Fort Cascades served as the main post comprising several blockhouses set up to defend the vitally important transportation corridor along the Columbia River through one of the treacherous points along the river.

The Oregon Trail was a long and perilous route.  Perhaps the most difficult section lay almost at the trail’s end as it made its way through the Cascade Mountains to the promised lands of the Willamette Valley.  Once the Trail dropped down out of the Blue Mountains of northeastern Oregon, it followed along the Columbia River.  It was possible to float your wagons down much of the river, but most kept to the road leading up and down along the south side of the Columbia.  Crossing the John Day and Deschutes rivers were minor difficulties compared to the last difficulty lying ahead in the mountains.

THE SETTING

The Columbia River is the only waterway bisecting the mountains, carving out the magnificent Columbia River Gorge.  The mountain range gets its name from the former mighty rapids running between today’s Bonneville Dam and the towns of Cascade Locks on the Oregon side and Stevenson on the Washington.  Now dammed, the Cascade Rapids dropped thirty feet over a four-mile run. 

These rapids were not as daunting as the twenty-foot high Celilo Falls found upstream another twenty miles upstream.  Celilo had a decent portage road leading around it – the road left the south bank of the Columbia at the Deschutes crossing.  The road traversed up above the lava cliffs on the south side of the canyon dropping down into the drainage of the Fiftthteenmile Creek at Fairbanks Gap.  The road then followed this creek back to the Columbia near The Dalles – thereby pushing past another set of rapids.  Note that in June and July, the falls was a mere ripple because of the massive amounts of snowmelt from the Rockies flowing seaward.  Emigrants, however, did not reach this area until much later in the summer.

Downstream, there was little leeway on either side of the river for portaging at the Cascade Rapids.  The seriousness of the rapids and the ease with which people could lose all their belongings so close to the end – or even lose their lives – led to the development of the Barlow Trail as an alternative to the river.  Barlow Trail was a rough-hewn toll road going around the south side of Mt Hood ending up in Oregon City.

ENTER THE ARMY

As the military began setting up posts in the territory, thought was given to the establishment of a road along the river to join Fort Vancouver, the main fort for Oregon, with the newly established fort at The Dalles – just downstream from Celilo.  Flood stages downstream and the brutal topography around the Cape Horn-Multnomah Falls area kept transportation options tied to the river.

Steamship was the best option from the bottom of the Cascade Rapids to Vancouver. From the top of the rapids to Fort Dalles another steamship took over.  A portage road went in, in1851, to get around the rapids which followed in part an earlier wooden train track which used mule power to get wagons over the Cascades portage.

To provide security to the important supply link, three forts were to be established, one at both the upper and lower portage landing site and another midway along the portage road.  In addition, a new portage road was to be built.

BEGINNINGS AT THE CASCADES

The first fort erected was Fort Rains – named after Major Gabriel Rains who directed the construction.  A blockhouse was in place by 30 September 1855.  Ten men and a corporal served at the little fort over the winter with the other two forts constructed the following year.

The Cascades, like Celilo Falls, was an important fishing and gathering area for Native tribes. As more and more emigrants passed through, some stayed behind to build there lives around the emigrant route. The Natives became more agitated with the changes, blaming the newcomers for disease, change of life and loss of lands. Trouble brewed beneath the surface.

In early 1856, the newly organized Ninth Infantry came west to augment the Fourth under the command of Colonel George Wright.  Wright previously served as a lieutenant colonel with the Fourth.  Captain Silas Casey, previously with the Second Infantry, became the lieutenant colonel of the Ninth with Captains Edward Steptoe – Third Artillery – and Robert Garnett – First Cavalry – appointed majors.

Colonel Wright took four companies upriver from Fort Vancouver to The Dalles on 25 March.  Their destination was the abandoned Hudson Bay Company post of Fort Walla Walla. 

BATTLE AT THE CASCADES

On 26 March 1856, a group of Native Americans belonging mostly to the Klickitat tribe, but probably some from the local Cascade tribe as well as Yakamas, attacking the houses at the Cascades portage.  The buildings at the lower landing were overrun.  Fourteen settlers, including Hudson’s Bay Chief Trader James Sinclair formerly in charge of the no-abandoned Fort Walla Wall (Nez Perces), plus three soldiers died.  Surviving settlers sought refuge at the little blockhouse and a house at the upper landing.  Both buildings quickly put under siege by the Natives.  The steamboats Mary and Wasco were able to escape from the upper landing. They quickly pushed upriver to find Colonel Wright.

