A memorial and biographical history of northern California, illustrated. Containing a history of this important section of the Pacific coast from the earliest period of its occupancy...and biographical mention of many of its most eminent pioneers and also of prominent citizens of today, Part 41

Author: Lewis Publishing Company. cn
Publication date: 1891
Publisher: Chicago : The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 1000

USA > California > A memorial and biographical history of northern California, illustrated. Containing a history of this important section of the Pacific coast from the earliest period of its occupancy...and biographical mention of many of its most eminent pioneers and also of prominent citizens of today > Part 41

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SETTLEMENT.

The settlement of Siskiyou County was occa- sioned by the Trinity gold mine excitement of 1849. The anxiety to reach the mines led to many expeditions along the coast, the discovery of Trinidad and Humboldt bays, the mouth of the Klamath, Salmon and Scott rivers, bringing thousands into this region and transforming it, in one year, from a beautiful wilderness to the home of civilization. Major Pearson B. Read- ing, the old trapper who settled upon his ranch on Cottonwood Creek, Shasta County, in 1847, gives the following account of the first mining in northern California:

In the spring of 1845 I left Sutter's Fort for the purpose of trapping the waters of Upper California and Oregon. My party consisted of thirty men, with 100 head of horses. In the month of May, I crossed the mountains from Sacramento River, near a point now called Backbone; in abont twenty miles' travel I reached the banks of a large stream, which I called the Trinity, supposing it led into Trinity Bay, as marked on the old Spanish charts. I remained on the river about three weeks, engaged in trapping beaver and otter; found the Indians very numerous, but friendly dis- posed. On leaving the Trinity I crossed the mountains at a point which led me to the Sac- ramento River, about ten miles below the Soda

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Springs. I then passed into the Shasta and Klamath settlements, prosecuting my hunt. Having been successful, returned in the fall to Sutter's Fort.

In the month of July, 1848, I crossed the mountains of the coast range, at the head of Middle Cottonwood Creek; struck the Trinity at what is now called Reading's Bar; prospected for two days, and found the bars rich in gold; returned to my home on Cottonwool, anl in ten days fitted ont an expedition for mining purposes; crossed the mountains where the trail passed about two years since from Shasta to Weaver.

My party consisted of three white men, one Delaware, one Walla Walla, one Chinook and about sixty Indians from Sacramento Val- ley. With this force I worked the bar bearing my name. I had with me 120 head of cattle, and an abundant supply of other provisions. After about six weeks' work parties came in from Oregon, who at once protested against my Indian labor. I then lett the stream and re- turned to my home, where I have since remained in the enjoyment of the tranquil life of a fariner.

When Siskiyou was first settled, the nearest approach to a road was the old Hudson Bay trail, leading up the Sacramento River through Shasta Valley, across the Klamath and over Siskiyou mountain into Oregon. Wagons liad never been over this trail, except six that Lind- say Applegate piloted as far as Wagou Valley, in 1849, and the one taken to the same point by Governor Lane in 1850. From there to the Sacramento Valley a wagon wheel had never made a track. Into this unknown wilderness of forest and mountain chasms the prospector plunged with as much confidence as if on an open plain, undeterred by the fear of Indians well known to be hostile. In the spring, the few pioneer prospectors were followed! by an immense throng from north, south and west.

Gold Bluff was another point whence emanated a gold excitement in May, 1850, which brought a rush of gold-seekers, with the usual result of settling some of the emigrants in that vicinity permanently.

COUNTY ORGANIZATION, ETC.

By the year 1851 the settlers became so numerous that a political organization became necessary. Accordingly the Legislature, March 22, 1852. authorizel the organization of the new county of Siskiyon, with the seat of justice at Yreka. The original act of February 18, 1850, left all this unknown region in one county, called Shasta, with the seat of govern- ment at Reading's ranch, while all that portion of the State lying west of this was created into Trinity County, comprising the area from which have also been carved Humboldt. Klamath and Del Norte counties. The act of March 22, 1852, described the boundary line of Siskiyou County as follows:

"At a point known as the Devil's Castle, near and on the opposite side from Soda Springs on the upper Sacramento River, from said point or place of beginning to run due east to the eastern boundary of California; and thence north to the Oregon line; and thence running west along the boundary line of the Territory of Oregon and the State of California to a point on said line due north of the mouth of Indian Creek (being the first large creek ad- joining the Indian Territory at a place known as Happy Camp.which empties into the Klamath River on the opposite side below the mouth of Scott River); and thence across Klamath River running in a southeasterly course along the suminit of the mountains dividing the waters of Scott and Salinon rivers, to the place of be- ginning."

