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Mrs.
Harris Mary Ann Young of Tennessee
By Miles Cannon
This
story of the life of Mary Ann Young, well-known pioneer, was written by
Miles Cannon and read at the last meeting of Crater Lake chapter,
D.A.R., by Mrs. J. H. Cochran.
Mary Ann Young of Tennessee
Overlooking
the Rogue River Valley from an eminence on the eastern slope of the
Siskiyou Range, the Jacksonville Cemetery--Oregon's repository of
unwritten history--seems to have been designed by nature as a haven of
rest for the dead and a shrine of beauty for the living. When the dawn
breaks to herald the morning of the day of resurrection, the pioneers
who sleep there should be able to catch the first glittering rays as
they sparkle and play on the faraway summit of the Cascade Range.
To the left of the entrance to the cemetery, at a distance of 50 yards or so, there is a double headstone that seems to rise out of a bed of matted English ivy and with becoming modesty invites attention to the tenants of the tomb below. Chiseled on the weather-stained marble are these words: "George W. Harris, killed by the Indians October 9, 1855. Age 35 years, 9 months and three days." To the left: "Mary A. Chambers, died February 17, 1882. Age 61 years, 11 months and 23 days." Though it occurred 74 years ago, these inscriptions contain the elements of a tragedy that entitles the actors to a place of prominence in the annals of our country. The Bible record, which goes back to 1789, was written in Tennessee, and from that we learn that Mary Ann Young was born on Christmas Day, 1821. Also, that George W. Harris was born on January 6, 1820. They were united in marriage February 18, 1843, and to that union there was born, on February 18, 1844, Sofia Ann Harris, and on February 23, 1846, David W. Harris. The family crossed the plains in 1853 and the following year settled on a donation claim eight miles north of Rogue River on what was then known as the Oregon-California Trail. The Pacific Highway of today crosses Harris Creek one mile west of the Harris home site. Mr. Harris selected this place on account of some open or prairie land there which he proposed to use in the production of grain and vegetables. The heavy traffic up and down the trail afforded a ready market for all kinds of produce, and there the Harris family set their stakes and went to work to carve a fortune from the wilds of old Oregon. Recently the writer, accompanied by Charles Sexton, guide, Mr. Hudson, present owner of the land, Alice Hanley, pioneer, and Claire Hanley, granddaughter of Sofia Ann Harris, visited the place where the tragedy occurred. The old Oregon-California Trail, the deep worn tracks of which are plainly outlined in the soil, ran north and south, and the Harris cabin had stood about 40 yards to the west and seemingly faced the east. From the outline of the ruins it was estimated that the cabin was probably 16x20 feet, with a fireplace on the north side of the one-room building. About 10 yards to the north was found the outlines of another building, and 10 yards to the northwest the remains of a well. In the center of the larger outlines is an excavation of some three feet and scattered about are charred bits of wood and rock. Fifty yards to the south there is a small stream now called Harris Creek, and to the south of this and west of the old trail is a willow thicket. These features as they appear at the present time will be woven into the narrative as they were originally. Probably not more than one in a thousand of the interminable throng that beats up and down the modern highway at a death-defying speed ever heard of Harris Creek or the historic tragedy enacted there. The Lupton Massacre
J.
A. Lupton resided, during the summer of 1855, on a donation claim
called "The Mound." The landmark may be seen a short distance southeast
of the point where the Crater Lake Highway touches the Owen-Oregon
logging road, which is six miles north of the present town of Medford.
He had recently been elected to the territorial legislature, and is
said to have had political aspirations of a high order. He is
characterized by those who knew him as willful, boastful and rash. He
seemed to enjoy a reputation of being an inexorable enemy of the Rogue
River Indians.
