"Portrait & Biographical Record of the Willamette Valley Oregon."  Chicago:
Chapman Publishing Company, 1903. p. 443.
 
SIDNEY SMITH
 
One of the distinguished pioneers of 1839, whose residence in Oregon extended
through a period of over forty years. Sidney Smith was a man whose life was
filled with kindly deeds, whose highest ambition was to help his fellow man and
to assist in the establishment of a commonwealth, to which he gave the best
years of his life. He was a descendant of old Revolutionary stock, his
great-grandfather being a powder manufacturer in Vermont near the New York line
during that memorable struggle for independence. The grandfather was a
commissioned officer in the Continental army. The father of Sidney, Capt. John
Smith, was a native of Vermont and served as captain of a company engaged in
quelling the whiskey insurrection in Pennsylvania in 1799.  Sidney Smith was
born at Amsterdam, in the Mohawk valley of New York, on October 2, 1809. He was
reared at Johnstown, NY., and when a young man went to Ohio, where for three
years he studied medicine, but never engaged in practice. In 1839, his interest
in Oregon was awakened by the reports of the Lewis and Clark expedition;
accordingly he resolved to journey to the northwest, and with that object in
view joined a company of sixteen young men who were similarly minded, among them
being P. K. Fletcher, Amos Cook, Mr. Shortless and Mr. Farnham. They left
Peoria, IL., in the spring of 1839 and were the first to cross the plains with
the intention of making permanent settlement. They intended to supply their
larder with wild game and fish, so started with very little provisions, but not
finding the food supply they had expected along the way, they reached the verge
of starvation, living for sixteen days upon a biscuit apiece each day and upon
dog meat, which they purchased from the Indians. Dissensions also arose in the
party and they quarreled among themselves almost to   the point of separating
into two companies, but eventually they continued on their way together. Mr.
Smith was less fortunate in one respect, for he accidentally shot himself, which
deprived him of three of his ribs. He was carried on a stretcher resting on the
backs of two mules, but after three weeks of suffering he finally recovered. At
one time the Indians stole their horses and Mr. Smith, with another man, went to
their camps and demanded of the chief that the horses be returned. At first the
Indians refused, but with drawn guns the demand was repeated, and at length the
chief promised to return the stolen animals by sundown of the following day,
which he did.
 
At Fort Boise the company divided and Mr. Smith with a few companions started
for Oregon. Others dropped out one by one until there were but two who completed
the journey and arrived safely in Oregon. On October 2nd Mr. Smith assisted in
building a house at The Dalles. He was deeply interested in the new country to
which he had come to establish his home and in his diary he speaks of the effect
produced upon him when he first viewed Mt. Hood. He also mentions his first
meeting with a white woman in this far-off land.
 
He was employed by the Hudson Bay Company, working barefooted in the rain for
seventy cents a day. He was afterwards employed by the Methodist Episcopal
mission at Salem, rafting up and down the Willamette River, and during this time
he boarded with Gustavus Hines, one of the first pioneers of the northwest.
 
He next found employment with Ewing Young, of Yamhill County, who had brought a
large band of Mexican cattle from California, settling in the Chehalem Valley,
to which he supposed that he could lay claim. Mr. Young had the reputation of
being a hard man to serve, but he found his equal in Sidney Smith, who stood up
for his own rights and usually, got them. When Mr. Young died, our subject was
his only companion. He left a large herd of cattle, and having no known heirs
this led to the organization of the provincial government for the purpose of
disposing of his estate. Mr. Young had often said that when he died he wanted
Sidney Smith to have his property: this the latter refused to accept, but when
the auction was held he purchased the brand and the right to the stock that had
not been rounded up, also the right to the land, and continued on the claim in
the cattle business for several years.
 
When the donation claim act went into effect Mr. Smith found he was entitled to
but six hundred and forty acres of land, and there he lived with but few
comforts and many hardships, having considerable trouble with the Indians from
time to time, and no white neighbors. The experiences and episodes of that
period of his career would make an interesting volume if written in detail. With
some of the Indians he formed warm and lasting friendships.
 
