Seems like a lot of folks, self included, have expressed opinions in the NG
about various wars. Here's a war that occured where thousands of people boat
every year, so it's on-topic for a change

I'll share a bit of history about a war that ultimately decided the
international border between the US and Canada in the Vancouver archipelago,
and observations about two of associated sites that boaters can still visit
today.

The contemporary descriptions suffer without the supporting photos, but the
history of this conflict and its ulitmate resolution may be of some interest to
a few
participants in the group.

The Pig War, Part I
The issues, the beginning, and a visit to American Camp


A hungry pig, a carelessly worded treaty, and conflicting territorial ambitions
turned San Juan Island into a war zone just over 150 years ago.

The Treaty of 1846 established the 49th Parallel as the boundary between US
territorial claims to "Oregon Country" to the south and Great Britain's
colonial interests in "British Columbia" to the north. The British government
recognized the importance of unimpeded transit through the Strait of Juan de
Fuca, and negotiated a southerly "jog" to the western end of the boundary that
split the strait into separately controlled upper and lower halves.

The lower sixth of Vancouver Island, most of the Gulf Islands, and all of the
San Juans were below 49N, yet north of the boundary midway across the Strait of
Juan de Fuca. Treaty negotiators finally agreed on language establishing the
boundary between Juan de Fuca and the 49th parallel as the midpoint of the
"main channel" separating Vancouver Island from the North American mainland.

At 49N, the main channel is rather obviously the Strait of Georgia.
Unfortunately, the Strait of Georgia does not connect directly to the Strait of
Juan de Fuca. The most direct passages are through Haro Strait, (to the west of
the San Juan Islands) and Rosario Strait, (to the east). British interests
theorized, with some logical justification, that the San Juan Islands were the
southern extremity of the archipelago associated with the SE shore of Vancouver
Island. By such reasoning, the designated channel would be the waterway closest
to the continental mainland, or Rosario Strait.

American partisans interpreted the term "main channel" to mean the widest, and
most direct route between the Strait of Georgia and the Strait of Juan de Fuca;
Haro Strait. The territory disputed between the British and American
interpretations of the treaty language included Orcas, San Juan, Lopez, and all
the other islands now referred to as the San Juans.

A disparity of this magnitude would send modern diplomats back to the
conference tables. In 1846, the territorial status of a few wilderness islands
in a remote corner of the continent must have seemed like a minor detail that
could be resolved, or not, in the future.

Native Americans prospered on San Juan Island for 3000 years prior to the
arrival of American and British settlers. The native peoples learned to shape
their habitat with the judicious use of fire, and cleared large meadows along
the San Juan ridgelines. The earliest European explorers and settlers
recognized the agricultural potential of the meadowlands.

In 1853, the Hudson Bay Company decided to show the flag on the disputed shores
of San Juan Island. John C. Griffin was assigned to establish a sheep ranch on
the Cattle Point Peninsula of the island. Belle Vue Farm was founded. HBC would
have been satisfied merely to advance British claims to the Island, but were
delighted when Griffin's farm proved to be an extremely successful agricultural
enterprise.

The arrival of Griffin's 1500 sheep was not long ignored by the Americans. The
US government dispatched representatives to tax the HBC herds. Griffin ignored
the demands of the American assessors for six years. He could not as easily
ignore a steady influx of Americans pre-empting island homesteads on the same
acreages where Griffin was running British sheep. One such unwelcome neighbor
was Lyman Cutlar, who established a claim on a prime sheep meadow scarcely a
mile from Belle Vue Farm.

Lyman Cutlar built a rudimentary cabin and spaded up ground to grow enough
vegetables to provision against a cold NW winter. One of Griffin's hogs
developed a taste for Cutlar's potatoes, and the frustrated farmer put his work
aside to herd the pig back to Belle Vue on a number of occasions. After several
oinking invasions, Cutlar lost patience with the porker. On June 15, 1859, he
resolved the situation with a single musket shot.

Cutlar walked to Belle Vue Farm and offered to pay Griffin for the pig. The
offer was withdrawn when Griffin set the price for this particular pig at a
truly extortionary figure. Griffin ordered Cutlar off his sheep meadow and off
the island, and threatened to have him arrested if he refused to pay for the
pig or remained on the island.

At the time of the pig incident, only about 40 people of European ancestry
lived on San Juan Island. Eighteen were American settlers. The Americans agreed
to make every reasonable effort to prevent Cutlar's arrest. If Hudson Bay
Company could force Cutlar off the island, who would be next? Prospects
improved in early July when a ship flying an American flag was spotted in the
Strait of Juan de Fuca. American settlers on San Juan raised an American flag
in response, and the vessel hove-to to investigate. Brigadier William S.
Harney, commander of the Department of Oregon, came ashore near Cattle Point to
learn of Cutlar's problem and the American settlers' difficult relationship
with Griffin and the Hudson Bay Company.

Harney dispatched a message to Fort Bellingham, ordering Captain George Pickett
and a company from the 9th Infantry to occupy the island. Pickett was ordered
to protect American settlers from hostile Indians and further abuses by Hudson
Bay Company. (The same George Pickett is more frequently remembered in
conjunction with a disastrous maneuver during the battle of Gettysburg).

Politicians have always been famous for taking all possible sides of an issue
at once. The Presidential response to Harney's decision to deploy Pickett's
company on San Juan Island was not an exception.. Wm. Drinkard, Acting US
Secretary of War under President James Buchanan, wrote: "The President was not
prepared to learn that you had ordered military possession to be taken of the
island of San Juan or Belle Vue. Although he believes the Straits of Haro to be
the true boundary between Great Britain and the United States, under the treaty
of June 14, 1846, and that, consequently, this island belongs to us, yet he had
not anticipated that so decided a step would have been resorted to without
instruction. Nevertheless… if you had good reason to believe that the
colonial authorities of Great Britain were about to disturb the status, by
taking possession of the island and assuming jurisdiction over it, you were
right to anticipate their action. It has been too much the practice of the
British Government to seize first and negotiate afterwards."

