The Cascade Massacre

Margaret Iman’s (1834-1924) story is writ in stone is a small, eponymous cemetery on the backside of Stevenson, a river town on the Washington side of the Columbia as she rips a gorge through the Cascades:

Born at Tippecanoe Co., Ind.
1852 Missouri to The Dalles on horse back
Carried motherless babe 500 miles
Took raft downriver to Cascades
1853 met and married Felix G. Iman
Survived Indian War of Mar. 26, 1856
Indians burned home
Had 16 children, 9 boys, 7 girls

Her husband, Felix Iman’s (1828-1902), slab is next to hers. Together they sketch a compelling pioneer story.1

Born DeKalb Co., Mo.
Arrived at Cascades by ox team in 1852
Married Margaret Windsor 1853
1854 built & owned steamer “Wasco”
1855 donation land claim of 323 acres
1858 worked on upper Cascades block house
Built & owned 2 sawmills
Built 1st school. For short time saloon owner.

Aside from a minor error, it hints at the enormous effort the Iman’s put into wresting a home from the forest. Frank, it happens, “was born 24 November 1828 in Monroe, Illinois,” according to “Iman Family Notes: ‘Margaret’ (A Windsor Perspective).”2 It wasn’t Frank who came from DeKalb Co., but rather Margaret, who left for Oregon from there.

It wasn’t an easy departure. Margaret, it turns out, was a runaway. She was born a Windsor, whose mother died when she was about ten years old and was subsequently raised by an archetypically cruel stepmother. By the time she was seventeen, her family was living in DeKalb Co., and by the time she was seventeen she’d decided she’d had it and ran away from home, joining a wagon train headed for Oregon. Her father went after her, dragged her back, and lost her again when he went looking for a river crossing. The second time he let her go. She was subsequently lost to the Windsor family until a descendant in Kansas put an add in the Ladies Home Companion in the 1920s asking if anyone knew what happened to her? One of Margaret’s children, Louis, chanced upon the magazine in a Vancouver, WA barber shop and his wife contacted the folks in Kansas.

The Indian War mentioned on her tombstone actually lasted longer than March 26, although not much. It’s frequently called the Cascade or Fort Rains Massacre and was part of a general Indian war of resistance to the white invaders known as the Cayuse War, of which, probably, the most famous incident was the euphonious Battle Of Seattle. The Imans played a not insignificant role in the events, and their interpretation of what happened differs considerably from the official record. According to James Windsor,3 who refers to the incident as the Yakima attack, the wrong Indians were punished. Sheridan claims4 that the Yakimas forced or coerced the local Cascade Indians into joining the attack, but the Iman’s claim otherwise. Sheridan left us a list of the settlers and soldiers killed in the uprising:

" I append a list of killed and wounded: Killed — George Griswold, shot in leg; B. W. Brown and wife, killed at the sawmill, bodies found stripped naked in Mill creek ; Jimmy Watkius, driving team at mill ; Henry Hagar, shot in Watkins' house, body burned ; Jake Kyle, German boy ; Jacob White, sawyer at mill ; Bonrbon, half-breed, died on the Maty going to The Dalles ; James Sinclair, of the H. B. Company, Walla Walla ; Dick Turpin, colored cook on steamer Alary; Norman Palmer, driving team at mill ; Calderwood, working at mill ; three United States soldiers, names unknown ; George Watkins, lived four days ; Jacob Roush, carpenter, lived six days. Wounded — Fletcher Murphy, arm; P. Snooks, boy, leg; J. Lindsay, shoulder; Jesse Kempton, shoulder; Tommy Price, thigh ; two .soldiers, U. S. Army ; H. Kyle, German ; Moffat, railroad hand; johnny Chance, leg; ]\I. Bailey, leg and arm; J. Algin, slightly'."5

Sheridan doesn’t supply us with a list of Indians hanged, but a loose sheet of paper in the Oregon Historical Society’s files offers these names: “Chief Chenoweth, Capt. Jo, Tecomcoc or Tecomeoc, Tsy, Sim-sasselas or Sim-Lasselas, Tumalth or Tunwalth (other spellings), Old Skien, Kenwake (sentenced but reprieved on scaffold), and 4 Finger Johnny.”6 In Margaret Iman’s oral memoirs she describes the hanging of the Indians: She recalled they were “hanged on a tree about one mile from where we lived. Some of them, when asked to talk, shook their heads and put the noose around their own necks. Others laughed at those who were hanging.”7

