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William "Billy" Smith
By Steve Lent, Crook County Historian
William Smith was born in England in 1826. He received his education in England and migrated to the United States in 1850. He first arrived in New York and stayed there one year before moving to Ohio and worked on a farm for two years. In 1864 William crossed the Plains by mule team to Stockton, California. After a short while of working for wages in the Stockton area he migrated north to Linn County, Oregon.
He came to Camp Polk in Central Oregon as a volunteer in 1865 and returned to the Willamette Valley in 1866. In 1867 he again came east across the Cascades with some of his neighbors and settled on Mill Creek near its confluence with Ochoco Creek. The land was not yet surveyed and unsettled so he took land by squatter right. At the time there was only a small military station located at Warm Springs Agency and the nearest community was The Dalles. Supplies had to be hauled in to last for several months. Wheat grown on the lowlands of Mill Creek was ground to flour using a coffee grinder and surviving in the new frontier was a challenge.
The small group of Ochoco settlers was chased from the region in the spring of 1868 by a raiding party of Indians. The group came back the following spring and "Uncle Billy" as he was known by his friends built one of the first cabins in Central Oregon and it stood standing for over 80 years. He continued living on his original homestead site until his death on February 26, 1914. He was truly one of the original settlers of Central Oregon and he was followed to his final resting place at Mill Creek Cemetery by a large gathering of his friends.