Denny Party

Late in July 1851 they reached the Burnt River in eastern Oregon where they encountered a man named Brock who suggested to Denny that Puget Sound would be a good place to create a town.

On September 28, 1851, at Alki, Terry and Low began building a cabin with help from the local Native Americans, and then staked claims to the land.

[5] Low returned to Portland to alert the others, Terry looked for a froe to make redcedar shake shingles, and David Denny stayed on in the unfinished cabin.

[4] In Portland, Arthur Denny recruited Illinois farmer William Nathaniel Bell and his wife, and, by coincidence, Charlie Terry, Leander's younger brother.

[6] The Terry brothers, from Waterville, New York, had come west as part of the California Gold Rush, but had not liked the rough and tumble of San Francisco.

On November 5, 1851, the Denny Party left Portland on the schooner Exact, bound for Puget Sound and Haida Gwaii.

The Exact carried a number of settlers bound for Puget Sound in addition to the Denny Party, including Daniel Bigelow who settled in Olympia.