Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 16.djvu/24



16 THOMAS W. PROSCH

appointed consisting of two army officers and one citizen Capt. Rufus Ingalls, Capt. A. J. Smith and L. F. Grover the latter in after years Governor of Oregon and United States Senator. They carefully went over the claims, and on the 10th of October, 1857, reported that in Washington Territory expenses had been incurred for subsistence, equipment and pay of troops amounting to $1,481,975.45. The amount in Oregon was more than three times greater. The commission did not take into account property losses of citizens, which were very great, and for which efforts to secure compensation were subsequently made with much persistence and diligence. Congress was nearly two years in acting, when the whole matter was referred to the Third Auditor of the Treasury, R. J. Atkinson. He assumed the role of "watch dog of the treasury." He paid no attention to the report of the Grover- Smith-Ingalls commission, but took up the original accounts, and examined them critically and harshly. He reported against them in 1859, 1860 and 1862, and his reports had influence with Congress. It was finally determined to pay the volunteers regular army rates, and to pay for purchased supplies in the same way. This was unjust to people here, and not at all like the treatment given Californians under similar circum- stances a short time before. Scrip had been issued for the services and supplies, and this from the beginning had been at a discount. In some cases it is said to have sold as low as ten and twenty per cent of its nominal value. Nothing was paid until 1861, and then slowly and cautiously for a long term of years. The Treasury Department gave twenty year bonds, bearing six per cent interest to pay these accounts, delayed for years, reduced in amount about one-half, and the bonds themselves being worth less than their face. Some of these Indian war accounts were unpaid in the 1870's. It is safe to say that, taking all things into account, the people did not get one-fourth of the money they should have got, and that the service rendered the United States was more illy paid than any other of the nineteenth century in the history of the