Part 31 (2/2)
”When Mr. and Mrs. Mercer came to Seattle, John Denny and wife and James Campbell and wife accompanied them. The three families swelled the population to thirteen families.
”D. B. Ward, a half brother of Mrs. Mercer, also came with them.
”'Seattle was not a very big city in those days,' said Mr. Ward recently in discussing the matter. 'I remember that soon after my arrival I thought I would take a walk up in the woods. I went to the church, which stood where at present is the Boston National Bank building. I found windows filled with little holes. It was a great mystery to me. I went down town and made inquiry about it and was told that every hole represented a bullet fired by the Indians during the fight three years before.'
”Mrs. Mercer was a woman of many grand qualities; she never permitted any suffering to go on about her if she were in a position to relieve it. She was a good friend of the poor and did many kind acts of which the world knew but little.”
In the latter years of her life she was a patient, uncomplaining invalid, and finally entered into rest on the 12th of November, 1897, having lived in Seattle for thirty-nine years. She was buried with honor and affection; the pallbearers were old pioneers averaging a forty years' residence in the same place; D. T. Denny, the longest, being one of the founders, for forty-five years; they were Dexter Horton, T. D.
Hinckley, D. T. Denny, Edgar Bryan, David Kellogg and Hans Nelson.
Mr. Mercer, at the age of 84 (in 1897), still survives her, pa.s.sing a peaceful old age in the midst of relatives and friends.
CHAPTER IX.
DR. HENRY A. SMITH, THE BRILLIANT WRITER.
This well known pioneer joined the ”mighty nation moving west” in 1852.
From Portland, the wayside inn of weary travelers, he pushed on to Puget Sound, settling in 1853 on Elliott Bay, at a place known for many years as Smith's Cove.
Being a gifted writer he has made numerous contributions to northwestern literature, both in prose and poetry.
In a rarely entertaining set of papers ent.i.tled ”Early Reminiscences,”
he brings vividly to the minds of his readers the ”good old times” on Elliott Bay, as he describes the manner of life, personal adventure, odd characters and striking environment of the first decade of settlement.
In them he relates that after the White River ma.s.sacre, he conveyed his mother to a place of safety, by night, in a boat with m.u.f.fled oars.
To quote his own words: ”Early the next morning I persuaded James Broad and Charley Williamson, a couple of harum-scarum run-away sailors, to accompany me to my ranch in the cove, where we remained two weeks securing crops. We always kept our rifles near us while working in the field, so as to be ready for emergencies, and brave as they seemed their faces several times blanched white as they sprang for their guns on hearing brush crack near them, usually caused by deer. One morning on going to the field where we were digging potatoes, we found fresh moccasin tracks, and judged from the difference in the size of the tracks that at least half a dozen savages had paid the field a visit during the night. As nothing had been disturbed we concluded that they were waiting in ambush for us and accordingly we retired to the side of the field farthest from the woods and began work, keeping a sharp lookout the while. Soon we heard a cracking in the brush and a noise that sounded like the snapping of a flintlock. We grabbed our rifles and rushed into the woods where we heard the noise, so as to have the trees for shelter, and if possible to draw a bead on the enemy. On reaching shelter, the crackling sound receded toward Salmon Bay. But fearing a surprise if we followed the sound of retreat, we concluded to reach the Bay by way of a trail that led to it, but higher up; we reached the water just in time to see five redskins land in a canoe, on the opposite side of the Bay where the Crooks' barn now stands.
After that I had hard work to keep the runaways until the crop was secured, and did so only by keeping one of them secreted in the nearest brush constantly on guard. At night we barred the doors and slept in the attic, hauling the ladder up after us.
Sometimes, when the boys told blood-curdling stories until they became panicky by their own eloquence, we slept in the woods, but that was not often.
”In this way the crops were all saved, cellared and stacked, only to be destroyed afterward by the torch of the common enemy.
”Twice the house was fired before it was finally consumed, and each time I happened to arrive in time to extinguish the flames, the incendiaries evidently having taken to their heels as soon as the torch was applied.”
While yet new to the country he met with an adventure not uncommon to the earliest settlers in the great forest, recorded as follows:
”I once had a little experience, but a very amusing one, of being 'lost.' In the summer of 1854, I concluded to make a trail to Seattle.
Up to that time I had ridden to the city in a 'Chinook buggy.' One bright morning I took a compa.s.s and started for Seattle on as nearly a straight line as possible. After an hour's travel the sun was hid by clouds and the compa.s.s had to be entirely relied upon for the right course. This was tedious business, for the woods had never been burned, and the old fallen timber was almost impa.s.sable. About noon I noticed to my utter astonishment, that the compa.s.s had reversed its poles. I knew that beds of mineral would sometimes cause a variation of the needle and was delighted at the thought of discovering a _valuable iron mine_ so near salt water. A good deal of time was spent in breaking bushes and thoroughly marking the spot so that there would be no difficulty in finding it again, and from that on I broke bushes as I walked, so as to be able to easily retrace my steps. From that place I followed the compa.s.s _reversed_, calculating, as I walked, the number of s.h.i.+ps that would load annually at Seattle with pig-iron, and the amount of ground that would be eventually covered at the cove with furnaces, rolling mills, foundries, tool manufacturing establishments, etc.
”As night came on I became satisfied that I had traveled too far to the east, and had pa.s.sed Seattle, and the prospect of spending a night in the woods knocked my iron calculations into pi. Soon, however, I was delighted to see a clearing ahead, and a shake-built shanty that I concluded must be the ranch that Mr. Nagle had commenced improving some time before, and which, I had understood, lay between Seattle and Lake Was.h.i.+ngton. When I reached the fence surrounding the improvements, I seated myself on one of the top rails for a seat and to ponder the advisability of remaining with my new neighbor over night, or going on to town. While sitting thus, I could not help contrasting his improvements with my own. The size of the clearing was the same, the house was a good deal like mine, the only seeming difference was that the front of his faced the west, whereas the front of mine faced the east. While puzzling over this strange coincidence, my own mother came out of the house to feed the poultry that had commenced going to roost, in a rookery for all the world like my own, only facing the wrong way.
'In the name of all that's wonderful!' I thought, 'what is she doing here? and how did she get here ahead of me?' Just then the world took a spin around, my ranch wheeled into line, and, lo! I was sitting on my own fence, and had been looking at my own improvements without knowing them.” And from this he draws a moral and adorns the tale with the philosophic conclusion that people cannot see and think alike owing to their point of view, and we therefore must be charitable.
Until accustomed to it and schooled in wood-craft, the mighty and amazing forest was bewildering and mysterious to the adventurous settler; however, they soon learned how not to lose themselves in its labyrinthine depths.
Dr. Smith is a past master in description, as will be seen by this word-picture of a fire in a vast pitchy and resinous ma.s.s of combustible material. I have witnessed many, each a magnificent display.
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