Isaac N. Ebey - Untimely Deaths

Untimely Deaths

Rebecca Ebey was never happy about the family's encounters with local Indians. Living some distance from the other Euro-American farmers, she stayed close to home managing the household during Isaac's long absences. Already weakened by tuberculosis, Rebecca died in 1853 following the difficult birth, and subsequent death, of the Ebeys' newborn daughter, Sarah. Ebey soon married Emily Palmer Sconce, a widow with a daughter named Anna.

In 1857, a party of northern (possibly Haida) Indians traveled by canoe into Puget Sound on a mission of vengeance. Following the death of one of their chiefs and 27 other tribal members in an attack by the USS Massachusetts the previous year, the Indian party searched for a white Hyas Tyee (great chief) in retaliation. Originally, the intended victim was Dr. John Kellogg, who lived near the present day Admiralty Head lighthouse. On the hot summer evening of August 11, unable to locate Kellogg (who was out of the area), the natives beached at Ebey's Landing and traversed the steep cliff up to Ebey's home. Knocking on Isaac Ebey's door, the natives called him out of the house, shot him dead, and beheaded him.

Emily and the children fled to Jacob Ebey's blockhouse on the ridge, and George and Lucretia Corliss (in-laws of Phoebe Judson) escaped into the forest. Unwilling to remain on the farm, Emily abandoned it, leaving forever with her daughter Anna. Isaac Ebey's relatives raised Ellison and Eason, and the two brothers later divided their father's farm between them.

There is question whether these raiding Indians were actually Haida (as inscribed on a historical marker at Ebey's Landing). Traditional stories of the Keex' Kwáan (Kake) tribe of Tlingits tell of the raid being led by a female relative of the slain Indian chief in the Massachusetts attack. Those stories also tell that the female leader of the raid was a member of the Tsaagweidí clan. In fact, the Puget Sound Herald of Steilacoom published an article fifteen months after Ebey's assassination stating the Kake and Stikine Indians, "numbering a couple hundred," were responsible for the "cold blooded murder." However, it was never known which particular tribe perpetrated the death and beheading of Colonel Ebey.