Clatsop-Statewide County OR Archives Biographies.....Abernethy, Mrs. Sarah F. November 25, 1843 - 
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Ila L. Wakley iwakley@msn.com May 19, 2010, 10:30 pm

Source: History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Vol. III, Published 1928, Pages 310 - 317
Author: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company

     MRS. SARAH F. ABERNETHY.  Few residents of Oregon are as well acquainted 
with its early history as is Mrs. Sarah F. Abernethy, a member of one of the 
first families of the commonwealth and an honored pioneer of Forest Grove. Her 
father, Dr. William H. Gray, the author of "Gray's History of Oregon," came to 
Oregon with Dr. and Mrs. Marcus Whitman and Rev. and Mrs. H. H. Spalding. This 
little party, which started across the plains in 1836, also included two 
teamsters and Rich and John, two Indian boys. Dr. Gray was hired by the 
American board of missions to act as secular agent for the missions which the 
board was about to establish. From Elmira, New York, they went to Pittsburgh, 
thence down the Ohio to its junction with the Mississippi, following the 
course of that river until it received the waters of the Missouri, and then 
proceeded upstream to Liberty Landing. From there they went by wagon to Fort 
Leavenworth, and at Council Bluffs they joined a caravan of the American Fur 
Company, which had nineteen carts, each drawn by two mules, hitched tandem. In 
addition to the American Fur Company's carts, Sir William Drummond, an English 
hunter, and sportsman, had two wagons drawn by mules, and these were the 
missionary wagons. They followed up the Platte river, crossed the North Platte 
and headed for Fort Laramie. When they came to the mountains all of the 
members of the caravan except Dr. Whitman decided to leave their wagons and 
carts. On June 6 they proceeded westward from Fort Laramie, carrying their 
goods on pack horses, but the belongings of the missionaries were transported 
in Dr. Whitman's wagon and in one of the company's carts. In spite of frequent 
upsets and incredible difficulties Dr. Whitman managed to keep up with the 
pack train and succeeded in taking his wagon as far as Fort Hall, thus gaining 
the honor of driving the first wagon ever driven so far across the plains.

     In December, 1837, Dr. Gray left Fort Vancouver in company with Frank 
Ermatinger and his twelve year old son and traveled to a trading post in the 
vicinity of what is now Helena, Montana. At that station they were joined by 
three Flatheads and a Snake Indian and two mountaineers and started for the 
east. They traveled south as far as Fort Hall, passing through the present 
site of Butte, Montana. On the other side of the Rocky mountains they were 
attacked by a band of Sioux Indians, who shot several of their horses, and 
when Dr. Gray approached them with a flag of truce they fired at him, one of 
the bullets passing through his hat. He immediately changed his tactics from 
peace to warfare and began shooting at the redskins, who captured Dr. Gray and 
his companions, killing the Indians in their party. When Dr. Gray explained to 
the chief of the band that they were neither traders nor trappers but had come 
to the country for the purpose of befriending the Indians the members of the 
party were released and allowed to retain their guns and enough powder for 
three loads of ammunition apiece. Three weeks later they reached Council 
Bluffs.

     Before his departure for the west Dr. Gray had become engaged to Mary 
Augusta Dix, who was of English lineage and came of the same ancestry as 
Dorothy A. Dix, the philanthropist. A native of Ballston Spa, New York, Mary 
A. Dix was born January 2, 1810, and was one of a family of seven daughters 
who were reared in a Christian home amid refined associations. She was married 
on Sunday, February 25, 1838, to Dr. Gray and soon afterward they started for 
the Pacific coast. By steamer and stagecoach they traveled to Independence, 
Missouri, where they were joined by the Rev. Cushing Eells, Rev. Elkanah 
Walker, Mr. and Mrs. A. B. Smith and a Mr. Rogers, who were also to become 
workers in the missionary field. At Independence they secured horses, on which 
they proceeded westward, and after an arduous journey of one hundred and 
twenty-nine days arrived at the Whitman mission. Dr. and Mrs. Gray became the 
assistants of Rev. and Mrs. Spalding, who were in charge of the mission at 
Lapwai, and remained there until November, 1840, when the Doctor was appointed 
secular agent for the Oregon Institute. From that point the story of the 
family is told as follows by Mrs. Sarah F. (Gray) Abernethy:

     "My father resigned from the missionary service in 1842. A few years 
later we moved to Clatsop plains, where father ran a dairy in connection with 
his medical practice. We made butter and furnished it to Astoria and Portland. 
A doctor in those days had a rather strenuous life. Once while father was on 
his way to attend a young man he was attacked by a bear. His dog attacked the 
bear, while father hurried on to attend his patient. The dog was badly 
crippled and did not return to our home for over two weeks.