Felix Iman’s schooner, Wasco, also particpated in the repulse. Assigned the task of hauling troops from Portland to The Dalles, the Wasco came under fire from Indians collected where White Salmon is now, across the river from Hood River; but the river is sizable and their balls had no effect. The third steamer to ply the waters between Cascade Locks and The Dalles, she subsequently returned to her trade, albeit for a short period of time. By 1857 she was out of business on the river. A newspaper advertisement from, probably, the 1860s offered passage between Bellingham, WA and Seattle on the “fast and commodious” steamer Wasco for $1; although I can’t be sure it’s the same steamer Wasco.

We can’t reasonably expect Sheridan, who was responsible for the protection of the whites along the river, to admit to hanging the wrong people. Nonetheless, this long quote from James Windsor describes the Iman experience:

Windsor points to this quote to help clarify the situation [of the Indian attack of March 26, 1856]: “I read the settlers in Skamania Co. at the Cascades had been expecting an indian attack for some time. Some of the friendly local indians had been warning the settlers that unfriendly tribes were planning an imminent attack, and for this reason Felix decided to build a new house closer to the river in case the family had to escape by boat. The original Iman house had been farther back from the river by about a mile. Of course no one knew when the attack would come and all were suprised by it. The local indians who were hung had been on friendly terms to the white locals. Indian Jim was one of the ones hung, and he was a good friend of Felix. They were of the Cascade tribe. The motive behind the hangings was anger and racism. Quite a few of the white settlers had lost relatives besides homes in the attack and there was some kind of revenge wanted, and as the Yakimas had all returned back to their land, the Cascades were the only Indians to take revenge one, even though they were innocent. Of course most white people at that time did not like Indians and did not trust them, so of course most of the locals were none too squeamish to get rid of them. Margaret claimed she witnessed the hanging, or at least at some point she claimed to have seen them hanging. Felix was away at the time and when he returned a day or two later he was sorry to hear about the hangings and told the locals that those Indians were all innocent and it was wrong to hang them. At least that is how history has left the story for us. There were also some sordid details a few days after the Yakima attack. There was a friendly indian and his wife and children and they were travelling by boat on the Columbia River near Shepherd's Point. It is said that Samuel Hamilton with some other local men, but not Felix, captured these Indians and their children and raped the woman and then killed them all, children included, in a very cruel way, by strangling them and chopping off their heads. Lt. Philip Sheridan (he later to be famous in the Civil War) was there serving as the commander of the force that had chased off the Yakimas, and Sheridan claimed it was Hamilton and some others whom he named go after the two indians who were then found murdered shortly thereafter. But of course this was hushed up and Sheridan declined to press charges and consequently never spoken of again, so no one prosecuted Hamilton and the others, but it is a sordid story and a sad comment on the history of the area.”8

The sorry story in my research of similar graveyard histories is that it is always the same: the perpetrators rarely see punishment which instead is meted out to the handiest person. Blame is always collective.


1 I’ve covered most of this story in previous blogs, so it may seem familiar. To an extent, I’ve plagiarized myself. The new material primarily concerns the “massacre.”
2 James Windsor, Draft, Iman Family Notes (with footnotes and editing by Steve Iman)[http://www.imanfamily.net/skamania/windsor.html].
3 Ibid.
4 Mea culpa for not having noted the references for this information. A case of casually reading through the Net for other information, reading this, and filing it away in my memory bank only to not be able to find the source when I went looking again. You’d think I’d learn.
5 Philip Sheridan as recorded in History of the Pacific Northwest: Oregon and Washington.
6 OHS 929.379272; R 179 cem. Ramsey, D. G., Skamania Co. WA Burial Lists.7 Another lost reference. I searched and searched but have yet to refind this memoir online, but I know it’s there. Trust me.
8 James Windsor; Op Cit.

