Wasunka: The mother of twins

If you take a drive out to Hope Point, on the Hope Peninsular, you will see four islands in Lake Pend Oreille. They are: Warren Island, Cottage Island, Pearl Island, and Memaloose Island. Warren, the largest of the four, was once called, Wasunka, which means, “Mother of Twins.” The twins, in this case, are Pearl and Cottage Islands. Mema-loose, meaning “dead,” was used by the Indians as a place to take their dead.

The famous explorer, David Thompson, built his Kullyspell House on the Hope Peninsular and in his journal complained about how difficult it was to dig the ground. For that reason, the bodies brought to Memaloose, the place of the dead, were placed in trees, rather than in the ground.

It is interesting how places get their names. Pearl Island was named for the daughter of a Joe Childs and was previously called, “Twin Island.” Cottage was named for a building found on the island and it too was once called, “Twin Island.” The once “Wasunka Island, the largest of the four, now bears the name of Illinois-born Charles S. Warren, a veteran of the Civil War, who drove a bull team from St. Joseph, Missouri, to Montana after the war.

Warren arrived in Virginia City, Mont., on Aug. 20, 1866. From there, he went to French Gulch in the Deer Lodge valley to try his hand at placer mining. He married Mittie Avery in 1872 and was elected sheriff of Deer Lodge County in 1873.

Warren moved to Butte, Mont., where he was one of the owners of the Gagnon mine. In 1877, at age 30, he was made adjutant general of the Montana Battalion in the Nez Perce Indian War. General Warren returned to Butte where he engaged in mining, real estate, and local politics.

In the summer of 1889, Warren came to Hope, Idaho, to do some mineral prospecting. He felt that the largest island in Lake Pend Oreille, known by settlers at that time as “Abbott’s Island,” had mining potential.

Warren bought the island from Frank T. Abbott of Hope for $525 on July 1, 1889.

Warren and his partners, Joseph Clark of Butte and George Pease of Murray, Idaho, filed a placer mining claim in 1890 and called their claim the “Pend d’Oreille” mine.

They built a cottage on the island and operated two barges on the lake, the “Webber” and the “Mud Hen,” in connection with working their claim.

In time, the island became known as “General Warren’s Island.”

On Oct. 9, 1909, Gen. Charles Warren, who lived in Butte, sold all but six acres of the island to J. Busch, one of the brothers of the Anheuser-Busch brewing company of St. Louis, for $24,336.

The Busches planned to build a large resort hotel, as well as individual summer cottages on the island. They also planned to build a water and electric light system.

Mr. Busch had a large hotel in Portland, Ore., and was buying up property to start a chain of hotels all over the West. Obviously, the resort complex was never built for some reason, and the Busches sold out.

Charles and Mittie Warren sold their six-acre portion of Warren Island and their cabin to Katherine Murphey Brown of Fort Worth, Texas, on September 11, 1920 but their name stayed with island.

(The information regarding Charles Warren came as a result of many hours of research done by Dale Selle. I treasure the times he allowed me to sit with him in some back room of a court house searching what seemed like thousands of records. I treasure the patience he showed while trying to teach me how true research was done.

However, most of all, I treasure the memory of him as a person and true friend.)