Part 2

The rest of the family who were able came to the table and we had breakfast; there was to be an Indian funeral later and the Doctor was to conduct it; so we separated and went to our various employments. Many of our family were sick. Those able to attend school were my brother Frank and myself, the two sons of Mr. Manson, a Hudson's Bay man, who were boarding with the Whitmans for the winter in order to attend the Mission school; Eliza Spalding, daughter of the Rev. H. H. Spalding, having arrived with her father a few days before; David Malin, a half breed. 'Liza was to remain for the winter. There were eight members of our family not well enough to attend school that morning, and most of the children of the immigrant families wintering there were unable to attend. I can recall only a few of these children besides those of our own family that were at school that morning, it being Monday and the first day of the term. School had not been in session before that, on account of so much sickness.

At nine o'clock we went to the schoolroom. Mr. Sanders was the teacher. Joe Stansfield went out that morning to drive in a beef animal from the range to be killed and brother Frank was the one to shoot it down. That made him late for school and when he came in school had been in session perhaps half an hour. When the hour for the forenoon recess had come, the girls had theirs first and we went over to the Doctor's kitchen. My brother John, who was just recovering from a severe case of measles, was sitting there with a skein of brown twine around his knees, winding it into a ball for there were brooms to be made soon. We all got a drink of water. John asked me to bring him some and after he had drank, said, "Won't you hold the twine for me?"

I replied, "'Tis only recess, but I will hold it at noon." The bell called us then, so we returned to the schoolroom and the boys were given their recess. The beef was being dressed in the meadow grass, northeast and not far from the school house. Three or four white men were at work and a lot of Indians were gathered around with their blankets closely wrapped about them and it is supposed that they had their guns and tomahawks under them. The boys went to where the beef was being dressed; in a short time we heard guns and the boys came running in and said the Indians were killing the men at the beef. Mr. Sanders opened the door and we looked out. We saw Mr. Rogers run from the river to the Mission house and Mr. Kimball running with his sleeves rolled up and his arms all bloody; he ran around the end of the house to the east door and Mrs. Whitman let him in. Mr. Hoffman was fighting with an Indian, swinging an ax; he was at the beef. Mr. Sanders ran down the steps, probably thinking of his family, but was seized by two Indians; he broke away from them and started for the immigrant house where his family were. One Indian on horseback and two on foot ran after him and overtook him just as he reached the fence to cross it; they killed him and cut his head off and the next day I saw him lying there with his head severed. Mrs. Whitman stood at a door which had a sash window, looking at the attack on Mr. Sanders. Mr. Rogers came to the door and she let him in; his arm was broken at the wrist.

Mary Ann Bridger was the only eye-witness of the attack on Dr. Whitman and John Sager, which had occurred just before the attack on the men at the beef. She ran out of the kitchen door and around the house and got into the room where Mrs. Whitman and the rest of the family were and cried, "Oh, the Indians are killing father and John!" It seems that after attending the Indian funeral, the Doctor returned to his home, where, soon after, some Indians came into the kitchen and as Dr. Whitman started to go from the living room to the kitchen he said to his wife, "Lock the door after me," which she did. In the course of conversation regarding the condition of the sick Indian, one of those in the kitchen slipped up behind the good man, drew a tomahawk from under his blanket and sank it into the Doctor's skull. Others attacked John Sager. Their dastardly deed accomplished, they left the room, not paying any attention to the fact that the little half-breed girl had run out; then they joined those around the beef and the general attack immediately began. The Doctor was not instantly killed. Mrs. Hays, Mrs. Hall and Mrs. Sanders came running to the Mission house for protection and Mrs. Whitman and Mrs. Hall unbolted the door, went into the kitchen and brought the wounded man into the living room and laid him on the floor, putting a pillow under his head. Mrs. Whitman got a towel and some ashes from the stove and tried to staunch the blood. He lingered but a short time, for the blow of his treacherous adversary had been sure and deadly. Mrs. Whitman went to the sash door and looked out to see what had become of those around the beef. She stood there watching, when Frank Iskalome, a full blooded Indian, shot her in the left breast, through the glass. Sister Elizabeth was standing beside her and heard her exclaim, "I am wounded; hold me tight." The women took hold of her and placed her in a chair; then she began to pray that "God would save her children that soon were to be orphaned and that her dear mother would be given strength to bear the news of her death."

