Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 1.djvu/289

Rh as an unyielding union man, and occupying the responsible place during that time and later of County Judge of Marion County. He has had a family of thirteen children, eight of whom are now living. He has twenty-three grand-children. His life has been one of intense activity, and he has performed almost no end of hard physical work, and has borne heavy responsibilities.

He says, however, that the most intense and thrilling experiences of his life were during the season that he spent in California, and going to and returning from the mines. This was 1849. It is worthy of the most careful record, being remembered to the most minute details by Mr. Case, and affording a chapter in human experience seldom equalled. It also shows the moulding influences brought to bear upon Oregon men, who showed themselves as perhaps of the firmest fibre to be found on the Pacific slope in 1849; which is saying a great deal. It deserves to be told in the language of Mr. Case himself, and perhaps it will be. But for some reasons it will be proper to give these recollections in a somew^hat condensed form, as in their entirety, as told by himself, they would compose a volume. Indeed, in his rapid and energetic conversation, with which only the most experienced stenographer could keep pace, it required him four hours to tell the whole thing even omitting many of the details that he remembers. However, it is only an idle thought or wish to imagine that what men were years in living in the fastest period of Pacific Coast history, can ever be told in full or the life itself be reproduced. There are distinct parts to his narrative. The Voyage; the Oregon Miner's Vengeance; and The Return Overland.