The Oregon missionaries were pioneers who settled in the
Oregon Country of
North America starting in the 1830s dedicated to bringing
Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...
to local
Native Americans.
[Jones, Nard. The Great Command: the story of Marcus and Narcissa Whitman and the Oregon country pioneers. Little, Brown and Co, 1959] There had been missionary efforts prior to this, such as those sponsored by the Northwest Company with missionaries from the Church of England starting in 1819.
The Foreign Mission movement was already 15 years underway by 1820, but it was difficult to find missionaries willing to go to Oregon, as many wanted to go to the east, to India or China.
[ It was not until the 1830s, when a schoolmaster from Connecticut, Hall Jackson Kelley, created his "American Society for the Settlement of the Oregon Country," that more interest and support for Oregon missionaries grew.][ Around the same time, four Nez Perce arrived in St. Louis in the fall of 1831, with accounts differencing as to if these travelers were asking for “the book of life,” an idea used by Protestant missionaries, or if they asked for “Blackrobes,” meaning Jesuits, thus Catholic missionaries. Either way this inspired Christian missionaries to travel to the Oregon Territory.] Oregon missionaries played a political role, as well as a religious one, as their missions established US political power in an area in which the Hudson’s Bay Company
The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC; french: Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson) is a Canadian retail business group. A fur trading business for much of its existence, HBC now owns and operates retail stores in Canada. The company's namesake business div ...
, operating under the British government, maintained a political interest in the Oregon country.[Loewenberg, Robert. Equality on the Oregon Frontier: Jason Lee and the Methodist Mission 1834-43. University of Washington Press, 1976] Such missionaries had an influential impact on the early settlement of the region, establishing institutions that became the foundation of United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
settlement of the Pacific Northwest
The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Tho ...
.
Wyeth-Lee Party
In 1834, New York Methodist minister Jason Lee Jason Lee may refer to:
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*Jason Lee (actor) (born 1970), American film and TV actor and former professional skateboarder
*Jason Scott Lee (born 1966), Asian American film actor
* Jaxon Lee (Jason Christopher Lee, born 1968), American v ...
came to the Oregon Country as the first of these missionaries, to establish the first American settlement and to convert the native population.[ The party was called the Wyeth-Lee Party as Lee had contracted with ]Nathaniel Jarvis Wyeth
Nathaniel Jarvis Wyeth (January 29, 1802 – August 31, 1856) was an American inventor and businessman in Boston, Massachusetts who contributed greatly to its ice industry. Due to his inventions, Boston could harvest and ship ice internati ...
, who was going on his second trading expedition, to accompany him.[ The party set out on April 28, 1834, traveling independently from the American Fur Company's caravan headed for the same destination.] Lee built a mission school for Indians in the Willamette Valley
The Willamette Valley ( ) is a long valley in Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. The Willamette River flows the entire length of the valley and is surrounded by mountains on three sides: the Cascade Range to the eas ...
at the site of present-day Salem, Oregon.[ The school evolved from a mission school to a secondary school called the Oregon Institute, eventually becoming ]Willamette University
Willamette University is a private liberal arts college with locations in Salem and Portland, Oregon. Founded in 1842, it is the oldest college in the Western United States. Originally named the Oregon Institute, the school was an unaffiliated ...
,[ the oldest university on the West Coast.
]
Whitman-Spalding Party
In 1835, Dr. Marcus Whitman
Marcus Whitman (September 4, 1802 – November 29, 1847) was an American physician and missionary.
In 1836, Marcus Whitman led an overland party by wagon to the West. He and his wife, Narcissa, along with Reverend Henry Spalding and his wife, E ...
made his initial journey west from New York, past the Rocky Mountains and into California.[ 1836, Marcus Whitman made the same trip, this time with his new wife, ]Narcissa Whitman
Narcissa Prentiss Whitman (March 14, 1808 – November 29, 1847) was an American missionary in the Oregon Country of what would become the state of Washington. On their way to found the Protestant Whitman Mission in 1836 with her husband, Marcus ...
, and another missionary couple, Henry Harmon Spalding (who had been jilted by Narcissa) and his wife Eliza Spalding. Narcissa and Eliza were the first white women to cross the Rocky Mountains
The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico ...
.[
The Whitman’s reached ]Fort Walla Walla
Fort Walla Walla is a United States Army fort located in Walla Walla, Washington. The first Fort Walla Walla was established July 1856, by Lieutenant Colonel Edward Steptoe, 9th Infantry Regiment. A second Fort Walla Walla was occupied Septem ...
on October 26, 1838, and founded a mission at Waiilatpu, about 25 miles east of Fort Wallo Wallo in the Walla Walla Valley, then the territory of the Cayuse Indians, in the present-day state of Washington. The Spalding’s founded a mission among the Nez Perce Indians at Lapwai
Lapwai is a city in the Northwestern United States, northwest United States, in Nez Perce County, Idaho, Nez Perce County, Idaho. Its population was 1,137 at the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census, and it is the seat of government of the Nez Pe ...
, at the foot of Thunder Mountain, in present-day Idaho
Idaho ( ) is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Montana and Wyomi ...
