USA > California > Mendocino County > History of Mendocino and Lake counties, California, with biographical sketches of the leading, men and women of the counties who have been identified with their growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 35
USA > California > Lake County > History of Mendocino and Lake counties, California, with biographical sketches of the leading, men and women of the counties who have been identified with their growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 35
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sixty acres one and one-half miles southeast of the present site of Willits. So sparsely settled was the country at the time that Mrs. Sawyers was the third white woman to establish a home in the valley. Farming and stock- raising were conducted upon an extensive scale and the original tract was enlarged through purchase until the home ranch finally embraced about one thousand acres.
With all of the labor involved in the management of so large a stock ranch Mr. Sawyers found time for educational, religious, civic and fraternal associations and for years was regarded as one of the leading citizens of the community, an influential Democrat, a deacon and trustee in the Baptist Church and a generous promoter of the public school system in the valley. Through the various degrees in Masonry he rose to the thirty-third, which was conferred upon him during a trip made for that purpose to Glasgow, Scotland. His death occurred at the ranch on Christmas day of 1879. For many years he was survived by his wife, who passed away at Willits January 18, 1914. Of their seven children the two eldest were born in Missouri, namely : Marshall N., now of Ukiah ; and Mrs. Annie O. Simonson, of Willits. The others are natives of California, namely: David Leander, whose home is at the head of Redwood avenue in Willits; Mrs. Fannie Hicks, of Santa Barbara ; Wade Hampton, of Fresno; George Edwin, of Santa Barbara; and Robert L., of Willits. The earliest memories of David Leander Sawyers are asso- ciated with Little Lake valley. On reaching man's estate he became manager of the homestead and continued there until 1879, when at the age of twenty- four he embarked in general contracting for the building of roads in Men- docino county. Since then he has built many roads both in mountains and in valleys. Among his contracts were those for roads over Redwood moun- tain, from Hardy to Juan creek, from Sherwood to Fort Bragg, twenty-three miles down the Eel river for the Northwestern Pacific Railroad, a portion of the state highway and numerous other important projects. Meanwhile until quite recently he engaged in farming and stock-raising on the old Baechtel ranch, but this enterprise has been sold in order that he might devote his attention wholly to road building.
The marriage of Mr. Sawyers and Miss Sarah E. Whited was solemnized at Willits November 5, 1876, and resulted in two children, the daughter being Mrs. Fannie Belle Rogers, of Willits; the son, Louis D., is an assistant of his father in the contracting business. Mrs. Sawyers was next to the young- est among the seven survivors in a family that originally numbered twelve children, whose parents, Doc Anderson and Sarah (Bishop) Whited, on coming to California purchased the first through tickets sold from Burlington to Sac- ramento over the Central Pacific Railroad. The family settled on a ranch in Little Lake valley, Mendocino county, where both Mr. and Mrs. Whited remained until death. The latter was a Virginian by birth and a member of an old southern family. In politics Mr. Sawyers votes with the Democratic party. Besides two terms as city trustee he has served several terms as a mem- ber of the board of education. Well known in fraternal activities he has been connected with the Ancient Order of United Workmen and the Woodmen of the World. In 1876 he was initiated into Willits Lodge No. 277, I. O. O. F., in which he has officiated as noble grand and representative to the grand lodge. In Masonry he is identified with Willits Lodge No. 365, F. & A. M. For some years he has been interested in the work of the Rebekahs, in which
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Mrs. Sawyers is past noble grand and ex-district deputy, being a leading worker in the order and well posted in its ritual observances. Besides being one of the most prominent Rebekahs in the county she is keenly interested in religious work and has been identified for years with the Baptist Church at Willits, a generous assistant in its charities and a promoter of its missionary movements.
CHARLES WILLIAM MATHEWS .- To direct the organization of a banking institution is no slight task and even greater difficulty attends the early history of the concern, which must be guided by wise hands and devel- oped by intelligent minds broad in their outlook, yet capable of infinite pains with details. The Fort Bragg Commercial Bank has a sound financial basis, due to the executive ability of its officers, who direct the policy of the con- cern wisely, energetically and forcefully. The structure on Main street occu- pied by the bank has an equipment modern, substantial and complete, in- cluding large fireproof safes, twentieth-century fixtures and model accessories. Organized in March of 1912 and opened for business on the 1st of May fol- lowing, with a capital stock of $50,000, the bank has prospered from the start and within the first year its deposits had increased more than $100,000. The officers and directors, who also were the organizers of the institution, are as follows: C. W. Mathews, president; David Brandon, vice-president ; H. P. Preston, cashier; J. W. Preston, B. A. Lendrum, M. H. Iversen and L. C. Gregory.