     "In 1852 father decided to bring a herd of sheep to Oregon. He mortgaged 
his ranch for all he could get and went to San Francisco, whence he sailed by 
way of the isthmus of Panama for New York city. At Washington, D. C., he 
stopped to visit General Joseph Lane, Oregon's territorial delegate. After 
visiting the national capital and New York city he went to Cincinnati and 
thence to St. Louis. The next spring he bought nearly four hundred sheep and a 
two-horse wagon and a team of horses. As soon as the grass would furnish 
pasturage to the sheep he started across the plains. He hired three men to 
drive the sheep and also hired a good shepherd dog. He drove the flock to 
Independence, Missouri, thence up the Kansas river and across to South Platte 
and on to Fort Laramie, the Sweetwater and South Pass. From there he followed 
the regular Oregon trail to Fort Hall, from which point he went to the Whitman 
mission. He averaged twenty miles a day and reached The Dalles safely. There 
he purchased a scow sixteen by sixty feet, on which he put his three hundred 
and sixty sheep, and made the trip down the river to the mouth of the 
Willamette. From there to Astoria he was towed by one of the Portland-Astoria 
steamboats. Putting up a sail at Astoria, he sailed across Youngs bay and 
reached the shore, the end of his journey. While fastening a line from the 
scow to the shore, a sudden squall sprang up which carried them out into the 
bay. A moment or two later and the lines would have been fast and they would 
have been safe. Instead of this, they were carried across the Columbia river 
to Chinook point, where the waves dashed over the scow and sank it, drowning 
all of the sheep. Instead of making a fortune, as he would have done had he 
been able to get the sheep ashore, father, through the loss of the flock, was 
unable to pay off the mortgage and lost his farm.

     "In 1853 he went to Astoria, where he ran a butcher shop for some time. 
That same year my grandmother and my Aunt Camilla Dix returned east by way of 
the isthmus of Panama in company with Doctor Dunning, my mother's uncle. From 
Astoria we moved to Fort Hope, on the Fraser river. Here father built a sloop, 
which he ran between Fort Hope and Yale, carrying freight. Two years later we 
moved to Okanogan, where father constructed a sloop, and though everyone said 
it was impossible to go down the river, he succeeded with his sloop, which was 
caulked with wild flax and with pitch from the trees growing along the river 
bank. With this sloop he transported freight from Celilo up the Columbia and 
up the Snake as far as Lewiston. He did not have money enough to install 
machinery, so he operated his sloop with sails and oars. Mother and we 
children came to Portland. Though father went east in 1852 and also in 1885, 
mother never returned to her native state. She died December 8, 1881, on the 
Clatskanie farm, near the mouth of the Columbia river, and was nearly seventy-
two years of age. For forty-four years father and mother journeyed together 
through life, becoming the parents of eight children. The first was John Henry 
Dix Gray. Then came Caroline Augusta, who married Jacob Kamm, and Mary Sophia, 
who became Mrs. Frank Tarbell. I was the next and the others were William 
Polk, Edwin Hall, Albert and James Taylor. My sister, Mrs. Jacob Kamm, of 
Portland, my brother, William P., of Paseo, my brother, James T., of 
Grayshaven, and myself are the only members of the family now living.

     "I was born on Mission bottom, just north of Salem, November 25, 1843, 
and was sixteen years old when my parents moved to The Dalles. When I was 
three years old our family moved to Clatsop plains. We went from Oregon City 
down the Willamette to the Columbia and thence to Astoria on a flatboat. We 
lived on Clatsop plains until I was nine years old. I went to school there to 
Professor Brooks and Mrs. Rebecca Ketchum, of New York, who came to Oregon 
with my grandmother, Mrs. Sarah Dix, and her daughter Camilla. On Clatsop 
plains my father built the first Presbyterian Church in Clatsop county. I was 
a student at Portland Academy and also attended school at The Dalles.

