Told by the Pioneers - Washington Secretary of State

Told
by the Pioneers
The immigration of 1861 was as follows: William Sherry settled
on the Patit. above :3Iiller; Alexander :310ntgomery, Albert 'Woodward
and Cyrus Armstrong on the Patit above Rexford, .Johathan Buzzard
on the old Cross place in Johnson Hollow near Da:'ton, Ambrose J ohn­
I'on where the trails crossed Johnson Hollow; Tom 'Vhetstone in the
Hollow, Amasa '\'est between Stubbs and the Baileys, Uncle Zeke
Hobbs between the Baileys and" Kentuck," .John \Vinnett and Henry
Owsley further up the Touchet, and Uncle Tom 'Vinnett and his sons,
Bill, Dock, Bob alld Le,,', on "Thiskey creek and the Hogeye. There
were three young fellows with the "Tinnetts, who do not seem to han
taken up land at that time. They were Simoll Critchfield, Cy .\fathe\\·
anel. Fred Kenney. This year the Paynes bought out Hearn at ('olumbia
school house, and the Forrests sold to R. G. Xewland. During this
:'ear my father rented the Stubbs place, broke up a portion of the land
alld fenced it with cottonwood rails made where the ~Iain street hridg'e
now crosses the stream.
The settlers up to this time were stock mell, settling along the
streams and grazing their stock on the hills in e\"Cry direction. They
raised a little hay and some oats on the fertile bottom lands, the hills
\\'ere considered of no value except for grazing. 'Yheat was not grown
hecause there was no a.vailable market. Surplus oats were hauled to
Fort Lapwai, but 011 account of the distallce and crude roads this was
not very profitable. "'hen the valleys were taken up, the growth of
the country stopped and the illcrease in population 'was ven' slo\\'.
The winter of 1861 and '62 was undouhtedl\' the most severe winter
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in the historv of this vallev so far as the memory of the white man
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g'oes. The snow came in December and lasted until the first of April.
It would snow, then thaw a little, which would settle the snow and
form a crust, then snow again, keeping an a\"Crage depth of about fin
feet. The small gulches and hollows drifted full, and the hillsides
seemed to present almost an even surface. There was snow in some
of these hollows on the following Fourth of .Jul:'. The thermometer
dropped down to 37 degrees below zero, and mall~' of those in use at
that time froze. The settlers lost most of their cattle and returned to
the 'Villamette valley in the spring for ne\\' stock. Henry Day had a
hunch of steers that escaped during the early winter and strayed up
the Touchet, where some fifty head wintered through on the natural
pasture. In the spring of 1862 most of the squaw-men sold out and
went to Montana, where Ives, the Buntons and Clubfoot George were
hanged by the vigilantes. Ives was caught red-handed and his fearless
prosecution by Col. Saunders, before the miners' court, while surrounded
by the road agents ready to take him away, was a notable occurrence
in the early history of Montana. 'Vhen the gang was finally
rounded up, it was found that the sheriff of the county was the ringleader
and he \\'as taken care of by the vigilantes also. Rexford could
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