From the age of seven years, in 1870, Mr. Mathews has been a resident of California and of Mendocino county, having come here with other mem- bers of the family from his native city of Ottawa, Canada. The early home of the family in the west was at Caspar, where the father engaged on timber contracts in the redwoods, the son assisting him in logging camps or work- ing in saw mills during the vacation period of school life. On completing the studies of the common schools lie secured a clerkship in the Bank of Men- docino and from that city in 1891 came to Fort Bragg to enter the employ of the Union Lumber Company, in whose office he has risen from a humble place to the responsible post of cashier. In addition to his banking business he still acts as cashier of the company with which he has been identified for more than a score of years and which justly may attribute to him much of its local strength and stability.
The marriage of Mr. Mathews united him with Miss Carrie Blake, a native of Massachusetts, and their union has been blessed with three chil- dren, William C., Inez A. and Phyllis M. Mr. Mathews was made a Mason in Fort Bragg Lodge No. 361, F. & A. M., and is a member of Mendocino Chapter, R. A. M., Santana Tribe No. 60, I. O. R. M., and with his wife is a member of Sapphire Chapter, O. E. S., of which he is past patron. Always interested in the cause of education, he has served for over ten years as a member of the board of school trustees of Fort Bragg and has been secre- tary of the board. He is an active member of the Baptist Church, and has served as a member of the board of deacons as well as on the board of trustees. Efficient in business, keen in financial dealings, devoted in friendships and loyal in citizenship, he belongs to that class of people whose presence has been helpful to Mendocino county and whose progressive spirit has aided in its commercial development.
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HON. LILBURN W. BOGGS .- The life which began in Lexington, Ky., January 14, 1798, and closed in Napa county, Cal., March 19, 1861, was lifted out of the ordinary routine by the romance of war service, of political turmoil and of victorious achievement. While ex-Governor Boggs is claimed in the annals of Missouri as one of the early governors of that commonwealth and as a leader during the dangerous period of Mormon hostilities, his name also is identified with the pioneer period of western development and with the open- ing of an overland trail for emigrants prior to the discovery of gold. Much as he loved Missouri and dear as was the home of that interesting and event- ful period of his career, he developed an attachment equally deep for the California home of his last years and experienced the gratification common to all high-principled men when success in the west enabled him to pay to the last penny the large indebtedness into which he had been plunged by reason of the great panic of the latter '30s. To retrieve these losses in his own state had seemed impossible, so at an age when many men would have feared launching their bark in a strange stream he came across the plains to make a new financial start in the world. The subsequent discovery of gold aided him greatly in his business affairs and enabled him to make good the losses of the past, besides leaving him a competency for his declining days. It was given to him to devote to California about fourteen years of stirring activity and then his health began to fail, dropsy of the heart developed and after suffering for more than a year he passed from pain into the peace of eternity.
