Douglas of the Forests: The North American Journals of David Douglas

David Douglas, the gardener’s boy who left school at eleven and who was befriended by the great William Hooker, was appointed collector to the Royal Horticultural Society in 1823. A short and successful trip to the eastern part of the United States was followed by two great expeditions to northwestern America. He kept a journal faithfully, and his accounts of the first two expeditions are in the archives of the Royal Horticultural Society in London. Sadly, his records and journals of his final expedition were lost when his canoe overturned in Fort George canyon on the Fraser river on June 13, 1833.

This edited and abridged version deals principally with Douglas’ second expedition, to what are now the States of Oregon and Washington and the Province of British Columbia in the years 1824-27. In the whole of that vast territory, there were not more than 400 Europeans, almost all of whom were engaged in the fur trade, and Douglas’ account of his travels is full of interest to naturalists and historians and gives a marvellous picture of what life was like in the huge wilderness before the primeval forest was exploited. He endured much and recorded some extraordinary adventures and achievements. He was the first man to climb one of the peaks of the Canadian Rockies and the first man to climb the Blue Mountains and Mount Roa in Hawaii.