Three miles due north of the Lupton homestead, on the north side of the river and within the boundaries of what was then the Indian reservation, was an Indian village of some 20 lodges which belonged to Sam's band, who were known as "treaty" Indians. They were at peace with the whites, and at the time of the massacre were receiving annuities from the government. Lupton had seen service in the Mexican War but had had no experience in fighting Indians. Evidently he had decided to adopt the methods of the savage rather than the tactics of the whites. Enlisting a company of probably 40 men who armed and equipped themselves, and himself in command, they left Jacksonville late in the evening of October 7, proceeded to the Bybee Ferry, crossed over and encamped upstream at the identical place where Candidate Hoover fished in 1928. Leaving their camp equipment behind, these men crawled through the underbrush to a place near the Indian rancheria and, when light enough for their purpose, fired into the silent wickiups of the sleeping savages. When the Indians ran out to see what the commotion was about the whites fell upon them, and neither age nor sex was spared in the carnage that followed. Whether it was known to the attacking party that the village contained only old men, squaws and children is a mooted question, but that proved to be a fact. From all authentic accounts we conclude that for depraved and misguided ferocity, the Lupton affair has few if any parallels in history. Holding in his hand an empty bow, a 12-year-old boy lay dead by the side of a squaw. From near this place Lupton is said to have been carried away with an arrow penetrating his body, from which he bled to death. By noon of that day the survivors had commenced to arrive at Fort Lane, and Captain Smith immediately dispatched a platoon of soldiers to survey the battleground. They found there 80 dead Indians--crushed and mangled. Savage vengeance was now to fall, not upon the guilty but, as too often was the case, upon the innocent. While Chief Sam steadfastly adhered to the terms of the Table Rock treaty, Joe in the meantime having died, still the officers at the fort exercised every precaution, especially during the night of the 8th, to avoid any retaliatory measures the enraged Indians might undertake. Beyond the dismal wailing of the squaws for the dead, nothing unusual was seen or heard. Sentry posts were doubled, however, and pickets paced the surrounding hills in order to catch the faintest sound or action. As the night wore on there came no warning. At 2 o'clock on the morning of the 9th an employee of the government, who occupied a cabin about one mile down the river from the fort, was shot and killed as he and a companion stood before their fire. This was approximately 20 hours after the Lupton affair. The next report came from the Jewett Ferry (two miles above the present Savage Dam), where an attack was made, and the third alarm came from Evans Ferry (300 feet below Savage Dam), which was the principal crossing of the river. When the Indians had finished their bloody work there, a courier was sent to Jacksonville. From Evans Ferry the trail meandered towards the foothills and near the present town of Grants Pass, where the Jones family was killed. Next the owners of a pack train encamped three miles to the north were killed and their property taken by the enraged savages, whose thirst for blood was still far from being satiated. The Wagner family had taken a donation claim on Louse Creek and established their home near the place where the Oregon-California Trail crossed that stream. Mr. Wagner was away from home at the time, and his wife and daughter were killed [and] scalped and the buildings, after being looted, were burned. At the Wagner place the Indians divided, and probably about one dozed proceeded down Louse Creek to the home of the Haines family. The Haines cabin stood near a cold spring flowing about 100 yards from the railroad crossing in the present town of Merlin. Mr. Haines was in bed sick when the Indians arrived at his house and unable to make an effective resistance. After killing the father the Indians took the little boy by the feet and swung his head against the corner of the cabin until life was extinct. Mrs. Haines and her little girl were taken into captivity and sent to an Indian encampment on Rogue River. It was learned from the Indians after the war that both were killed within a week and their bodies thrown into Rogue River. After looting and setting fire to the Haines house the Indians returned to the Wagner place. Mr. Haines and his boy were later buried between two large pine trees across the road from where the house stood. The stumps of these trees may still be seen. The courier sent from Evans Ferry reached Jacksonville about noon of the 9th, by which time there had been 15 white people killed. The citizens of Jacksonville hardly realized the full import of what was going on north of the river; nevertheless they