The Boggs family originally settled on the eastern shore of Maryland, hut during the latter part of the eighteenth century John M. and Martha (Oliver) Boggs sought a home in the then unsettled regions of Kentucky, where the former died in young manhood, leaving a son Lilburn W., to take up the burden of self-support in boyhood years. To this lad destiny brought an early experience in warfare. At the age of sixteen he enlisted in the war of 1812 and under Capt. Levi Todd, of Fayette county, Ky., he spent eighteen months at the front, taking part in the battle of the Thames or Tippecanoe be- sides other minor engagements. On his return he became a bookkeeper in the old Insurance Bank of Kentucky, but at the age of eighteen went to St. Louis and from there removed to Franklin on the Missouri river, opposite the present site of Boonville. Later he was stationed at Fort Osage as deputy factor for paying Indians their annuities. While in St. Louis he had married Miss Julia Bent, daughter of Judge Silas Bent, and she died early in 1821, leaving two sons, Angus and Henry Carroll. In addition to the work at Fort Osage he engaged in business for a time at Marias DuCene. While the family were living at the latter post his elder son had a narrow escape from death. The two small boys, Angus and Henry Carroll, were amusing them- selves sliding on the ice, when the elder slid a little too far and fell into the opening. The swift current swept him down under the ice to a point where there was an air-hole. An old Indian, whose wigwam was near by, witnessed the accident. Without a moment's hesitancy he seized a rail, ran down on the ice, laid flat on his body, shoved the rail along in front of him over the thin ice and finally reached the spot where the small boy was becoming exhausted from the cold and from his vain efforts to retain a hold on the breaking ice. Reaching out with great care the Indian grasped the child, hauled him on the ice and bore him to safety, then stalked off to his wigwam with as little concern as though he had not risked his life in a most dangerous and coura-
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geous act. The father of the child was known as the "Big Trader" among the Indians and he at once sent for the rescuer, thanked him most earnestly and inquired as to how he could reward him. Pointing to a huge pile of trade blankets the Indian replied "One blanket." Such was the gratitude of the father that the Indian not only received one blanket, but as many as he could carry and other articles dear to the heart of a savage were also heaped upon him.
The second marriage of ex-Governor Boggs was solemnized in 1823 and united him with Panthea G. Boone, daughter of Jesse Boone and grand- daughter of the famous old Kentucky pioneer, Daniel Boone. A new home ivas established at Harmony, Mo., on the Neosho, a branch of the Osage river, at which point Mr. Boggs was engaged in trading with the Indians for furs and pelts. The first child of the second marriage was born at Harmony, Thomas Oliver Boggs, a comrade of Kit Carson on the plains and for more than forty years a resident of Las Animas, Colo., and engaged as a trader among the Indians as an agent of the great Bent's organization of furriers. From the post at Harmony the family removed to Six Mile Settlement in Jackson county, Mo., where in October, 1826, occurred the birth of the second son, William M. Boggs, also a plainsman and later captain of the emigrant train to California. From Six Mile Settlement the family removed to Inde- pendence, where Mr. Boggs engaged in the mercantile business. All of the children of his second marriage were born in Jackson county with the excep- tion of a son, George W., whose birthplace was Jefferson City.
The personal qualities of Mr. Boggs were so attractive, his intellect so profound and his interest in the state so great that naturally he rose to influ- ence. After serving as representative, senator and lieutenant-governor he was honored with the office of governor. After the burning of the old state house he was engaged to visit the east and purchase supplies for the com- pletion of the new capitol, a splendid structure for those times, begun about 1837 and finished in 1840, constructed of white freestone, with six granite columns in front. thirty feet between cap and base, six feet in diameter, and placed in a circle at the main entrance, over which on a stone slab appear the names of Governor Boggs and the other state officers. His service as governor was filled with anxiety and trouble, but he persisted in independent appoint- ments despite of enmity aroused. He was no weakling, to be controlled by party machinery. Dissensions arose with leading statesmen who regarded themselves as supreme in power, but no criticism could turn him from a course he believed to be right. His frontier friends and backwoods associates were treated with a hospitality gracious and cordial ; the poor were welcomed to his home with as much tact and kindness as the rich received. Many a man was indebted to him for a start that in after years led him to fortune and success. His greatest trouble as governor was with the Mormons, who had formerly lived near Independence, Mo., but after hostilities that threatened the shedding of blood had been exiled, retreating to Nauvoo on the Mississippi river in Illinois. The later troubles of this sect in Illinois are a matter of history and only terminated with the shooting of Joe Smith in the Hancock county jail in Carthage and with the exile of the Mormons to the then desert of Utah. Meanwhile the activity of Governor Boggs in causing their removal from Missouri had embittered Smith and he had prophesied that the Governor would die of violence within twelve months. Shortly after that prophecy Orin
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Porter Rockwell had attempted to assassinate the Governor, who by the merest chance escaped death. Two balls lodged in the left side of his brain, one lodged in the fleshy part of his neck and one passed through the hollow of the neck and came out at the roof of the mouth. The attempted murder pros- trated him for a year, but did not prevent his election to the senate and his splendid service in behalf of his district in that body.