Finally Mr. Rogers suggested that they all go up stairs for safety. The only weapon of defense they had was an old, broken gun; but when the Indians would start to come up, as they did after a time, some one of them would point it over the stairs, and the Indians were afraid to face it. Miss Bewley and her brother had staid behind their family, to winter at the Mission. She was sick and the Doctor thought he could treat and help her; she would not consent to remain unless her brother staid also; he was lying in bed in a little room off the kitchen, very sick with measles, during the attack upon the Doctor and John, but the Indians paid no attention to him at that time. Miss Bewley was supposed to assist with the housework and to teach the girls some fancy work--knitting, tatting, etc.--the few kinds of such work as was done in that day. The Doctor had been asked to go up to see her that morning, as she was reported to be in a very excited state. He found her weeping bitterly, but she would give him no reason as to why she cried so hard. He came down and asked Mrs. Whitman to go up and see if she could not comfort her. This was early Monday morning. Another incident that fixes the day and time as the Monday forenoon recess is this. One of the fixed rules of the Doctor's was the hour of the day we took our baths, both summer and winter--eleven o'clock in the morning; and as we did not get our usual baths on the Saturday previous on account of the sickness of so many of the children, Mrs. Whitman was bathing a part of them this Monday morning. Some were out of the tub and dressed; one was in the tub and some were dressing. Elizabeth said that mother came and told them, in a calm tone of voice, to dress quickly and then she helped the one who was in the tub to get out and assisted her to dress. This is the hour that is fixed in my mind beyond a doubt, as the hour of the massacre, regardless of the statement of others that it was two or three o'clock in the afternoon.

Now to return to the schoolroom. My brother Frank came in with the other boys and shut the door, saying, "We must hide." So we climbed to a loft that was above a part of the schoolroom and was sometimes used as the teacher's bedroom. It did not extend to the ceiling, but was so arranged that it left a hall on the south side of the building where there were two windows giving light to the main room. There was a fireplace in the schoolroom. In order to get up to the loft, we had to set a table under the opening and pile books on it; one of the boys got up first and then we girls stepped on the books and the boy above managed to pull us up, until finally all were up and hidden among the rubbish that had accumulated there. Frank told us all to ask God to save us and I can see him now, after all the years that have passed, as he kneeled and prayed for God to spare us. It seemed as though we had been there a long time, when the door was opened and Joe Lewis and several Indians came into the schoolroom and called "Frank." As they got no answer, he called the Manson boys and they answered. Lewis then said for all to come down and the two Mansons, about 16 and 17 years of age, and David Malin, 6 or 7 years, went among the first; then the girls. I was afraid to try to jump to the floor, but Lewis said, "Put your feet over the edge and let go and I will catch you." He failed to do this and I struck the floor hard, hurting my head. When he helped me up I was dazed and when he asked me "Where is Frank?" I replied, "I don't know." Frank remained quiet and it evidently did not occur to any one to search for him in the loft.

They sent the Hudson Bay boys and the half-breed Indian boy in charge of an Indian to Finlay's lodge and from there they were sent the next day to Fort Walla Walla and were safe there. Later, after the rescue of the survivors, the two Manson boys went down the river from the fort with us; but they would not let the boy David go, claiming him as a Canadian. His father was a Spaniard and his mother a squaw. The last look I had of him was when we rowed away from Fort Walla Walla, leaving him standing on the bank of the river crying as though his heart were breaking.

Lewis said to me, "Where do you want to go?"

I said, "I want to go to the kitchen where John is."

He replied, "John is dead and the rest of them."

I said, "I don't believe it, for he was there when I went down at recess."

But he took my hand and the rest of the children followed, with the Indians bringing up the rear. When we went into the kitchen, the dead body of John laid on the floor and his blood had run and made a stream of dark, congealed crimson. He laid on his back with one arm thrown up and back and the other outstretched and the twine still around his knees. It appeared as if he had been hit and just slipped out of the chair he was sitting on. We children all sat down on the settle that was near the stove. A stove was a luxury in those days; there was one in the living room and in the kitchen, where the children sat in terror, was a Hudson's Bay cook stove of a very small and primitive make; the oven was directly over the firebox and two kettles which were of an oblong shape sat in on the side, something like the drum on the sides of a stove. The kettle of meat had been put on to cook for dinner and was still on the stove. Joe Lewis took a piece out and cut it up, put it on the lid of the kettle and said, "You children haven't had any dinner," and passed it to us, but none of us could eat.

The room was full of Indians and they would point their guns at us, saying "Shall we shoot?" and then flourish their tomahawks at our defenseless heads. One of them had on John's straw hat that he had braided from straw cut from wild grass one summer when he was working for the Rev. Spalding. Mrs. Spalding had sewed it for him. The Indian's name was Klokamus. Later, he was one of five hanged at Oregon City in the summer of 1850. The pantry was being plundered by the squaws. In memory, I can hear the rattle of the dried berries on the floor as they emptied the receptacles of them, in order to get the pans and cans to carry away. Joe Lewis went into the living room and must have gone into the parlor where mother had a large wooden chest in which she kept her choice clothing and keepsakes; he came out with five nice, fancy gauze kerchiefs of different colors, made to wear with a medium low-necked dress. He gave them to the Chief and the headmen that were in the room.

