USA > California > Lassen County > Fairfield's pioneer history of Lassen County, California to 1870 > Part 25
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William H. Clark says that during the trial at Quincy Warren said he made his confession the day after the murder when he was frightened because he thought he was going to be hanged. He said that he told what he did because he thought it would save his life and claimed that it was not the truth. Mr. Clark also said that the testimony of the witnesses for the prosecution was contradictory and that publie sentiment seemed to be in favor of the defendants. The friends of the accused men always insisted that they were innocent and some of them said the ones who committed the murder intended to kill Mr. Lawson. After the trial Gilbert, Warren, and Cahill came back to this valley. The first two did not stay very long, but Cahill lived here several years. Gilbert was a resident of Sonoma county, California, for many years and died at Santa Rosa in 1910.
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WHITE'S HORSES STOLEN
The following was told by Fred Hines. About the middle of April, 1861, Charles M. White, who lived where Haviland built the first house in Toadtown in January, 1857, had a span of fine horses stolen from his stable by Clark Rugg and John Morrow. It has been told that Rugg and Harper opened a blacksmith shop in Susanville in 1859 and Rugg had been there ever since. He seems to have been a natural thief. Morrow had crossed the plains to Indian valley in 1856, but came to this valley to live the next year. He was an industrious man, but was rather slack in his morals. He was paying some attention to a grass widow who lived in Susanville and that took him there quite frequently. During these visits he became acquainted with Rugg and before long they were great friends. Rugg was not satisfied in Susan- ville and wanted to go to Salt Lake City and also wanted to take White's horses along with him. Morrow was a man who would do anything for a friend so he went along to help him.
The night of the 16th of April they took the horses out of White's stable and started on the emigrant road for the Hum- boldt river. They went together as far at least as the Lassen Meadows on the Humboldt, and there Morrow turned off and went to Humboldt City ten or twelve miles to the southeast. Rugg went on with the horses up the Humboldt nearly to Gravelly Ford, but becoming frightened about the Indians he turned back. A few days after the horses were stolen L. N. Breed started from the valley to go to Humboldt City. When out near Smoke creek he noticed that the tracks of two horses came into the road and he saw them in the road all the way to the Humboldt river. He also Morrow in Humboldt City. In a day or two Breed set out for Honey Lake and not long after reaching here he heard that White's horses had been stolen. He hunted up White and told him about the tracks he had seen in the road and about seeing Morrow. It was late at night, but White at once rode down to see Hines because Morrow used to make his headquarters there. Hines told him that Morrow had been there that afternoon and said he was going over to Neale's store and then up to Tom. Watson's about half a mile east of Richmond. Hines had partly undressed to go to bed, but he put on his clothes, went out and saddled his horse, and the two men went down to the next place and got William Dow.
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The three men went first to the Neale store and there they were told that Morrow had been there that afternoon and bought some tobacco and had then gone on up the road. They went on up to Watson's, but he had not been there. The before-men- tioned grass widow had moved down to the Thompson ranch three miles southeast of Janesville, and for that and one or two other reasons they concluded that the man they were looking for had gone down there and they followed him. William Ellison, called "Blue Bill," lived near the Chandler and Fry place and from him they learned that Morrow had left his horse with him and gone away. They reached Thompson's just about daylight and woke him up and asked him if Morrow had been there. He said he had not. Just then some of them saw a man on foot out in the field to the north of them and he was making a circle as if trying to reach "Blue Bill's" cabin. They headed him off and found he was the man they wanted. He was very much excited and drew his pistol, but Hines told him to put it up and not to try anything of that kind. They disarmed him and took him up to "Blue Bill's" and put him on his horse. Then they took him to the Hines and Sylvester ranch and put him in a room up-stairs.
On the 11th of May, or about that time, he was given a pre- liminary examination at Richmond before Squire V. J. Borrette and bound over to the higher court. His bail was fixed at $5000, but he could not raise this and was sent to jail, probably at Quincy.
A man was sent out to Lassen's Meadows, and Rugg was arrested as soon as he got back there and brought to Honey Lake with one of the stolen horses. The other horse had broken down somewhere on the road. Both men were tried at Quincy and found guilty. Hines was subpoenaed as a witness, but he did not recognize the authority of Plumas county and would not go. Rugg was sent to San Quentin for five years and Morrow for four years. About a year before Morrow's term had expired some of the prisoners made a break for liberty while the lieuten- ant governor was inspecting the state prison. They put the lieutenant governor in the lead and at first the guards did not dare to fire on them. When they did shoot Morrow got a bad wound across the abdomen from a rifle bullet, but he managed to get up to Indian valley and there was captured by John Young and sent back to prison. Probably he would never have been
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captured if he had not been wounded, and Mr. Hines thinks he got further away from the prison than any of the others who escaped.
