Frontier Fighters! Frontier Fighters! Frontier Fighters! Frontier Fighters! Monumental incidents in the adventurous journeys westward of the American Pathfinders and Pioneers, who led a life of almost continual hardship and peril in their quest for excitement and fortune. In recounting the enterprise and valor of those who explored and helped build the Far West, we must not overlook the heroic roles that the missionaries played in this epic drama of wilderness conquest. One of the first and most noted of Northwest missionaries was Dr. Marcus Whitman, the Yankee physician and missionary who sacrificed his life to bring the Christian religion to the painted red savage of the western mountains and plains and to save the Pacific Northwest to America. 1834, Boston, Massachusetts. The Foreign Mission Board of the Presbyterian Church is publicly examining young men for service in the Northwest. And now that we've approved the application of Reverend Samuel Parker for missionary service in the Oregon Country, we will discuss yours, Dr. Whitman. What are your special qualifications? Well, sir, I'm a graduate doctor of the Berkshire Medical College of Pittsfield, Massachusetts. I am an elder in the communion of our faith, the Presbyterian Church. And what other qualifications have you, Dr. Whitman? For several years I've been preparing myself for missionary service by performing practical tasks and many lines. Hard labor, most of it. Your sponsors in Rushville, New York, your home, speak highly of you, Dr. Whitman. For which I am grateful and humble. Spoken as befits a doctor of medicine and probably a missionary to the red savages of the Northwest. Then you will approve my application? Yes, I'm sure I will. I shall recommend that you become the companion of Reverend Parker to investigate religious conditions in the Oregon Country. May God's blessing follow you. Music Dr. Whitman and Reverend Parker found the far Northwest so promising a field for their labors that Dr. Whitman returned to Boston for permission to establish a permanent church in the wilderness. This was granted by the Presbyterians and Dr. Whitman, now married to Narcisse Apprentice of Pratsburg, New York, began the long and arduous journey back into the Northwest. They were accompanied by the Reverend and Mrs. H. H. Spaulding, also newly married. Having left his convoy, Dr. Whitman, with one light wagon, determined to be the first to cross the Rocky Mountains on wheels. July 18, 1835, the junction of Smiths Fork and the Bear River on the present Idaho-Wyoming boundary. Narcisse, listen to me. You are laboring too hard. Why not leave the wagon here and carry off your belonging the rest of the way? No, Narcisse. With divine guidance and help, this wagon must be the first to reach the Oregon Country. Dr. Whitman, with all due respect to your skill as a surgeon and your zeal as a missionary, you're a fool, sir. Fool are no fool, Reverend Spaulding, and with all due respect to your holy orders. This party is going to enter Oregon not to foot, but on four solid American-made wheels. Oh, look, Marcus, toward that clearing in the Pines yonder, on that mountain slope, straight ahead. White men, Dr. Whitman, beaver trappers, the judge by their leather costume. Then let's hurry. Here, give me a lift, Spaulding, with this off-wheel. It's locked between these two rocks. Ah, that's fine. Well, I'd never have accomplished it alone. Hi, Spenger. Hi. Welcome to the Rocky Mountains, sister. Thank you, gentlemen. But why the jollification? Are women unusual in this neighborhood? Madam, you and the other lady are the first white women to ever cross the Rocky Mountains. Yes, and you're something the Honorable Hudson's Bay Company cannot get rid of. They may succeed in driving us out of this country, but they'll never get rid of you. Yes, sir. Old Moses right. You two ladies have led the way into this mountain wilderness, beyond which lies peace and plentitude, happiness, contentment, and prosperity. Dr. Whitman and his bride established themselves at Walla Walla, in what is now the state of Washington. Reverend Spaulding erected a mission on the Clearwater River in what was later to become Idaho. As the Oregon Country was claimed both by the United States and England, it was only natural that the Hudson's Bay Company, a British concern, would discourage in every way the emigration of Americans. In 1842, Dr. Whitman was informed that the mission authorities had decided to suspend all activities in the Northwest. Narcissa. Yet, Mark. Narcissa, I must go to Boston. Oh, in the wintertime? Oh, Mark, I'm sure God will be willing to wait until spring. No, I must go now. This mission cannot be suspended, and Oregon must be saved for the Union. I must see President Tyler to give him and his cabinet first-hand information of the great potential wealth of this country. What about the company? I will also tell them of the continual pressure brought against us by the Hudson's Bay Company, working for people who have no interest in