An illustrated history of Sacramento County, California : containing a history of Sacramento County from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospective future portraits of some of its most eminent men, and biographical mention of many of its pioneers and also prominent citizens of today, Part 46

Author: Davis, Winfield J., 1851- 4n
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 916

USA > California > Sacramento County > An illustrated history of Sacramento County, California : containing a history of Sacramento County from the earliest period of its occupancy to the present time, together with glimpses of its prospective future portraits of some of its most eminent men, and biographical mention of many of its pioneers and also prominent citizens of today > Part 46

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Hoge with 100 volumes of choice literature by the members of the convention as a testimonial of their esteem for him as their presiding officer. The address was a very appropriate and happy effort. The labors of the convention were endorsed by the people in the adoption of the constitution by a majority of 11,000 votes, and it went into effect January 1, 1880. In 1879 Judge Johnson received the unanimons nomination of the Workingmen's Convention for Supreme Judge, but declined to be their candidate. In 1882 he was elected to the State Senate, and re-elected in 1884. Both terms he was chairman of the committee on city and towns, and reported a bill for establishing a uniform system for municipal governments, which became a law in 1883 and fills about 150 pages of the statute book. During the legisla- tive session of 1884-'85 he was also chairman of the committee on education. In 1886 he was elected Attorney-General of California for four years, and assumed the office the 1st of January, 1887. In January, 1888, he went to Washington city to argue the celebrated rail- road tax cases in the United States Supreme Court against some of the most eminent lawyers in this country, among them Senators Edmunds and Evarts.

Socially, Judge Johnson is pre-eminently a polished, companionable gentleman, qualities which led him years ago to become a member of the order of Freemasons and a Knight Tein- plar. He has taken thirty-two degrees in the order. He served as Worshipful Master in the lodge, and as High Priest and Eminent Com- mander of the Commandery in Cambridge City, Indiana. In 1878 he secured a dispensation and organized Santa Rosa Commandery, No. 14, which has become one of the most prosperous in the State. He was chosen its first Eminent Commander, and served fonr successive years by re-elections. He has filled the office of Grand Senior Warden two years in the Grand Commandery of Indiana, is now Grand Captain General of the Grand Commandery of the State

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of California, and in that capacity will attend the Triennial Conclave to be holden in the city of Washington in October, 1889.

Judge Johnson's estimable wife, and the inother of his five children-four sons and one daughter-passed from earth in October, 1888, leaving a large circle of mourning friends who knew hier only to love her.

The Legislature of 1889 employed the At- torney-General, John F. Swift and Stephen M. White to go to Washington and argue before the Supreme Court of the United States ex parte Chae Chan Ping, a habeas-corpus case on appeal from that circuit. The idea was to assist the Attorney-General of the United States, who is opposed by ex-Governor Hoadley and other eminent counsel for the Chinaman, in the solu- tion of the question as to the constitutionality of the Exclusion Act which took effect October 1, 1888, in excluding a Chinese laborer who has a return certificate, from returning here after this act took effect. The importance of this case cannot be overestimated. It is to be hoped that the State's counsel will succeed, that the constitutionality of the Exclusion Act will be upheld, and that the Supreme Court will have this Chinaman remanded to his ship, to be carried back to China, thus settling forever the doctrine that a later act of Congress must pre- vail over a treaty.

As an orator Judge Johnson has few equals on the Pacific coast; and this fact being recog- nized, his services are in frequent demand to deliver public addresses on various themes and occasions. Among his latest efforts are an ora- tion delivered on the Fourth of July, 1888, at Sacramento, and an address opening the Sonoma County Fair in August of the same year. As . a sample of his style of eloquence and his lofty patriotism, the following extract is given from the former; and both for its oratorical and his- torical merit-dealing as it does with Sonoma County.

THE ORATION.

Attorney-General George A. Jolinson was then introduced and delivered an eloquent ora-

tion. He spoke in an earnest, impressive man- ner, and his patriotic sentiments were heartily applauded. He said:

"Of all the days in the American calendar, this is the most patriotic. It belongs to no party, no clique; it belongs to all the people.

" We have other aniversaries, the birth of our children, of our mothers and sires, the plighted vow to some tender being. These we celebrate around the home altar, and bind each year with the circlet of our hopes, our fears, our smiles and our tears.

