TOUTLE RIVER, a tributary of the Cowlitz River, may have derived its name from Indians referred to by Lewis and Clark on March 27, 1806. They wrote of the Cowlitz River as "Coweliskee" and continuing: "On the same river, above the Skilloots, resides the nation called Hullooetell, of whom we learnt nothing, except that the nation was numerous." (Journals, Elliott Coues edition, Volume III., page 911.) The Wilkes Expedition, 1841, first charted the present name of Toutle River. ( Hydrography, Volume XXIII., Atlas, chart 67.) The railroad surveyors, in 1853, showed the river as "Seh-quu." (Pacific Railroad Reports, Volume XI., Part II., chart 3.) The Bureau of American Ethnology says Sekwu is the Klickitat name of a village at the fork of the Cowlitz River, presumably belonging to the Cowlitz tribe. (Handbook of American Indians, Volume II., page 500.) The present name of the river was restored in 1856. (Preston's Map of Oregon and Washington West of the Cascade Mountains.) Subsequent maps have shown the name as Toutle River although old settlers use the local name of "East Fork of the Cowlitz." (Mrs. E. B. Huntington, of Castle Rock, in Names MSS. Letter 158.) For years, Silver Lake, six miles northeast of Castle Rock, was known as "Toutle Lake." A town on the river, in the central part of Cowlitz County wears the name of Toutle.