Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 14.djvu/74



66 HENRY C. COE

Moses was later compelled to give up the murderers, who were afterwards taken to Walla Walla and hanged. The dream habit seemed to be contagious and spread to neighboring tribes. Ah old scallawag named Colwash, a rump chief of a rene- gade band that made its headquarters on the north bank of the Columbia River at the Grand Dalles, the same thieving outfit that caused the early emigrants on their way to the Wil- lamette Valley so much trouble and annoyance, got the fever and dreams and dancing commenced. The character of these performances soon reached the ears of the agent of the Yakima reservation at Fort Simcoe, who had jurisdiction over all the Indians north of the Columbia River and east of the Cascade Mountains. At this time the Rev. J. H. Wilbur was the tem- poral as well as the spiritual head of that institution and a man who would not stand for any performances of that kind at this particular time. A message was sent notifying Colwash to cease his "dreaming" and close up his dahce house instanter. No attention was paid to the order and dreams and dancing continued. Two Indian policemen were sent from the reser- vation to arrest the offender and bring him to the agency. On their arrival at the camp members of the band crowded so thickly fn and around the dance house that the policemen were unable to make the arrest and returned to the agency and reported the facts in the case.

Father Wilbur, who had just finished his dinner, listened quietly to their report; then, turning to an attendant, ordered a team to be hitched to his two-seated covered hack ready for an immediate start to the Dalles. To Mrs. Wilbur he said, "Mother, a little lunch for our suppers." And inside of an hour with his two trusted policemen was on his way to the scene of the disturbances. Father Wilbur was a remarkable man of powerful physique, an indomitable will and as utterly fearless as it was possible for a man to be, of a genial, kind-hearted, generous nature, he was as sternly just and firm as a New Eng- land Puritan. Late that night he reached the block house in the Klickitat Valley, fifty miles from the agency and thirty