A Look at Fort Vancouver and its Civil War Ties – Including its Most Notable Quartermaster, Ulysses S. Grant

On a recent road trip through Oregon and Washington, my husband and I had the opportunity to visit two different forts with Civil War ties. Now, for those living in many other parts of the country, Civil War sites are quite common. Here on the West coast, however, such sites are few and far between. So, I was happy to learn some Civil War history connected to Fort Vancouver and Fort Klamath, located in southern Washington and southern Oregon, respectively. 

Fort Vancouver is located on the northern side of the Columbia River, which serves as the border between Oregon and Washington, less than ten miles north of the city of Portland, Oregon. On a clear day, visitors can see the snowy peaks of nearby Mt. Hood, Mt. Saint Helens, and Mt. Adams in the distance. Since we were there on a cloudy day, we did not have those views – but just the day before, we got a magnificent view of Mt. Hood, the largest mountain in Oregon which overlooks the city of Portland and stands at 11,249 feet.

Fort Vancouver was established in 1825 by the London-based Hudson’s Bay Company to serve as a fur-trading headquarters. Originally located on a bluff to the north of its current location, “The fort served as the core of the HBC’s western operations, controlling the fur business from Russian Alaska to Mexican California, and from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. Vancouver was the principal colonial settlement in the Pacific Northwest, and a major center of industry, trade, and law.” [1]

The fort moved to its current location in 1829, at which time a village grew up around it that soon became one of the largest settlements in the West. There HBC employees and their families lived in simple one- and two-room cabins. At peak times, more than 600 people – from a variety of countries around the world – lived in the village, supporting not only the fur trade industry, but also several hundred square miles of agriculture, dairies, a shipyard, a distillery, a tannery, a sawmill, and a gristmill. 

Today, Fort Vancouver National Historic Site includes Fort Vancouver, a visitor’s center, Vancouver Barracks, and Pearson Air Museum (one of the country’s oldest continuously operating airfields), all in Vancouver, Washington; and the McLoughlin House in Oregon City, Oregon. The fort itself features the Chief Factor’s House, kitchen, bakehouse, blacksmith shop, Barclay Quarters, Indian trade shop, fur store, carpenter shop, counting house, jail, and bastion. The buildings have all been carefully reconstructed on their original footprints since the actual fort burned down in 1866. On the day we were there, volunteers were manning both the blacksmith shop and carpenter shop, demonstrating work performed during the fort’s operation.  

One of the largest buildings at the fort is the Chief Factor’s House, and “everything about this house was designed to impress – the height, the staircase and veranda, the paint colors, the flower garden, and the cannons placed in front. As the center of economic, social, and political activity, this building housed the top two officers at the post and their families. The building’s central feature – a large hall – provided facilities for officers of the HBC and their guests to dine and enjoy holiday celebrations, religious services, weddings, and even an election under the provisional government.” [2]

The longest serving Chief Factor at Fort Vancouver was Dr. John McLoughlin, a trained physician who served from 1825 to 1845. During that time, “he and his wife Marguerite were known for their hospitality and generous support of those in the community. McLoughlin loaned money to emigrants to help them establish commercial ventures and he owned sawmills, a gristmill, a granary, a general store, and a shipping concern. He also donated land for schools and churches, and provided assistance to exhausted, starving American emigrants arriving at Vancouver after crossing the long and difficult Oregon Trail.” [3] 

McLoughlin’s kindness and generosity to American emigrants earned him the disapproval of George Simpson, governor of HBC’s North American operations. Simpson wanted McLoughlin to turn away American settlers, whom he saw as encroaching on this shared British and American territory. Instead, McLoughlin offered them credit in the fort’s shops – later leading to his being called the “Father of Oregon.” [4] 

After being pushed into retirement in 1846, McLoughlin settled into the house he had built by Willamette Falls in Oregon City. The house is now part of the Fort Vancouver National Historic Site. There he built a new career for himself, became a U.S. citizen, and served as mayor of Oregon City – the first capital of the Oregon Territory from 1848-1852. 

By the time McLoughlin left Fort Vancouver, fur trading was on the decline. That same year, the U.S. and Great Britain ratified the Treaty of Oregon, finally settling the Oregon boundary dispute by agreeing to a partition of the Pacific Northwest at the 49th parallel. This put Fort Vancouver under U.S. jurisdiction, but allowed HBC to continue operating throughout the territory. 

In 1848, the U.S. Congress officially designated this new section of the country – which included all of the present-day states of Oregon, Washington, and Idaho, as well as parts of Montana and Wyoming – as the Oregon Territory. This was primarily in response to the perceived need to protect American settlers from Indian attacks after thirteen Americans were killed by a small group of Cayuse men at the Whitman Mission, about six miles from modern-day Walla Walla, Washington.

