Tales from the First Newspaper on the Sound
Looking back at 1855, when a Steilacoom weekly became the voice of a territory under siege.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Capt. O. H. Parker, of the steamer State of Washington, holds a rare relic: No. 26 of the 'Puget Sound Courier,' the first newspaper published on the Sound, dated December 7, 1855. Steilacoom was then the headquarters of the garrison and the Hudson Bay Company's trading post, making it the principal town in the territory. The editorial column, featuring the motto 'Truth Without Fear,' captures the raw intensity of the Indian War. An editorial reports that Northern Indians had been committing depredations, and notes the sloop-of-war 'Decatur' had left Seattle to chastise them. The paper recounts the death of Lieut. W. A. Slaughter, killed in a surprise attack on the Green River, and debates the government's policy of removing Indigenous people to reservations. Amidst these urgent reports, the paper carries domestic ads, poetry, and spirited, sometimes petty, editorial barbs aimed at rivals in Olympia.
“The Northern Indians have been committing depredations... The sloop-of-war Decatur left our harbor for Seattle on Saturday last in gallant style.”
This 1855 dispatch provides a grim, firsthand look at the tensions of the Puget Sound Indian War. It serves as a stark reminder that the history of Seattle and Steilacoom is deeply intertwined with the displacement and dispossession of Indigenous populations, a legacy that remains part of the regional conversation today.
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