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Sound, on the west coast of Vancouver Island, was taken by the Indians, and all her crew murdered, except the Indian interpreter. A large number of natives, while robbing the ship next day, were killed by the explosion of the magazine, a just retribution for their perfidy. During the same summer Mr. Stuart, of Astor's company, established Fort Okanagane. On the 12th December, 1813, the British sloop-of-war Raccoon, 26 guns, Captain Black, appeared before Astoria. The American flag was hauled down, the British standard raised, and the name of Astoria was changed to Fort George.

A short time previous, the agent employed by Mr. Astor had sold him, as well as the business of the Pacific Fur Company, to the rival Northwest Company for the merely nominal sum of $40,000. By this pretended purchase of the interests of the Pacific Fur Company, the Northwest Company enjoyed a sole occupancy of the territory west of the Rocky Mountains, to the line of the Russian settlements.

In 1817 the United-States Government sent to the mouth of the Columbia the sloop-of-war Ontario, Captain James Biddle, carrying the Hon. J. B. Prevost, United-States commissioner, to receive the return, to the United States, of Astoria as an American settlement captured during the war, the treaty of Ghent providing for such surrenders by both nations. She arrived at Astoria, August 19, 1818, when Captain Biddle again raised the American flag at Astoria, it reassuming the name of its distinguished founder. The formal surrender of the property by the British commissioner and the agent of the Northwest Company was made October 6, 1818.

October 20, 1818, a convention was entered into for ten years, between Great Britain and the United States, permitting a joint occupancy, by citizens and subjects of both nations, of the territory west of the Rocky Mountains. In March, 1821, the Hudson's Bay and Northwest Companies, who for many years had carried on such fierce opposition to each other that hostilities ensued, entered into a partnership. With their combined influence, favorable legislation was secured from the British Parliament, extending the jurisdiction of the courts of Canada to the Pacific Ocean (notwithstanding the existence of the foregoing treaty by which non-occupancy by the English Government was agreed to). December 26, 1821, the two companies, as a partnership, obtained from the British Government an exclusive license of trade in said territory for 21 years. 1824 the Hudson's Bay Company swallowed up the Northwest Company, and became sole owners of said license of trade, and successors to all the property and establishments of their former rivals the Northwest Company.

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In 1824 and 1825, respectively, the United States and Great Britain, by treaties with Russia, recognized 54° 40′ north latitude as the southern line of Russian America. In 1827 the treaty between the United States and Great Britain continued indefinitely the provision of joint occupancy in the treaty of 1818, until either party should give twelve months' notice of desire to abrogate.

From 1824 down to 1836 the Hudson's Bay Company were almost exclusive possessors of the territory west of the Rocky Mountains, with here and there an occasional trading-party, hunter, or trapper, attempting to enjoy their doubtful and dangerous avocation. The latter were generally employed by the enterprising Fur Companies of St. Louis, and but seldom extended their operations as far west and north as what is now Washington Territory. The area of the present Territory of Washington may be regarded during this period, and even down to 1845, as under the control and jurisdiction of the Hudson's Bay Company. Within its boundaries they had established forts at Vancouver, Walla Walla, Okanagane, Colville, Nisqually, Cowlitz River, and, just after the abrupt termination of the negotiations between Messrs. Buchanan and Sir Richard Pakenham in 1845, by instructions from London, a claim at Cape Disappointment was secured. This admirable distribution of posts was not only calculated to

secure the trade of the country, but to hold the native tribes in subjection; in short, to hold possession of the country.

In 1834, the missionary settlements from the United States commenced, and shortly afterward the American population slowly found their way into Oregon, confining for several years their settlements south of the Columbia. True, two of the three missionary stations, established under the auspices of the American Board of Foreign Missions, viz., Whitman's at Waiilatpu and that of Messrs. Eels and Walker, near the Spokane River, had been located in what is now comprised in this Territory. In 1841 the United-States Exploring Expedition (Captain Charles Wilkes) surveyed the coasts, bays, harbors, and rivers of this Territory. In 1843 Lieutenant Fremont, U. S. A., on his second expedition, reached Vancouver, thereby connecting his first reconnoissance, which had only extended to the South Pass, with the eastern terminus of Captain Wilkes's exploration.

In October, 1845, Colonel M. T. Simmons, with his own and several other families, who had crossed the plains in 1844, settled near the head of Puget Sound, at Tumwater, the mouth of the Deschutes River. This marks the commencement of American settlement in what now constitutes Washington Territory. The Oregon provisional government, formed July 5, 1843, had created the District of Vancouver, embracing all the present Territory of Washington. Shortly subsequent Lewis County was cut off, and the name of Vancouver changed to Clark.

