On August 5, 1861, President Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) signs the Revenue Act of 1861, passed by the U.S. Congress "to provide increased Revenue from Imports, to pay Interest on the Public Debt, and ...
On August 10, 1861, Isaac Stevens (1818-1862), former governor and Congressional delegate of Washington Territory, accepts a commission as colonel in the U.S. Army and assumes command of the 79th Regi...
On September 13, 1861, Colonel George Wright (1803-1865), the officer in charge of the U.S. Army's District of Oregon, which includes all troops within Washington Territory and the state of Oregon, tr...
On September 28, 1861, Isaac Stevens (1818-1862), Washington Territory's first governor and two-term delegate to the U.S. Congress, is promoted to Brigadier General in the Union Army.
On November 4, 1861, the Territorial University (later, University of Washington) opens in downtown Seattle. The university was located at present-day 4th Avenue and University Street, where the Olymp...
On November 29, 1861, the Washington Statesman begins publication in Walla Walla. Brothers William Smith and R. B. Smith hire typesetter R. R. Rees to assist them in putting out the four-page, six-col...
In 1862, Marcus Oppenheimer (1834-1901) settles on the Columbia River near the Canadian border in what will be Stevens County. He opens a store to purvey goods to miners traveling north to Canada, and...
On January 11, 1862, the Washington Territorial Legislature in Olympia formally incorporates the "City of Walla Walla," the largest community in the then-vast Walla Walla County, which was created eig...
On March 12, 1862, smallpox (variola major) arrives at Victoria, British Columbia, carried from San Francisco on the steamship Brother Jonathan. The catastrophic 1862 smallpox epidemic among Northwest...
On May 3, 1862, Abner Dunn shoots Frank Mahoney after an evening of quarrels and scuffles. They are both residents of Sehome, one of the four towns that would consolidate to form modern day Bellingham...
On August 1, 1862, Victor Smith (1827-1865), Collector of Customs for the District of Puget Sound, sails into Port Townsend on the lighthouse tender USS Shubrick to move the Customs records to Port An...
On September 1, 1862, U.S. Army Brigadier General Isaac Stevens (1818-1862), the first governor of Washington Territory, is killed in action at the Battle of Chantilly, Virginia, 25 miles west of Wash...