Ten years of missionary work among the Indians at Skokomish, Washington Territory, 1874-1884. Eells Myron
character. All of these things proved to be of good service to him in his new position, where education, farm-work, purchase of goods, law business, intercourse with government, the ideas which he had received from his parents about the Indians and Christianity, were all needed.
In 1871, soon after he assumed his new duties, he began a Sabbath-school and prayer-meeting. He selected Christian men as employees. These consisted of a physician, school-teacher, and matron, carpenter, farmer, and blacksmith. He also selected men with families as being those who would be likely to have the best influence on the Indians. In 1872 Rev. J. Casto, M.D., was engaged as government physician, and Rev. C. Eells, the father of the agent, went to live with his son, and both during the winter preached at the agency and in the camps of the Indians. During 1874 a council-house was built, with the consent of government, at a money-cost to the government of five hundred dollars—besides the work which was done by the government carpenter. This has since been used as a church, and sometimes as a school-house. During that spring it was thought best to organize a church, for although at first it would be composed chiefly of whites, yet it was hoped that it would have a salutary influence on the Indians, and be a nucleus around which some of the Indians would gather. This was done June 23, 1874, the day after the writer arrived at the place. It was organized with eleven members, ten of whom were whites, and one, John F. Palmer, was an Indian. He was at that time government interpreter. The sermon was by Rev. G. H. Atkinson, D.D., of Portland, superintendent of Home Missions for Oregon and Washington, and one of the vice-presidents of the American Missionary Association; the prayer of consecration by Rev. E. Walker, who had been the missionary associate of Rev. C. Eells during his work among the Spokane Indians; the right hand of fellowship by Rev. A. H. Bradford, a visitor on this coast from Montclair, New Jersey; and the charge to the church by the writer. Thus affairs existed when I came to the place.
IV.
SUBSEQUENT POLITICAL HISTORY.
AS far as the government was concerned, affairs remained much the same until 1880. Then the time agreed upon by the treaty for which appropriations were to be made—twenty years—expired. By special appropriation affairs were carried on for another year, however, as usual. In July, 1881, the government ordered that the carpenter, blacksmith, and farmer be discharged, and Indian employees be put in their places. Some of these were afterward discharged. The next year the three agencies on the sound, the Tulalip, Nisqually, and Skokomish, were consolidated enough to put them under one agent, without, however, moving the Indians in any way. The three agencies comprised ten reservations, which were under the missionary instruction of the Presbyterians, Congregationalists, and Catholics. By the consolidation there was to be no interference with the religious affairs of the Indians. Mr. E. Eells, the agent at Skokomish, was selected as the one who was to have charge of all, but his head-quarters were moved to the Tulalip Agency, which was under the religious control of the Catholics. Thus, after more than eleven years of residence at Skokomish, he departed from the place; after which he usually returned about once in three months on business. A year later this large agency was divided; the five Catholic reservations were set off into an agency, and the five Protestant reservations were continued under the control of Mr. Eells, whose head-quarters were moved to the Puyallup Reservation, near Tacoma.
V.
THE FIELD AND WORK.
THE work has been about as follows: At Skokomish there were about two hundred Indians, including a boarding-school of about twenty-five children. Services were held every Sabbath morning for them in Indian. The Sabbath-school was kept up, immediately following the morning service. English services were held once or twice a month, on Sabbath evening, for the white families resident at the agency and the school-children. On Thursday evening a prayer-meeting was held regularly. It was in English, as very few of the non-English-speaking Indians lived near enough to attend an evening service, had they been so inclined. Various other meetings were held, adapted to the capacities and localities of the people: as prayer-meetings for school-boys, those for school-girls, and those at the different logging-camps.
Thirty miles north of Skokomish is Seabeck, where about thirty Indians live, most of whom gain a living by working in the saw-mill there. For several years I preached to the whites at this place, about eight times a year, and when there, also held a service with the Indians.
Twenty miles farther north is Port Gamble, one of the largest saw-mill towns on the sound. Near it were about a hundred Clallam Indians, most of whom became Catholics, but who have generally received me cordially when I have visited them two or three times a year. They, however, have obtained whiskey very easily, and between this and the Catholic influence comparatively little has been accomplished.
Thirty-five miles farther on is Port Discovery, another saw-mill town, where thirty or forty Indians have lived, whom I have often called to see on my journeys; but so much whiskey has been sold near them and to them, that it has been almost impossible to stop their drinking, and hence, very difficult to make much permanent religious impression on them. By death and removal for misconduct, their number has diminished so that at one time there were only one or two families left. But the opportunity for work at the mill has been so good that some of a fair class have returned and bought land and settled down.
Forty miles from Port Gamble, and seventeen from Port Discovery, is Jamestown, near Dunginess, on the Straits of Fuca. This is the center of an Indian settlement of about a hundred and forty. Previous to 1873 these Indians were very much addicted to drinking—so much so, that the white residents near them petitioned to have them removed to the agency, a punishment they dreaded nearly as much as any other that could be inflicted on them. The threat of doing this had such an influence that about fifteen of them combined and bought two hundred acres of land. It has been laid off into a village; most of the Indians have reformed, and they have settled down as peaceable, industrious, moral persons. I have generally visited them once in six months, and they have become the most advanced of the Clallam tribe. A school has been kept among them, a church organized, and their progress has been quite interesting—so much so, that considerable space will be devoted to them in the following pages.
Once a year I have calculated to go farther: and twenty miles beyond is Port Angelos, with about thirty nominal Indian residents. But few of them are settlers, and they are diminishing, only a few families being left.
Seven miles further west is Elkwa, the home of about seventy Indians. It was, in years past, the residence of one of the most influential bands of the Clallam tribe, but they are diminishing, partly from the fact that there have been but few white families among them from whom they could obtain work, and, with a few exceptions, they themselves have done but little about cultivating the soil. As they could easily go across the straits to Victoria in British Columbia, about twenty miles distant, where there is little restraint in regard to their procuring whiskey, because they are American Indians, they have been steadily losing influence and numbers. Four or five families have homesteaded land, but as it was impossible for them to procure good land on the beach, they have gone back some distance and are scattered. Hence they lose the benefits of church and school. Still the old way of herding together is broken up, and they obtain more of their living from civilized pursuits.
Thirty-five miles farther is Clallam Bay, the home of about fifty more. This is the limit of the Indians connected with the Skokomish Agency. They are about a hundred and fifty miles from it, as we have to travel. In 1880 they bought a hundred and sixty acres of land on the water-front, and are slowly following the example of the Jamestown Indians. This is the nearest station of the tribe to the seal-fisheries of the north-west coast of the Territory; by far the most lucrative business, in its season, which the Indians follow.
VI.
DIFFICULTIES IN THE WAY OF RELIGIOUS WORK.