Revised December 22, 2022
Introduction:
During 1842 and 1843, the Rocky Mountain Mission Jesuits seem to have taken their order’s call to go forth in the world as contemplatives in action to-heart. Superior Pierre-Jean De Smet, as well as the other Rocky Mountain missionaries, logged thousands of miles, over land and sea, to expand the Kingdom of God in the Pacific Northwest.
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| St. Joe River, Idaho |
De Smet and Charles Go to Fort Vancouver
A
“bitter” winter capped off the year of 1841, an eventful one for the first
Jesuit missionaries to the Pacific Northwest. According to Schoenberg in The
History of the Catholic Church in the Pacific Northwest, snow fell “for
three months without interruption, and even seasoned” Natives ”succumbed to
snow-blindness and had to be rescued from the drifts.” The Salish leader Tjolzhitsay,
who had welcomed the Jesuits into his People’s homelands during the warm days
of August and witnessed a month later the founding of St. Mary’s, the region’s
first Catholic mission, died during that long and dreadful winter. (Schoenberg,
HCC, 65)
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| F. N. Blanchet |
 |
| Modeste Demers |
By mid-April, winter had given way to spring, and De Smet
decided to travel to Fort Vancouver, the “principal” Hudson’s Bay Company post
in the Pacific Northwest. There were, writes Palladino in Indian and White
in the Northwest, several reasons why De Smet decided to make the long and
difficult trip to the “west side” of the present states of Washington and
Oregon where Fort Vancouver was located. Not only had he determined that St.
Mary’s needed “seed, agricultural implements, and other supplies,” he also wanted
to meet the two Catholic priests who had arrived in the Oregon Country before
him. In 1838, Fathers François Norbert Blanchet and Modest Demers had emigrated from
Canada to the Willamette Valley; they had come, writes Shawna Gandy in her
biography of Blanchet
for the Oregon Encyclopedia,
in response to the “French Canadian settlers’ petitions for priests.” (Palladino,
38-39; Gandy, 1)
Joining De Smet on the journey, writes Carriker, was his
friend Charles “Lamoose,” son of Ignace Partui. Charles’ knowledge of the
terrain of the Inland Northwest must have proven invaluable to De Smet who,
according to Schoenberg, had “every intention” of preaching “to all the tribes
on his route.” Early on in the journey, writes William L. Davis, S.J. in his
history of St. Ignatius Mission, De Smet veered from the trail, the same one he
had taken the year before, to go north in search of a Kootenai camp at Horse
Plains in present Sanders County, Montana. Another time, he headed south in
order to visit the Schitsu’umsh in their homelands on Lake Coeur d’Alene in
present northern Idaho. Davis explains that De Smet reached the area by crossing the Coeur d’Alene Mountains at “Sohon’s
Pass [St. Regis Pass on the Idaho/Montana border near Shoshone County, Idaho],
which brought him to a small tributary of the North Fork of the Coeur d’Alene
River, which he followed to the lake, skirted its northern short, and came to
the site of the present city.” (Schoenberg, HCC, 66; Davis, 6-7)
Another historian, however, interprets the encounter
between De Smet and the Schitsu’umsh from a different perspective. Joseph
Seltice in his book, Saga of the Coeur d’Alene Indians, writes
that three Schitsu’umsh men, “No Hand, Polatkin and Stellam” led De Smet and
his companions to “Headwaters, the present city of Coeur d’Alene,” where their
chief, Twisted Earth, was located. Seltice, who served as Chief of the Coeur
d’Alene Tribe from 1932 to 1949, adds that De Smet “first came among the Coeur
d’Alene Indians” on the “First Friday of the month, and this day has been
faithfully observed by all the Coeur d’Alenes from 1842 to this very day.”
(Seltice, 31)
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| Columbia River |
From Schitsu’umsh territory, De Smet and Charles headed
northwest toward Fort Colville and arrived there in the first part of May. The
plan to canoe down the Columbia River to Fort Vancouver went aground when the
travelers discovered that the river was too swollen with spring runoff to permit traffic. While waiting
for the water elevation to drop, De Smet traveled around the Fort Colville area
visiting nearby Native communities. By the end of May, the Columbia had
subsided enough for De Smet and Charles to resume their journey. On May 30, the
two men stepped aboard a Hudson’s Bay Company barge commanded by fur man Peter
Skene Ogden, and on June 8, the barge arrived at Fort Vancouver.