Some survivors from the lower landing made their way downriver to Fort Vancouver.  Second Lieutenant Philip Sheridan was ordered to take a detachment of forty dragoons upriver to try and relieve the situation. 

ENTER PHILIP SHERIDAN

Sheridan found a little cannon to go with his group.  The gun, taken off a steamer just in from San Francisco delivering supplies to Fort Vancouver, was normally only used to blast out salutes.  With the gun and his men, Sheridan put aboard the Belle of Oregon City early in the morning of the 27^th. Off they steamed into action.

Disembarking on the north shore near the lower landing, Sheridan sent the Belle back downriver to bring up more ammunition and troops to help.  Highwater constrained Sheridan’s force onto a narrow peninsula which they were unable to push across with the Natives defending the base.

The next morning, Sheridan put twenty of his men in a bateau from the Hudson Bay post at Vancouver. He ferried across the river to the south shore.  Using Bradford Island as a screen,the men managed to pull their boat up past the lower rapids.  The island serves as a base for Bonneville Dam today. The men then crossed over to help relieve the blockhouse. At the same time men from Wright’s group arrived on the scene. They came by the Mary and Wasco and led by Major Edward Steptoe. 

BATTLE FINISHED

Steptoe pushed down the main shore and had Sheridan with Lieutenant Alexander Piper and his mountain howitzer return to Bradford Island to capture the local Natives – Cascades – which had crossed after their erstwhile allies – Klickitats and Yakamas – fled the scene into the mountains.

On the night of 27 March, another company of the Fourth under Captain Henry D. Wallen arrived with a company of local volunteers.  The volunteers wanted to kill the Indian prisoners, but Sheridan told them that was not going to happen.  Nine of the prisoners were eventually tried and hanged on the orders of Colonel Wright.

Some of the local settlers killed an innocent Native family along the portage road a few days later.  The father of the family served as Colonel Wright’s interpreter.  The family hoped sent to take a steamer down to Vancouver to get them out of the war zone.  Nine – mostly children – suffered strangulation.  Unlike the Natives who attacked the Cascade portage, the local settlers were never brought to justice.

SHERIDAN ONWARD

Sheridan stayed at the Cascades for awhile. The rest of the men of the Ninth under Steptoe left to go back upriver. There, they continued the campaign against the Natives of eastern Washington.  A month later, Sheridan headed to Fort Yamhill relieving William Hazen’s place in finishing the construction of that fort.  He stayed at Yamhill – with a nine-month trip further south to Fort Hoskins – until called east in September 1861.

FORT BUILT IN EARNEST

With the battles over, the construction of Fort Cascades began in earnest.  The fort went up at the lower landing.  Both there and at the upper landing, blockhouses added to the defense. The blockhouse at the lower landing was similar in construction to the blockhouse built at Fort Yamhill – today at the central park in Dayton, Oregon. 

UPPER LANDING

The upper blockhouse became Fort Lugenbeel named after the Captain Pinkney Lugenbeel of the Ninth – Class of 1840 West Point – charged with its construction.  Sited on a hill above Little Ashes Lake, the fort looked across from today’s town of Cascade Locks.  The blockhouse, also known as “Pinkney’s Folly”, was manned by twelve soldiers and one officer.

Lugenbeel went on to found the site for today’s Boise.  In 1864 he finally got back east in time to serve as temporary regimental commander of the Nineteenth Infantry US, finishing the war as a battalion commander.   Eventually, he made full colonel commanding the Fifth Infantry in 1880 before retiring two years later.

fort rains

Fort Rains was already in place. It was the only one of the three to serve its defensive purpose. The blockhouse lost its importance with erection of the other two forts. Eventually, the river claimed the fort. Another replica fort built onsite from the logs in the 1920’s suffered a similar fate from the waters below, as well.

FORT CASCADES

The main fort went up at the lower landing.  A barracks housed the 79-man garrison and two officers’ quarters and other buildings associated with the fort erected besides the blockhouse.  The fort became abandoned in 1861. Unlike other forts in the region, Fort Cascades left unmanned by militia volunteers during the Civil War.

Like many forts, a little village grew up around Fort Cascades dealing mostly with the portage railway.  A huge flood in 1894 washed away the townsite and the remains of the fort.  You can walk around the old sites on a 1.5-mile trail with several exhibits explaining the history of the fort, the portage railway, and the area in general.