Page:Recollections of My Boyhood.djvu/95

in California was made on January 24th, 1848, in a mill race that General Sutter was having excavated on the Sacramento River. Means of communication were poor, and it was some time before the news reached our straggling settlement in the Willamette Valley. When it did, it caused great excitement and an exodus for the mines. Father, with a large percentage of the male population, left for the gold fields. The party prospected a little on the Rogue River in the Rogue River Valley, and on a smaller stream now known as the Applegate, then pushed on to California. After spending a number of months in the mines of California, the Oregon party, numbering about 40 men, chartered a small sailing vessel at San Francisco, intending to return by water to the Columbia. We often heard father tell the thrilling story of the dreary voyage in winter weather, of how for weeks the little craft was buffeted by chilling winds until the sails and ropes were covered with ice, and the passengers were half starved and half frozen. Of how they were tyrannized over by a heartless captain and crew until they believed they were in the hands of pirates whose purpose was to starve them to death and throw them overboard in order to gain possession of the gold they had accumulated in the mines. Of course the Oregon men would not stand this. They organized a rebellion and took the ship. The captain and crew were put on short rations, along with the other men, and were required to make the mouth of the Columbia River in as short a time as possible. This they did, landing the Oregon party at the old pioneer town of Astoria.