Clark County history: Vancouver commander Gibbon chose the Union over the Confederacy

When the Civil War broke out, John Gibbon, a North Carolinian and 1847 West Point graduate, remained faithful to the Union while his brothers, cousin and brothers-in-law chose the Confederacy. Gibbon received his first wound at Fredericksburg, Va., in December 1862. During Pickett’s Charge at Gettysburg, Pa., in July 1863, Gibbon was wounded a second time. His cousin, J. Johnston Pettigrew, took part in Pickett’s attack.

Gibbon fought in the Mexican, Seminole and Utah wars and in many bloody Civil War battles, including Bull Run, the Wilderness, Cold Harbor, Antietam and Gettysburg. The day after Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered to Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Va., Grant ordered a second meeting, the Commissioner’s meeting, to finalize the capitulation details. Three officers from each army were appointed to the meeting.

Gibbon was among the Union leadership. They worked out the details in the parlor where Lee had acquiesced the day prior. The day after the signing, Gibbon requested the table on which the final papers were signed inscribed with the event, date and signatories. Decades later, the table would unexpectedly show up in Seattle.

Gibbon remained in the Army after the war. As a colonel in 1876, he commanded Fort Ellis, Montana Territory, and planned a coordinated campaign with Major Gen. George Crook and Lt. Col. George Custer against the Sioux and Cheyenne. Gibbon was not nearby when Custer was attacked near the Little Bighorn River. Arriving after the fight, Gibbon likely rescued several hundred besieged soldiers. The next day, he evacuated the wounded and buried the dead.

Brig. Gen. Gibbon served as commander of the Department of the Columbia in Vancouver from 1885-1891, becoming one of its longest-serving leaders. During his tenure, the U.S. shifted the military from protecting the colonization of the West, turning the military from Native American conflict to its imperial ambitions overseas. When Gibbon arrived at Vancouver Barracks in 1876, innovative communication technologies were emerging nationally, tying military and civilian locations, and allowing speedy response to regional crises like 1885 Seattle’s anti-Chinese Riots and the 1890s labor troubles in Idaho mines.

While quelling the anti-Chinese riots, Gibbon stayed at Seattle’s Occidental Hotel. Amos Benjamin visited him there. He showed him the Appomattox table Gibbon had ordered inscribed years earlier. Benjamin, who had been present at the signing, had carried the inscribed table from post to post throughout his enlisted career and was now posted at the Vancouver Barracks. The two old comrades spent the evening discussing April 10, 1865, the date of the event enshrined on the table. (Today, the National Park Service’s Appomattox Court House collection holds the table.)

Gibbon later acknowledged the injustices against Native Americans, especially the Nez Perce at Big Hole in 1877, where 89 Indigenous men, women and children were killed. Although he considered the deaths “unavoidable,” his testimony to a congressional committee in 1878 revealed that a Nez Perce band led by Chief Joseph was subjected to the greatest possible injustices by the U.S. government. Gibbon believed the Indian Department’s mismanagement forced the Nez Perce to rebel. As the Department of Columbia commander, he tried to help them after their return to the Northwest.