A launch from HMS Satellite makes for the Griffin Bay shoreline on July 27 , 1859 in this watercolor done that very day while on deck of the British warship . Pickett ’ s tents can be seen ashore . Below , a painting of English Camp c . 1868 , by a Royal Navy officer . beinecke library photo
British were uneasy about Americans observing ships transiting Victoria Harbor from San Juan ’ s southwestern shore , only seven miles across the Haro Strait .
Following a number of clashes over land and taxes that culminated in sheep rustling , the dispute boiled over on June 15 , 1859 . A failed American miner named Lyman Cutlar found a company pig rooting in his meager subsistence garden , and snapped . He seized his rifle and shot the intruder . This was the heinous act that nearly plunged the United States and Great Britain into war .
Cutlar was threatened with arrest by British authorities if he did not make fair restitution for the pig . He refused and went into hiding . This compelled Department of Oregon commander Brig . Gen . William S . Harney to dispatch Company D , 9th U . S . Infantry to San Juan Island in July , 1859 under the command of Capt . George E . Pickett .
This was a great tonic for Pickett , a Virginian and Mexican war veteran and the same officer who would one day lead his Confederate division at the Battle of Gettysburg . Bored with frontier san juan island national historical park photo court martial boards that mainly tried drunks and deserters , he relished the opportunity to confront the British on San Juan . However , his enthusiasm overreached common sense . Despite being ordered by Harney to merely show the flag and protect U . S . citizens , Pickett posted a proclamation near his Griffin Bay camp . The third proviso read :
III . This being United States territory , no laws other than those of the United States , nor courts , except such as are held by virtue of said laws , will be recognized or allowed on this island .
An outraged Vancouver Island Gov . James Douglas volleyed by dispatching Capt . Geoffrey Phipps Hornby and the 31-gun steam frigate H . M . S . Tribune . Hornby was commanded to order Pickett off , and if the American did not comply , to refuse reinforcements or the erection of fortifications . British naval officers in Victoria warned Douglas that Hornby ’ s orders were too provocative . The Royal Navy ’ s mission , they stressed , was to maintain the peace , not start wars . But the governor countered by suggesting that Hornby land Royal Marines on the island equal in number to Pickett ’ s soldiers : 64 . To lend weight to the proposition , two more warships dropped anchor in the bay .
Pickett refused to comply , and threatened to open fire should the marines attempt a landing . One pioneer account , written 40 years after the fact , offers a
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