The commissioners to designate the election precincts and provide for the first election were: Wilson T. Smith, H. G. Ferris, D. H. Lowry, Charles M. Tutt and Theodore F. Rowe; and the first county officers elected were: Win. A. Robertson, Judge; Chas. MeDermit, Sheriff; H. G. Ferris, Clerk; John D. Cook, District Attorney; M. D. Aylett, Treasurer; James T. Lowry, Surveyor; R. B. Ironside, Coroner; Richard Dugan, Assessor, and D. II. Lowry. Publie Administrator.

The Assemblymen from this county have

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HISTORY OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA.

been the following: W. D. Aylett, 1854; J. R. Cook, 1880; W. T. Cressler, 1873-'74; E. J. Curtis, 1855-'56; John Daggett, 1881; John A. Fairchild, 1867-'68; G. F. Harris, 1875-'76; Win. Irwin, 1862-'63: J. K. John- son, 1885; W. J. Little, 1871-'72; S. L. Little- field, 1863-'64; J. K. Luttrell, 1865-'66, 1871-'72; R. M. Martin, 1869-'70; J. W. McBride, 1873-'74; Charles McDermit, 1860; Peter Peterson, 1883; W. G. Procter, 1853; P. C. Robertson, 1877-'78; R. C. Scott, 1863- '64; Wm. Shores, 1869-'70; F. Sorrell, 1861; Elijah Steele, 1867-'68; Thomas H. Steele, 1865-'66; Caleb N. Thornbury, 1862; B. F. Varney, 1857, 1863; A. B. Walker, 1858; Wm. F. Watkins, 1859.

Three companies served from Siskiyou County during the Rebellion, all of whom were used on the frontier and in the Indian wars on the coast. Charles McDermit, Joseph Smith and Robert Baird were the first captains.

The first newspaper in this county was the Mountain Herald, issued June 11, 1853, by Thornbury & Co., the proprietors being C. N. Thornbury, W. D. Slade and S. F. Van Choate. It was a four-page, sixteen-column paper, the pages being only 9 x 16 inches in size. Small as it was, it was a great achievement for a little town over a hundred miles np in the mountains. In 1855 the Know- nothing party took posses- sion of the paper and renamed it the Yreka Union; but this regime continued but a short time.

Mining is still the leading industry in this county, but agriculture is gaining upon it.

MINERALOGICAL.

The following paragraphs are from the State report :

Siskiyon County lies between the parallels 41° and 42º north latitude, and 121° and 124° west longitude. It is the central of the three most northerly counties ot the State, bounded on the east by Modoc County, on the south by Humboldt, Trinity and Shasta counties, on the west by Humboldt and Del Norte counties, and on the north by the State of Oregon. It

contains within its boundary lines 3,040 square miles of territory, a very small portion of which is arable. A large area, comprising thirty-four townships, designated on the maps as the Lava Bed Road District, and situated in the extreme northeastern portion of the county, adjoining Modoe, is, as its name implies, covered with lava and unfit for cultivation. The remainder, about two-thirds of the whole, is mineral land, and here the various kinds of gold mining-quartz, placer, drift, and river --- that exist in California, are prosecuted.

This corner of the county ineludes a small portion of the lacustrine system of the State; and the areas of water designated as the Lower Klamath and a portion of Tule Lake, with several of smaller dimensions, in the aggregate cover 100 square miles of surface.

This county is sui generis. It has no counter- part on the Pacific Slope. Within its borders are found valleys and plains of arable land at an eleva- tion of from 2,500 to 4,000 feet, surrounded by beetling cliffs and serrated ridges that rise from 500 to 900 feet above sea level.

Scott Valley is situated near the central por- tion of the county at an elevation of 3,000 feet. Twenty miles from Mount Shasta this valley is forty miles long by six miles in width, or about 240 square miles in all. Etna, its principal town, is at the head of the " wagon-road naviga- tion." From this point supplies are sent by pack animals to the Salmon and Klamath re- gions. A short line (six miles) of railroad is in progress of construction fromn Montague Station, on the line of the California and Oregon Rail- road, to Yreka, the county-seat, which, when completed, will be the terminus of the railroad system in this county.

Volcanic cones are marked features in the landscape of Siskiyou. In this county, partien- larly in the Klamath, Salmon, and Scott Ranges. mountains lose their smoothly-rounded summits. Table lands are seldom seen; sharp, serrated ridges have replaced them, with deep gorges and preeipitons cañons. An important change is to be noted in the topographical features of this county. The Coast and Sierra Nevada Ranges are here merged into one. The strike, or trend, of the stratification has been changed from west of north to north twenty degrees east. The formation and metalliferous belts of Siski- you are not so clearly defined as in the middle and southern counties of the State, where they are easily traced for long distances.

