Page:The Pacific Monthly, volumes 5 and 6.djvu/441

 lumbia some one of their people acted as pilot. Lottie was captain of the steamship Beaver for several years. It will be remembered the Beaver was the first steamship ever seen on the Pacific Ocean. She is an historic craft. A prominent lady now living in Portland was born on the Beaver while Mr. Lottie was captain of her, Lottie was a Scotchman, a large and powerful man. After Major James Birnie retired from the service of the Hudson Bay Company at Astoria to his farm at Cathlamet, Mr. Lottie succeeded him in charge of their affairs at that point. A feud existed between Lottie and Colonel John McClure, an American, who had taken up a claim joining the old Astor place on the west, and which later on became the principal business portion of Astoria. McClure was an ill-tempered and dangerous man when under the influence of intoxicating drink. During one of his sprees he went up to Hudson's Bay headquarters and wrapped on Mr. Lottie's door. When Mr. Lottie opened the door, McClure said with an oath: "I have come to kill you," and commenced shooting at Lottie, who seized an old saber encased in a heavy iron scabbard, with which he knocked McClure down, injuring him severely. When McClure's friends called to take him home, Lottie refused to give him up, saying: "The Colonel is my guest, and I will take good care of him until he can go home." Lottie was not blamed in this case, as he had a right to defend himself. Mr. Lottie was drowned in the Columbia River below Vancouver some years later, and Colonel McClure sold out his town site to Judge Cyrus Olney, late in the '50s, and returned to Indiana, his native state, where he died many years ago.

Captain John Scarborough, an Englishman, was also one of the earliest pilots. He resided at Scarborough Head in 1844, and doubtless had been there much longer, but I find no record of him before that time. His home was near where Fort Columbia now stands. He died in 1856.

When Captain Charles Wilks, of the United States Exploring Expedition, with the sloop of war Peacock, entered the Columbia in 1841, she came in over the bar without a pilot and was met just inside the cape by several prominent Oregonians, who recommended a colored man, who lived at or near the cape, as a pilot, but he ran the ship aground on the Chinook sands. He lived afterward in Astoria as late as 1857. His name was George Washington. His wife was a Chinook woman, a sister of the wife of Colonel John McClure, one of the proprietors of Astoria. "Old George," as he was called, was very fond of speaking of "Con'el McCloo, my broder-in-law, sah." George was very old, and once, when asked his age, said: "I doan kno' 'zactly how ole I is, sah; but I war jis' 18 year ole when de British laid de barge on de tea."

The first pilot-boat on the bar was the launch of the sloop of war Peacock. She was wrecked on the bar as she was departing from the Columbia, on the i8th day of July, 1841, and "Peacock Spit" still bears her name. Her launch was saved and Captain Wilks left it with Dr. John McLaughlin, chief factor of the Hudson Bay Company, with instructions that it should only be used as a pilot-boat and to assist mariners at the mouth of the river. The "provisional" Legislature of Oregon some time after passed an act requiring Dr. McLaughlin to deliver the launch up to the legislative authority, and Governor Abernethy made a formal demand, which McLaughlin ignored by referring to the positive orders of Captain Wilks, at the same time claiming that the "provisional Legislature" could not act for the Government of the United States. Finally, to avoid trouble. Dr. McLaughlin turned her over to Lieutenant Niel M. Howison, of the United States Navy, and he sold her to an Astoria pilot, whose name I have not been able to learn. She was not nearly as seaworthy nor so fit for a pilot-boat as a good, large Chinook Indian canoe.

The first pilot on the bar of the Columbia not connected with or under the influence of the Hudson Bay Company was one Captain Reives. In May, 1848, he took a crew of Indians and went outside to bring the Hudson Bay Company's bark Vancouver, but lost her on the bar. He figured but little as a pilot and was soon lost sight of.