Friday, November 27, 2009

Digital Updates at the Washington State Library

The Washington State Library has been adding items to its excellent digital collections. This entry at the WSL blog describes the updates, which includesuch items as Authentic account of the murder of Dr. Whitman and other missionaries by Fr. J.B.A. Brouillet, Reminiscences of Washington Territory by Charles Prosch (pictured below), and Seattle General Strike , an "account of the Seattle general strike from the point of view of the unions, written by the History Committee of the General Strike Committee."

I have just begun dipping into these resources, but I will share with you this excerpt from Prosch's memoir of early settlement and the Civil War in the territory:

At an early stage in the great civil war it became appar-
ent that there were in California, Oregon and Washington,
men ready to aid in the destruction of the Union by every
means within their power. They were creatures who had not
the courage to face the dangers of the battle field, else their
zeal would have led them to remain at the east or induced
them to go there and openly espouse the Confederate cause
by taking up arms in its defense. They were northern cop-
perheads and doughfaces, (so called then) far more despicable
and treacherous than the worst of those in open rebellion
against the best government on earth. Here, thousands of
miles from the theater of war, it was safe to hatch treason, and
they lost no time in availing themselves of the opportunity
their isolation afforded. In secret they plotted, here and
elsewhere on the coast, to dismember the Union, with a view
to aiding their confederates in the Southern states.


If you want to see where this story goes you will have to read it yourself!

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