"But to-day we celebrate the birth of a nation, the fairest and bravest, whose home is on the land and on the sea, on the mountain and in the valley, wherever waves the freeman's flag. It has given to us all the other holidays which we usually celebrate. *

" It is meet that this day should be celebrated amid the salvos of artillery, industrial displays, the music of instruments, the waving of ban- ners, the smiles of beauty, and the glad voices of children. So long as American liberty is of any worth this day will be welcomed.

"We have given to the world a new dispen- sation, that all men are and of right ought to be free, that the people are the source of all power, that sovereign rights are inherent in them, and not the gift of any purple-clad Cæsar.

" We have thrown aside the hoary conceits of centuries, and installed in their place new ideas, ideas which have unfettered the human mind, educated the public conscience, tanght men to think and act for themselves, inspired the hopes of the masses, made life worth living for, and sublimated all human endeavor.

"We have crowned with flowers civil and re- ligions liberty, raised the down-trodden, sup- pressed the fagot and the stake, and illustrated history with the grandest achievements of war and peace. We have added to the civilization of the age, contributed to the general well- being, made home happy, government secure, and taught a lesson to all tyrants.

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"To perpetuate these blessings, we need no standing army, only eternal vigilance, which is the price of all liberty, only heroic effort at all times to do right, only self-discipline, self- illumination, and if need be millions of swords will leap from their scabbards to hiand these cherished blessings down to our descendants. *

" When we recall to mind the struggles and privations of the Revolution, our own undisci- plined soldiery essaying to cope with the first power in Europe, with troops which had seen service under Amherst at Montreal, and Wolfe on the Heights of Abraham; when we recollect the bloody feet which stained the soil at Valley Forge, and hope deferred that made the heart sick, except the great heart of our Washington, and even he was thinking of a dernier resort across the Alleghanies-when we think of all this, before Saratoga and Yorktown were won, and the liberty bells rang out their glad clarion, we realize that it costs something to achieve liberty, and that our free institutions, thus ac- quired, necessitate the most vigilant care to be handed down unimpaired to our posterity. When we recollect that our now cominonest rights were denied before Washington fought and La Fayette bled for liberty, the heritage that we now enjoy becomes precious and inesti- mable. When we go further back to the days when Brutus drove out the Tarquin, and an- other Brutus called aloud on Tully's name 'and shook aloft his crimsoned steel;' when, again, all was lost at Philippi and the imperial pur- ple was restored; when, again, another Cæsar lorded it over the Roman world and the Christ had not where to lay his head-we must prize the heroic achievements of the men of '76.

"When we go further back to the days when the Persians swarmed over Greece, and were held at bay by the three hundred in the passes of Thermopylæe; when Athens was abandoned, and their academic groves deserted; 'where the attic bird trilled its thick-warbled notes the summer long,' and old and young took refuge within the wooden walls at Salamis; when

Miltiades led at Marathon-Marathon, blessed name! which still sheds aronnd the world the aroma of liberty, and which twenty-two centu- ries later led the English bard to sing, when thinking of freedom for modern Greece:

"'The mountains look on Marathon, And Marathon looks on the sea; And musing there an hour alone,

I dream'd that Greece might still be free;'-

" When we recall to mind all this, we cannot forget to love, cherish and perpetuate our free institutions. * * * *

"Here the General Government moves in its orbit, and the States move in theirs, without any collision or impingement; the one exer- cising its granted powers for national purposes, including the preservation of its antonomy; the other retaining and exercising the grand re- siduum of popular rights to effectnate local purposes and local amelioration, which may be denominated home rule. Such was the wise forethought of our fathers in distributing the powers of the National Government. They builded not for a generation, but for all time, and left their ineffaceable impress upon the ages.