Skamania CountyCemetery District #1

Stevenson

Bob (names changed to protect my lapses) was working diligently wiring sections of the chain-link fence to the railings when he saw me, waved, and asked, “Find what you’re looking for?”

“Well, since I wasn’t looking for anything in particular,” I answered, “I guess I did.”

Wearing the uniform of a sexton, jeans and a duckbilled cap, Bob sauntered over for some conversation. If there’s one given among cemetery workers it’s that they’re willing to chat at the drop of a shovel. They’re particularly willing to chat with someone who’s merely visiting out of curiosity rather than lamenting a recently departed soul. They’re always proud of the maintenance they do, and they want to share it with you.

Cascade Cemetery
Bob does an exceptional job. Slim and energetic, smiles come easy to his angular features and his eyes twinkle as he lists the accomplishments of his four years on the job. He talked about a columbarium niche wall they’re erecting in the center of Wind River Memorial.

“When I came, there was $2000 saved for that project. They’ve been wanting one for years. I paid cash for the one we’re putting in. Thirty-two thousand dollars. It’ll be more like $40,000 when we’re done. I still have that $2000 in the bank.”

Stevenson
There are ten cemeteries in the Skamania County Cemetery District, double the amount I was expecting. “When I came on the job,” Bob said, “only a few of the cemeteries were being well maintained: these here in town and Stevenson down by the river, pretty much that was it. I said, nope. Our mandate is to take care of all the cemeteries, so I give them all equal treatment.

“I had one lady call up in tears. She said they couldn’t find the grave they were looking for until they realized that it was now out in the open and not covered up by the brush and weeds anymore. They were so happy!”

Underwood Chris-Zada
The cemeteries reflect that attention: they all look alive and well-tended. Each is a respectable cemetery in its own right, and a few are over-the-top delightful. Stevenson Cemetery, hugging the bank of the Columbia, has a location to, well, die for; whereas both Berge and Underwood Chris-Zada fairly ooze charm and attention to detail. Eternity looks pretty good from there.

“Ten cemeteries?” I asked. “You got a map for those cemeteries?”

“Nope, but I’ve got their addresses. Want ‘em?”

“Sure.”

“Hop in. I’ll give you a ride to the office,” he offered, and then backed his truck up the hundred or so yards to a small building.

Berge
“Used to be, when I first came here, all the files for all ten cemeteries fit in one file cabinet,” he smiled, as some seven or eight filing cabinets crammed the office. “A lot of files seemed to have just gotten lost, and we’re working to resurrect what we can.

“We bought our own back-hoe this year, so we can open and close our own graves. We used to have to farm that out,” he boasted. “Bought that with cash, too.”

Bob wrote a couple notes on the copy of the addresses he gave me and walked me back to my car, where he set to repairing the fence again.

Cascade Cemetery
“Be sure and visit the Indian cemetery at Bonneville,” he told me. “It’s called the Cascade Cemetery, but it’s got some important people buried there. It’s maybe going to be on the National Registry.”

Snow still covered the ground in the shade, crunchy patches not a quarter of an inch thick, and the air wasn’t cozy warm yet, but spring was definitely in the air and Bob was busy making his charges the best they could be. I hadn’t planned on heading back past Bonneville, but now I had no choice. Gotta go see the important people.

Berge

Blue Lines

Oregonian tend to think of the Columbia as their river. The big cities are on their side. The Interstate is on their side. Hood River is on their side. God is on their side. Vancouver is on the Washington side.

We conveniently forget that a river has two banks and that after Hermiston, both of the Columbia’s are in Washington. Eventually the whole river disappears into Canada, which, after all, is a foreign country and we have no idea what happens to it after that. The Columbia could be a secret pipeline from Hudson’s Bay, for all we know. The Métis think the Columbia is pay-back for the Red River, but that’s an obscure story down here.