The Whitman Massacre “is usually ascribed to the inability of [missionary Marcus] Whitman, a physician, to prevent [a] measles outbreak. Cayuse in at least three villages held Whitman responsible for the widespread epidemic that killed hundreds of Cayuse while leaving settlers comparatively unscathed. Some Cayuse accused settlers of poisoning them so they could take their land.” [5]. The Cayuse War that followed was just one of many Pacific Northwest Indian Wars that occurred between 1848-1879. 

“The Oregon Boundary Treaty of 1846, the Whitman Incident, and fear of Indian attack combined to spur the establishment of western outposts along the Oregon Trail,” Donna Sinclair explains in “Our Manifest Destiny Bids Fair for Fulfillment”: An Historical Overview of Vancouver Barracks, 1846-1898. “Military possession of the Pacific coast would complete the almost fifty year struggle for American occupation. All that remained was to extinguish Indian title to the lands, and the Pacific region would belong solely to the United States. On May 19, 1846, the U.S. Congress authorized the establishment of military posts along the road to Oregon. The route extended west from Independence, Missouri through Kansas and Nebraska Territory and into the Oregon Country. Establishing forts strategically on this trail would solidify U.S. possession of the west.” [6]

The first group of U.S. soldiers sent to Vancouver arrived by ship in May 1849 and set up their base next to the existing HBC fort. They immediately constructed nine buildings, with the first – now known as the Grant House – serving as both Headquarters and Commanding Officer’s residence. They called their fort Columbia Barracks, but the name would later be changed to Fort Vancouver (1853-1879), and eventually Vancouver Barracks (1879-present). 

That same month, a second group – a regiment of mounted riflemen – set out from Camp Sumner, about five miles west of Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, to begin the long journey to their new post. As Sinclair describes, “After much drilling, the train of 700 horses, 1,200 mules, a number of oxen, and 171 wagons assembled for the first military march to travel the length of the Oregon Trail. On May 10, 1849, five companies headed toward Oregon, joined by Major Osborne Cross, the official quartermaster and journalist of the expedition.” [7]

Upon finally arriving at Fort Vancouver in October 1849, Cross recorded in his journal: “Fort Vancouver, which is the headquarters of the Hudson’s Bay company, is on the right bank of the river. It is situated on a beautiful plain about five miles long and probably three-quarters of a mile wide. The country gradually rises and runs back for ten or fifteen miles, passing through several plains, some of which are cultivated. On one of these plains there is an excellent seminary where the children from the fort and neighborhood are educated. Immediately in the rear of the fort and on the rising ground, the company of artillery under Brevet-major Hatheway have put up temporary quarters and have made themselves very comfortable. This place would be a fine location for troops. Indeed it is the only spot between here and the mouth of the river where the mountains will admit of it.” [8]

This new fort “became the headquarters and supply base for troops, goods, equipment, and services for U.S. military posts throughout the Northwest. Fort Vancouver’s soldiers protected Oregon Trail settlers, developed a transportation infrastructure, and cleared the way for settlement through negotiation, conflict, and displacement of Native people to reservations.” [9] 

The fort also became something of a training ground for Civil War generals in the 1850s. Among the officers who served there were Union generals George McClellan, Joseph Barnes, John Reynolds, Benjamin Alvord, Benjamin Bonneville, Henry C. Hodges, Rufus Ingalls, Augustus V. Kautz, Phil Kearney, Alfred Pleasonton, Joshua W. Sill, and George Wright; as well as Confederate generals George B. Crittenden, William Wing Loring, Nathan Wickliffe, Gabriel J. Rains, and George Pickett.

The most notable of those to serve at the fort, however, was Ulysses S. Grant – and today, the Ulysses S. Grant House on Officer Row is the oldest building at Vancouver Barracks. Despite its name, Grant himself played no part in its construction, nor did he ever sleep there.

According to NPS literature, “Brevet Captain Ulysses S. Grant was posted at Vancouver Barracks with the 4th Infantry in 1852. However, he was not the Commanding Officer, and did not live in the Grant House. He was assigned to the Quartermaster’s Depot, near the Columbia River (which no longer exists), and maintained his residence there.” [10]

Four years prior to Grant’s arrival at Fort Vancouver, he had chosen to remain in the peacetime army following his service in the Mexican-American War. That same year, in August 1848, he married Julia Dent in St. Louis, and two years later, their first son was born. In those early years of their marriage, the couple lived for a time in New York, then Michigan. However, “familiar work and domesticity abruptly ended in the spring of 1852, when a large portion of the Fourth infantry was ordered to the Pacific Coast, which required a larger military presence. Grant would act as the quartermaster.” [12] Julia, pregnant again, was unable to accompany him, and instead returned to her family in St. Louis. 

