Told by the Pioneers - Washington Secretary of State

Trdd by the P'ionccrs
,Ve met our supposed highwaymen eyery morning for eight or ten
days, always going toward the mines, never going our way, and we
assumed they were following us at a distance waiting for an opportunity
to cateh us off guard, but I suppose we were too strong for
them, there being five men in our party. They finally gave us up on
Burnt Rin>r. ,Ve continued on to the Umatilla River, where I surrendered
my team and returned to my home at Chehalis.
One little ineident happened on Powder Riwr I must write about.
,Ye had camped on the Powder River slough to clean up and rest our
teams and in the afternoon I looked in my carpet sack and found a
large buckskin sack of gold dust. My first thought was that someone
had stolen it and put it there and was going to accuse me of its theft.
I decided to hide it and taking the purse and my gun I started down
the slough. I had to pass close to the camp fire where the men 'were
sitting around, and I noticed they were watching me, so I turned
right around and went back to my wagon and replaced the purse in
my carpet bag with the determination to kill the man who accuses me
of stealing it. I put all fresh caps on my revolver and gun and kept
close watch until morning. When Bob started out to look for the horses
the next morning, I followed him about two hundred yards from
camp and asked him if he had lost any money. He said he had lost
none that he knew of, so I told him of my find as well as my suspicions.
Asking_. me to wait, he returned to camp - and searched his belongings,
and on his return said one of his purses was missing. He described
it as containing $2800, tied up with about one yard of red silk ribbon,
one inch wide. I told him this fitted the description of the purse I
had, and he was mad and thought the same as I. "Keep the purse,"
he said, "don't say a word and when he accuses you, we will hang the
----." I carried the purse to the Umatilla and there gave it to
Bob, and I don't know to this day who put it in my carpet sack.
I ,\-ent home to Chehalis for the winter. At this time all kinds of
wild animals were plentiful in Lewis County. One day my brother,
Turner, who lives at ,Vinlock, and I went hunting near where Newaukum
station now stands. ,Ve had a fine hunting dog, which caught a
half-grown cougar. ,Ve heard them fighting and when we reached the
scene they ,vere tnmbling around so much we were afraid to shoot as
we did not want to hurt the dog. ,Ve dropped our.g'uns and ca~ght
the cougar by each front paw and pulled each way WIth all our mIght.
When the cougar would turn his head to bite at Tur.ner's hand, I
would stick mv butcher knife in his mouth, and when It would reach
for me, Turne;' would jerk it. We hung au until I stabbed it to death.
My knife had an eight inch blade. Neither were hur~ much, but o~r
dog was injured to such an extent we had to carry 111m home, and It
was severai weeks before he could go hunting again.
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