WHITMAN, lARers ( 1802-47 1. An Ameri can pioneer and missionary, horn at Rushville, N. Y. He studied medicine at the Berkshire :Medical Institution at Pittsfield, Mass., and practiced for four years in Canada. Tn 1834 he offered himself for missionary work to the Ameri can Board of Commissioners for Foreign Mis sion. In 1835, with Samuel Parker, he was sent to explore the Oregon country. but turned back at 0reen lIiver. In 1836 he married, and with three other missionaries. II. 11. Spalding and his wife. and W. II. (tray, started westward. The party took the first wagon across the Rocky Mountains, reached the Columhia River on May 2Ist, and located near t he site of t he present Walla 11 alla. Wash. Other inissbmaries came out and four stations were organized, Friction ensued. and numerous quarrels were rvimeted tot he him rd. which voted in 1812 to discontinue the southern branch of the work. Whitman immediately .dartyti East, through the dead of winter, and a ftvn suffering much inconvenience reached Bos ton, Mardi 30, 1843. and seeured a reversal of the hoard's resolution. On November 39, the Cayuse Indians attacked the station, mur dered \Mitt Mall, his wife, and twelve other per sons. and took the other residents prisoners. The
prisoners were afterwards released by the influ ence of the chief factor of the Iludsim's Bay Com pany. The massacre has been attributed to the instigation of the Ilndson's Ilay Company or of the Catholic missionaries; but the Probable explanation is the prevalence of epidemic diseases. unknown before the coming of the whites, which the Indians attributed to poison. In 1864-65 the statement was made by 11. IT. Spalding that Whitman's visit to the East in 1842-43 was made for political reasons, and that by a visit to Washington and interviews with ]'resident Tyler. Secretary Webster, and others, he prevented the cession to England of the American claim to Oregon (q.v.), and in fact prevented Oregon from being traded for a cod fishery on Newfoundland. This belief has gained wide circulation, but Professor E. 0. Bourne, in Essays in Historical Criticism (New York, 1901), presented an elaborate documentary study %vhich seems to disprove the claim. For the other side consult: Mowry, Marcus Whitman New York, 1901) and Nixon, Lifc of Marcus Whitman (Chicago. 1895).