After being released from prison he came back to Honey Lake and stayed about a year and worked for Hines part of the time. One day when he was hauling lumber he met Breed on horseback and the latter said "How do you do, John." Morrow never said a word, but wound the lines around the brake, climbed off the wagon, and started for Breed. He didn't wait for Morrow to reach him, but put spurs to his horse and rode away in considerable haste. He was afraid of Morrow and told Hines that he should not have employed him and kept him here in the valley.
One day Morrow had a fight in Susanville with Old Man Varney who wore a wig, although his antagonist did not know it. When he hit Varney the man went one way and his wig the other. Morrow looked first at him and then at the wig and said "God. Didn't I scalp him quick!" Mr. Hines afterwards heard that Morrow and some others stole some horses near Carson City and were captured while making their way east with them. For this they were sent to the Nevada state prison at Carson City. It was reported that Rugg went to Mexico after getting out of San Quentin.
CONDITIONS AT THE CLOSE OF 1861
While some of the conditions remained the same as during the previous year, the gradual improvement for the better went on and each year life became more comfortable for the settlers.
The mining towns on the Comstock lode were rapidly filling up and they made a better market for the Never Sweats. Prices were high, but as yet they were in no condition to profit much by it. There were no mowers in the valley and there were not men enough to cut much hay by hand. There was not land enough cleared up to raise a great deal of grain, but now that a better market had come this work went on rapidly. This year flour had to be brought into the valley again for the gristmill was not finished until late in the fall. It was usually very high in price, but once this fall Shaffer sold it at Richmond for $7 a hundred and that was extremely cheap for flour in those days. V. J. Borrette bought some seed wheat from Sylvenus Conkey
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this spring and paid ten eents a pound for it. Freight to Vir- ginia City was five cents a pound and a little more than that to Marysville. Langdon and Whiting brought the mail and express into the valley from Oroville and Quincy during the winter of 1861-62.
Probably there was considerable feeling in the valley in regard to the civil war, but it had not become so bitter as it was later on.
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CHAPTER VIII
1862. SETTLEMENT
T HE DAYS of squatter filings were almost done in the land of the Never Sweats. Only five filings were made with Roop this year and these were the last ones ever made.
In January C. Arnold, Henry Arnold, Leroy Arnold, A. Curtis, and M. S. Scott located a half section just to the north of the upper Hot spring and three and one half sections south and southwest of it. This land was bounded on the south by the lake and the Susan river. William Long, Arthur Long, and Gould claimed an irregular tract which contained something like three sections of land and lay south of the hot springs about five miles southeast of the preceding claim.
In February U. J. Tutt located a section having the High Rock spring in the northwest corner of it. This claim was about twelve miles east of the forgeoing location. Antone Storff, Fred Borrette, and Alexander and Ezra Moe claimed the creek "com- mencing from Antonio Storff's house, and water ditch running 1200 feet up the creek on Ruff Elliott water creek for Quartz mills and mining purposes." This must have been about a mile south of Richmond.
During the preceding winter Charles and "Bige" Adams had put up a water power sawmill above the little valley on the west branch of Baxter creek. This spring W. M. Cain hauled the castings for it from the foundry at Gold Hill, Nevada. They must have commenced sawing very early in the spring for lum- ber was taken from there to the Humboldt mines in April. Wil- liam V. Kingsbury, known as "Smoke Creek Sam," and H. P. Bates built a water power sawmill on Lassen creek about a mile and a half above where it is crossed by the mountain road from Susanville to Janesville. It was known as the Bates mill, but the settlers called it "Bates's Rawhide Mill" because the belts were made of rawhide with the hair on.
This spring Jarvis Taylor and another man started a butcher shop in Susanville on the north side of Main street between Lassen and Gay. This was the first butcher shop in Susanville. The Neales divided up their ranch and Williaw Dow bought John H. Neale's part of it.
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In July Malcom Bankhead went over to the Lathrop and Bradley ranch and put up a blacksmith shop. In the fall he and Henry E. Lomas divided up their business, the latter taking the last shop built. Lomas ran this shop until 1865 and then turned it over to his brother Thomas J. and went to White Horse valley in southeastern Oregon.
