Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 4.djvu/70

60 three members; he also organized the first Congregational Church in Forest Grove; his many golden words and good examples are his living monument.

In 1849 Colonel William King built the first sawmill ever built in Portland, which was run by water power. Soon after it was finished it was destroyed by fire.

In 1850 W. P. Abrams and C. A. Reed erected the first steam sawmill in Oregon on the river bank near where Jefferson Street is located. This proved a profitable enterprise. Just south of the mill was an Indian encampment, occupied by different tribes. Their wigwams were constructed of bark and brush. Squaws sat on mats, weaving their water tight baskets, often very prettily decorated, while the Indian men lounged about in scarlet blankets, as if posing for a picture, and their children sat in their canoes gliding o'er the water with swanlike grace. Information had been circulated among them that the mill would be started up on a certain afternoon, and all were curious to see the working of this new evidence of the white man's superiority. At the stated time the Indians were in and around the mill; suddenly the steam whistle sounded its shrill shrieks in a continuous blood curdling blast, which sent every Indian man, woman and child fleeing for their lives into the dense woods. It was a long time before they could be induced to go near the mill.

In 1847, 1848, and 1849 many emigrants arrived who settled in Portland, adding thrift and push to our small colony. The discovery of gold in California on the twenty-fourth of January, 1848, caused Portland to look like a deserted hamlet, as all men and boys caught the gold fever and started for the golden shores of California, where many were killed by the Digger Indians; others died of various diseases, and some returned home broken in health, while others returned with their hard