The Walla Walla Valley Boom of 1864
As Civil War refugees flood the territory, Walla Walla sees an influx of skilled professionals and families looking to trade conflict for a fresh start.
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.
A stroll this week around the different creeks and streams that environ the city has sufficed to assure us that no meager proportion of the immigrants across the plains this season have determined to make permanent homes in the Walla Walla valley. Since the last issue of our paper, quite a train of wagons have come in, bearing representatives from the States of Illinois, Missouri, Iowa and Wisconsin. The oppressive results of the war, added to the privilege of entering a homestead here, have had the effect of inducing untold hundreds to leave the East for our rich and virgin valleys. The immigrants seem to be an intelligent, energetic class of persons; all the professions and trades are well represented—doctors, lawyers, farmers, painters, clerks and school teachers. Already, many of them have found permanent and profitable employment in their respective callings.
“The oppressive results of the war, added to the privilege of entering a homestead here, have had the effect of inducing untold hundreds to leave the East for our rich and virgin valleys.”
The 1864 rush to Walla Walla driven by Midwesterners fleeing the Civil War mirrors the recurring cycles of migration that have shaped the town's demographics for over 160 years, highlighting the tension between the arrival of new settlers and the existing housing supply.
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