In a short time my brother Frank came into the room. He sat down beside me, saying "I came to find you. John is dead and we don't know what has become of the rest of the family; the Indians are going to kill me and what will become of you, my poor, little sister?" Word was finally passed out not to kill any of the children and we were ordered out of the house, so we went and stood in a corner where the "Indian room" made an ell with the main part of the house; the Indians were very numerous, some of them on horses and most of them armed and painted and they seemed to be waiting for something. Soon out came the immigrant women that had all fled to the Mission house for safety upon the outbreak of the massacre; as they passed us their children went with their mothers, leaving Frank, Eliza Spalding and myself standing there. They were followed by Mr. Rogers and Joe Lewis bearing a settee with the wounded Mrs. Whitman on it, covered up with blankets and Elizabeth close beside it, her arms laden with clothing. When they had gotten out of and a short distance from the house in an open space, Joe Lewis dropped his end of the settee. Mr. Rogers looked up quickly and must have realized what it meant; but he was shot instantly and fell and an Indian tried to ride his horse over him. Elizabeth turned about and ran back into the house. Then an Indian came to Mrs. Whitman and took his whip and beat her over the face and head and then turned the settee over in the mud. She was very weak from loss of blood; my sister Catherine told me and I am convinced that she did not last long after being beaten and thrown face down in the mud, with the blankets and settee on top of her.

An Indian came and stood by Frank and another one took up his stand close by and they talked together earnestly; the first one was a friendly one and he seemed to be pleading with the other to spare Frank's life, but finally the ugly one took hold of my brother and said, "You are a bad boy." Then he shoved him a short distance from my side and an Indian shot him in the breast; he fell and did not struggle and I think he died instantly as he made no movement. The Indians all went away then and the women and children that belonged in the immigrant house were gone and Eliza and I were alone. We seemed to be paralyzed and the horrors we had passed through so numbed our thoughts that we did not seem to think that we could go to the other house, as we had been taught not to go where we had not had permission. It was getting quite dark by this time, in the short November day, and we stood close together, when a friendly Indian came; he was the one that had pleaded for Frank's life and he took us by the hands and led us over to Mrs. Sander's door. She took us in and gave us some supper and one of the other families took Eliza in to give her a place to sleep.

When I had eaten my supper, Miss Bewley asked me if I would go over to the Whitman house to take food to her brother who was lying terribly ill in the little room just off the kitchen. He had seen and heard some of the awful things that had taken place during the day, but had not been molested, probably because the Indians thought him dying anyway. I told her I was afraid to go, as I would have to step over the dead bodies. Mrs. Sanders took me into a bedroom and spread a quilt on the floor and I laid down, but not to sleep until far into the night. Mr. Gillam, the tailor, had been wounded while sitting on his table sewing and had run into this room; he was suffering terribly and begging to be put out of his misery; along towards morning he was given his release from suffering.

We got up very early and ate a scant breakfast, as we knew not what daylight would bring. The Indians would surely ask to be fed as they were then sitting in the early glimmerings of light on Monument hill, chanting the Death song. The wind had blown and whistled so mournfully in the night that it had added to my fear and I never hear the sound of the wind blowing in the winter, but my mind goes back to that terrible night; and it has been 72 years since I heard it wail its requium around desolated Waiilatpu.

My four sisters and the two half-breed girls, with the wounded Mr. Kimball, were alone in the chamber of the Mission house all night, for they had made no attempt to leave when the others had gone in the afternoon. The children were all ill with measles and two were very ill--sister Louise and Helen Meek. They begged constantly for water, but there was none upstairs; the pitchers of water that were there on Monday morning had had cloths dipped in them to put on Mrs. Whitman's wounds. Mr. Kimball's broken arm pained him excessively and he sat on the floor with his head against a bed until toward morning, when he told Catherine to tear up a sheet and bandage his arm and he would go to the river for water.

Catherine said, "Mother wouldn't want the sheets torn up." "Child, your mother will never need sheets. She is dead," was his answer. He went out in the dim morning light and succeeded in reaching the river, wrapped in the blanket Catherine had put around him, Indian fashion. Meanwhile the Indians had come to the immigrant house and had told us to prepare their breakfast. While they were waiting for their meal, an outcry was made that drew us all to the north door in the Hall's room. I stepped out on the lower step and an Indian with a gun in his hand was on the upper step; we saw the figure of a man with a white blanket around him, walking near the Doctor's house; he was near the corn-crib about half way to the house, when the Indian on the step above me shot, and the man fell. It was Mr. Kimball returning with water for the fevered children. I realize that my statement is different from all the others of the survivors in regard to the killing of Mr. Kimball, but I have a clear remembrance of this tragedy, which time has not dimmed or effaced from my mind. According to some, he hid in the brush till the next day and in working his way to his family was killed as he was crossing the fence by the house. I remember the same day, about noon or later, Joe Stanfield came in and said that a "Boston man" was hiding in the brush. Some of the women wanted to investigate, but Joe said "No, don't." We thought it might be Mr. Hall, as he had gone, as I remember, early in the morning of the massacre to see if he could shoot some ducks on the river. He was never heard from or his body found, so no one knows his fate.