equipped a company of 20 to go to the relief of any who might be in need of assistance. First they went to Fort Lane and reported to the commanding officer there. The soldiers were held in loath, it would seem, while the officers were sifting the many wild rumors afloat. As a matter of fact the Indians had concealed their movements so successfully that dependable information was hard to get. It was not until late in the afternoon, therefore, when the dragoons, together with the volunteers from Jacksonville, left in pursuit of the bloodthirsty savages. Before returning to the affairs of the Harris home it may be noted that, in after years, Mrs. Harris was induced by her close friend and neighbor, Miss Alice Hanley, to relate to her the manifold details of the siege and the untimely death of Mr. Harris. The writer is indebted to Miss Hanley for the following authentic account of the tragedy. In complete ignorance of the series of crimes already committed by the Indians and without the slightest intimation of their impending danger, the family had arisen early that bright and promising morning and set about the duties of the day. They had noticed and remarked about a column of smoke that rose just over the east divide in the direction of the Wagner home, but that seemed to cause no particular apprehension. Yet Mr. Harris had mentioned the absence of Mr. Wagner who, two days before, had started to the Sailor Diggings (Waldo) with a Boston temperance lecturer, and he was somewhat perplexed at the sight of so much black smoke ascending into the air at that early hour. The sun seemed to be a long time in scaling the timbered mountain that morning, thought Mrs. Harris, but when its rays finally fell upon that cabin home all seemed serene and peaceful. Early she had planted her tubs on the puncheon stoop at the front door where she was busily engaged with the family washing. The pack train that passed southward the evening before, she told her husband, must have camped on Louse Creek, and perhaps the men had started a brush fire. Mr. Harris considered that good reasoning and it seemed to dispel an ominous feeling that lingered unbidden in his mind. Now in her 34th year, Mrs. Harris often expressed herself as content to meet the trials and tribulations of a pioneer life, and at no time had she felt more hopeful than on that autumn morning. It was her custom to dress her wealth of auburn hair and secure it with a tortoiseshell comb that she had treasured for many years, and thus she was adorned upon that particular morning. To add to her matronly beauty, according to Miss Hanley, her hair fell over a shapely head in natural waves, and it requires no stretch of imagination to appreciate the fact that she was to her family a queen in a cabin home. Neither is it difficult to appreciate how an Indian in quest of scalps would look upon that scene. Sofia, then in her eleventh year, was engaged inside the one-room dwelling which contained the family furniture and utensils. On the north side was the fireplace, where in the absence of a stove all the cooking was done. There the mother had heated the wash water by the use of a crane, but when she poured the water into the tub she found it necessary to use all the cold water in the house to cool it before she could rub her clothing. She could get another bucket of cold water, she thought, from the well when more convenient. David, then in his ninth year, had been given a pail and sent to the garden, an eighth of a mile away, for potatoes. Mr. Harris had rigged a block for splitting puncheon to fence his crops out in the open north of the storage house, and for an hour or more Mrs. Harris had heard the sound of his mallet as it drove a broad ax into the yielding blocks of yellow fir. It could not have been later than 9 o'clock--probably not more than 8:30. Suddenly the sound of the mallet ceased, and an instant later Harris reached the stoop and told his wife that there were some Indians down the trail, pointing to the place where the road entered the timber about 75 or 100 yards toward the Wagner home, and that there was going to be trouble as they had their war paint on. Taken by surprise, Mary Harris was rather slow to appreciate the gravity of the situation, so her husband reinforced his command to get inside by gently pushing her through the open door and shielding her with his body as he followed her in. He had just crossed the threshold when a shot rang out from the direction of the Indians and a bullet pierced his left lung. He closed the door, and as he placed the hardwood bar in a position to secure it he said to his wife that he believed he was mortally wounded. Mrs. Harris then supported him to a bed in a corner opposite the fireplace where a brief but tragic consultation was held. Harris told his wife that he would be unable to defend her against the Indians whom he was confident were determined upon their destruction; that she must defend herself and children to the best of her