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HISTORY OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA.

Besides gold, other products of commercial value are found in the county, viz .: platinum, silver, copper, cinnabar, plumbago, and anti- inony.

The Klamath River and its tributaries have been important agents in the distribution of gold throughout the county. The Klamath takes its rise in the high table lands and moun- tain ranges of Southern Oregon and Northern California, and where the lacustrine system of those regions is found. Upper Klamath, Lower Klamath, Goose, and Rhett lakes, which are connected, give the river its source, and are the reservoirs from whence it draws the main vol- ume of its waters. Its general course is ten degrees south of west, till it disembogues into the Pacific Ocean at a point forming the western extremity of the dividing line between Del Norte and Humboldt counties. The Klamath runs a tortuous course on its way to the ocean, and bears to every point of the compass before it loses itself in the great sea. In the northern portion of Humboldt County the river plunges through box cañons miles in extent, and, emerg- ing, becomes a broad sheet of water apparently eurrentless and smooth, but there is an under- current that renders this place dangerous to the bather. Rapids, whirlpools, and eddies mark its whole course after this brief repose. In no place and at no season of the year is the river practically navigable for vessels of any burden. During the freshet of 1862 its waters rose in one of the eañons to 102 feet above low water mark. A rise from forty to fifty feet is not an uncommon occurrence. The Klamath is well stocked with several varieties of trout, and with salmon in their season. Its length, from the point where it crosses the north boundary line of California, at an elevation of 4,368 feet above ocean level, to its mouth, with contour lines, as given by the United States Coast Survey, is 362 miles, its average grade being twelve feet to the mile. At Happy Camp, 130 miles from this river's outlet, a rain gange shows the precipitation to be for the past five years an average of about forty-six inches annually.

It is estimated that there are about 1,000 Chinamen engaged as miners in this county, and the number is rapidly increasing. They may be found principally on the Klamath River and its tributaries, where lie the auriferous placers. Many of these people own the ground they work, more work as " tributers," paying a royalty to the owner of the claim, and a minority work

by the day. Several shrewd wage-workers re- ceive but small remuneration; their actual busi- ness on the ground is to spy out its value and report the same to their wealthier countrymen who deal largely in mining properties. The output of the claims owned by Chinamen cannot always be ascertained, as often the wily Celestial takes his own bullion to San Francisco and ships it thence to China direct. . "John's " gold sel- dom appears tabulated in Wells-Fargo's state- ments, or in the annual statistics of the United States Branch Mint. Placing the average earn- ings of the Chinese at the low figure of $1 per day, it would make their yearly harvest from the gold gravels of this county $365,000; but this amount can, with safety, be quadrupled, as these people own and work some of the richest river claims in Siskiyou.

Mining Distriets: Cottonwood, Yreka, Hum- bug, Deadwood, Oro Fino, Callahan's Ranch, Scott River, Oak Bar, Seiad Valley, Cottage Grove, Liberty, South Fork of Salinon, and Forks of the Salmon.

SOLANO COUNTY.

Perhaps no county in the State has had so momentons a history as Solano, lying as she does in a sense at the portal to the great interior valleys and the mining regions. She has had the vision of great cities and of metropolitan importance. All these things were disappoint- ments, however, and the county has fallen back to not less solid, if less brilliant, advances in the way of fruit culture and the growth of grain, while still her two cities of Vallejo and Benicia keep up the prestige that attaches always to things naval or military.

MEXICAN TIMES.

The first event to record historically in the annals of Solano County, is a battle fought by General Vallejo with the Soscol Indians in 1835 at a point called Thompson's Gardens above the modern city of Vallejo. The contest was severe, but the General was victorious. This victory seems to have made friends be- tween the Indian Chief, old Sam- Yeto or Solano, and Gereral Vallejo, for henceforth they were

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HISTORY OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA.

hand and glove together. The first actual settle- ment in the limits of the county, however, was made by the Baea, or Vaca, and Peña families upon their princely grant of 44,380 aeres, com- prising all the Vaea Valley. They built their adobes, Baca in the main valley, and Peña in the lateral Laguna Valley. This was in 1841. Baca, a native of New Mexico, came with the Workman party in 1841, and spent the remain- der of his life in Solano County, dying probably before 1860. He was a hospitable man and of good repnte.