On the 15th June, 1846, the treaty of limits between the United States and Great Britain made the 49th parallel, and the middle of the channel separating the continent from Vancouver Island, the northern boundary of the American Oregon. In November, 1847, within the limits of the present Washington, while yet a part of Oregon, an atrocious massacre was perpetrated at Whitman's missionary station (Waiilatpu) not far distant from the site of the present city of Walla Walla. Dr. Whitman and wife and nine others (Americans) were murdered in cold blood by a band of Cay use Indians. This led to the Cayuse war, in which the provisional government of Oregon inflicted upon those perfidious wretches a chastisement most richly deserved, but hardly commensurate with their guilt.

August 14, 1848, Congress organized the Territory west of the Rocky Mountains, naming it Oregon. The region north of the Columbia River having attained sufficient population (March 2, 1853), was set apart as a separate Territory, and denominated Washington Territory. The act of Congress establishing this Territory ascribed the following boundaries: north, by the treaty line of 1846, separating it from the British possessions; cast, by the Rocky Mountains; south, by the 46th parallel to its intersection with the Columbia River, and thence by the channel of that river to its mouth; and west, by the Pacific Ocean.

[1853.]-The survey of the Northern Pacific Railroad route from the headwaters of the Mississippi to Puget Sound by the late Governor Isaac J. Stevens, the then and first governor of Washington Territory, occupied the whole summer and fall of this year. September 29th, proclamation of Governor Stevens of his entrance into the Territory and assumption of executive duties, dated at St. Mary's village. November 28th, executive proclamation, fixing time of election, defining judicial districts, and apportionment of districts for election of members of Legislative Assembly. A census of the white population was taken this year by J. Patton Anderson, first United States marshal, which exhibited 3,965 inhabitants, and 1,682 voters.

[1855.]-Gold having been discovered on several of the tributaries of the Columbia, in the vicinity of Fort Colville, miners from Oregon and Puget Sound rushed to the "new diggings." The latter, mostly unarmed (for treaties had been concluded the spring before which seemed to be a guaranty of the peace

able disposition of the Indians), crossed the Cascade Mountains, and passed through the Yakemi country. Several were surprised and murdered. UnitedStates Indian agent Bolon was killed, and he and his horse consumed by fire. Simultaneously, outrages of similar character were committed by Indians in various regions, from the boundary of California to the north boundary of this Territory, indicating concert of action among the Indian tribes. The Indian war of 1855-56 ensued as a necessary consequence in Oregon and Washington, which was long maintained, almost exclusively by the people of those Territories. At its conclusion, General Wool, of the United-States Army, then in command of this military division, was as hostile to the authorities and population of this Territory as the Indians had been when it commenced, and much more than he had been against the Indians during any of his campaigns.

[1859.] February 14th, Congress admitted Oregon into the Union as a State, annexing to Washington Territory all that portion of Oregon Territory lying east of the present east boundary of Oregon, extending the south and southeastern limits of this Territory to the 42d parallel, continued eastward to the Rocky Mountains, and embracing within it the SOUTH PASS, that great gateway of American immigration to the Pacific States and Territories. This summer is also notable for the San Juan Island emeute, which terminated peaceably by General Winfield Scott entering into a temporary agreement, consenting to the joint occupancy of that island by detachments of troops of the United States and Great Britain. This humiliating condition of things yet continues, and the laws of Washington Territory are suspended in that portion of its limits.

[1863.] March 30th, the act of Congress, establishing the Territory of Idaho, curtailed its huge proportions, and reduced the Territory to its present boundaries. A reference to the map will show that this Territory embraced at one time great portions of the Territories of Idaho and Montana (as at present constituted), including those mining regions, the richness and apparently inexhaustible yield of which have attracted so much interest.

The present limits of Washington Territory are suggestive of and associated with matters of historic moment, intensely interesting in a political and national point of view. It embraces the identical territory the struggle for which prolonged that memorable controversy between Great Britain and the United States known as the Oregon question-a contest continued at intervals from 1807 until June 15, 1846. While it is true that both nation's asserted claim to the whole of the territory west of the Rocky Mountains, up to the farfamed 54° 40', yet the gist of the controversy, the real bone of contention, the turning-point upon which the matter finally hinged, was the territory south of the 49th parallel, west and north of the Columbia River. The United States had offered on several occasions, as a compromise, the 49th parallel westward to the Pacific Ocean. Great Britain had likewise offered the 49th parallel westward of the Rocky Mountains to the Columbia, thence down that river to the Pacific. Great Britain coveted the region north and west of that river, with its free navigation, and exclusive ownership of the Puget Sound Basin. The negotiations develop this fact, and its open avowal by Sir R. Pakenham-in September, 1844, in reply to the able establishment of the American claim to the whole territory by Mr. Calhoun, that "he," Sir R. Pakenham, "did not feel authorized to enter into discussion respecting the territory north of the 49th parallel, which was understood by the British Government to form the basis of negotiation on the side of the United States, as the line of the Columbia formed that on the side of Great Britain"-at least attests the fact that the value of this interesting region was appreciated by the British negotiator.