ability. When he told her to get the rifle and use it, she protested that she had never fired a gun in her life, much less loaded one, that she knew nothing about a gun, that she simply could not, no, she could not fire a gun. With an appealing look the wounded man told her that she must defend her home and children. Those two words--home and children--seemed to rouse her from a sort of lethargy that had possessed temporarily her very soul when she realized that her peaceful home had been transformed into a place of carnage. Hardly a minute had passed since they had entered the house and bolted the door before the spirit of Mrs. Harris rose to the situation, and she faltered not again. Taking the trusty rifle down from its hanger she held it while her husband explained hurriedly the mechanism. Sofia brought the powder horn, cap box, bullets and paper wads. These being explained, she loaded the gun, ramming the charge home like a veteran. Sprawled upon the bed and bleeding profusely, Mr. Harris cautioned her to keep the hammer down until ready to fire, and to use the sights. With that she climbed the ladder to the attic above, where openings in the chinking enabled her to survey the field in all directions. She saw the Indians peering from behind trees in an effort to determine the force that might be in the house and then, with a deadly aim, she opened fire. The smell of powder had its effect, and now she knew of no such thing as fear. Thus the brave woman, who had been reared in the sunshine of culture and refinement, fought her enemies with the courage of a gladiator for a period of 19 consecutive hours. At first there were only a few Indians present--a scouting party that had ridden over from the Wagner place to reconnoiter the premises--and these remained well under cover. They appeared to be apprehensive that there was a force in the house, for shots would come from all sides. At intervals a warrior would expose himself in order to draw fire, and dancing about, challenge the besieged to shoot him. They were always accommodated, first from one porthole and then another. Mrs. Harris was prone, in later years, to bemoan her poor marksmanship, yet with the occasional use of a small revolver she succeeded in impressing upon the savages that there was more than one defender of the fortress. Upon several occasions they endeavored to taunt the inmates to the point where they would come out and give battle, by running into the open air and waving bloody scalps. One of these Mrs. Harris recognized as Mrs. Wagner's, and another as that of her 4-year-old daughter. The Indians would wave these hideous symbols up and down and from side to side in a fashion designed to create a furious state of mind in the whites, who they supposed had taken refuge in the cabin. After the close of the war the Indians were greatly chagrined to learn that they fought a lone white woman. Subsequent arrivals from the Wagner and Haines places brought the total number of Indians about the premises--that is the number that Mrs. Harris was able to count at any one time--up to 21, though she said that it was possible that a greater number were present. She noticed a squaw with the warriors at times, and after a while Mrs. Harris recognized her as a Rogue River Indian whom she had frequently employed to do housework. Having had in her wardrobe an ill-fitting dress, she had given it to the squaw, who now wore it with a savage grace as she aided her kindred in their efforts to murder her benefactress. During the forenoon a ball entered the lower room through a muslin window and, striking Sofia's arm between the elbow and wrist, broke one of the bones. While she was not wholly deprived of the use of the member, it was exceedingly painful as well as a dangerous wound. Nevertheless the child continued to melt lead bars and mould bullets for her mother, who never left her vigil in the attic until the Indians retired from exhaustion. As night approached, a bright moon rose over the scene and lighted the open space about the house. This enabled Mrs. Harris to observe every attempt to approach the building with firebrands. An internal hemorrhage set in after he was shot through the lung, and Mr. Harris fully realized that his hours were numbered. Thirst is one of the direful results of a hemorrhage, but in the case of Mr. Harris his suffering could not be relieved. The open space about the buildings would expose one to a merciless fusillade from all directions, even if Mrs. Harris dared to leave her post. Shortly after the noon hour the dying man called for his wife to come to him; to bring him water and to relieve his suffering. Soon his calls became ravings, and Mrs. Harris always believed that his suffering was relieved by a delirious condition that developed during the last hours of his life. Mr. Harris was mortally wounded, and he had so informed his wife when he instructed her to defend her home and children. While the piteous calls for water tore the woman's