Show notes
Marcus and Narcissa Whitman were Christian missionaries who left their homes in upstate New York and traveled with another missionary couple, Henry and Eliza Spalding, to what was then called Oregon Country in 1836. Their mission? To "Christianize" Indians.
In fact, Oregon wasn't even a territory yet. The United States government didn't have any programs in Oregon Country, which at the time consisted of the present-day states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and parts of Wyoming and Montana. The Whitmans and the Spaldings were among the very first Americans of European decent to travel across North America by land to the western part of Oregon Country.
Lewis and Clark had only just done it thirty years earlier, and there had been fur traders, trappers, and others of various nationalities in the area for a few years. But the Whitmans and the Spaldings were the first to settle in Cayuse and Nez Perce Indian territory near today's fashionable wine destination of Walla Walla, Washington.
Eleven years after the Whitmans arrived, a group of Cayuse ambushed and killed them along with eleven other people in what became a pivotal event in Washington state and Pacific Northwest history called The Whitman Massacre, but the story you might think you know may very well be appended - or upended - or both by the time this article is finished.
The story of Marcus and Narcissa Whitman has been told and retold so many times in classrooms throughout American history that it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction. But a new book coming out this month from Seattle's own Sasquatch Books aims to do just that. It's called Unsettled Ground: The Whitman Massacre and Its Shifting Legacy in the American West, authored by Cassandra Tate, a Seattle-based writer and editor. A former journalist, she earned a Ph.D. in American History at the University of Washington in 1995 and has contributed more than 200 articles to one of our favorite websites, HistoryLink.org, the online encyclopedia of Washington State history.
For those of you who have no idea what the Whitman Massacre is or how its effects have rippled across time to lap against the shores of modern day discourse, the following is an abridged version.
Prior to 1803, the United States didn't even stretch halfway across North America. Thomas Jefferson purchased the Louisiana Territory from France, essentially expanding America two-thirds of the way west toward the Pacific. He then sent Lewis and Clark and the Corps of Discovery to go check out the new purchase, which they did and came back with fantastic tales of strange creatures, harrowing landscapes, and tribal indigenous peoples.
A few years later, a wave of religious revivalism called the Second Great Awakening swept across the east coast, including a particular hotspot in western and central New York state called the "Burned-over District." It was so named because of the highly publicized revivals that crisscrossed the region to such a great extent that spiritual fervor seemed to set the area on fire. Caught up in this fervor were a young Marcus Whitman and Narcissa Prentiss.
Marcus dreamed of becoming a minister but did not have the money for such schooling. He studied medicine for two years with an experienced physician and received his medical degree from Fairfield Medical College in New York. He practiced medicine for a few years in Canada but was interested in going west. In 1835, Whitman traveled with the missionary Samuel Parker - who eventually introduced him to Narcissa - to present-day northwestern Montana and northern Idaho, to minister to bands of the Flathead and Nez Perce nations. During this journey, he treated several fur trappers during an outbreak of cholera.
In fact, Oregon wasn't even a territory yet. The United States government didn't have any programs in Oregon Country, which at the time consisted of the present-day states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and parts of Wyoming and Montana. The Whitmans and the Spaldings were among the very first Americans of European decent to travel across North America by land to the western part of Oregon Country.
Lewis and Clark had only just done it thirty years earlier, and there had been fur traders, trappers, and others of various nationalities in the area for a few years. But the Whitmans and the Spaldings were the first to settle in Cayuse and Nez Perce Indian territory near today's fashionable wine destination of Walla Walla, Washington.
Eleven years after the Whitmans arrived, a group of Cayuse ambushed and killed them along with eleven other people in what became a pivotal event in Washington state and Pacific Northwest history called The Whitman Massacre, but the story you might think you know may very well be appended - or upended - or both by the time this article is finished.
The story of Marcus and Narcissa Whitman has been told and retold so many times in classrooms throughout American history that it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction. But a new book coming out this month from Seattle's own Sasquatch Books aims to do just that. It's called Unsettled Ground: The Whitman Massacre and Its Shifting Legacy in the American West, authored by Cassandra Tate, a Seattle-based writer and editor. A former journalist, she earned a Ph.D. in American History at the University of Washington in 1995 and has contributed more than 200 articles to one of our favorite websites, HistoryLink.org, the online encyclopedia of Washington State history.
For those of you who have no idea what the Whitman Massacre is or how its effects have rippled across time to lap against the shores of modern day discourse, the following is an abridged version.
Prior to 1803, the United States didn't even stretch halfway across North America. Thomas Jefferson purchased the Louisiana Territory from France, essentially expanding America two-thirds of the way west toward the Pacific. He then sent Lewis and Clark and the Corps of Discovery to go check out the new purchase, which they did and came back with fantastic tales of strange creatures, harrowing landscapes, and tribal indigenous peoples.
A few years later, a wave of religious revivalism called the Second Great Awakening swept across the east coast, including a particular hotspot in western and central New York state called the "Burned-over District." It was so named because of the highly publicized revivals that crisscrossed the region to such a great extent that spiritual fervor seemed to set the area on fire. Caught up in this fervor were a young Marcus Whitman and Narcissa Prentiss.
Marcus dreamed of becoming a minister but did not have the money for such schooling. He studied medicine for two years with an experienced physician and received his medical degree from Fairfield Medical College in New York. He practiced medicine for a few years in Canada but was interested in going west. In 1835, Whitman traveled with the missionary Samuel Parker - who eventually introduced him to Narcissa - to present-day northwestern Montana and northern Idaho, to minister to bands of the Flathead and Nez Perce nations. During this journey, he treated several fur trappers during an outbreak of cholera.
