"Crossing the plains in 1850, young Van Asselt was of great assistance to his party in procuring game and in driving the hostile Indians away, because of his superior marksmanship, which he had acquired as a hunter on the estates of wealthy residents of his native country. He landed at Oregon City, Ore., in September, 1850, and the ensuing winter he spent in mining in California. He accumulated a considerable sum, and, lured by stories of the richness and vastness of the great Northwest, he returned to Portland in 1851, and, crossing the Columbia, made his way to the Sound country. On this trip he was accidentally wounded, the bullet being imbedded in his shoulder. In the days of the Indian troubles on the Sound, Van Asselt was safe from the attacks of the hostiles, who held him in superstitious reverence because of the fact that he carried a bullet in his body. They believed that he could not be killed by a tomahawk. This fact, perhaps, had much to do with his escape from assassination at the hands of the hostiles in the Indian war of 1855. "Jacob and Samuel Maple, who with L. M. Collins accompanied Mr. Van Asselt to Puget Sound, have been dead many years. Arthur A. Denny has been gathered to his fathers, along with many others of the old pioneers of King County and Washington. Van Asselt is the last of that hardy race that opened the wilderness on Puget Sound and made it blossom like the rose. "The news of the death of Van Asselt was received as a sad blow among the people of Van Asselt, where the aged pioneer spent the greater portion of his days in the house which still stands as a monument to his rugged pioneer days. In Van Asselt the people speak the name of the pioneer with reverence on account of the many charities he extended to the poor during his lifetime, and also on account of the many acts which he did in pioneer days to save and maintain the peaceful relations with the savages. "The marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Van Asselt was celebrated in this county, on Christmas evening 1862. All of those present at the wedding have now passed away with a few exceptions. "Mr. Van Asselt leaves a wife, Mrs. Mary Jane Maple Van Asselt; a son, Dr. J. H. Van Asselt; two daughters, Mrs. J. H. Benadom, of Puyallup, and Dr. Nettie Van Asselt Burling, and a grandson, Floyd Julian, son of Mrs. Mary Adriane Van Asselt Julian, who died in 1893. Mr. Van Asselt also leaves a brother, Rev. Garrett Van Asselt, of Utrecht, Holland, and several sisters in Holland. "The following were selected as active pallbearers: William P. Harper, Dexter Horton, D. B. Ward, O. J. Carr, Isaac Parker, M. R. Maddocks. The honorary pallbearers were: Edgar Bryan, Rev. Daniel Bagley, F. M. Guye, Joseph Foster, William Carkeek, Judge Orange Jacobs.