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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1858 | 3 |
| 1859 | 10 |
| 1860 | 2 |
| 1861 | 3 |
18 stories matching general
- A Frontier Fourth: Cannon, Troops, and a Ball in Steilacoom
On July 4, 1859, Steilacoom turned out for a warship salute, a military review at Fort Steilacoom, a reading of the Declaration of Independence, and an evening ball.
- The Quartermaster’s Arithmetic: Scrip, Pork, and Profiteering in Washington Territory
A detailed audit of Quartermaster General W. W. Miller’s books exposed inflated prices, unexplained payments, and scrip issued for vouchers the commissioners had already disallowed.
- The Surrender Demand That Came Before Peace
Father De Smet escorts Kamiakin, Skloom, and other chiefs to Vancouver to meet Gen. Harney—but the terms are blunt: the 'ringleaders' must be handed over first.
- The Mystery of the Degenerate Wheat
A local doctor presents a strange botanical specimen that challenges the agricultural wisdom of 1859.
- The Land Company That Claimed Puget Sound — and the Settlers Who Fought Back
A federal surveyor's report from Olympia questioned the sprawling British land claims around Steilacoom and Fort Steilacoom, siding with American settlers who had built farms inside the company's alleged grant.
- ‘Rule or Ruin’: A Territorial Lawmaker Turns on Governor Stevens
Confined to his room with a cold, a member of the Washington Territorial Legislature answers his critics — defending his right to name the governor's unpopular appointees and accusing a ruling clique of trying to shut the rest of the territory up.
- The Day the Steamers Left Puget Sound
An 1861 Steilacoom editor warns that losing ocean steamship service will isolate Washington Territory and strangle its growth.
- Pioneering the Snoqualmie Pass Road
Citizens of King County organize to build a wagon road across the Cascades, raising over a thousand dollars to bridge the wilderness.
- The Coat That Became a Campaign Scandal
A Steilacoom merchant says Col. Wm. H. Wallace paid for the coat Warren Gore called stolen—and that the real target is the county's voters.
- A Territorial Power Struggle
A scathing critique of the Acting Governor's unilateral removal of a Capitol Commissioner.
- The Land Office Money That Never Reached the Books
Register Isaac W. Smith accuses Receiver Selucius Garfielde of holding land-claim payments on private deposit and refusing to account for them—an 1861 public audit fight in Washington Territory.
- The Vultures on Steilacoom's Streets
A furious 1858 editorial accuses local authorities of letting California gamblers plunder the town in plain sight.
- Judge Chambers’s New Mill Turns New Dungeness Wheat Into ‘Superb’ Flour
A newspaper tour of the just-finished grist mill found machinery ‘complete in every particular’ and a cleaning apparatus that astonished the visitors.
- A Town Organizes a Vigilance Committee to Keep 'Northern Indians' Off Its Shore
Citizens meet at the Court House, resolve that 'no Northern Indians at any time be allowed to land at this place,' and appoint a standing Committee of Vigilance to enforce it.
- Gold in the Wenatchee—and a War Warning at Fort Simcoe
A hard-riding express reaches Steilacoom with word of 300 miners in the new Wenatchee and Naches diggings—and a settler's letter warning of a wider Indigenous war over the invasion.
- Steilacoom Empties Its Garrison for a Near-War on San Juan Island
On Aug. 9, 1859, soldiers and two brass cannon left Steilacoom aboard the steamer Julia to reinforce Capt. Pickett’s tiny command, as the U.S. and Britain edged toward war over a boundary and a pig.
- The Fur Company’s Land Empire Is Declared Public Domain
A letter from Washington City reports that the Hudson’s Bay and Puget Sound Agricultural companies’ territorial claims have been ruled forfeit, opening their Nisqually and Fort Vancouver lands to American survey and settlement.
- The Winter War Blueprint: An 1858 Campaign to Subdue the Tribes
A field letter from the Indian war in Oregon and Washington urges the Army to occupy the Colville Valley, cut off Indigenous trade, and expel missionaries and Hudson’s Bay Company employees.