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| Fort Vancouver, 1845 |
De Smet on the “West Side”
In his biography of De Smet, Carriker suggests that Fort
Vancouver “may have been the most sophisticated village west of Santa Fe, with
the possible exception of Monterey, California. The Hudson’s Bay Company
operated a shipyard, gristmill, dairy, orchard, and farm in addition to the
headquarters post.” De Smet met with Chief Factor John McLoughlin in “his
baronial residence” and enjoyed the doctor’s legendary hospitality. “The two
men,” writes Carriker, “formed an instant friendship.” (Carriker, 56-57)
Later, De Smet traveled to the Willamette Valley where he
met with Fathers Blanchet and Demers. “The three apostles of the Northwest,”
writes Father Palladino, spent several days in conversation, “the charms of
which could only be known to their own hearts and to their Angel Guardians.”
Before the priests parted company, they had developed an action plan for the
propagation of the Catholic faith in the Oregon Country. De Smet would return
to St. Louis, to “seek his superior’s approval, and then sail to Europe in
search of money and recruits” for the Oregon Country missions. He began his
return trip to St. Mary’s on June 30. (Palladino, 39)
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| Spokane River and Plains |
De Smet and Charles Return to St.
Mary’s
De Smet and Charles left the “west side” as they had
reached it: on-board a Hudson’s Bay Company barge commanded by Peter Skene
Ogden. Two weeks later, the two men left the barge behind at Fort Walla Walla
and proceeded to St. Mary’s via an “ancient Indian trail” that led from Fort
Walla Walla “through the plains near Spokane” to the southern end of Lake Coeur
d’Alene. From there, it followed the St. Joe River to a point where it “ended
abruptly” in the Bitterroot Mountains. However, before beginning their ascent, De
Smet decided to visit the Schitsu’umsh once again. During this visit, which
probably took place somewhere on the St. Joe, De Smet directed the Schitsu’umsh
“to send some of their men to the Flat-Head Mission late in the fall, when a
Father would be ready to come to them.” (Carriker, 58; Palladino, 39)
De Smet Leaves the Rocky Mountains
After surmounting the “steep rocks and dense forests” of
the Bitterroots, Charles and De Smet arrived at St. Mary’s on July 27. Two days
later, De Smet left the mission, ultimately bound for St. Louis. On his way
there, however, he also meant to find Father Point who was with the Salish who
were participating in the summer buffalo hunt at Three Forks. Carriker writes
that Charles convinced De Smet to take a “traditional Indian route across the
mountains” to the camp. The route led “up the Bitterroot River, not down it, to
its source at Ross’s Hole. After cresting the mountains beyond at present-day
Gibbon’s Pass, the two men descended into the Big Hole River drainage system
and from there worked their way east to Three Forks by way of the Beaverhead
and Jefferson Rivers.” (Carriker, 58; Carriker, 59)
Charles and De Smet arrived at Three Forks in early
August. There, De Smet found Father Point and informed him that he was to go
immediately to Schitsu’umsh country where he, with the help of
“jack-of-all-trades” Brother Huet, should establish a mission. Having communicated
his directions, De Smet then left the Salish, eager to begin the return trip to
St. Louis before winter weather set in. With an escort of 10 Salish men that
included Gabriel Prudhomme and Ignace La Jeune, De Smet left Three Forks and
arrived in St. Louis two months later.
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| Lake Coeur d'Alene |
Point and Huet Arrive in Coeur
d’Alene Country
As De Smet went east, Father Point and Brother Huet went
west. The two Jesuits arrived in Schitsu’umsh territory on Friday, November 4.
“It was the first Friday of the month,” writes Father Schoenberg, “the day on
which Catholics all over the world, even in a wilderness, give special honor or
devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.” Point, writes Schoenberg, selected the
mission site somewhere on the “north bank” of the St. Joe River, a tributary of
Lake Coeur d’Alene. He adds that, after Point instructed Huet to begin
construction of the mission’s buildings, he left to spend the “winter with the
main body of the tribe at their fish camp,” which was located “where the
Spokane River flows out of Lake Coeur d’Alene, presently the campus” of North
Idaho College in the city of Coeur d’Alene. (Schoenberg, HCC, 73, 772,
n. 71)
Jesuits on the Move
During 1843, the Rocky Mountain Mission Jesuits were
seldom in one place for long. Taking to-heart their Order’s call to go forth in
the world as contemplatives in action, De Smet and the other missionaries
logged thousands of miles, over the land and over the sea, that year to build the
Kingdom of God in the Pacific Northwest. De Smet began the year with a tour of
the major cities of the eastern and southern United States that yielded over
$5,000 from generous souls in New Orleans, Boston, Louisville, Cincinnati,
Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York. The treasure De Smet
collected convinced Missouri Vice Province Superior Father Peter Verhaegan to
authorize the purchase of additional supplies for the Rocky Mountain Mission
and to augment its staffing.