heartstrings, she fully realized that to leave her post, even for a moment, would only invite irretrievable disaster. Dire extremities indeed, between which she must choose. From the time she climbed the ladder to the attic during the morning hours Mrs. Harris never saw her husband alive again. When at last she descended from her bullet-torn battlement she made her way in the darkness to the bed and found him cold in death. It was her belief that he died during the last hours of daylight. With her arm only loosely bandaged, and suffering the most excruciating pain, Sofia continued through the day and night to feed the fire and mould bullets. The supply of wood was soon exhausted, and then she burned everything and anything she could lay hold of. When at last hostilities slackened she gave way to her suffering and cried aloud in anguish. David had not returned, though there was still hope that he might be safe, but the concern which that mother felt for her boy under those circumstances can never be fully realized. Dame Rumor has had much to say about the number of Indians killed, the fate of David and the captivity of the Wagners and the Haines, but as to her veracity at least, Rumor is a treacherous character. No one knows what became of the boy. He was never heard of from the time he left the house, nor was there ever found a stitch of clothing or a bone that would suggest a clue. The Indians knew nothing of him, and his fate is still and probably will always remain an unsolved mystery. His mother believed that when he saw the Indians at the house and heard the guns he ran away into the forest and became bewildered and finally was killed by mountain lions. In response to the question as to whether she killed any of the Indians, Mrs. Harris said that she was not certain that she had, though upon two occasions she had taken deliberate aim and that the two braves at whom she fired did not appear upon the scene again. In early days Indians took delight in being fired at, provided they were not hit, and as it would appear that they did not become furious enough to assault the house en masse the casualties may not have been very great. However, Indians removed their dead and wounded if possible, and any estimate of their loss usually was only a wild guess. It would be interesting to know the result of Mrs. Harris' rifle practice upon that occasion, but beyond the fact that she held the enemy at bay until she was rescued by the troops, the truth will never be known. The Indians retired between 2 and 3 o'clock in the morning of the 10th and moved down the small creek a short distance where they started fires, probably for cooking food. The mother, now for the first time since morning, ventured to the well for water and then washed and dressed the little girl's wounded arm, covered the body of her dead husband with a blanket and made ready to abandon the house. She surmised the Indians would renew the attack as soon as it was light, and she felt that she could not hold out another day. Any fate was preferable to being taken into captivity, so she decided to take a chance for life in the wilderness. Gathering up her suffering child, who between sobs promised to try not to cry, the poor woman abandoned her home and stole away into the shadows of the night. After a futile tramp through the nearby timber softly calling for David, she concealed herself in a willow thicket south of the house and near the trail. By this time the torture of the little girl from her wound was being intensified by a raging fever, and it was only with the greatest effort that she could avoid crying out in her distress. She had but a short time to wait until it was light enough to observe the situation. Scanning the morning mist in the direction of her home, she was horrified to see four savages sitting on the bank of the stream near the house, their bare feet in the water. Apparently they were guarding the place while the remaining members of the band were asleep a short distance away. The slightest sound would attract attention, and it was there that the heroic efforts of Sofia were worthy of commendation. Suddenly she noticed these Indians duck down under the bank into the shallow water and speedily depart. Furiously they made their way to their sleeping comrades, and within a very short time there was not an Indian to be seen in the vicinity; all had vanished like a shadow. Another mystery now confronted the wretched woman. She heard a sound coming from the south. An ominous sound, no doubt, for she knew of no other kind in that accursed locality. It grew nearer and louder, and then it dawned upon her that it was the sound of galloping horses. Then, making out the sound of rattling sabers, she cried aloud, "It's the soldiers! Please God we are rescued!" Mrs. Harris had lost her tortoiseshell comb, and her golden tresses refused to stay in place. While bending over the couch of her husband her hair became immersed in the blood that saturated the bed clothing, and