"With their success in establishing free in stitutions afterward came the success of other countries, notably that of France. * * * * *

"Thus we have paid the debt we owed to France for giving La Fayette as a co-laborer to Washington, and for her assistance in the Revo- lutionary war, by placing before her a Republi- can example to imitate, instead of the iron rule of her Merovingian, Carlovingian and Capetian Kings, the house of Valois, of Bourbon, and the imperial monarchy. * * * *

"First the struggling democracies of Athens and Rome; then the gradual acquisition of the great common-law rights; then a general gov- ernment and local governments, each preserving its respective autonomy; then other free States, or countries essaying freedom at great odds. *

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" Never can we sufficiently repay the debt of gratitude which we owe to the fathers of '76, and to the framers of the Constitution of the United States. *

* *

" It will remain a standing monument for all time, how these men, in days of great responsi- bility and peril, without chart or compass, amid a new-born nation convulsed with excitement and discussion, and full of the gravest appre- hensions, built up the sacred edifice of our lib- erties, laid 'deep and broad its foundations, and made enduring its superstructure, until its grand proportions stand forth to-day unrivaled by modern art, the hope of the country and the despair of all emulators. It could not have been done without the aid of Divine Providence, who makes the nothingness of man to praise Him, who before had made distraught the ad- visers of a senile king, and who, now that the fairest flower of George the Third's colonial possessions had been plucked from his grasp, would not permit old-world ideas to dominate the chosen seat of a better, more liumane and more enlightened civilization.

* * *

"The great central character of the times was our George, the leader of the American armies, the President of the Constitutional Convention, at all times patient, thoughtful, hopeful, prayer- ful; whom Thackeray, with all his British in- stincts, has characterized as the greatest, wisest and best of the Anglo-Saxon race.

* * * %

" Had not the American Revolution succeed- ed, civilization would have stood still on the dial-plate of time; history would have to be re- written, and those grand, heroic characters which now leap forth into ruddy life on its pictured pages would not be so much as a name or a memory. We could only inuse, thinking of what might have been.

"'Some mute, inglorious Milton here may rest, Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood.'

" IIad not the American Revolution succeed- ed, the courses of English thought would have

continned to run along the narrow channels of old England, instead of the majestic rivers and lakes of America.

"George Washington would have lived and died a quiet, self-possessed. well-to-do country gentleman, given to hunting and hospitality, on the banks of the Potomac; Jackson would never have built his entrenchments of sand- bags at New Orleans, nor Lincoln have issued his Emancipation Proclamation. This country would still have been under the Mexican domination; its untold mineral wealth, its cereals and its fruits would have existed nowhere except in the imagination of some dreamer.

" But with American success came the bound- less American endeavor and American enter- prise, until now we are the most numerous, the most cultured, the most flourishing, and the freest of the great English-speaking race.

"And here will be written by-and-by the classics of our mother tongue, as already here is spoken the English language in greater purity, elegance and force than anywhere on the face of the globe. * * * *

" Small causes apparently very often precipi- tate momentous events. As the wrath of Achilles caused the Trojan war; as a hasty plate of soup spoiled General Scott's Presiden- tial prospects; as the noise and confusion which prevailed once upon a time, when General Cass was attempting to explain his views, affected his political aspirations; so the refusal of onr forefathers to drink the English tea has given us a free and independent country, and added immeasurably to the world's civilization.

" Now, we can get along in the happiest ac- cord with our English brethren. They appre- ciate ns and we appreciate them, for we are all of one blood and lineage. We claim kinship with their Shakespeare. their Milton, and their Gladstone, and they are entitled to share in the world-fame of our Washington, our Marshall and our Webster.

" In perpetuating these blessings derived from our Revolutionary forefathers, we need states-

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men at the helm of State. We need thought- ful men, men whose sympathies are as broad as the protecting shield of the Republic. The civil service of the country should be placed on a high plane, and should be the reward only of a conscientious and faithful discharge of duty, and competency for its performance. Men should be taught to regard the national honor as their own, and unscrupulous money-changers and their patrons driven from the place where enthroned dnty should sit. Strong moral forces should lend a helping hand to the government ot State, and these must be backed by educa- tion and an enlightenment of the publie con- science.

" We salnte, therefore, this one hundred and twelfth anniversary of American Independence, this great country which is the recognized home of liberty the world over; we salute her hon- ored past, her prosperous present, her prom- ising future, the destined abiding place of the millions to come who will blend with and add to the greatest of the English-speaking race; whose drum beat and martial tread will be heard whenever the rights of the humblest of her citizens are trampled upon by any foreign power, or when any one of the increasing stars on her flag is sought to be dimmed.

"We salute this anniversary, in this great Valley of the Sacramento, where nature has done so much and art so little; where there is room, and plenty of room, for the thousands, I might say the millions, to come; where on the one side may be seen an almost treeless expanse of waving grain, on the other the semi-tropical fruits mellowing into more than Eastern Iuscions- ness, all around a climate

Where summer first her robe unfurls, And where she longest tarries,

with a people as generous and hospitable as the tempered airs which have grown them.