The Osborn family hid under the floor in the Indian room and remained hidden until in the darkness of the night they came out, put a little food together, wrapped a coverlid about Mrs. Osborn and went out into the cold. There were Mr. Osborn and three children in the party. Mrs. Osborn had been confined to the bed and this was the first time she had been out of doors in some days, though that day she had been able to go into Mrs. Whitman's part of the house. They climbed the fence and took the irrigation ditch, as it offered more protection for them, being quite deep with the wild rye grass and buck brush growing thick and tall on the banks; then they got into the main road and went on for some distance, finally hiding for the day; besides Mrs. Osborn was unable to travel further. Their sufferings were terrible, all being thinly clad. At last Mr. Osborn concluded to take the oldest boy and go to the Fort, if possible, leaving his wife and the other children hidden in the bushes. He made his way to Fort Walla Walla, carrying his boy on his back; the boy had nothing with which to cover his head. When Mr. Osborn arrived at the Fort he asked Commander McBaine to take him in and to furnish him horses and food to use in the rescue of his wife and the other children. McBaine refused, saying he "Could not do it."

"I will die at the Fort gates, but I must have help," was Osborn's reply.

In the happy days before these tragic happenings, an artist by the name of Stanley came to the Mission. He had been sent out by the Government for the Smithsonian Institute to take pictures. At the time of the Massacre he was again on his way to visit the Mission. He and his Indian guide intended to go down into the Willamette valley, near Oregon City, to winter. Meeting an Indian woman, she told him everyone was killed at the Mission; he was asked if he was a "Boston man" or a Frenchman and replying that he was a Frenchman, was allowed to proceed unmolested. He reached the Fort in safety and when McBaine refused to let Mr. Osborn have horses, said to the latter, "You can have my horse and what provisions I have," and he also gave him a silk handkerchief to tie on the child's head. Stitkus, an Indian, took his own French chapeau and put it on Mr. Osborn's head. McBaine at last gave an Indian a blanket if he would go with Mr. Osborn and rescue the family; but he instructed him not to bring them to the Fort, but to take them to an Indian village. The mother and children were found with some difficulty, and as they came to the fork in the road on the return, one leading to the Umatilla Indian village where their lives would not have been safe, and the other to the Fort and security, the Indian, disregarding McBaine's explicit directions, refused to take the one to the village and insisted that they proceed to the Fort. The little party did so, and were finally admitted. Their hardships were many, even there; but they remained until such time as we were all ransomed. This is as I remember hearing from sister Catherine as she, later, lived close to the Osborn family in the Willamette valley and she and Mrs. Osborn were together frequently; also from the account sworn to by Mr. Osborn in Gray's History.

Tuesday morning, Miss Bewley made some gruel, hoping to be able to send it over to her sick brother. Chief Tilokaikt came in and she told him of her brother and he was very sympathetic and took a number of us in charge to go over to the Mission house. Some of the party went inside of the fence on the north side, while some took the south side which was the public road. When we were a few yards from the house, we saw Mr. Sander's body lying there; then we heard a cry and saw Catherine and Elizabeth coming, each carrying a sick child in their arms. The women hastened to meet them and helped them to the house, which had sheltered us through the night. Poor Mary Ann Bridger was tottering along by herself. They had to leave Helen Meek alone and we could hear her screaming and begging to be taken also, disregarding Catherine's assurance that she would soon return for her. At last all the sick ones were transferred to the immigrant house, save Mr. Bewley; and Mr. Sales, who was also very ill in the blacksmith shop. Sister Louise died five days after this and Helen Meek a few days after her.

This same morning (Tuesday) we were given muslin to make sheets to wrap the dead in and Wednesday morning Joe Stansfield and the women helped to cover and sew them in these sheets. He had dug a long trench about three feet deep and six feet long; then all the bodies were put in a wagon and hurried to the grave. They were all piled up like dead animals in the wagon bed. A runaway occurred and scattered some of the bodies along the road and they had to be picked up. There was a Catholic father who was visiting the Indians and he went up to the hole where they were burying them and helped. He would take hold of one end of a body and Joe Stansfield hold of the other and they would lay them in this shallow place until all the victims were ranged side by side--Mr. and Mrs. Whitman, then the two Sager boys and Mr. Rogers, and so on, then covered with the earth.