LITMIR.BIZ

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McNatt, a tall man, stood in the door of the fort with one hand up on the frame and Jim Broad beside him; Milton Holgate stood a little back of McNatt, and the bullet from a savage’s gun passed either over or under the uplifted arm of McNatt, striking the boy between the eyes.

      Quite a number of women and children were taken on board the two ships in the harbor, but my mother remained in the fort.

      The battle was again renewed and fiercely fought in the afternoon.

      Toward evening the Indians prepared to burn the town, but a brisk dropping of shells from the big guns of the Decatur dispersed them and they departed for cooler regions, burning houses on the outskirts of the settlement as they retreated toward the Duwamish River.

      Leschi, the leader, threatened to return in a month with his bands and annihilate the place. In view of other possible attacks, a second block house was built and the forest side of the town barricaded.

      Fort Decatur was a two-story building, forty feet square; the upper story was partitioned off into small rooms, where a half dozen or more families lived until it was safe or convenient to return to their distant homes. Each had a stove on which to cook, and water was carried from a well inside the stockade.

      There were a number of children thus shut in, who enlivened the grim walls with their shifting shadows, awakened mirth by their playfulness or touched the hearts of their elders by their pathos.

      Like a ray of sunlight in a gloomy interior was little Sam Neely, a great pet, a sociable, affectionate little fellow, visiting about from corner to corner, always sure of attention and a kindly welcome. The marines from the man-of-war spoiled him without stint. One of the Sergeants gave his mother a half worn uniform, which she skilfully re-made, gold braid, buttons and all, for little Sam. How proud he was, with everybody calling him the “Little Sergeant;” whenever he approached a loquacious group, some one was sure to say, “Well, Sergeant, what’s the news?”

      When the day came for the Neely family to move out of the fort, his mother was very busy and meals uncertain.

      He finally appealed to a friend, who had before proven herself capable of sympathy, for something to appease his gnawing hunger, and she promptly gave him a bowl of bread and milk. Down he sat and ate with much relish; as he drained the last drop he observed, “I was just so hungry, I didn’t know how hungry I was.”

      Poor little Sam was drowned in the Duwampsh River the same year, and buried on its banks.

      Laura Bell, a little girl of perhaps ten years, during her stay in the fort exhibited the courage and constancy characterizing even the children in those troublous times.

      She did a great part of the work for the family, cared for her younger sisters, prepared and carried food to her sick mother who was heard to say with tender gratitude, “Your dear little hands have brought me almost everything I have had.” Both have passed into the Beyond; one who remembers Laura well says she was a beautiful, bright, rosy cheeked child, pleasant to look upon.

      In unconscious childhood I was carried into Fort Decatur, on the morning of the battle, yet by careful investigation it has been satisfactorily proven that one lasting impression was recorded upon the palimpsest of my immature mind.

      A shot was accidentally fired from a gun inside the fort, by which a palefaced, dark haired lady narrowly escaped death. The bullet passed through a loop of her hair, below the ear, just beside the white neck. Her hair was dressed in an old fashioned way, parted in the middle on the forehead and smoothly brushed down over the ears, divided and twisted on each side and the two ropes of hair coiled together at the back of the head. Like a flashlight photograph, her face is imprinted on my memory, nothing before or after for sometime can I claim to recall.

      A daughter, the second child of David T. and Louisa Denny, was born in Fort Decatur on the sixteenth of March, 1856, who lived to mature into a gifted and gracious womanhood and passed away from earth in Christian faith and hope on January seventeenth, 1889.

      Other children who remained in the fort for varying periods, were those of the Jones, Kirkland, Lewis, McConaha and Boren families.

      Of the number of settlers who occupied the fort on the day of the battle, the following are nearly, if not quite all, the families: Wm. N. Bell, Mrs. Bell and several young children; John Buckley and Mrs. Buckley; D. A. Neely and family, one of whom was little Sam Neely spoken of elsewhere; Mr. and Mrs. Hillory Butler, gratefully remembered as the best people in the settlement to visit and help the sick; the Holgates, Mrs. and Miss Holgate, Lemuel Holgate, and Milton Holgate who was killed; Timothy Grow, B. L. Johns and six children, whose mother died on the way to Puget Sound; Joe Lake, the Kirkland family, father and several daughters; Wm. Cox and family and D. T. Denny and family.

      During the Indian war, H. L. Yesler took Yoke-Yakeman, or “Denny Jim,” the friendly Indian before mentioned, with him across Lake Washington to the hiding place of the Sammumpsh Indians who were aiding the hostiles. Yesler conferred with them and succeeded in persuading the Indians to come out of their retreat and go across the Sound.

      While returning, Denny Jim met with an accident which resulted fatally. Intending to shoot some ducks, he drew his shotgun toward him, muzzle first, and discharged it, the load entering his arm, making a flesh wound. Through lack of skill, perhaps, in treating it, he died from the effects, in Curley’s house situated on the slope in front of Fort Decatur toward the Bay.

      This Indian and the service he rendered should not be forgotten; the same may be appropriately said of the faithful Spokane of whom the following account has been given by eye witnesses:

      “At the attack of the Cascades of the Columbia, on the 26th of March, 1856, the white people took refuge in Bradford’s store, a log structure near the river. Having burned a number of other buildings, the Indians, Yakimas and Klickitats, attempted to fire the store also; as fast as the shingles were ignited by burning missiles in the hands of the Indians, the first was put out by pouring brine from a pork barrel, with a tin cup, on the incipient blazes, not being able to get any water.

      “The occupants, some wounded, suffered for fresh water, having only some ale and whisky. They hoped to get to the river at night, but the Indians illuminated the scene by burning government property and a warehouse.

      “James Sinclair, who was shot and instantly killed early in the fight, had brought a Spokane Indian with him. This Indian volunteered to get water for the suffering inmates. A slide used in loading boats was the only chance and he stripped off his clothing, slid down to the river and returned with a bucket of water. This was made to last until the 28th, when, the enemy remaining quiet the Spokane repeated the daring performance of going down the slide and returning with a pailful of water, with great expedition, until he had filled two barrels, a feat deserving more than passing mention.”

      On Elliott Bay, the cabins of the farther away settlers had gone up in smoke, fired by the hostile Indians. Some were deserted and new ones built far away from the Sound in the depths of the forest. It required great courage to return to their abandoned homes from the security of the fort, yet doubtless the settlers were glad to be at liberty after their enforced confinement. One pioneer woman says it was easy to see Indians among the stumps and trees around their cabin after the war.

      Many remained in the settlement, others left the country for safer regions, while a few cultivated land under volunteer military guard in order to provide the settlement with vegetables.

      The Yesler mill cookhouse, a log structure, was made historical in those days. The hungry soldiers after a night watch were fed there and rushed therefrom to the battle.

      While there was no church, hotel, storehouse, courthouse or jail it was all these by turns. No doubt those who were sheltered within its walls, ran the whole gamut of human emotion and experience.

      In the Puget Sound Weekly of July 30th, 1866, published in Seattle, it was thus described:

      “There was nothing about this cook house very peculiar, except the interest with which old memories had invested it. It was simply a dingy-looking hewed log building, about twenty-five feet square, a little more than one story high, with a shed addition in the rear, and to strangers and newcomers was rather an eye-sore and nuisance in the place – standing

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