in the darkened room this had escaped her attention. In her place of refuge in the thicket, her disheveled hair hung in clotted ringlets without sign of order. Her appearance was the more deceptive by reason of her face being blackened with powder smoke. Sofia's appearance was little if any better. When the mother realized that the troops had arrived, she gathered up her child and ran forward with all her strength. A soldier mistook her for a squaw and, enraged at what he had seen at the Wagner home, lowered his gun. Just as he was pressing the trigger another discovered that she was white and struck the gun barrel in time to save the woman's life, the ball striking the ground in front of her. Neither the mother nor child had tasted food since the morning of the 9th, and the soldiers now urged them to return to the house and prepare themselves a meal. Remaining only long enough to acquaint themselves with what had taken place and leaving a detail of four volunteers with the rescued, the soldiers hurried on in pursuit of the Indians. A part of the puncheon floor was then removed and a grave dug in the center of the room. The body of Mr. Harris was then prepared for burial, and the distracted mother and fatherless child were called for a last look at the features of their fallen protector. The blanketed form was then lowered into the grave and the earth returned to its place. It was apparent that the conflict between the whites and reds would develop into a war; therefore it was deemed advisable to leave nothing about the premises that might prove of value to the enemy. The soldiers carried away the gun with which the defense was made and what ammunition was left. Mrs. Harris retained the family Bible before referred to and a small testament that belonged to David. Written on a flyleaf are these words: "Reward of merit. Presented to David W. Harris by his teacher, F. A. Reed, February 24, 1854." The crucial test of motherhood came after a fruitless search for David, and Mrs. Harris realized that she must abandon her boy to his fate. Words can convey no conception of her anguish as the curtain fell on the pioneer tragedy. During the day a number of pack outfits had arrived on the river, and two of these men had ridden out to the Harris home to ascertain the extent of the trouble. One, James D. Burnett, an uncle of Alice Hanley, and who was riding a large mule, invited Mrs. Harris to ride behind him to the river. The other man, George McKay, volunteered to take Sofia in front of him on his horse. The torch was then applied, and as the party rode away under the protection of four volunteers the smoke and flames were leaping high over the erstwhile happy home of the Harris family. At the river crossing the rescued were placed in a wagon and taken to Jacksonville. From that time to the present day the landscape of that tragic field has changed but little. The furrows of the old Oregon-California Trail are overgrown with grass, and lead horse bells are heard no more, nor is there any sound save the bleating of the sheep that frequent the place. Years later the body of Mr. Harris was exhumed and placed in the family plot in the Jacksonville Cemetery. During the remaining years of her life Mrs. Harris visited the place only once, in 1874. Sofia was married to John S. Love on the 26th of February, 1860, and to this union there were born four children, the second oldest of whom, Mary Harris Love, married John A. Hanley. Among the children born to this union is Miss Claire Hanley, who retains many of the characteristics of the Harris family. A victim of an attack of malignant smallpox, Sofia yielded her life January 16, 1869, and was buried by the side of her husband, who had preceded her to the grave by 15 months. Mrs. Harris married Aaron Chambers February 15, 1863, and from that time until her death she resided at the Chambers home four miles northwest of Medford. Mr. Chambers had been married before, and when he died September 15, 1869 he was buried by the side of his first wife. After his death Mrs. Harris-Chambers assumed the management of the farm, which was heavily mortgaged and run down. She succeeded in improving the estate and clearing it of all indebtedness. February 17, 1882 she died, and after a separation of 28 years was again assigned a place by her husband's side beneath the tangled ivy in the Jacksonville Cemetery. "And there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things have passed away." Medford Mail Tribune, November
23, 1930, page B1
Compare this version of the Mrs. Harris story. INDIAN DEPREDATION CLAIMS.--Among the Indian depredation claims examined by the Interior Department and recommended paid by the government are the following, made by persons of Jackson County. Mary A. Harris, house, wheat, etc., October 9, 1885, $3862: $1888.50 allowed.--Tidings. Excerpt, Oregon Sentinel, Jacksonville, March 8, 1888, page 2 Last revised July 4, 2011 |
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