In August G. W. Lathrop and Wife sold half of the Lathrop and Bradley ranch to U. L. and P. J. Shaffer and on the 8th of the following month sold the other half of the same ranch to the same men. The Shaffers opened a store there and kept a station for travelers, as Lathrop had done, until they sold out in 1868. Old settlers still call it the Shaffer place. While they lived on this ranch there was a great deal of travel to and from the Black Rock, Idaho, and Humboldt mines, and from its loca- tion it was quite a noted station.
At Milford H. C. Wilkins and -Everett, who had a store at the Summit in Sierra valley, built a store across the creek from the gristmill and nearly opposite to it. Mr. Everett stayed in Milford and ran the store there.
At Janesville during the winter of 1861-62 H. E. Lomas had built a stable on the south of Main street perhaps 300 yards west of the creek. It had never been used and this spring he sold it to L. N. Breed who made a dwelling house out of it. On the 17th of May there was born to Susan Hill, the Wife of Smith J. Hill, a daughter who was named Jane Agnes. This summer Preston R. James and his brother-in-law, A. A. Holmes, put up a two story frame building east of the creek and on the south side of Main street. It stood perhaps 150 feet from the street and about the same distance from the creek. In the fall they opened a hotel in this building and ran it two or three years. P. R. James taught school in the old Fort this fall. Some time this year Malcom Bankhead and Family moved to Oakland, California, and the most of them have lived there or in that vicinity ever since.
Susanville. Early in the spring John Burkett erected a build. ing that he used for a saloon and a restaurant on the south side of Main street the fourth lot west from Gay street. He called the saloon the "Humboldt Exchange." George Heaps and Joseph Hale ran a faro game in it this year and perhaps part of the next. In March John II. Neale commenced a building on
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the north side of Main street the third lot east from Gay. When it was completed he put into it the most of the goods that were in the store on the Neale ranclı. Some time during the year I. J. Harvey and E. D. Hosselkus went into business with him. It was called Neale & Harvey's store, and they had the largest stock of merchandise that had ever been in Susanville. They sold goods here for several years. This building was burned in the fire of November, 1881, and F. and S. say that it was A. Otto's blacksmith shop when it was burned. This spring a man named Cogswell built a livery and feed stable on the southwest corner of Main and Gay streets. In July T. N. Long and Al. Leroy commenced a building on the southwest corner of Main and Union streets. It was a story and a half frame building, 25 by 45 feet, and in it they opened a saloon perhaps as early as December. It was called "The Magnolia" and was the most pretentious building ever put up for a saloon in the town. After being used a few years for a saloon a stock of merchandise was put into it, but it was always called The Magnolia Building. It was burned September 23, 1882, in a fire that burned everything facing the south side of Main street between Lassen and Union streets and the old Cutler Arnold log hotel on the corner diagonal from The Magnolia. This summer Governor Roop sold three lots on the north side of Main street just east of the Brannan House to Harry Thompson who built a house on the northwest corner of them. He could not pay for the lots and Roop took them baek and moved into the house. He set out some trees and put a couple of fish ponds into the front yard. This was the Roop residence for several years and used to attract considerable attention. In after years it was moved away and now, 1915, stands on the west side of Lassen street next to the house on the southwest corner of North and Lassen streets. Some years before this Governor Roop had some timbers hewed to make the frame for a gristmill. They were then hauled to the river and piled up on the north side of it near where the bridge south of town is now. The gristmill was not built and some time this year Roop used these timbers in building a stable at the rear end of the lot on the southeast corner of Lassen and Nevada streets. This he leased to William M. Wentworth who ran it as a livery and feed stable. This year M. Bienstock and Samuel Peyser had a store and a tailor shop in a building that stood on the south side of
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Main street between Gay and Union streets and near the east end of the block. They also used the building as a dwelling house. This fall V. J. Burris started a butcher shop on the south side of Main street between Lassen and Gay and near the middle of the block. William J. Young opened a photograph gallery on the north side of Main street and perhaps one third of a block east of Roop street. This was the first photograph gallery in the county. In October Governor Roop sold some land at the northeast corner of Cottage and Lassen streets to the trustees of the M. E. Church for one dollar. There is nothing to show that they ever erected a building on it. Probably the first flag- pole in Susanville was put up this year. It was a small one and was set up in the middle of Main street near Gay.
In continuation of what was told in 1861 about Lassen Lodge, No. 149, F. & A. M. the History of Plumas, Lassen, and Sierra counties says : "A charter was granted in May, 1862, and the lodge was instituted in due form, June 24, 1862. In October a dispensation was obtained for that purpose, and the place of meeting was changed to Susanville. This was done because Richmond had 'gone up like a rocket, and come down like a stick,' and Susanville had been left to glory over the decay of her rival." It is said that Governor Roop was a Royal Arch Mason and that he installed the first officers of this lodge.
