Archives West Finding Aid

Edward Huggins was born in London, June 10, 1832. In October 1849 he joined the Hudson's Bay Company, sailing on the "Norman Morrison" for Fort Victoria, arriving there in March 1850. Sir James Douglas, in charge at Fort Victoria, sent Huggins to Fort Nisqually, where he arrived on Apri1 13, 1850, to work under the direction of William Fraser Tolmie.

During the Indian War he was given charge of the Company's installation "Muck Farm," ten miles east of Nisqually; he encountered no hostile Indians.

In 1857 Huggins married Lettice Work. When William F. Tolmie took over the duties of Sir James Douglas at Fort Victoria in 1859, Huggins was placed in charge of Fort Nisqually. In June 1870, the Puget Sound Agricultural Company (which Huggins contended was not affiliated with the Hudson's Bay Company) surrendered rights claimed under the Treaty of 1846, and Huggins was ordered to move to the interior of British Columbia. Instead, he resigned, and became a United States citizen.

Huggins then pre-empted his residence, and a few years later purchased the quarter section upon which the buildings of Fort Nisqually stood. He then began farming and stockraising "on his own account," and eventually acquired the remainder of the Nisqually farm, and in addition purchased about 1,000 acres from the Northern Pacific Railroad Company.

In the late 1870s Huggins was elected County Commissioner on the Republican ticket, serving three terms until he was elected County Auditor in 1886. He then moved to Tacoma and joined the staff of the National Bank of Commerce, ultimately becoming its vice-president. When his health began to fail, he returned to his farm at Nisqually, where he died in 1907.

He wrote a great deal, contributing a large number of articles to the Portland Oregonian in 1900. Clarence Booth Bagley was a friend of Huggins; it is through Bagley's auspices that these and many other Puget Sound Agricultural Company materials were acquired.