In the same year, 1841, or as some say, the year after, Don Jose F. Armijo obtained his grant of three square leagues in the Suisun Val- ley. In this year (1842), eame in John R. Wolfskill, the first American settler, who bc- longs quite as innch to Yolo as to Solano County, his grant lying in both. It was on the Putah Creek. Wolfskill, a Kentuckian, came from New Mexico to California in 1838, and in 1842 settled on a ranch on Putah Creek, granted to Francisco Guerrero and owned by William Wolfskill; and he was still living there in 1885, at the age of eighty-one years, wealthy and a prominent fruit-grower. Edward, his son by his first wife, has of late years been his business manager. William Wolfskill, brother of John R., went to Los Angeles, where he became a prominent citizen and died in 1866, at the age of sixty-eight years.

Fired, as it seems, by emulation of the whites, Solano applied also for a grant, and aided by his friend, Vallejo, eventually ob- tained it. This was the Suisun grant, given in 1842 Vallejo subsequently purchased it. Solano died in 1849, and in 1850 most of his tribe migrated to Napa, carrying with them their little hoards of grain. Napa was a sacred place for thent. It is worth noting, parentheti- eally, that these Indians sowed the first grain raised in the county. Their rancheria was at Rockville, a little below the present village of Cordelia. Here Solano had his adobe. After his death and the departure of the tribe, an old Indian named Jesus Molino, who had been

Christianized, remained in the adobe many years, farming in a small way. At the foot of the valley, a short distance from Rockville, was found a rnde cross planted, supposed to mark the tomb of Solano.

In 1844 John Bidwell received the Ulpinos grant on the banks of the Sacramento. Besides the above mentioned grants, General Vallejo made a claim for the Soseol grant of 84,000 aeres, where Vallejo now is, on the score of reimbursement for his expenses in the Indian wars. This was disallowed by the United States Government. A elaim made for El Sobrante, or remaining lands, made by one Lneo, and henee often called the " Lnco" grant, caused an immense deal of litigation in the county nutil it was finally thrown out by the courts.

BENICIA.

In 1846 the town of Benicia was founded under the brightest anspiees, and thus deserves to rank first of the towns in California of Ameri- can foundation. It was not ealled Benicia at first, but Francesca, after the first name of General Vallejo's wife, Francesea Benicia Vallejo. But we anticipate.

Immediately after the surrender of California to the United States, Dr. Robert Semple, a very long-headed citizen of the time, east about him for the site of the coming city, that should command the interior trade. The bold bare hills on the northern shore of the Straits of Carquinez captivated his fancy. He set to work at once. General Vallejo, who owned or claimed all the land lying thereabont, granted the doctor five miles of frontage on the condition only that the new city should be named after his wife. The site was iminediately surveyed by Jasper O'Farrell and Lieutenant Warner, and the name Francesca chosen. In the following year Yerba Buena changed its name to San Francisco, and, fearing confusion, the second name Benicia was taken instead. Thomas O.Larkin was Dr. Semple's associate in this undertaking. Popu- lation immediately flowed in, William I. Tustin, wife and son being the first inhabitants. In

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1847 eight honses were erected, one of them being that of Lundy Alford and Nathan Bar- bonr, who moved their house from Sonoma on receiving the present of a free lot. In this year Captain von Pfister, well known in early times, started s store, the first in the county. Bethuel Phillips was one of the active men of those days.

Dr. Robert Semple, a native of Kentucky, was a remarkable man who came overland to California in 1845, a member of the Hastings party; he was a printer and dentist by occupa- tion. He began farming for Johnson & Keyser, and, becoming prominent in the Bear revolt, he was a conspirator and filibuster, but he exerted his influence with great success in restraining the lawlessness of his men. In July he went to Monterey, served for a time in Fauntleroy's dragoons, and then with Walter Colton pnb- lished at Monterey the first California news- paper, the Monterey Californian. Early in 1847 the paper was transferred to San Francisco, and Semple, obtaining from Vallejo a large traci of land on Carquinez Strait, devoted his energies, in company with Larkin, to the building of a great city at Benicia, at the same time taking an interest in various political matters. In 1848-'50 he made much money by his ferry. In 1849 he was a member and president of the State constitutional convention. He finally moved to Colusa County, where he died in 1854, at the age of forty-eight years, as the result of a fall from his horse. He was a good- natured, honorable man. Being six feet and eight inches high, gannt and stoop-shouldered, he was the subject of many an amusing anecdote. It was said, for example, that his legs were so long that in riding horseback he had to strap the spurs away np on the calves so that they could touch the horse! Ilis marriage to Miss Fannie Cooper, December 16, 1847, was the first wedding in Solano County. She was the daughter of Major Stephen Cooper, who kept the California House, an adobe, the first hotel in the county. He was at the time a judge of the first instance.