When the Idaho mining excitement broke out in 1862 the people of this section saw that it would be a good thing to have the travel to these and the Humboldt mines come this way. The citizens of Chico wanted to be on the road, too, and they joined hands with them in the work of getting a short route between that place and Susanville. Part of what is called the "Humboldt Road" from Chico to this valley must have been built this year. The following tells how they tried to show the advantages of the new route. The "Sacramento Union" of October 30, 1862, tells that a correspondent writing from Big Meadows about two weeks before that says that James Berry started from Chico with the mail at 11:30 P. M., and got to Big Meadows (65 miles) at five o'clock the next morning. At seven o'clock A. M. A. H. Barber started on horseback from Big Meadows and reached Susanville (45 miles) by noon.
October 18th James L. Eastwood located an irregular traet of land on the north side of Susan river. It extended from the
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river to the foothills and was about two miles and a half below where the Johnstonville bridge is now. This was the last filing in Roop's Record Book.
This year Thomas J. and Edward Mulroney and William Leith bought the ranch that Gordier located on the Baxter creek. T. J. Mulroney spent the rest of his life on that place and Mr. Leith stayed in that neighborhood as long as he lived. Miss Philenda Montgomery taught a private school at the S. Conkey ranch during the winter of 1862-63. The lake was very high this year and kept rising every year excepting 1864 until 1868.
Mt. Meadows. William B. Long bought out Fredonyer this spring, but did not take his family there until later on. A man named Mc Williams settled to the southeast of the Goodrich ranch and P. J. Quinn and his Brother claimed the land along the creek between the Devil's Corral and Fredonyer's pass. Willow Creek valley. "Sandy" Young, and perhaps Hy. Good, came into the valley this year with about a thousand of General John Bidwell's cattle. They built a cabin on the south side of the valley just below where Round valley opens into it and kept the cattle there until 1864. Long valley. William E. (Paul) Jones came into the valley and located on the creek above the Hood place. Thomas Smith took up a place just south of the Willow Ranch and that fall or the spring of 1863 he sold it to James McDermott. C. M. West and Albert S. Wright built a hotel at the junction of the Sierra valley and Honey Lake wagon roads. This was called the "Junction House" and for at least twenty-five years it was a well known station for the accommoda- tion of travelers. Edwin Dalton came into the valley this year.
In the fall of 1861 J. H. Breed bought his brother's share of the Smoke Creek Station and probably got the part that belonged to Hines a little later on. He stayed there the following winter and in the spring sold out to I. J. Harvey who had been em- ployed to buy the property for a United States Army Post. During the winter of 1862-63 William V. Kingsbury established a trading post at Smoke Creek and afterwards kept a station, or hotel, in connection with it. He stayed there until late in the 60's. The following is his advertisement, which was something out of the common, as it appeared in "The Sage Brush" of January 12, 1867 :
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"WELL
WHILE YOU ARE ABOUT IT LOOK HERE ! !
"The Celebrated SMOKE CREEK STATION, situated on the Humboldt, Idaho, East Bannock, Reese River, Salt Lake, Sur- prise Valley, New York, London, Paris, Japan and China road, in fact from which point you can go anywhere if you want to, is still running, commanded by that well known individual,
SMOKE CREEK SAM.
"Owing to the immense travel to the above localities, we have made arrangements to accommodate it all, in a superior and gentlemanly like manner. We are endeavoring to induce the directors of the PACIFIC RAILROAD to locate the terminus of the road at Smoke Creek, it being we think, the most central point for it. San Francisco may 'buck' a little against it, but geo- graphical position will tell.
"It is unfortunate for San Francisco to be located so far away from Smoke Creek but we cant help it now. - Speaking of 'SQUARE MEALS,' torch light processions, baled hay and 'sich' like, there is where we understand ourselves. We can converse upon those subjects, in connection with that commercial article called cash, with the most perfect aplomb and nonchalance.
"We most respectfully invite those going anywhere to call on us.
Kingsbury & Co."
There was a large emigration to the valley this year. It was the largest one that ever came in excepting that of 1859.
