Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 22.djvu/195



LAST PHASE OF OREGON BOUNDARY 185

icans by misrepresenting the motives with which the Americans came into 1 the gold region. Says the report :

"Among the Hudson's Bay Company's people, there are some gentlemen of high character and respectability. Mr. McKay, Mr. McTavish, Mr. McLean, and the agent at Fort Ylale, whose name I forget, have exhibited marked courtesy and kindness towards Americans ; but that my strictures upon the generality of the subordinate officers, to whom they were intended to apply, were not too severe will be admitted, when I state on the authority of Colonel Snowden, a citizen of Yuba county, in California, that he learned from several Indian chiefs, that they and their people were led to believe by the representations of the Hudson's Bay Company's servants, that the Americans were coming there to rob them of their cattle, of their food, and their squaws, and were advised by those same evil-minded individuals to commence a war of extermination against our citizens." 12

On the competency of Colonel Snowden as a witness I cannot pass judgment, nor on that of the Indians quoted; consequently, I cannot say how much this evidence may be worth. So grave a charge can only be admitted on the most conclusive evidence. The most convincing thing about it is that it states the logic of the situation, though it is to be hoped that there was no actual incitement. Past question, however, the opposed views regarding the Indian made understanding on this subject between the two white peoples almost impossible. It will be seen from what has been said that the quarrel with the Americans was against the Hudson's Bay Company much more than against the British people. My last quota- tion from Mr. Nugent's interesting document will be on this point.

"From all these petty exactions and oppressions, these denials of justice and evidences of rampant preju- dice, the conclusion is irresistible that whatever may have been the disposition of the British Government, the feel- ing of the Colonial officials and of the servants of the Hudson's Bay Company was aught but friendly toward our people ... I would here remark that from the

12 Ibid. p. 14.