That the big cites and the highway are on the Oregon side is an accident of geography. Vancouver at the edge of the “plains” on the bluff overlooking the Columbia was the site of the first whiteman’s trading post (that suspect Hudson’s Bay again) and there’s way more flat land up there upon which to build a city than there is on the Oregon side of the river; but Portland only backs up to the Columbia. Its river is the Willamette, and it’s the Willamette with its connection to the valley above the falls that trumps Vancouver’s flats. Likewise, it’s sheer luck that The Dalles, the annual Native-American rendezvous spot, and the Hood River Valley are on the Oregon side, and that when the Columbia makes its big sweep around the Oregon knuckle that the outer bank — the bank where the force of the river eats away at the land — is on the Washington side leaving scant purchase for roads, much less towns.

The result is that Oregon’s gain is Washington’s gain. It’s classic win-win: Oregon gets the traffic and Washington gets the quaintness. A fair number of Oregonians test the Washington side between Dallesport and Vancouver, through the heart of the Gorge on Highway 14, a broad, well-maintained two-lane highway that offers some spectacular views — especially around Cape Horn, where the road rises high above the water — unequaled across the river. Far fewer brave Highway 4, a tight, twisty run from Longview to Long Beach. Nonetheless, it’s one they would do well to take now and again, the scale is more human.

But here I have to issue a disclaimer. I have not been west of Cathlamet on Highway 4 — soon, but not yet — and the highway heads away from the river there; but between Cathlamet and Longview, the highway rides on most of the land that is there. The only people living anywhere here abouts live on Puget Island (which connects to Washington with a bridge and to Oregon with a ferry), a farming island in the middle of the Columbia, but the island supports no town. Curiously enough, though, this almost lack of people is enough to form a county, Wahkiakum County: 3755 of them, according to ePodunk.

The lack of people, of course is what makes the north bank quaint and accessible, Longview to Vancouver notwithstanding. Lack of people also makes for slim cemetery pickings; and not enough make use of the views, with the notable exceptions of Stevenson Cemetery, which is scrunched between the highway (14) and the river just east of town and is visible from the highway, and Mount Pleasant Cemetery out of Carrolls, WA (I currently have three Mount Pleasant cemeteries in my Washington State database), which perches on hill some 1200 feet above the river with soaring views of the Columbia in one direction and the Cascades in the other. Don’t mind the wind, thank you.

But it’s the downriver cemeteries of Cowlitz County to its border with Wahkiakum County that I’ve been recently exploring. (If you’re elsewhere in the world, I suggest a good map to understand the geography of this region.) Of the three I visited, only tiny Abernethy has river views, and those through the trees. Come summer that view will shrink. The other two, Bunker Hill (every state has one) and Oak Point have none.



You might note, if you’re staring at that map, that there are a lot of things around here named “Abernathy” and that many sources likewise call the cemetery “Abernathy”; but when you finally find its near-forgotten little self — hardly a city lot under a canopy of trees plunging towards the water — you’ll find a sign saying “Abernethy Cemetery” and that most everyone in the place is named “Abernethy,” as well. No one is named “Abernathy.”

The other cemeteries are fine enough, if not noteworthy, but they do have a couple graves that are uncommon and represent the other blue line — other than the Columbia: police, law enforcement officers. Running into graves of policemen (so far no women that I’ve run across) is not in itself unusual, but both of these have a twist. In Bunker Hill it is a fellow named Clint Crombie (1895-1981) who was not just a cop but a Mountie, a corporal in the Northern Patrol. How romantic is that? His trusty dog, Rex; his horse; his flat-brimmed hat; always getting his man. Why, I’ll bet he knew Sergeant Preston personally. Maybe he even served under him. Coulda been. Could too.



Crombie may have been romantic and glamorous, but not so Marvin Meads (1925-1992). Marvin was all business. Marvin took his business to the grave with him. Marvin was a sergeant in the Longview Police Department. We know so because he had his badge sealed in clear ceramic and mounted on his tombstone under his name, just like people seal photographs of the deceased with clear ceramic and mount them on tombstones. Marvin, not to be outdone, did this as well; but Marvin, unlike most people who choose a portrait, opted for a full body shot, in uniform, brandishing a shotgun. Just the image you want to carry into heaven with you. Or, perhaps he was concerned about just which direction he was going and thought a little protection might come in handy. In any event, it was a curious choice.



Just don’t let the vandals see it, Marvin.