On July 5, 1852, Grant set sail from New York Harbor on the steamer Ohio bound for the Isthmus of Panama. The plan was to cross the isthmus by train, boat, mules, and foot; then, after arriving at Panama City, board another ship for San Francisco. However, after a serious outbreak of cholera upon their arrival, Grant’s commanding officer, Col. Benjamin Bonneville, “decided that he would lead the healthy majority of the regiment across the isthmus and ordered Grant to follow with the regiment’s baggage and with the remaining passengers – soldiers and civilians – men, women, and children, many of them sick with cholera. No doctor, little food, and no other officer accompanied them…. His travails included failure of transportation, problems with supplies, navigating through tropical rainstorms, mud-filled roads, and frequent stops to bury the dead.” [13] About one-seventh of those who set sail from New York Harbor on the Ohio died on the journey.

Traumatized by his experience, Grant arrived in San Francisco in early September, then proceeded north to Fort Vancouver – where, two months later, he finally learned his wife had given birth to their second son in July. While military records indicate he performed his work as quartermaster satisfactorily, he was “miserable, lonely, and increasingly desperate for his family,” so he sought ways to earn money so he could bring his family out to join him. [14]

Grant hoped to join others making their fortunes selling goods and services to gold-seekers flocking to California. His efforts included selling ice, raising hogs, growing and harvesting crops, and operating a boarding house. All of his ventures failed, as did his applications for leaves and transfers. Eventually, however, he was promoted to a full captain and ordered to report to Fort Humboldt, which he did in early January 1854, leaving Fort Vancouver behind.

His presence, however, is still felt there today. “It is of historical note that the road in front of Officers’ Row, now known as Evergreen Boulevard, was named Grant Avenue for many years. The house continues to be called the “Grant House” as a tribute to the role that the stately old building and Ulysses S. Grant both played in the earliest history of Vancouver Barracks.” [15]

In my next post, I will share some photos as well as a bit of what I learned from visiting Fort Klamath in Klamath County, Oregon. I will also write a bit more about the Civil War years and what they looked like for those in these far-western forts.

Endnotes:

1. “The Hudson’s Bay Company’s Fort Vancouver – Fort Vancouver National Historic Site.” National Park Service, 26 August 2022, https://www.nps.gov/fova/learn/historyculture/hbcfort1.htm. Accessed 18 August 2024.
2. “The Chief Factor’s House.” National Park Service, 8 September 2020, https://www.nps.gov/places/fovachieffactorshouse.htm. Accessed 18 August 2024.
3. “McLoughlin House – Fort Vancouver National Historic Site (U.S.” National Park Service, 22 June 2024, https://www.nps.gov/fova/planyourvisit/placestogo-mcloughlin-house.htm. Accessed 18 August 2024.
4. “Dr. John McLoughlin.” National Park Service, 21 March 2019, https://www.nps.gov/people/johnmcloughlin.htm. Accessed 18 August 2024.
5. “Whitman massacre.” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitman_massacre. Accessed 18 August 2024.
6. Sinclair, Donna. “Our Manifest Destiny Bids Fair for Fulfillment”: An Historical Overview of Vancouver Barracks, 1846-1898, National Park Service, Feb 2004, https://npshistory.com/publications/fova/vancouver-barracks-1.pdf, pg. 20.
7. Ibid, pg. 22.
8. Settle, Raymond, ed. The March of the Mounted Riflemen: First United States Military Expedition to travel the full length of the Oregon Trail from Fort Leavenworth to Fort Vancouver, May to October, 1849 as recorded in the journals of Major Osborne Cross and George Gibbs and the official report of Colonel Loring, The Arthur Clark Company, 1940, pg. 266.
9. “The Civil War Era at Fort Vancouver (U.S.” National Park Service, 22 December 2017, https://www.nps.gov/articles/civilwarfortvancouver.htm. Accessed 18 August 2024.
10. “The Grant House: First Army Headquarters in the Northwest (U.S.” National Park Service, 23 August 2021, https://www.nps.gov/articles/granthouse.htm. Accessed 18 August 2024.
11. Waugh, Joan. U.S. Grant: American Hero, American Myth. University of North Carolina Press, 2009, pg. 31.
12. Ibid, pg. 35.
13. Ibid, pg. 36.
14. Ibid, pg. 37.
15. “The Grant House: First Army Headquarters in the Northwest (U.S.” National Park Service, 23 August 2021, https://www.nps.gov/articles/granthouse.htm. Accessed 18 August 2024.