America other than its exploitation for profit. On the following day began one of the greatest rides in history, in the dead of winter, ostensibly to save a small Christian outpost, but in reality to save the Oregon Country for the American people. Warned at Fort Hall that the Pawnees and the Sioux were on the warpath, Dr. Whitman and his companion Amos Lovejoy abandoned the northern trails and took a southerly course with a guide over the Spanish Trail, causing them an additional thousand miles of horseback travel. Winter now set in in earnest. After incredible hardships, fighting the elements and savages, Whitman and Lovejoy finally reached the Rio Grande. January 13, 1843. Whitman, Lovejoy and their guide are lost in a bleak canyon in the New Mexico mountains. Dr. Whitman, Dr. Whitman, Miguel the guide. I can't get him to his feet. Frost, probably. Here, here let me help you. Oh, let me sleep, let me sleep. I want to slumber on the white carpet. No, no, you can't sleep Miguel, you can't sleep. We've got to travel, travel. That's the only way we'll ever reach our destination. Miguel, he no want to travel, he just want to sleep, sleep. Oh no, no, Doctor, you hurt, please. Hatcho, I'll take off all your clothes and throw you down that cliff unless you wake up and move. Oh no, no, I'm wide awake now, but my face when you slap me, it tingles, please. That means the frost is leaving your flesh. Now march. Dr. Whitman finally reached Boston, where after considerable descent, the Foreign Mission Board reversed its decision. The Whitman mission was saved. Dr. Whitman also interviewed President Tyler and his cabinet, giving the federal authorities valuable information, which later helped to determine America's policy in dealing with England over the so-called Oregon question. Back at his mission again, and his persecutors unable to shake his determination to win and hold the Oregon country for the United States, Dr. Whitman's career reached an atrocious climax. November 29, 1847. My people die on medicine, man, and you do nothing. I am powerless, old chief. The pale-faced medicine man's magic is greater than mine. He is the servant not of the great spirit, but of the evil one. Who told you that? A half-blood, a trapper of the Hudson's Bay traders. But the pale-faced has given my people corn, saved them from starvation, has healed them of their pain and extracted the arrows of their enemies. Only to secure their confidence, to prepare the good soil for the rotten seed. If your medicine cannot overcome this plague which has fallen on my people, what can I do? Make war. Make war against whom? Against the pale-faced doctor and his squaw who cast the spell of the spotted death over the red people of your glorious tribe. Show me proof of the white man's perfidy and I will punish him. You demand proof. Look, your son Grey Eagle approaches. His head is deeply bowed in shame. My son, why do you avoid my eyes? My sister Red Fawn, your daughter, oh father. Spotted death? Yes, my father. Grey Eagle, my son, take four braves of your clan to exact the blood vengeance from the pale-faced invaders as prescribed in the death ritual of my people. Go. You look extra tired tonight, Marcus. I'll make you some tea. Yes, nurse, yes, I'm very weary. Not with work, but with worry. Why declare? If the Hudson's Bay Company don't leave us be, I'll give them a piece of my mind if I have to go all the way to England to do it. Wouldn't do you any good, my dear. Only make matters worse. Very well, Marcus. I'll hold my tongue, anyway, until they start persecuting us again. All too soon, I fear. What do you mean, Marcus? Tonight, an Indian, one of our converts, brought me distressing news. Couldn't be worse than we've been hearing for months. But it is far worse. An epidemic of measles has attacked the Indians and we mission people are held responsible. But you've worked yourself to skin and bones treating the Indians. Yes, I did my best. But who are we to question the will of God? Marcus, the window! Indians! I see them. Pray, my darling wife, pray that God's will be done. Our Father who art in heaven, help. Oh no, no, he's your friend. God's servant in his wilderness. Oh no! Forgive them, Father. For they know not what they do. Forgive them! Thus ended the earthly careers of Dr. Marcus Whitman and Narcissa, his devoted wife. Theirs was a glorious martyrdom, but nonetheless an unnecessary, shameful, revolting martyrdom. Human sacrifices on the blood-stained altar of greed and political expediency. United by the common bond of their great love for each other, their patriotism, and their abiding faith in the Creator they both served so faithfully, they departed this life together with benedictions for their savage executioners on their trembling lips. And so we bring to a close another splendid chapter in the lives of those gallant frontier fighters, who despite natural obstacles and man's lust for power, won and welded the great Western Empire to the United States of America. Such noble comparison and