Page:Our First Indian War.djvu/10

Rh What a burden was thus thrust upon the officers and legislature of the Territory! There was in the treasury forty-three dollars and seventy-two cents, with an outstanding indebtedness of four thousand and seventy-nine dollars and seventy-four cents. War was inevitable, but where could funds be obtained to carry it on? Application was made to the Hudson's Bay Company, and on the personal guaranty of Governor Abernethy, Jesse Applegate and A. L. Lovejoy, supplies to the value of one thousand dollars were promptly supplied by it.

These three gentlemen were appointed loan commissioners to obtain subscriptions and loans from the merchants and few men of means in the Willamette valley, and they secured the pledge of five thousand dollars with which to equip the regiment of volunteers for an extended campaign in the upper country. Very little of this was in cash, and the rest was in provisions of all kinds, clothing, blankets, arms, ammunition, horses and their accoutrements, and all else that could be made available.

A company of riflemen was raised the same day, and officered and equipped the next, and it pushed forward to The Dalles at once. A regiment was raised during the succeeding thirty days, and Cornelius Gilliam was made its colonel. Mitchell Gilliam, one of the judges of the King County Superior Court, is his grandson.

It was in those days a matter of the greatest difficulty and hardship to get a. body of men up the Columbia river to The Dalles, and it was not until the last of January that Col. Gilliam, at the head of one hundred and thirty men, was able to take the field, with the latter place for his base. The first engagement was with the Des Chuttes, John Days and Cayuses. About twenty miles from what was later known as Celilo, the Indian camp was attacked, one Indian killed and the rest dispersed. The next day the whole force went in pursuit of the enemy, which was found and attacked, regardless of its numbers, several Indians killed, a large number of horses, a few cattle, and nearly fifteen hundred dollars of stolen property recaptured. Skirmishing continued for several days, with a loss to the army of four men killed.

Peace negotiations, lack of facilities for transportation and of food, delayed the progress of the troops, and it was not until late in February, 1848, that a fight of any importance occurred. This was a little below the mouth of the Umatilla river, where the Cayuses had chosen their ground. Repeated charges were