Page:Portland, Oregon, its History and Builders volume 1.djvu/42

26 commander of the expedition, like Cook, lost his life on this voyage, it was in many respects one of the most valuable of all the exploring expeditions to this region. La Perouse was accompanied by a corps of scientific observers able to report in full the value of the country, and their observations and the report of the voyage, make up four volumes with a book of maps, and really gave to the world the first scientific knowledge of this vast region. The expedition had also another very decisive feature as showing at that time what other nations than England thought of the ownership of the country. La Perouse was instructed to ascertain the extent and limits of the rights of Spain, and no reference was made whatever to any rights of England, clearly showing that in the estimation of other nations, England had no rights on the Pacific coast as against Spain or any other power.

Following La Perouse in 1786, three fur trading expeditions were dispatched to the northwest coast. One of these under the command of Captains Meares and Tipping, with the ships, Nootka and Sea Otter was fitted out in Bengal and traded with the Indians in Prince Williams sound and the Alaskan coast. A second expedition was fitted out by English merchants at Bombay, sailing under the flag of the East India Company, reached Nootka sound in June, 1786, and secured six hundred sea otter skins, not as many as they hoped for, because the Indians had promised to save their skins for Captain Hanna who had given them a thrashing, and who returned in August. This expedition from Bombay is remarkable for more than its six hundred sea otter pelts. It left behind, at his own request, the first white man to reside on the northwest coast of America—one John McKey—who being in bad health, chose to take his chances with the Indians, the chief promising him protection. McKey lived for over a year with the Indians, taking a native woman for a wife, was well treated but endured many hardships, kept a journal of his experiences, and gave to the world, through Captain Barclay, who carried him away to China, the geographical fact that Vancouver island was not a part of the mainland.

The third expedition of that year was two ships fitted out in England in 1785, but did not reach the Pacific coast until 1786. It was sent out by what was called King George's Sound Company, an association of British merchants acting under licenses from the South Sea and East India monopolies, and was commanded by Nathanial Portlock and George Dixon, both of whom had been with Cook on his last voyage. They reached the coast of Alaska in July, 1786, then drifted south intending to winter at Nootka, but from bad weather and other causes failed to find harbors and sailed to the Sandwich islands where they wintered. They returned to the coast in 1787 and repeated their cruise of drifting southward from Alaska. Portlock and Dixon named several points on the coast in this cruise, secured two thousand, five hundred and fifty sea otter skins which they sold in China for $54,857, while the whole number of otter pelts secured by the other fur traders,—Hanna, Strange, Meares and Barclay down to the end of 1787 was only 2,481 skins. Captain Barclay reached the coast at Nootka in June, 1787, coming out as the commander of the ship Imperial Eagle, which sailed from the Belgian port of Ostend under the flag of the Austrian East India Company, making another nation engaging in the fur trade. Barclay went no further north than Nootka, got eight hundred otter skins and then sailed southward, discovering Barclay sound; continuing his voyage south, passing the Strait of Fuca without seeing it, he sent off a boat to enter a river, probably the Quillayute—with five men and a boat-swain's mate, where they were attacked by the Indians and all killed. These were probably the same savages that gave Heceta and his men such a battle in 1775. Mrs. Barclay had accompanied the captain on his voyage, and is entitled to the distinction of being the first white woman to land on the soil of old Oregon.

Following up Captain Barclay's careful survey of the coast, the Spanish government sent north in 1788 another exploration to find out what the Rus-