Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 19.djvu/289

 THE QUARTERLY of the Oregon Historical Society VOLUME XIX DECEMBER, 1918 NUMBER 4 Copyright, 1918, by the Oregon Historical Society The Quarterly disavows responsibility for the positions taken by contributors to its pages. THE SURRENDER AT ASTORIA IN 1818. BY T. C. ELLIOTT. With what thrills of patriotic feeling have the people of this republic watched the forward progress of the American flag on the battle fields of France during this year 1918 ! ! So intense has been the interest in the outcome of our national participation in the greatest war of all history that we have all but overlooked the historic event on the Pacific Coast one hundred years ago, when the American flag was first raised by national authority over the country drained by the waters of the great Columbia river. In the next previous number of this Quarterly the writer contributed a brief narrative of the visit of Captain James Biddle to the Columbia river in August, 1818, to, in the capacity of special commissioner of the United States, publicly proclaim sovereignty over the Columbia River Country. It is proposed now to relate the circumstances leading to and connected with the visit during the first week of October, 1818, of Mr. J. B. Prevost, the other commissioner appointed upon this mission. It is a fortunate coincidence, however it may have come about, that at Astoria, Oregon, the new city hall, a permanent public structure, directly adjoins and faces the site of the orig- inal stockade built by the Pacific Fur Company in 1811 and afterward enlarged by the North- West Company, where stood the pole from which the stars and stripes were unfurled to