48 University of California Publication in History

only by fragmentary evidence. One, Alexander Henry, who had
journeyed west with the Lisa group, crossed the mountains into the
Snake River valley, where he traded for a winter.
 In 1811 the expeditions of John Jacob Astor's Pacific Fur Com-
pany got under way. Astor, already the leading fur merchant in
the country, was now looking with shrewd business designs toward
the Northwest. He sent two groups, one by sea and one by land.
The first, aboard the "Tonquin," reached the mouth of the Colum-
bia in April, 1811, and founded a post which was named Astoria.
The second, under Wilson Price Hunt, reached there early in 1812.
Although Astoria was the first permanent United States settle-
ment on the Pacific, it had been preceded by the explorations and
by the establishment of trading posts of other countries.
 A review of the earlier history of the North Coast is essential to
an understanding of the diplomatic controversies. For many years
international dispute had centered about that region. A long nar-
rative of exploration and rivalry may be summarized by saying
that the Spaniards, long claiming the entire "South Sea" as their
sphere, had found the Russians encroaching from the north, and
now between them had come the advance guards of the English,
both by sea and by land.
 Theoretically, all North America was Spain's until by specific
 agreements she signed parts of it away. Effectively, this was not
 true, and in increasing measure Their Catholic Majesties had had
 to depend upon their explorers, traders, soldiers, and scholars to
 maintain as much as possible of the domain they claimed.
 Spanish sailors, by the late eighteenth century, had run the
 coast line to latitude 610 north. Meanwhile, by land, Spain had
 definitely occupied Alta California to the Bay of San Francisco,
 where her outpost presidio and mission were established in 1776.
 This site was not only the farthest north of the California settle-
 ments; it was also a part of the great frontier defense scheme
 which, under Charles III, involved a chain of presidios from ocean
 to ocean, from San Francisco to St. Augustine.
 The establishment of San Francisco was a phase of Spanish de-
 fensive colonization, inspired by the fear of Russian aggression.
 Masters of Siberia after their great eastward movement, the Rus-
 sians under Peter the Great sought further fields for their commer-
 cial ventures. Their endeavors were carried forward most ably by