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| Adrian Hoecken, S.J. |
Rocky Mountain Reinforcements
The reinforcements Verhaegan assigned to the Rocky
Mountain Mission were Fathers Adrian Hoecken and Peter De Vos and a brother whom
Schoenberg identifies as Michael McGean in his two books of Northwest Catholic
history, Paths to the Northwest and The History of the Catholic
Church in the Pacific Northwest. According to Schoenberg, Father Hoecken
came from a family that had given “seven children to the Church,” and Father De
Vos had been Novice Master at the Jesuit seminary at Florissant. “Of Brother
McGean,” he writes, “there is little to record except that he was of Irish
descent and was born in 1812.” He adds that Brother McGean died on October 28,
1877, “having served the Coeur d’Alene Mission well in farming and tending
stock, he was respected by all.” (Schoenberg, Paths to the Northwest, 27; Schoenberg, Paths to the Northwest, 28)
Reinforcements also came from Europe. Prior to De Smet’s
arrival on the continent, the Right Reverend Jan Roothaan, Superior General of
the Society of Jesus, assigned four European Jesuits to the Rocky Mountain
Mission, knowing, according to Schoenberg, that De Smet “would not leave him in
peace until he sent more Jesuits to the Rocky Mountain Mission.” On March 20,
1843, “Fathers Joseph Joset, a delightfully innocent little Swiss;” “Father
Peter Zerbinatti, a Neopolitan;” “Father Tiberius Soderini, a Roman; and
Brother Vincent Magri, a Maltese” began the first leg of their journey to the
Rocky Mountains. (Schoenberg, Paths to the Northwest, 29)
Changes at the Schitsu’umsh Mission
In the spring of 1843, writes Schoenberg, Father Point
returned to the mission Brother Huet was building on the St. Joe River and “assisted
in the construction of the first church, a long, low hut of logs and moss,” as
did, most likely, the Schitsu’umsh. According to Schitsu’umsh historian Joseph
Seltice, “Brother Huet was a skilled builder, and he drew up plans for building
a mission. In the early part of the following spring, 1843, they [perhaps Huet
and the Schitsu’umsh] began a new village five miles down the river from the
present city of St. Maries. Brother Huet built a log church, 30 x 14 feet, and
by the fall of 1844, one hundred families lived at this newly erected village
on the St. Joe River.” (Schoenberg, HCC, 74; Seltice, 35)
It was at this time, too, that Father Point began to
refer to the mission as “St. Joseph,” a name that lasted until the mission was
moved to another location in 1846. “Though it was intended to be permanent,”
writes Seltice, “the mission remained there [on the St. Joe] for only two years.
Many of the people were opposed to moving the mission, but this location was
also a gathering place for summer sports: horse racing, foot racing, boat races
and nightly dances. People finally realized that these activities and religious
gatherings could hardly mix.” In 1845, Father Joseph Joset, S.J. was assigned
to the Schitsu’umsh mission, and in the spring of 1846, he moved it to a “knoll
surrounded by flat alluvial lands, on the Coeur d’Alene River ten miles above” Lake
Coeur d’Alene, the present site of Old Mission State Park in Kootenai County,
Idaho. From the “very beginning,” writes Schoenberg, Joset called the mission
“Sacred Heart,” not St. Joseph. Thirty years later, the mission would be moved
yet again. (Seltice, 35; Schoenberg, Jesuit Mission Presses of the Pacific Northwest,
72)
De Smet Arrives in Europe
As Hoecken, De Vos, and McGean traveled west to the
mountains, De Smet headed east across the Atlantic Ocean, bound for Europe.