     "On June 24, 1863, St. John's day, I was married at The Dalles to William 
Abernethy, a son of Oregon's first and only provisional governor. Dr. Condon, 
the noted geologist and well loved minister, performed the marriage ceremony. 
It took place at four o'clock in the morning and we had our wedding breakfast 
on board the boat while en route to Portland. We went to Clootches, now called 
Seaside, and there spent our two weeks' honeymoon.

     "In my husband's family there were only two children. His sister, Anna, 
married Henry Clay Hodges, who was then an army officer at Vancouver barracks 
and later became a brigadier-general. For many years I resided with my 
husband's parents, to whom I became deeply attached, and after the death of 
Governor Abernethy his widow lived at our home. My husband was born in New 
York city and made the trip to Oregon on the Lausanne in the spring of 1840 
with his parents. He attended the public schools of Oregon City and was next a 
student in Andover Seminary. His education was completed in the scientific 
department of Yale University and he then returned to Oregon. For a number of 
years he was an assayer at The Dalles and afterward engaged in assaying at 
Placerville, Montana, where he also conducted a jewelry store. His partner was 
a Mr. Robbins and during that time I remained with the Abernethy family in 
Portland. We moved to Multnomah county in 1864 and lived five miles out of 
Portland at what is now known as Abernethy Heights. My husband carried on a 
packing and commission business in Portland. His place of business was burned 
and we had no insurance. In 1889 we sold our place of one hundred and sixty-
three acres at Abernethy Heights and settled in Coos county, about half way 
between Roseburg and the coast. There my husband engaged in farming and cattle 
raising until 1904, when we came to Forest Grove to educate the children, 
expecting to be here only a few years, but liked the place so well that we 
decided to remain."

     Of the thirteen children born to Mr. and Mrs. Abernethy, three are 
deceased. Anna May, the eldest, is the wife of Benjamin Wallace Starr and the 
mother of two children, Spencer and George Abernethy. Caroline Augusta was 
united in marriage to the Rev. H. F. Burgess, who is now filling a pastorate 
in Seattle, Washington, and they have become the parents of five children: 
Henrietta, Fidelia, Abernethy B., Caroline and Margaret. William G. lives in 
Tacoma, Washington, and has a wife and two children, Lucille and Thelma. 
Violet O. F. is Mrs. B. Swanton, of Marshfield, Oregon, and the mother of six 
children: John Edwin, Elizabeth, Bennett and Violet, twins, Daisy and Roberta. 
Edwin is married and lives on the home farm near Dora in Coos county. Daisy S. 
F. married Archibald Hahn and they make their home in Princeton, New Jersey. 
They have a family of three children: Sarah Fidelia, Archie and Dorothy. Pearl 
D. is the wife of M. C. Miller, of Coquille, Oregon, and the mother of six 
children: William, Virginia, Felix, Priscilla, Lincoln and Teddy. Mary Frances 
is Mrs. A. T. Hahn, of Multnomah, and has two children, Caroline Augusta and 
Laura.  Camilla Dix, the next in order of birth, is at home. Mizpah Ione is 
the wife of Virgil Waterman, of Portland, and they have become the parents of 
four children: Lincoln, Virgil, Jr., Wesley W. and Mary Agnes. In 1898 Mr. and 
Mrs. Abernethy gave a home to Robert Abernethy Ray, whom they reared from the 
age of three years, and he is now living in the state of Washington.

     While residing in Portland, Mr. Abernethy was a lieutenant in the Oregon 
National Guard, and his fraternal affiliations were with the Masons and the 
Improved Order of Red Men. His manhood bore the impress of sincerity and 
candor, and his high sense of honor made him universally respected. He 
attained the ripe age of eighty-five years, passing away December 31, 1916. 
Mrs. Abernethy has witnessed the progress of civilization in Oregon and has 
personally known many men and women prominent in the early days who have since 
passed from the stage of action. She has been fortunate in developing the 
attributes of patience, industry and fidelity to home and its duties, and her 
children and friends have always found in her a safe adviser and one whose 
counsel is never given through selfish considerations but always in behalf of 
the best interests of others. It is such qualities that have made the 
words "mother" and "home" synonymous with all that is dearest to the human 
heart.

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