On completion of his service as senator ex-Governor Boggs settled on a farm near Independence, thence went into that town and later purchased a farm in Cass county, but the death of his eldest daughter, Martha, at that place caused him to become dissatisfied and he returned to Independence. Mean- while a number of his friends had investigated the country west of the Rocky mountains and had given favorable accounts of natural resources and cli- mate, but doubted the advisability of families attempting to cross through the unexplored intervening country. Captain Rickman, who had been west as far as Yerba Buena (now San Francisco) advocated the idea of a trans-continental railroad and he and the Governor would converse for hours over the feasi- bility of such an enterprise. As early as 1842 the Governor wrote an article on the subject addressed to Shadwick Penn, then the editor of the St. Louis Republic. The article described an overland route for the railroad via Santa Fe (much the line later taken by the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe) with the exception that his starting point was to be Independence, Mo., and his ter- ininus, San Diego, Cal. His estimate of the cost of construction was based on such cost in Pennsylvania and was remarkably near the true cost of the later undertaking. The original article on the subject is still preserved and is in the possession of the Sonoma Pioneer Society.
Against the advice of many timid and conservative counselors the Gov- ernor determined to migrate to California. His eldest sons, Angus and Henry Carroll, who were married and living on farms in Jackson county, did not care to accompany him, although the latter followed in 1850. The eldest child of the second marriage had gone to Bent's ford and so it was the fourth son, William M., who had charge of the expedition which left Independence May 10, 1846. Just before starting William M. Boggs married Sonora Hicklin, daughter of John Hicklin, who in early life had been an intimate friend of the Governor and his comrade on expeditions among the Indians. At Ash Hollow on the Nebraska river William M. Boggs was chosen captain of the party which included about one hundred families. The wisdom of the choice was proved by the success of a most dangerous trip. All of his party reached their destinations in safety with the exception of the Donner family and their imme- diate friends, who decided to take a cut-off against which the captain advised. Their terrible sufferings in the Sierra Nevada mountains and their subse- quent fate are matters of history. Being an expert marksman Captain Boggs supplied the large expedition with buffalo-meat and other ganie and was therefore exceedingly popular. besides which he showed the pluck in hard- ships that invariably wins admiration from others.
Previous to the arrival of the Missourians in the Sacramento valley in November, 1846, they were met by Colonel Fallon of the Fremont party, who informed them that the American flag was flying in California and that recruits were being gathered for the army of Colonel Fremont. Later Gen- eral Vallejo tendered the ex-Governor the use of his house on the Petaluma rancho and there the family spent the wet winter in 1846, with no society
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except an occasional visit from the General. In the spring the Governor entered into merchandising in Sonoma, where Colonel Mason, the military governor of California, appointed him alcalde of the northern district, his jurisdiction to extend to Sacramento and to include Sutter's Fort, thence extending northward to the Oregon line and down the coast to the bay, including all of the country north of the bay of San Francisco. Among the duties of the alcalde was the performance of marriage ceremonies and fre- quently Governor Boggs rode thirty or more miles in order to officiate at weddings. He read the service at the marriage of Dr. Robert Semple, the founder of Benicia, and Miss Frances Cooper, daughter of Stephen Cooper, who erected in 1848 the first hotel at Benicia. He also united in marriage William Edgington and Nancy Grigsby, daughter of Capt. John Grigsby, of the Bear Flag party ; also many other young couples of pioneer prominence. Other duties of the office of alcalde included the trying of cases and the maintenance of order, with authority to call on the military if necessary. It happened that in one case Captain Sutter had been ordered to appear before the court, but instead of responding in person he sent an Indian with gold dust amounting to about $300, stating that gold had been discovered on the Ameri- can river and his business was of such importance that he could not obey the summons. This was the first news received at Sonoma concerning that most interesting event. People at once rushed for the mines, but the Governor continued at Sonoma, took charge of gold dust for returning miners, built up a very large trade as merchant and in a few years had amassed a small for- tune. In 1852 he sent two sons to Missouri to buy fine stock and in that way some splendid Durham cattle were brought into Napa county that proved most valuable in the future history of the stock industry there. His last years were passed happily on his farm in Napa valley and at death his body was interred in the Tulucay cemetery in that county, where his wife, who passed away September 23, 1880, was buried by his side. Many of the most im- portant state papers of Governor Boggs were lost or destroyed by fire, a fact greatly deplored by the representatives of the present generation as well as by patriots interested in the preservation of early history. One of the doct- ments still in existence, dated at Copenhagen, April 21, 1840, and signed by the Royal Society of Northern Antiquarians, informs him of his election as a member of that society, organized in furtherance of the perpetuation of pre- Columbian history of America. The letter is partly in the Danish language and is a beautiful specimen of penmanship, signed by the president as well as the secretary, and bearing the legal seal of the society. By chance this docu- ment has been preserved, while many other papers equally interesting and perhaps even more important, have passed out of existence, depriving the fam- ily of the pleasure of a complete understanding of events entering into the history of this pioneer governor and shaping his policy in public affairs. Enough, however, has been preserved to indicate his forceful intellect, splen- did capacity for leadership, intelligent grasp of national issues and rare devo- tion to his country and his home.