" And from this great valley we can point with pride to the unnumbered valleys scattered beyond, and to the hills as prolific as the val- leys, with their grain belts, their frnit belts,

their mineral belts, their sanitary belts, all of which tend to reward industry, prolong life and make it enjoyable; to our colleges and admira- ble common-school system; to a free and en- lightened press; to a reading and thinking poople; whether amid urban splendors or rural homes; to a fearless and incorruptible judiciary, and to the mass of our population, healthy, happy and contented.

* *

* ***

"California has an area three times as great as that of the State of New York, and larger than that of Great Britain and Ireland, with Portugal added as a make-weight.

" While, however, she has only about seven inhabitants to the square mile, Rhode Island las 300 and Belginin has more than 500. Thus it will be apparent what advantages this State has for supporting a greatly increased popula- tion. She is among the greatest of the wheat. prodneing States, far ahead of any other in the production and value of her mines, and was at one time the greatest gold and silver producer in the Union.

"To this is to be added, among other re- sources, the unrivaled wealth of her fruits, her lumber interests, her wool, most of which are constantly increasing.

"From so much of retrospeet let us now look forward to the coming years, when the great Valley of the Sacramento will enrich and be enriched by the thousands who will settle here; when every valley will begin to smile like a Vaca or a Capay; when California will, appar- ently, have arrived at the acme of her material development; when from the dome of the State Capitol shall float the same flag which flies there to-day, and the same songs be sung to fire the patriot's heart; when all over this great nation will be seen the same patriotic display, the arts and sciences prevailing, labor receiving an adequate requital, and fraternal ties binding the States and people together stronger than with ribs of steel; still even then will we look hopefully forward to a still greater future, to a

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still more rhythmical development, until we finally sink to rest beneath the sods of the great valley."

EORGE SERMONET, wholesale and re- tail grocer, No. 700 Eighth street, Sacra- mento, is a native of France, born at Dambach, Alsace, on the 24th of April, 1838, his parents being Joseph (a vineyardist) and Catharine (Schaechtel) Sermonet. He was reared at his native place and attended school from the age of six until he was fourteen. Then he worked on his father's place. When he reached the age of twenty-one years he entered the army, joining the First Artillery Regiment at Grenoble. After he had been there nine months he went with his regiment to Algiers, Africa, where he remained from the 12th of June, 1860, until November 24, 1864. There he saw much active service, and was promoted sergeant, and given charge of the artillery at the fortress of Tiaret. He commanded the guns there during the Arab rebellion of 1864. He returned to France with his regiment in the fall of 1864, and was located at Rennes, depart. ment Ille-et-vilaine, the capital of French Britany. They embarked at Toulon, November 26, 1864, and marehed to Rennes, reaching there January 20, 1865. He left there August 8, 1865, on partial discharge, and on the 31st received his full discharge. After remaining home some months he came to America, sailing from Havre on the 2d of September, 1867, and landing at New York September 21 from the steamer Bellona. At New York he took a steamer bound for California, and crossing the Isthmus resumed his sea voyage on the steamer Constitution, landing at San Francisco October 25, 1867. He came to Sacramento on the 27th and engaged with L. Kreuzberger in his coffee and spice mille. He was employed there until 1872, when he embarked in the grocery business on the corner of Tenth and E streets. Two years later he removed to the corner of Seventh

and G streets. In 1877 he commenced the con- struction of his present business house at No. 700 Eighth street, and finished and moved into it on the 27th of April, 1878. He does an ex- tensive retail business, whilst his wholesale trade is constantly increasing, and he handles large quantities of California wines. His store is heavily stocked, giving his customers a large range of goods to select from. Mr. Sermonet was married in this city July 6, 1872, to Miss Hildebrand, a native of Germany, who came to this country when a child. They have five children, viz .: Felix, Edward, Annie Frances, Clorinda Grace and Victor Peter. Mr. Sermo- net is a member of the A. O. D., and is treas- urer of the Catholic Knights of America. He is an enterprising, wide-awake business man.

