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The Archeological Excavation of Waiilatpu Mission
1947 Report, Part 3
Excavation of the Mansion (Emigrant) House, and the Grist Mill
THOMAS R. GARTH
Published in
Oregon Historical Quarterly June, 1948.
Volume XLIX, Number 2, pages 117-136.
Table of Contents 1947 Archeological Report
This dwelling, which was 400 feet east of the
mission house, has in recent years come to be referred to as the
"emigrant house" as it was where immigrants stopping at the mission
were usually quartered. There are no contemporary statements as
to the dimensions of the building or the number of rooms. Some information
was obtained after 1880 from individuals who had been in the structure,
but memories after so long a period are not entirely to be trusted.
As far as we can tell, the building was divided
into four rooms on the main floor with a single room in the attic
where grain was stored. The construction was no doubt similar to
that in mansion-type houses in the East, with a rectangular groundplan
and a central doorway flanked by windows on the facade, which in
this case was probably on the north side. Estimates of its size
vary considerably.
A combination of unfortunate circumstances has
caused the ruin to be in exceptionally poor state of preservation.
The mound is pock-marked with relic-hunters' holes; parts of it,
especially on the north side, have been carried off with a slip
scraper to build up the banks of a nearby ditch; and worst of all
the adobe bricks in the walls seem to be of poorer quality than
those in the other dwellings (possibly because of a greater alkalinity
of the soil) so that they have lost their identity and fused with
the soil surrounding, them, making it almost impossible to recognize
individual bricks. Unfortunately, too, the building was on relatively
high ground, so that there was little flood deposition over it to
protect it from the tramping of cattle. The walls were only a few
inches below the ground surface. In undisturbed areas the inside
edge of the wall could be determined by where it interrupted the
burned earth deposit (ash, orange-colored earth, etc.) inside the
building. The outside edge, however, was more difficult to recognize
as there was little ash and debris here to define the edge.
On the surface of the burned earth deposit (called
floor 2) a soapstone elbow pipe of Indian manufacture was found
along with numerous trade beads, indicating that the Indians must
have camped here when nothing was left of the house but a mound.
14 Much of the remainder of the mound
has been disturbed to some extent. The southeast corner was traceable,
but not so definitely as in the case of the southwest corner. The
outside edge of the north wall was defined by gravel along its border
deposited by a severe flood when the wall was yet standing. The
inside edge was also discernable, giving the wall a fourteen-inch
thickness. Window glass was scattered along the north wall in two
areas, indicating the presence of windows. Several sketches of the
mission show windows so located in this building. What appears to
be part of a brass window catch was found along with the glass near
the east end of the north wall. At the west end the wall line does
not show plainly and the occurrence of window glass along the edge
is our best evidence of wall in this area. The east wall is in deplorable
condition. The northeast corner is indefinite. Test pits show the
burned earth deposit of the ruin to be very shallow both in this
area and along the north border of the mound. At most only a few
inches of wall remain in place. The adobe bricks seem to have been
laid directly on the ground without there being a rock or log foundation
of any kind.
Assuming that the south wall had a thickness the
same as the north wall, the dimensions of the building are thirty-five
feet six inches from north to south, and thirty-seven feet from
east to west. W. H. Gray, who built the house in 1841, gives its
dimensions as thirty-two feet by forty in a book written some years
later. 15 Thus there
is not too great a discrepancy between the dimensions as he remembered
them and those found. The digging so far has' failed to indicate
the presence of a cellar, and it seems doubtful that one existed..
There is no historical mention of a cellar, and, too, the large
irrigation ditch only twentyfive feet away would have kept a cellar
flooded most of the time.
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Grist Mill
In Spalding's inventory of mission property the
grist mill is described thus: "1 Flour Mill (without mill house)
Stones good size and quality, stone light, heavy dam & large pond
with race. Forbay & Floom secured at great expense.
. ."16 The structure may have consisted
of a simple milling platform which supported the stones and other
milling equipment. That the mill was proving inadequate for the
needs of the mission and the immigrants is evident from the fact
that Dr. Whitman planned to build a new and better one and at the
time of the massacre had obtained new milling machinery and had
commissioned Josiah Osborn to build the new mill.
17 There are several statements to
the effect that there was no house over the old mill. Yet the fact
that it was in use from 1844 to 1847 and was employed for grinding
almost the year around makes it likely that it at least had a roof.
There was also a threshing machine and a turning lathe on the platform
which would need protection from the elements. No doubt the structure
was open on the sides. The mill was more than likely of the type
called tub mill,18
which were very common in rural areas in the eastern United States
in the nineteenth century. In this type of mill the four or five
foot diameter wheel turned in a horizontal plane, it being set as
low to the ground as possible. A wooden drive shaft went from the
center of the wheel up through the floor of the milling platform
some six or eight feet above. Here the shaft passed through the
lower mill stone, which was stationary, and fitted into the upper
stone (the runner) which turned. By this means there was a direct
drive between the mill wheel and the upper stone, no gearing being
required. Water was conducted from the pond to the wheel by means
of a flume.
The earthen dikes to the old mill pond, though
worn down in places, are still in a fair state of preservation.
Some parts are as much as five feet high. Where the two dikes approach
one another to form the race was the obvious place for the mill.
We started a trench about twenty feet south of the main dikes and
after removing about ten inches of gravel and two inches of mud
struck heavy hewn pine timbers, which proved to be part of a foundation.
The timber, nine to twelve inches in diameter, were laid three one
way and two the other making a level platform approximately seven
and one-half feet square, the diagonal of which was in line with
the mill race. They were in a fair state of preservation, though
somewhat worn and decayed on top. This platform probably served
to support the mill wheel. It was low enough and wet enough so that
it did not burn when the Indians destroyed the rest of the mill
in 1855. A foundation of this sort was needed to support the considerable
weight the wheel and the runner above. Additional hewn timbers lay
in odd positions on either side of the wheel foundation, but we
had to discontinue our summer's excavation before we could completely
uncover them. A post found about ten feet northwest of the platform
may be one of those which supported the milling platform above.
Although no charred timbers have so far been found, in the area
between the wheel foundation and the border of the north dike there
are indications of intense heat turned the soil a deep orange color.
This probably resulted the burning of the mill in 1855.
Tub
wheel foundation of the grist mill.
Being under water the timbers are still well preserved.
Until recently we had hoped to locate the granite
mill stones in the marshy ground near the mill site. We now know
that the stones were removed from the site and used in the Simms
and Dent mill which was built in 1859 just south of Walla Walla.19
They may yet be located in this area. The stones were forty inches
in diameter, a fact that should facilitate their identification.
Next: Part 4
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Endnotes
14 Indians roamed
the valley on fishing and hunting expeditions as late as 1905, coming
from the Umatilla Reservation.
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15 W. H. Gray, History of Oregon . .
. . (Portland, Ore., and New York, 1870), 466.
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16 Richardson, op. cit., 149.
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17 Osborn to his brother and sister,
April 7, 1848. In Hulbert, op. cit., Vill, 258.
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18 W. H. Gardner, "The Whitman Mission
Grist Mills." Ms., National Park Service, Region Four, San Francisco,
California.
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19 W. S. Clark, ms. in Whitman College
Library.
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