A danghter, born in 1847 to Nathan Barbour, in Benicia, was the first white child born in the county.

Benicia, as the first point to rise in opposition to San Francisco, might have gained the vantage but for the sudden transformation of 1849. The early prospects sufficed to start a crop of town projects farther up the bay and its tribn- taries, embracing in this county Montezuma and Halo-Chemuck, while westward was founded Vallejo, which, though failing to retain the State Capitol, became quite a town. It made a vain effort for the county-seat, which, after being secured by Benicia, was in 1858 trans- ferred to the more central Fairfield, founded for the purpose by R. H. Waterman, who named it after his birthi-place in Connecticut, and gave ample lands for public buildings. J. B. Lemon erected the first house. The plat was filed in May, 1859. It stands in close proximity to Suisun, which may be regarded as the trading quarter and more important half, and the chief shipping point of the county. Suisun was in- corporated in 1868 and has several mills and warehouses. The place is named after a tribe of Indians once roaming here.

Not to be ontdone in town-building, how- ever, John Bidwell in the same year, 1846, sent a number of men to his grant on the Sacra- mento, there also to establish a town. After a disastrous time, the men deserted the place, which had gained the Indian name of "Halo-Che- muck," " nothing to eat." Later on, in 1851, Colonel N. H. Davis founded, on the spot, the town of Rio Vista, building the first house. In 1846, also, L. W. Hastings, a Mormon, built an adobe house upon the bald point of the Monte- zumna Ilills, where Collinsville now is, and established the first ferry across the Sacramento, hoping to found a town that might be the nuclens of a Mormon settlement. The total lack of timber deterred his fellow religionists, however, and the spot was soon abandoned. L. P. Marshall was the first permanent settler, going there in 1852. In 1846 came also Albert Lyon, John Patton, J. P. Clay and Willis

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HISTORY OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA.

Long, the first American settlers in the Vaca Valley

In 1847 Feltis Miller and J. D. Hoppe settled on the Sacramento River at the mouth of Cache Creek, while in the fall came David M. Berry and family, who moved the follow- ing year to the Suisun Valley, and became the first American settler there. In 1848 John Stilts settled in Green Valley, being followed shortly after by W. P. Durbin and Charles Ramsey. In 1849, Lundy Alford removed from Benicia to the Suisun Valley.

CITY OF VALLEJO.

In 1850 General Vallejo determined to found a great city on the rolling hills that lie at the mouth of Napa Creek. It was originally to have been called " Eureka," and for a time was dubbed "Eden," but the wishes of his friends led to the choosing of "Vallejo," after himself. Captain Stewart put up the first house there.

General John B. Frisbie was Vallejo's right- hand man, and deserves to be called, after Val- lejo himself, the founder of the town. Born in 1823 in New York State, Frisbie came to Cali- fornia in 1847. In his native State he had been a military captain, a lawyer and a poli- tician. In 1848 he was a candidate for lieuten- ant-governor of California. Married a daughter of General Vallejo, and became a prominent business man of the town of Vallejo, interested in the building of railroads, president of a bank and a man of considerable wealth. In 1860 he sent the first cargo of wheat to Europe. In 1867 he was a member of the Legislature. Losing his fortune just previous to 1880, he moved with his family to Mexico, where he was living at last accounts.

It was in connection with his pet city that General Vallejo made his grand offer to the State, on condition of its being made the capital. He offered a free gift of 136 acres of land, with $370,000 in money for the erection of the buildings. The offer was accepted and the story of the session held there and the senttling

off to Sacramento related on page 206, is as a twice-told tale to Californians.

The making of Vallejo was the establishment at Mare Island, just opposite, of the United States naval station for the Pacific Coast. The purchase was made by the Government in 1851, and the great dry dock, one of the largest in in the country, being 525 feet long, 78 feet wide and 32 deep, was sent out ready built from New York in 1852, in which year the island was officially declared the navy yard and naval depot for the coast, although not taken formal possession of until 1854, through Ad- miral David G. Farragut. There is a large foundry, machine shops and repair shops, and an immense quantity of stores of all kinds is carried. On an average about 1,000 men are employed, all of whom live in Vallejo. Many additions to the appliances have lately been made

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A memorial and biographical history of northern California, illustrated. Containing a history of this important section of the Pacific coast from the earliest period of its occupancy...and biographical mention of many of its most eminent pioneers and also of prominent citizens of today, Part 41

Author: Lewis Publishing Company. cn Publication date: 1891 Publisher: Chicago : The Lewis publishing company Number of Pages: 1000

Author: Lewis Publishing Company. cn
Publication date: 1891
Publisher: Chicago : The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 1000