There was no man who figured in the early history of the state who did more for
the emigrants than did he. A large-hearted man, of kindly nature, no one ever
sought his aid and did not receive it. He frequently would kill a beef to
furnish food for the travelers, and his house was the shelter for many an
emigrant party. He was indeed liberal, helping the needy, feeding the poor and
assisting the widows and orphans in many ways.
 
In 1845 Daniel Bayley, who was en route with his family to Oregon, obtained
permission from Mr. Smith to remain upon his place for the winter. This was an
eventful day for Mr. Smith. During the long dreary winter days Cupid was acting
his silent part, and Mr. Smith married Mr. Bayley's daughter, Mianda in the fall
of '46. During their courtship they planted an acorn upon the grave of Ewing
Young, which has grown to a large tree and still stands.
 
It was about this time that the Hudson Bay Company tried to persuade Mr. Smith
to declare himself a British subject, as he was an actual settler, and the
British wished to lay claim to this section of the country. Though they offered
him much land he refused, saying that the company had not land enough to buy
him.
 
In 1849 he went to California, and return with considerable gold. Wheat and oats
were selling very high in those days, and in his business undertakings Mr. Smith
was very prosperous. In 1856 he located in LaFayette, Yamhill County, Ore., and
the following year engaged in merchandising, which he followed for about ten
years, when he retired to his farm. As the years passed he accumulated land
until he was the owner of one thousand two hundred and eighty acres.
 
Mrs. Smith was born in Ohio, May 6, 1829, and was the daughter of Daniel Bayley,
who was born in 1802, and died when about ninety-two years of age. He married
Elizabeth Munson, who was a lineal descendant in the seventh generation from
Thomas Munson, of England, who afterward lived in Hartford and New Haven, Conn.,
and served as a sergeant in the war against the Pequod Indians. The ancestry of
the Munson family dates from Thomas Munson, who came to America in about 1634,
and settled in Hartford, Conn., where he became prominently identified with the
early history of that city. Timothy Bayley, father of Daniel Bayley, was a
captain in the Revolutionary war, and like many other barefooted patriots at
Valley Forge, suffered all the hardships of that memorable winter. Jared Munson,
the father of Mrs. Bayley, was a physician. Mrs. Bailey was a woman of wonderful
resources and ability, and after coming to Oregon acted as physician to the
entire countryside for miles around. Mrs. Smith is still living, a fine
Shakespearian scholar and a lady of marked refinement and culture. She resides
in LaFayette, and is the mother of five children: Irene, now the wife of Dr. J.
F. Calbreath, of Salem; Mrs. Almira Hurley, of Independence, Ore.; Mrs. Mianda
Kimberlin, of LaFayette; Gustavus Hines, who is a graduate of the medical
department of the Willamette University, and was practicing medicine at
Enterprise, Ore., at the time of his death; and John U., an attorney at Hilo.
Hawaiian Islands.
 
Mr. Smith was a Democrat in politics, but cast his vote for Lincoln and took an
active part in the establishment of the first school in Oregon. He was a friend
of every enterprise tending to improve social and political conditions in the
state. He lived to see Oregon become possessed of all the comforts and evidences
of civilization known to the older east, and to see it enter statehood of the
Union. He looked with pride upon what was accomplished, assuming no credit for
the part he bore in the attainment of this end; but history acknowledges its
indebtedness to him, and many of the pioneers remember with gratitude the great
and unselfish interest he exhibited in all matters pertaining to the welfare of
the community in the territorial days. Since his death, which occurred September
18, 1880, his memory has been enshrined in their hearts.
 
He was among the one hundred and two men who met at Champoeg to decide whether
Oregon should become British or American territory, and when Joe Meek, who was
in favor of British sovereignty, drew an imaginary line upon the ground, one
side representing the United States and the other Great Britain, Mr. Smith was
the first man to step upon the side representing the United States, and thus
declare himself in favor of American sovereignty.

     
*******************

Submitted to the Oregon Bios. Project in December 2009 by Kim Nesbitt.
Submitter has no additional information about the person(s) or family mentioned
above.