Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 24.djvu/410

 378 Frederick V. Holman and humanity of Peter Skene Ogden. In honoring Peter Skene Ogden and his memory they honor themselves. It is to be greatly regretted that for many years the grave of this great benefactor has not been marked, even by a tombstone. Here will come Oregon pioneers and their descendants through all coming times, and with loving hearts tell their children and their children's children of Peter Skene Ogden, and of his rescue of the unfortunate captives of the Whitman massacre, although of another nation. Notwithstanding the American Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the threat of war over the division of the original Oregon Country, the trouble over the San Juan Archipeligo, and the Alaska boundary, the Alabama claims, and other irritating causes and troubles between the United States and Great Britain, and the differences in the forms of government of these two countries, we are in reality one great family, actuated by the same or similar instincts, traditions, and motives. Seventy-six years ago Peter Skene Ogden, a British subject and a high officer of a great British corporation, rescued these American captives because, not only of his duty as a humanitarian, but because these captives and the overwhelming majority of the pioneers then in Ore- gon were of the same color, spoke the same language and worshipped the same God. They were of his race, and therefore should be rescued and protected. Peter Skene Ogden was their savior. It is events, such as this, that have assisted to make the English-speaking peoples united in feelings and in hopes. This monument is a mile-stone on the road to Anglo-Saxon unity and to Anglo- Saxon world harmony and peace. May it ever be such a mile-stone! And now I have the honor to dedicate this memorial stone to Peter Skene Ogden and to his memory forever.