Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 12.djvu/39

 EARLY NAVIGATION OF THE STRAITS OF FUCA 31 The Washington remained at Nootka until after the 13th July, when she left that port in company with the Columbia for Clayoquot, where as already stated, all the furs were trans- ferred to the Columbia, and the captains exchanged vessels, Kendrick remaining on this coast in the Washington. Why the transfer was made at Clayoquot, instead of Nootka, we can not say. Perhaps it was owing to the trouble at Nootka over the seizure of Meares's vessels. Perhaps it was one of Captain Kendrick's sudden whims. If we believe Haswell, Kendrick was subject to sudden changes of mind. The suggestion of Greenhow on page 199, that on this oc- casion the Washington under Gray re-entered the strait of Fuca for a distance is pure imagination. There is not one jot or tittle of evidence to support it; on the contrary, the evidence is all the other way. The affidavit of Mr. Funter and the crew of the North West America, sworn at Canton, on 5th December, 1789, says: "The Columbia and the Amer- ican sloop Washington did depart from King George's sound "together, unmolested in any measure by the Spaniard. . . "That the Columbia and Washington did steer to a harbor to "the southward of King George's Sound, where they separ- "ated, the Columbia returning to China and the Washington "remaining on the coast." As these persons left Nootka on the Columbia, and were passengers on her on the voyage to China, and had no apparent interest in misrepresenting the facts, we may assume this statement in the absence of all evi- dence to the contrary to be correct. Hence it appears that, during 1789, the only occasions on which the Washington entered the strait of Fuca were during the cruise in March and April, of which I have already given the outlines as recorded by Haswell. All that now remains is to determine the most easterly point within the strait then reached by her. Captain John T. Wai- bran of the Department of Marine and Fisheries at Victoria, who is one of our best-posted and most thorough students of the early history of the coast and to whom I am greatly in-