.[ Henry Spalding is credited with the creation of the Protestant Ladder, used to teach natives history from Creation to ascent into Heaven. This style of teaching, using a long strip of paper or cloth, was based on the Catholic Ladder used by Catholic Missionaries in the region. ][Furtwangler, Albert (2005). Bringing Indians to the Book. ]
Catholic Missionaries
Catholic missionaries
Missionary work of the Catholic Church has often been undertaken outside the geographically defined parishes and dioceses by religious orders who have people and material resources to spare, and some of which specialized in missions. Eventually, p ...
in Oregon Territory followed two paths into the region, with missionaries, such as Father Francis Norbert Blanchet and Father Modeste Demers
Modeste Demers (11 October 1809 – 28 July 1871) was a Roman Catholic Bishop and missionary in the Oregon Country. A native of Quebec, he traveled overland to the Pacific Northwest and preached in the Willamette Valley and later in what would beco ...
, coming from Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
in 1837 and a later group of missionaries following a path similar to the Protestant missionaries coming from the Eastern America, such as Father Pierre-Jean De Smet in 1841.
Catholic missionary work in Oregon Territory officially began when Fr. Francis Norbert Blanchet was appointed Vicar-General of Oregon Country by Archbishop Joseph Signay of Quebec in April 1838. Fr. Blanchet and Fr. Modest Demers arrived in the region at Fort Vancouver on November 24 1838.[Kris A White and Janice St. Laurent, “Collections: Mysterious Journey: The Catholic Ladder of 1840,” ''Oregon Historical Quarterly'' 97, no. 1 (1996): 72–74] Originally the missionaries used hymns and books which had been translated into the Chinook Jargon, a language used commonly among different native groups of the region for trade, in their conversion efforts. Realizing that the ideas and concepts within Catholicism were not coming across to their audiences, Fr. Blanchet began using carved shale sticks in his conversion efforts in April 1839, during a visit to the Cowlitz settlement. The shale stick, referred to as the Catholic Ladder, was carved with representations of Christian History. These shale sticks were then distributed to Native chiefs, starting in October 1839, to teach Catholicism. Soon after, the Catholic Ladder began to be produced in paper copies and later massed produced for distribution in the Pacific Northwest with Quebec church leaders arranging for the printing and shipping of 2,000 to the region. Later, Protestant missionaries began using their own version of the ladder, with Henry Spalding being credited with creating the Protestant Ladder using some images from the Catholic Ladder and adding his own. Both the Catholic and Protestant ladders would also represent the opposing domination as heathens.
In 1841, The Rocky Mountain Mission in the Pacific Northwest was started by Fr. Pierre-Jean De Smet and became the most sought-after mission post among Jesuits. The majority of Jesuit missionaries were Italian, owing to instability at home during the period, but missionaries from other nations came to region as well.
Blanchet was made Bishop in 1843, along with the region being made into an Apostolic Vicariate which reached from the Arctic in the North, the Rockies
The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico in ...
in the East, and the US-Mexican border
Mexico shares international borders with three nations:
*To the north the United States–Mexico border, which extends for a length of through the states of Baja California, Sonora, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León and Tamaulipas.
*To the southe ...
in the South. Later, in 1846, the region was made into the Ecclesiastical Province of Oregon with Blanchet becoming the archbishop of the archiepiscopal see of Oregon City. This made Oregon the second Ecclesiastical Province
An ecclesiastical province is one of the basic forms of jurisdiction in Christian Churches with traditional hierarchical structure, including Western Christianity and Eastern Christianity. In general, an ecclesiastical province consists of seve ...
created in the US.
Catholics in the region faced persecution by the majority Protestant white settlers, with Father Augustin Magliore Blanchet, Francis Blanchet’s brother, being blamed for the Whitman Massacre
The Whitman massacre (also known as the Walla Walla massacre and referred to as the Tragedy at Waiilatpu by the National Park Service) was the killing of the Washington missionaries Marcus Whitman and his wife Narcissa, along with eleven others ...
in 1847, despite only arriving in Walla Walla three months prior to the events.
Legacy of Early Oregon Missionaries
Missionary work in the Oregon country continued into the 1850s, though in 1853, the Washington territory
The Territory of Washington was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from March 2, 1853, until November 11, 1889, when the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Washington. It was created from the ...
was established, separate from the Oregon territory to which it had previously belonged.[Norwood, Frederick. “Two contrasting views of the Indians: Methodist involvement in the Indian troubles in Oregon and Washington.” Church History, vol 49, no. 2, 1980] The success in converting Native Americans to Christianity was varied. In some cases, the Indians were very suspicious of the missionaries, and this suspicion only increased when many of the Indians contracted diseases that were introduced by missionaries and White settlers.[Cook, S.F. “The Epidemic of 1830-1833 in California and Oregon” ‘ ‘The Emergent Native Americans: A reader in culture contact’ ‘ ed. Deward Walker, Jr. Little, Brown and Co. 1972. pg 172-192]
As tensions between native tribes and White missionaries rose during the 1850s, resulting in small-scale wars between settlers and natives, like the Rogue River War, missionary work in Oregon was increasingly targeted at White immigrants from the eastern parts of the US, rather than native populations.[
]
References
External links
Oregon Methodist Missions Papers 1835-1858
Blaine Family papers 1849-1864
* Walker Family Papers. Yale Collection of Western Americana, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Oregon Missionaries
Christianity in Oregon
History of Washington (state)
Oregon Country
Oregon pioneers