Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/109

Rh The probate court of Clarke county made an application for an injunction against Loring and Ingalls at the first term of the United States district court held at Vancouver, beginning the 29th of October 1850, to stop the further erection of buildings for military purposes on land that was claimed as the county seat. The attorney for the United States denied that the legislative assembly had the power to give lands for county seats, did the territorial act permit it, or that the land could be taken before it was surveyed; and declared that the premises were reserved by order of the war department, which none might gainsay. The court sustained the opinion. At a later period a legal contest arose between the heirs of A. M. Short and the Catholic missionaries. The military reservation, however, of one mile square, remains to-day the same as in 1853.

On the 13th of May Major Tucker left Vancouver with two companies of riflemen to establish a supply post at The Dalles. The officers detached for that station were Captain Claiborne, Lieutenants Lindsay, May, and Ervine, and Surgeon C. H. Smith. A reservation of ten miles square was made at this place, and the troops employed in erecting suitable store-houses and garrison accommodations to make this the head-quarters for the Indian country in the event of hostilities. Both the Protestant and Catholic missions were found to be abandoned, though the claims of both were subsequently revived, which together with the claim of the county seat of Wasco county occasioned lengthy litigation. The military reservation became a fourth factor in an imbroglio out of which the Methodist missionary society, through