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The Hood River Glacier, Hood River, OR.., December 29, 1894, page 2
Photograph of this Blockhouse

THE OLD BLOCK HOUSE AT THE CASCADES

Sheridan's block house, opposite Cascade Locks, Oregon, on the Columbia River, has tumbled down, its heavy, hand-hewn timbers, relics of stormy days in the Northwest country, still sound say a few near the foundation, have been used by the vandal fishermen to build a fish ways, until the old river, scandalized by the desecration, swept them all away during the great flood of this summer, and now nothing remains to mark the old stronghold of the pioneer but a few moss-grown and rotten timbers.
An incident in the early history of General (then Lieutenant) Phil Sheridan is recalled by the ruins of this old building, which is thus related by the veteran river pilot, Captain J. McNulty, who fought the Indians here as a volunteer during the campaign of 1856, with "Little Phil," and who it is yet making regular trips as a pilot on the middle Columbia.
The "fishing Indians," mostly Wascos, Snakes and Cascade, with renegades from many other tribes, a regular hotchpotch of "Siwashes," whose love of the succulent salmon was greater than tribal ties, and whose lodges lined the river near the spearing rocks at the falls and cascades, had long been turbulent and aggressive, but had made no serious outbreak until March 25, 1856. On that day a band of them attacked Brown's mill, situated just above Cascade Locks, on the north, now Washington side, killing and horribly mutilating Mr. Brown and his wife. The other whites living at the mill, together with the captain and the crew of a little steamer, the Mary, then tied up at the landing, had gone several miles up the river to spend the day, leaving only the engineer, Buck Minster, and a small boy, Jimmie Watkins, on board. Lucky for these, there was a little fire banked under the boilers.
The attack was so sudden that before Minster could realize the danger the Indians were upon him. The foremost reached the shore-end of the gang plank as he did the other, to draw it aboard. A quick shot from his pistol sent the red man headlong into the river. The plank was drawn in, while the boy cut the shore line, and the little Mary began drifting at once, under a hail of bullets and arrows, from one great danger into another -- that of the terrible current above the rapids.
Sending the boy to the wheel, Minster threw everything inflammable within reach into the furnace -- some bacon, oil and even furniture -- and made steam enough for headway, the boy, under orders, making for an eddy behind an island near the head of the rapids, out of reach of the Indians. The little fellow had proven himself a real hero, for in going to the wheel he had been exposed freely to hostile bullets, one striking him in the leg, but he crawled manfully to his post and saved the boat.
As soon as full steam could be made the steamer was headed across the river to Atwells, where alarm was given of the outbreak. Messengers were sent to Fort Dalles and Fort Vancouver. From the former Colonel Wright came to the rescue with a company of United States troops, with Lieutenant Phil Sheridan, with a troop from Fort Vancouver, embarked on the steamer Belle, bringing one cannon. Landing at Lower Cascades, he was quickly on the ground and rounded up a number of the hostiles. A company of volunteers from the Willamette valley came on the boat Jennie Clark, piloted by Captain McNaulty. The troops soon subdued the Indians, but not before a dozen or more whites had been killed. Nine Indians were hung near the smoking ruins of Brown's mill. The officers decided then to build a block house here for the protection of scattered pioneers, a rallying place for them during later Indian scares.
This was done during the same year, 1856, and it was always called Sheridan's, but just who, no one seems to know. A point of rocks on the river a short distance from the rapids is also called Sheridan's point. Soon the last of the pioneers will have passed away, as has this, their moss-covered old log stronghold, and little incidents like Jimmie Watkins' heroism and even Sheridan's prompt trip, too trivial to be noted in history, will have been lost saved for dim tradition. So it may be well to give one passing moment to the old block house that nestled for so many years under the shadow of the House mountain, itself the scene of one of the strangest Indian legends in the Northwest country. -- George P. Morgan, in Chicago Blade.