CAPTAIN JOHN KAY FRASER .- There is hardly a better known resident along the shores of Clear lake, in Lake county, than Captain Fraser, who came to this region almost fifty years ago, in 1866, and has lived here almost continuously since. He is one of the forceful characters which are necessary to the successful development of a section in its early days, and he
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has continued to occupy an important position in his community to the present, his high standing as a business man, influence in civic matters and personal integrity being of definite value in promoting its welfare. As a typical representative of the Highland Scotch race from which he springs, it inight be expected that he would possess the qualities of physical hardiness and mental fitness which have distinguished its scions for generations. In a maternal line he is descended directly from a sister of Lovat, who fomented the last Jacobite uprising. After Lovat was beheaded his sister crossed the Atlantic to the new world, settling in Nova Scotia, and her posterity inter- married with the Frasers.
Hugh Fraser, grandfather of Captain Fraser, came to Nova Scotia from Scotland, and there his son, Hugh Smith Fraser, the Captain's father, lived and died. The latter fought in the French-English war. He married Mrs. Hannah (Mckenzie) McKay, who also passed all her life in Nova Scotia. and who was a member of a family as famous in Canada as her husband's, the Mckenzie river in British America, which drains the great Arctic slope, being named for her family, while the Fraser river is so called in memory of the family here under consideration. There are no names in the great north- west of more historic importance, and few of the explorers whose deeds are known have been more honored. Hugh Smith Fraser died at the age of sixty years, his wife at the age of sixty-eight. She had four children by her first husband, John George, Roderick, Carmichael and Christobal ; and nine by her marriage to Mr. Fraser, viz .: Alexander, Elizabeth, Anna B., Sarah, Robert, Smith, Mary, Thomas and John Kay. Duncan Fraser, one of the governors of Halifax, was a cousin of Mr. Fraser.
John Kay Fraser was born at New Glasgow, Nova Scotia, December 2, 1844, and his educational advantages were meager, as he grew up in a stony region still in its pioneer state, and the nearest school was two miles distant. Until sixteen years of age he lived on his father's farm. from that time until he was twenty serving an apprenticeship to the trade of carpenter and builder on the island of Cape Breton. Then he went to New York City to follow his trade, and after remaining there one spring and one summer proceeded to Charleston, S. C., and Savannah. Ga., whence he returned to New York. Meantime he was employed as a journeyman carpenter. In the early fall of 1866 he set out from New York for California, going by the Nicaragua route and arriving at San Francisco in October of that year. Again he went to work at his trade. and his employer, William Murdock, needing a man to come up to Lake county to build a dredge on Borax lake, sent him. He arrived liere in December and at once commenced the construction of a steam dredge, the first of its kind ever built in the county, and used in the dredging of Borax lake. His work on the dredge and around the borax mine lasted twenty-three months, until the borax was exhausted, after which he went to the silver mines at Hamilton. Nev. Returning to San Francisco after six months' work in the silver mines, he resumed carpentry in that city, doing general building work until he decided to come back to Lake county in 1870. For a year or so he was engaged in mining and refining sulphur at Sulphur Banks, in 1871 buying some land at Elgin Point to the improvement of which he devoted about a year. Selling it in 1872, he turned his attention more par- ticularly to the boat business, with which he has ever since been associated. In May, 1873, he went to San Francisco to get a steam launch for Capt. R. S.
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