SARAH CATHERINE KOONTZ
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My parents both crossed the plains in wagon trains in 1852. My father was William Martin and mother’s name was Ann Yantis, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Alexander Scott Yantis.
Mother was 14 years old when she came. She rode a mule and help herd the extra stock during most of the trip. My father and mother were married in 1854 and lived in Thurston County until 1872. We came directly from Thurston County to Walla Walla County.
One of the most tragic experiences of crossing the plains was that of the Ward families who were in the train which my father, Alexander Scott Yantis, commanded. When they reached what was called “the desert,” the three Ward families chose a trail which would go through a little timber. It was not the main-traveled road and Captain Yantis, who had been over the road before, begged them to keep the train as the Indians more frequently attacked from the cover of brush. The Wards rode on saying they would meet them where the trails crossed.
The main train reached the rendezvous, but there was no sign of the other wagons. A cow had strayed and father and another man rode back. They came to the spot where a terrible tragedy had been enacted. The men lay dead, wagons and equipment were in flames and the women were being driven away. Father sent for help while he looked for signs of life among them. One boy of 9 called to him, “Is that you, Mr. Yantis?” Father went over and the boy, whose name was Newton Ward, begged him to take him with him. By the time help arrived, the Indians had taken more lives. Newton’s brother, William, made his escape with an arrow in his side. The two boys were the only survivors. William finally reached Boise, crawling on his hands and knees the last of the journey. The brothers did not find each other for thirty years.
A grave in the cemetery at Touchet marks the spot where one of Washington’s oldest settlers was laid at rest.
When William Martin was fifteen years old he hired out to work for a neighbor in Missouri. Covered wagons were continuously passing by and the talk was all of Oregon. William wanted to go west but his parents discouraged him on the occasions when he visited them and expressed his desires. In 1852, at the age of eighteen, he was employed to drive an ox-team in one of the westbound caravans.
When William went to say “goodbye” to his parents they begged and protested, but his mind was filled with tales he had heard and he remained obdurate. His father gave him $5.00. He was to receive $1.00 a month and board from his employer.
After the usual experiences and long toilsome journey, the party arrived at Oregon City, where William and another lad contracted to cut cord wood. After working three months each had 75 cents and his axe. William still had the $5.00 given him by his father, and each boy had a blanket brought from Missouri. They bought a little food and set out on foot for the country adjacent to Puget Sound. They came by way of Snoqualmie Pass, which was then little better then a deer trail: then down through the jungle on the west side until they came to the open country and the settlement near what is now Olympia. There they found work in a sawmill.
William later took up land near Tenino, building a log cabin of two rooms. A family name Yantis had meanwhile arrived in the neighborhood and William fell in love with Ann, the second daughter. During the Indian troubles, Will Martin became a Lieutenant. In 1856 he and Ann were married at Fort Hennas on Mound Prairie, where the Yantis family had taken refuge.
The wedding of the dashing young soldier and his beautiful bride was one of the greatest events to take place at the fort.
Ann Yantis had spent four months in the saddle crossing the plains when she was fourteen years old. The older sister, whose duty it was to ride Jinny, the little mule, and herd the cattle along with the train, met with a serious accident, so Ann, despite her age and inexperience, assumed the task, driving the cattle nearly all the way across.
Amid the hardships of pioneer life in the little frontier settlement in Thurston County, the Martins struggle with the other settlers, cutting down forest trees and clearing the land, planting and harvesting. In all of the development the Martins took an active part. Their children were born in the little log cabin among the pines.
William Martin made the furniture for their home, and his daughter speaks lovingly today of his skillful work in fashioning chairs and tables, bedsteads, a clothes press and everything in use about the cabin. “How I wish I had one of those chairs,” she said. “They are still in existence, and were beautifully made.”
In 1872 the Martins, desiring to go into the stock business, loaded their possession into a lumber wagon, the only way of freighting in those days, and with their family headed for Snoqualmie Pass and the country east of the mountains.
They drove through the Yakima Valley, reached the Columbia, and were ferried across. They camped at Old Fort Walla Walla, and there, on the banks of the Columbia, this pioneer family again set up the family alter and created another frontier home.
The old blockhouse at Fort Walla Walla was the children’s playhouse. One of the old buildings inside the fort was used for church and Sunday school. General Howard, who was stationed near the old fort with his soldiers during an Indian outbreak when the Columbia River was patrolled, preached every Sunday and conducted the Sunday school.
The old wharf, which was really the hull of an old steamer, was commandeered in case the settlers would have to leave their homes in a hurry. Mothers and children slept on this wharf for ten successive nights, while the soldiers stood guard. One woman refused to leave her comfortable bed, but the soldiers went into her home and escorted her to the wharf. A wedding took place during the exciting period of waiting for an Indian attack.
The old steamer Frederick K. Billings plied up and down the Columbia and Mrs. Koontz recalls that she often rowed a boat out to the steamer, taking butter and eggs for shipment to the Portland market. The boat was run by Captain William Gray, son of the pioneer, Captain Gray.
The Baker railroad was built in 1872. The children of Wallula had many a free ride on the flat cars when this road was first built.
Six generation of this pioneer family have made their homes in the land chose in the ‘50s by the stout-hearted men and loyal women who braved the dangers of the plains and the wilderness beyond the Rocky Mountains.