The following came into the county this year and lived here all the rest of their lives or are living here yet. This does not mean the children. John P. Garrett, Samuel Hoffman and Wife, Hiram N. Skadan, Mrs. J. C. Wemple, Abel Parker and Family, Francis L. Parker, John Fitch, Israel Jones, John D. Kelley and Family, Hiram Winchel, Isaac Hallett and Wife, Isaiah Hallett, Thomas Montgomery and Family, Philenda Montgomery, Isaac N. Jones, John F. Todd, La Fayette Marks, Frank M. Hostetter and Family, Isaac M. Stewart, John N. Barry and Family, Patrick Bagin, Otis N. Johnson and Wife, James L. McDermott, Charles A. Batterson, Amzi Brown, William M. Wentworth, Kinsey Talbott and Family, John Pickard and Wife.
The following lived here from twenty to forty years. Edwin Dalton, Hiram H. Dakin, J. M. Parker and Family, Emma
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Parker (Mrs. H. H. Dakin), Josephine Parker (Mrs. B. F. Sheldon), Leonard Hicks, Samuel Peyser and Family, John G. Newington, and Thomas W. Pickard and Family.
The following lived here from two or three to ten or fifteen years.
Judson Dakin, Sr., Smith Parker, James K. Belk and Wife, Thomas Holden, A. A. Dakin, Cyrus Fletcher and Family, Chandler R. Fletcher, Charles W. Dake and Family, William Harris and Family, John Harris, *Samuel S. Stinson and Fam- ily, James L. Eastwood, M. Bienstock, Czar Giddings, H. F. Thompson, J. L. Wedekind and Family, C. Frank Wedekind and Wife, George Wedekind, U. L. Shaffer, P. J. Shaffer, Cyrus Mulkey and Family, Carl Osborn, Asher D. Spalding, Levi McCoy and Wife, Elisha Pickard, John Campbell and Family, Griffith G. Miller and Family, Jacob C. Miller, Julius Drake, William E. (Paul) Jones and Family, Thomas Housen, F. V. Burris and Family, H. L. Spargur, I. J. Harvey and Family, Capt. William N. De Haven and Wife, Frank Peed, Thomas Smith, H. F. Tarrant, William J. Young, E. J. Carpeaux, A. H. Brown, A. R. Leroy, Joseph Belknap, *William Taylor, James Thompson, Henry E. Adams, Henry Bolan (or Boland), John H. Cowan, Jacob Hill, James Arnold, James Hutchings, John Thoroughman, Thomas Towell, John McDaniel, Thomas J. Bran- nan, John S. Shook, Cyrus Smith, *S. W. Hammond, P. J. Quinn, Miles Harper, Matilda Christie (Mrs. Amos Roach), John R. Lockwood, Mrs. Geo. W. Perry and Son, Mrs. Mary Johnston and Robert Johnston's three children.
NEVADA POLITICS. 1862
January 14, 1862, elections for county officers were held in all the counties of Nevada excepting Lake county, the county governments were organized, and the political machinery of the territory went to work. The officers elected at this time were to hold office only until the following September. The reason why Lake county did not hold an election was given in 1861.
In 1861 the Nevada legislature failed to appoint a commission to confer with California in regard to the running of the Sierra Nevada mountain line between the sections. Later on this com- mission must have been appointed, for the "Sacramento Union" of March 19, 1862, says that a Memorial from Governor Nye of
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Nevada, dated March 11, 1862, was presented to the legislature of California on the 18th. It was as follows:
"To the honorable the legislature of the state of California : We your memorialists, duly elected by the governor and the legislative assembly of the territory of Nevada for the purpose of representing to your honorable body the reasons why the bound- ary line between California and the territory of Nevada should be made to conform to the suggestions in the act of Congress organizing the same, would respectfully show that the organic act aforesaid in describing the limits of the territory whose inter- ests we seek to represent, declares that the southern boundary thereof should be the 37th degree of north latitude, extending thereon from the 39th degree of longitude west from Washington to the dividing ridge separating the waters that flow into the Carson valley from those flowing into the Pacific. Thence on the said dividing ridge northerly to the 41st degree of north latitude, thence due north to the southern boundary line of the state of Oregon : provided, that so much of the territory within the present limits of the state of California shall not be included within this territory until that state shall assent to the same by an act irrevocable without the consent of the United States." The Memorial went on to say that the country east of the Sierras was mountainous and incapable of supporting a very large pop- ulation, that their interests were with the people of Nevada and they would always carry on their business with them, that it was 300 miles to the capital of California and nearly 100 to that of Nevada, that Plumas county had never succeeded in enforcing their laws there to any great extent, and that their population would be a great help to the people of Nevada. They gave many more reasons for changing the line so it would follow the ridge dividing the waters of the Pacific from those of Nevada, and then respectfully asked that the legislature of California pass such an act. The document was signed by James W. Nye, Isaac Roop, and R. M. Ford.
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