Fort Orford
Sept 24. 1851
To Anson Dart Esq
Supt Ind Affs
for Oregon Ter
My dear sir – Your kind favor of the 9th Inst. came to hand to day. In reply to your inquiry whether the men under Capt Walker were left at Rogue River in obedience to or to carry out any orders which I had at any time received from yourself, I answer they were not. But the object, I will give the language of Gov. Gaines as well as I can recollect, as I was governed by his experience in governmental affairs & his advice – And it was to carry into effect the treaty which he had concluded with the Indians: to go up the river & make known to the white men the fact of the treaty & its provisions; to allay as much as possible the excitement pervading among the whites; to awe the Indians & to receive the stolen property which the chiefs might be able to recover from their people.
A war & to the natives a bloody one had just closed: some 30 of their women & children had been prisoners in the hands of the whites & report says their women had been brutally treated; white men from all parts of the world had lost property in some cases their all & were making loud threats, if it was not speedily recovered, they would shoot down
Indians wherever they might meet them. I was compelled to return to Oregon City with a white man whom I found it necessary to remove out of the Indian country. But the removal of this white man was not the occasion of employing Walker & his party & had no connection with it.
With best wishes I remain
Dear sir your obt servt
(signed) H.H. Spalding
Ind. Agent for S.W. Oregon