Pickett landed at San Juan Town on the shore of Griffin Bay on July 27, 1859.
His first brash act was to post a notice officially declaring the entire island
"US Territory." By July 29, the 31-gun Royal Navy frigate "Tribune" was
anchored in Griffin Bay with cannons trained on Pickett's shoreside position.
Pickett responded by moving camp to the top of the Cattle Point ridge and
talking bravely about turning Cattle Point into a second "Bunker Hill."

The British flotilla expanded. HMS "Satellite" arrived on July 30, and Pickett
relocated his camp again to the far side of the ridge, just above present South
Beach. On August 10, Lieutenant Colonel Silas Casey arrived from Fort
Steilacoom with an additional 180 US soldiers. Displeased with the South Beach
camp and now the ranking American officer, Casey relocated the American Camp to
its final location just over the hill from Griffin Bay and Belle Vue Farm.

The first visitors to American Camp were curious sightseers from Victoria. The
atmosphere was extremely relaxed, and tourists were allowed to inspect both the
American military camp and the British fleet on the same day. Lt. Col. Casey
did order a fortified redoubt dug into a hill on the eastern edge of the
campground. Construction was assigned to recent West Point graduate Henry
Martyn Robert. (Robert eventually retired as CommandingGeneral of the US Army
Corps of Engineers, but is best remembered as the ultimate maven of
parliamentary procedure and author of "Robert's Rules of Order")

Jan and I visited American Camp on a warm, sunny, afternoon in September. It is
easily possible to anchor in Griffin Bay or snag a mooring buoy at Griffin Bay
Park and be within a short walk of the National Historic Park at American Camp.
Griffin Bay has a liberal sprinkling of rocks and shoals along the shoreline,
and a detailed chart would be particularly important for safe approach or
anchoring. For a variety of reasons, we elected to stay at the Port of Friday
Harbor Marina and bicycled six miles to the camp.

Cyclists will encounter a few steep grades enroute, but we rode up most of them
on a 6-speed Dahon Mariner folding bike and walked up the rest. Including stops
to pick a quart of roadside blackberries and marvel at eye-popping pastoral
island vistas, travel time from Friday Harbor is about 45 minutes by bike.
Boaters not familiar with the interior of San Juan Island should consider the
hike-or-bike option at least once. No bikes aboard? There's a rental booth
across the street from the Friday Harbor ferry dock.

Only two original buildings and Robert's Redoubt remain at American Camp. The
facility was hastily built, and never well maintained. When the 1859 structures
needed initial repairs, the Civil War had erupted, and the US Government had
more pressing needs for military construction resources. A well-marked
interpretive walking trail with old photos and sketches substitutes well for
the missing buildings. If there were no history at all associated with the
site, it would be well worth a visit to enjoy the spectacular views of the
Strait of Juan de Fuca and Griffin Bay from the Cattle Point highlands. We
stood in thigh-high brindle grass and watched the sun glinting off the rigging
of a gaff-rigged schooner ("Adventuress"?) tacking into the wind a few miles
south of the island. A soldier or a settler could have enjoyed a similar view
during the Pig War days.

Purse seiners worked close ashore just south of Cattle Point Peninsula. In the
still autumn air, we could hear the loudest communications between deckhands as
aluminum tenders spread nets in large circles. Shortly thereafter, a busy
rumble began when diesel powered winches closed and hauled the nets.
Generations ago, the same Native Americans who cleared the San Juan meadows
with fire would have used spears, traps, and cedar bark nets to gather similar
harvests of fish.

Modern visitors consider San Juan Island an idyllic environment. Enlisted
American soldiers considered a posting here dreadful duty indeed. Steamer
passage between the Pacific NW and the eastern homes of most of the soldiers
cost $300, far more than a private's annual pay. Even if leave time had been
available, the high cost of transport would have insured most of the men were
isolated from home and family for the duration of their tour here. San Juan
Town, with rowdy bars and other "diversions" was clearly visible from Robert's
Redoubt, but strictly off limits to enlisted men. Soldiers who visited
San Juan Town were punished harshly. Many deserted. Boredom was epidemic. When
American Camp was closed in 1872, a review of medical records reviewed that
while there had not been many deaths at American Camp, one of the leading
causes was "suicide."

The camp laundress building is a small, rectangular shack. National Park
literature states that the building served as home for as many as three post
laundresses, (and their families!), at various times when American Camp was
active. Laundresses were required to be married, and if a laundress ever became
widowed she was allotted only sixty days to find a new husband. Most widowed
laundresses would have any number of suitors among the enlisted men. Female
companionship was scarce on the frontier, and as a laundress drew a full
military ration and could earn up to $20 a month, she would be considered a
prize catch.

Inside the white picket fence surrounding the parade ground, the original
officers' quarters still stand. George Pickett erected the building in 1860.
The structure would be a compact single family home by modern standards, but it
served as a duplex at American Camp. George Pickett was not the only Pig War
officer to ride to greater fame, (or infamy). The other original resident of
the American Camp officers' quarters was First Lieutenant James W. Forsyth.
Forsyth served as a brigadier general in the Union army, and near the close of
his career he led the 7th Cavalry charge into the controversial "Indian battle"
of Wounded Knee.

(Next: The conclusion of the war, and a visit to British Camp).