After a 21-day voyage, De Smet landed in Ireland at the end of June and then
spent the remainder of the year touring the continent to recruit funds and volunteers
for the Rocky Mountain Mission. According to Carriker, De Smet promoted the
Mission so “deftly” that “when he left Antwerp in December 1843, he carried
with him a bank credit for more than 145,000 francs ($26,500), a princely sum
for the times.” (Carriker, 67)
Conflict in Coeur d’Alene Country
Sometime during 1843, probably during the late summer,
Father Point had a falling-out with the Schitsu’umsh. While the exact cause of
the rift is not clear, Schoenberg acknowledges that Father Point was no saint;
in fact, he claims that Point was generally irascible and subject to
“occasional snits.” When he fled the Schitsu’umsh mission, Father Point headed
for St. Mary’s – where else could he go – to seek Father Mengarini’s advice,
and no doubt, his consolation. It must have greatly soothed the volatile Vendéan
when he learned that Mengarini had decided to send one of the reinforcements,
Adrian Hoecken, to the Schitsu’umsh. (Schoenberg, HCC, 97)
De Smet, etal Depart Europe
According to Palladino in Indian and White in the
Northwest, when De Smet departed Europe for North America on December 12,
five Jesuits accompanied him: “Fathers John Nobilli, Michael Acolti, Anthony
Ravalli, Louis Vercruysse, a Lay Brother, Francis Huybrechts.” In addition to
the Jesuits, a “colony of Sisters” also accompanied De Smet on the journey to
the Oregon Country. The colony was composed of six Sisters of Notre Dame de
Namur who would become the first “Catholic nuns in the Pacific Northwest.” Specializing in the instruction of girls, the Sisters
established a school at St. Paul in present Marion County, Oregon. Sainte Marie
de Willamette “primarily attracted the daughters of the Canadian fur traders”
and their Native or Metís wives. (Schoenberg, Paths to the Northwest,
29; Palladino, 43; Gandy, Oregon
Encyclopedia, 1)
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| Notre Dame San Jose, 1876 |
Conclusion:
Infused with funds and staff, the future of the Rocky
Mountain Mission looked bright at the end of 1843. Catholic missionaries were
so plentiful in the Pacific Northwest, in fact, that a Hudson’s Bay Company Factor
noted in a letter to a friend that “in the Columbia there is no want of
labourers for the Vineyard.” Ironically, the “Vineyard” would soon grow weary
of its laborers. (Phillips, 72)
Text
Sources:
Carriker, Robert C. Father Peter John De Smet: Jesuit in
the West. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman and London, 1995.
Davis, William L., S.J. A History of St. Ignatius
Mission: an outpost of Catholic culture on the Montana Frontier. Copyright 1954.
Dorel, Frédéric, “A Romantic Invented
Tradition: Restoring the Seventeenth-Century Paraguayan Reductions in the
Nineteenth-Century Rocky Mountains” in Crossings and Dwellings: Restored
Jesuits, Women Religious, American Experience, 1814-2014, edited by Kyle B.
Roberts and Stephen R. Schloesser, Brill, Leiden, Boston, 2017.
Gandy,
Shawna. “François Blanchet,” Oregon
Encyclopedia, last visited August 9, 2021.
Gandy, Shawna. “Sisters of
Notre Dame de Namur,” Oregon Encyclopedia, last
visited August 18, 2021.
Palladino, L.B., S.J. Indian and
White in the Northwest; or A History of Catholicity in Montana. John Murphy
& Company, Baltimore, 1894.
Schoenberg, Wilfred P., S.J. A History of the Catholic
Church in the Pacific Northwest 1743-1983. The Pastoral Press, Washington,
D.C., 1987.
Schoenberg,
Wilfred P., S.J. Jesuit Mission Presses in the Pacific Northwest: A History
and Bibliography of Imprints 1876-1899. Ye Galleon Press, Fairfield,
Washington, 1994.
Schoenberg,
Wilfred P., S.J. Paths to the Northwest: A Jesuit History of the Oregon
Province. Loyola University Press, Chicago, Illinois, 1982.
Seltice, Joseph. Saga of the Coeur d’Alene Indians: An
Account of Chief Joseph Seltice, edited by Edward J. Kowrach and Thomas E.
Connolly, Ye Galleon Press, Fairfield, Washington, 1990.
Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, East-West Province /
West, Step into History,
last visited August 27, 2021.
Image Sources (in order of appearance)
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Joe River at Red Ives. Tensmayer, Greg, Forest Service of the United States
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