Page:History of Oregon volume 1.djvu/514

Rh that gentlemen of the Hudson's Bay Company who took part in these discussions were more scholarly and accomplished than their antagonists, but the Americans were better informed on the technicalities of the points in dispute. The British in Oregon had also a local weak point to defend. They had been ordered by the board of management to remove their establishments on the south side of the Columbia to the north side, but had not done so, and were occupying territory supposed to belong to the United States, when they forcibly ejected an American citizen from the territory they claimed for Great Britain. This gave color to the opinion of some that England intended, or the Hudson's Bay Company for her, to attempt holding the whole of Oregon in case of a war, which really seemed impending at this time, and it gave occasion to men like Williamson and Simmons to assert a right to settle wherever they might chose, if their reason for choosing was only to defy the power of England.

In July Colonel Simmons renewed his endeavor to explore the country toward or about Puget Sound, and started with a company consisting of William Shaw, George Waunch, David Crawford, Niniwon Everman, Seyburn Thornton, and David Parker. They found at a small prairie five miles north of the plain on which the Cowlitz farm of the Puget Sound Association was situated, and ten miles from Cowlitz landing, that John R Jackson of their immigration had been before them, made a location at this place, and had returned to bring his family. Jackson made his settlement in the autumn, which he called Highlands.

Continuing to the sound, the party took canoes and made a voyage down to and around the head of