, during the same year, two ships, sent out by Boston merchants, under Robert Gray and John Kendrick, entered Nootka Sound. Estevan Martinez and Gonzalo Haro, sent from Mexico to look after the interest of Spain in these regions, explored Prince William Sound, and visited Kadiak. During the same year, the Russians established a trading post at Copper River. In 1789, Joseph Billings visited the Aleutian Islands, and the Boston vessels explored the Eastern coast of Queen Charlotte Island. In 1790, Salvador Fidalgo was sent by the Mexican government to Nootka; and Monaldo explored the Straits of Juan de Fuca. In 1791, four ships belonging to Boston merchants, two Spanish ships, one French and several Russian vessels touched upon the Northwest Coast. The Spanish vessels were under the command of Alejandro Malespina; Etienne Marchand was the commander of the French ship. The 'Sutil y Mexicana' entered Nootka Sound in 1792; and during the same year, Vancouver commenced his explorations along the coast above Cape Flattery. In 1803–4, Baron Von Humboldt was making his searching investigations in Mexico; while the captive New Englander, Jewett, was dancing attendance to Maquina, king of the Nootkas. Lewis and Clark traversed the continent in 1805. In 1806, a Mr. Fraser set out from Canada, and crossed the Rocky Mountains near the headwaters of the river which bears his name. He descended Fraser River to the lake which he also called after himself. There he built a fort and opened trade with the natives. Kotzebue visited the coast in 1816; and the Russian expedition under Kramchenko, Wasilieff, and Etolin, in 1822. Captain Morrel explored the Californian coast from San Diego to San Francisco in 1825; Captains Beechey and Lütke, the Northwest Coast in 1826; and Sir Edward Belcher in 1837. J. K. Townsend made an excursion west of the Rocky Mountains in 1834. In 1837, Dease and Simpson made an open boat voyage from the Mackenzie River, westward to Point Barrow, the farthest point made by Beechey from the opposite direction, thus reaching the Ultima Thule of northwestern discovery. Sir George Simpson crossed the continent in 1841, Fremont in 1843, and Paul Kane in 1845. Kushevaroff visited the coast in 1838, Laplace in 1839, Commodore Wilkes in 1841, and Captain Kellett in 1849. Following the discovery of gold, the country was deluged by adventurers. In 1853–4, commenced the series of explorations for a Pacific railway. The necessities of the natives were examined, and remnants of disappearing nations were collected upon reservations under government agents. The interior of Alaska was first penetrated by the employés of the Russian-American Fur Company. Malakoff ascended the Yukon in 1838; and, in 1842, Derabin established a fort upon that river. In 1849, W. H. Hooper made a boat expedition from Kotzebue Sound to the Mackenzie River; and, in 1866, William H. Dall and Frederick Whymper ascended the Yukon.
I have here given a few only of the original sources whence my information is derived concerning the Indians. A multitude of minor voyages and travels have been performed during the past three and a half centuries, and accounts published by early residents among the natives, the bare enumeration of which I fear would prove wearisome to the reader. Enough, however, has been given to show the immediate causes which led to the discovery and occupation of the several parts of this western coast. The Spanish cavaliers craved from the Indians of the South their lands and their gold. The Spanish missionaries demanded from the Indians of Northern Mexico and California, faith. The French, English, Canadian, and American fur companies sought from the Indians of Oregon and New Caledonia, peltries. The Russians compelled the natives of the Aleutian Islands to hunt sea-animals. The filthy raw-flesh-eating Eskimos, having nothing wherewith to tempt the cupidity of the superior race, retain their primitive purity.
CUPIDITY AND ZEAL.
We observe then three original incentives urging on civilized white men to overspread the domain of the Indian. The first was that thirst for gold, which characterized the fiery hidalgos from Spain in their conquests, and to obtain which no cruelty was too severe nor any sacrifice of human life too great; as though of all the gifts vouchsafed to man, material or divine, one only was worth possessing. The second, following closely in the footsteps of the first, and oftentimes constituting a part of it, was religious enthusiasm; a zealous interest in the souls of the natives and the form in which they worshiped. The third, which occupied the attention of other and more northern Europeans, grew out of a covetous desire for the wild man's clothing; to secure to themselves the peltries of the great hyperborean regions of America.