But the treaty of 1846 has not settled the controversy, the boundary between the two nations, and now we do not know the northwest boundary of the Territory of Washington. The title to San Juan Island and the Archi

pelago de Haro is still in dispute. A second treaty (July 1, 1863) has been found necessary to ascertain the rights possessed, and the value of the benefit conferred, by the Hudson's Bay Company in enjoying its exclusive trade and occupancy from 1824 down to 1846. The inmense claim now being urged under the latter treaty, $5,000,000 (a trifling proportion of which is for establishments outside of Washington Territory), together with the dispute as to the sovereignty of San Juan and other islands, which so nearly provoked collision in 1859, between the British fleet and the camp of the United-States Army on San Juan Island, justify the statement that at no time, since first pressed by the foot of white men, has its Territory been exempt from a conflict between rival nations as to rights of sovereignty or exclusive possession. That Janusfaced treaty of 1846 is among its most notable features of history. It aimed to settle the boundary, but left the seeds of future controversy by its uncertainty. Twenty-one years have elapsed, and the boundary of the United States is still undetermined. A portion of Washington Territory is subjected to that anomaly of two nationalities holding armed occupation as evidence of adverse claims. That treaty also denied the claim of the British Government, as such, south of the 49th parallel, yet resolved that great nation into individuals, and conferred upon such individuals, or combinations of them, the privilege of absorbing as much territory as they saw fit to claim as possessory rights, which the UnitedStates Government bound itself to respect.

HISTORICAL SKETCH OF NEVADA, INCLUDING BOUNDARIES, POPULATION, ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS, EARLY SETTLEMENTS, &c.

GEOGRAPHICAL POSITION AND AREA OF THE STATE.

THE State of Nevada reaches from the 37th to the 43d meridian west from Washington (114° to 120° west from Greenwich), and, from the point where it adjoins Arizona (near the 35th), to the 42d degree of north latitude, being bounded by Oregon and Idaho on the north, by Utah and Arizona on the east, by Arizona on the south, and by California on the southwest and west. Prior to 1866 the State extended no farther east than the 38th meridian, and no farther south than the 37th degree of north latitude, Congress that year having taken from Utah and added to Nevada one degree of longitude. A tract of irregular shape, covering an area of some 12,000 square miles, lying between California and the Colorado River, and bounded on the north by the 37th degree of north latitude, was at the same time taken from Arizona and given to this State, which, with these additions, has now an area of about 112,190 square miles, or 71,800,000 acres, from which about 1,600 square miles may be deducted for the area covered by the water surface of various small lakes within its borders. In the organic act creating the Territory of Nevada, Congress designated the dividing ridge of the Sierra Nevada for the western boundary thereof, contingent on the consent of California, which by this arrangement would be required to surrender a considerable strip of country lying within her limits east of the Sierra, which, not withstanding much importunity on the part of her neighbor, she declined to do. In the absence of any survey establishing the boundary between these two countries (a fixed geographic line), much uncertainty prevailed as to its precise location, a circumstance that afterward. led to a conflict of jurisdiction, threatening to end in serious results. With a view to settling this question and preventing further difficulties, the Legislature of California passed a law in 1863, providing for a joint survey to ascertain and adjust this boundary; which, having afterward been done, set the matter at rest by giving to that State the greater part of the territory in dispute. The term Nevada, signifying in Spanish a heavy fall of snow, was adopted as a State cognomen, because of the immense bodies of snow that fall on the Sierra Nevada range of mountains lying partly within its limits, and bordering it for a long distance on the west, as well as upon many of the mountain-chains in the interior of the State. Nevada is subdivided into twelve counties, nine of which were created at the time of its first organization and three since. These counties are of very unequal dimensions; the more western, owing to their being the site of the principal mineral discoveries, their proximity to California, and other favoring circumstances, being, as a general thing, more populous, and consequently smaller than those situated farther in the interior.

POPULATION.

THE number of inhabitants in the State, exclusive of Indians, amounts to about 35,000, being somewhat less than it was three or four years ago, when the population was much swollen by speculators, adventurers, and other tran

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