JOSEPH W. CLARKE, foremau of the round houses of the Central Pacific Railroad Com- pany, at Sacramento, is a native of Madison County, New York, born at Brookfield, February 26, 1836, his parents being Ethan and Amny (Crandall) Clarke. His father, who was pro- prietor of a machine shop, came of one of the oldest families in that part of New York, and was a son of a Revolutionary veteran. When the subject of this sketch was nine years old, the family removed to Rockford, Illinois. There he learned the machinist's trade with his father and brother. Afterward, during an interval of eight years, he worked off and on in the shops of the Illinois Central Railroad at Chicago, the remainder of the time for that period, at Rock- ford. For one year (during 1864 and 1865) he was in the service of the Government about Chattanooga. In 1868 Mr. Clarke camne to California, via Nicaragua route. Ile left New York on the steamer Guiding Star, and landed at San Francisco from the steamer Moses Taylor, May 3, 1868. Ile proceeded to Butte County, and mined at Oregon City about a year. He then came to Sacramento, and on the 3d ofMay, 1869, entered the employ

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of the Central Pacific Railroad Company, as a machinist in the shops. In 1874 he was promoted to his present position; there are from 125 to 150 men in his department, independent of engineers and firemen. Mr. Clarke was married in Illinois, March 31, 1868 (the day he started for California), to Miss H. A. Stevens, a native of Mount Desert Island, Maine. They have two children, viz .: Joseph Hermann and Amy. Mr. Clarke is a member of Columbia Lodge, K. of P., and of Red Cloud Tribe, Red Men. He has been identified with the shops since the early days, and enjoys the respect and esteem of all in his department, as, indeed, of the community generally.

AUREN UPSON, deceased, a once promi- nent, but now silent, figure in Sacramento history, was a native of Connecticut, and son of Asahel and Lydia (Webster) Upson. Both the Websters and the Upsons were among the earlier and prominent families of New England. Lauren Upson was born at Oxford, New Haven County, Connecticut, but reared across the line in Hartford County, at Marion, Southington Township, where his parents re- moved when he was a mere child. He was a twin brother with Warren Upson, who died in 1855. He and Warren were the oldest of nine brothers, and it fell to his lot to do the farm work. He remained on the farm until twenty years of age. He was also engaged more or less on the construction of the Hartford and New Haven Canal. He was given a year's time be- fore reaching his majority, and so left home at the age of twenty years, and went South trav- eling overland, finally bringing up at Marion, Perry County, Alabama. After a few years he returned to Connecticut, and was there married to Selina Chatfield, a native of Oxford, Con- nectient, and a relative of the Goodyears, the great rubber manufacturers. After his mar- riage lie went back to Alabama with his bride, and embarked in the mercantile trade at Marion,

in which he met with great success. But the financial crash of 1837 fell heavily npon him, as he was endorser for large amounts on the paper of men who went under at that time. Meantime, however, he had been a great stu- dent, studying law and reading up on the politi- cal situation, so that when he was admitted to the bar at Marion he was already one of the best posted men politically in Alabama. He practiced his profession more or less, but his taste lay more in the line of writing, and he adopted the profession of editor as his future life work. He was given charge of the leading Whig paper, and with such effect did he wield his pen in behalf of that great party's princi- ples that he changed Perry County from a Democratic to a Whig county, and held it in line as long as he was at the helm of the paper. In 1847 Charles Langdon, editor and proprietor of the Mobile Advertiser, was elected mayor of Mobile, and he asked Mr. Upson to go to that city and take charge of the editorial department of the paper. He did so and remained in charge until 1851, when he started for California. The journey was made via New Orleans and Panama, and he landed in San Francisco in January, 1852. He proceeded to El Dorado County, where he remained a short time, and was then called upon to come to Sacramento and take charge of the Union, then in its infancy, with which he remained until 1864. The history of the United States does not present a more marked example of a newspaper controlling public sentiment throughout a vast extent of territory than that of the Union, throughout the Pacific Coast during that period. At times his pen seemed almost inspired, and a tremen- dous influence for good was wielded by the paper at a time when the future destiny of the United States was being wrought. The build- ing of the Pacific Railroad, which supplies what was necessary to forever bind and cement the American Union, conld never have been accom- plished when it was, without the great efforts in its behalf by Lauren Upson. In fact its very conception at the time would have seemed

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Author: Davis, Winfield J., 1851- 4n Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 916

Author: Davis, Winfield J., 1851- 4n
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 916