USA > California > Nevada County > History of Nevada County, California; with illustrations descriptive of its scenery, residences, public buildings, fine blocks, and manufactories > Part 6
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The Patweens had broad, ovoid faces, low and very wide forcheads, stiff, bristly hair, and thin beard, which they generally plucked out. The head small; eyes bright when young, but bleared and hideous in age; nose thin at the base but broad and full below, almost in the shape of an cquilat- eral triangle; color of the skin, a dull bronze, sometimes dark brown, and more rarely quite black. The people were nsnally plump and fat when young, but wonderfully emaci- ated and dried up in old age. The frame was small, skull thick, hands and feet very small. A young Patween girl, with her soft, creamy complexion, wide dreamy eyes, and delicate hands and feet, was uot destitnte of a certain savage beanty.
The Patweeus had no name for, or idea of God, and no religions ceremonies; they had dances and feasts correspond- ing with our pie-nies and harvest-homes. They had a certain ceremony pretending to raise the dead, in which several muffled forms appeared in the sweat-house, before whom the women passed in procession, with fear and trembling. But this was only a device to seare the women and keep them in subjectiou. At their harvest time, they made fires on the hills, whooped, yelled, and chased the devil through the woods and finally up a tree, where the evil spirit was bribed to leave the country. Some times they drove the evil one iuto the 'sweat-house, where he was speedily "done for." The Corusies, or Colusa branch, buried their dead; the body was wrapped in a sack of skins, with the head bent down between the knees, and laid on its side. When the widow removed the funeral tar from her head it was a sign that she wanted to marry again.
The Neeshenams lived between Bear River and the Co- sumnes. The Poosoones resided at the month of the Amer-
ienn River, on the north side; the Quotoas, about the pro- sent site of Placerville; the Colon as, nround Suttor's old mill; tho Wapummes, near Latrobe.
The Neesheuams were very low in the social seale; both sexes went naked as late ns 1849. The men wero largo and well formed. They had no political organization, and no punishment for murder but personal revouge. Kidnapping women was a capital erime, and a woman's intercourse with a white man was pnuished with death. A squaw was stoned to death for this offense ut Dry Creek, in 1850. The women never would tell their own names, and the man nover cullod his wife by name, except in anger or derision. They had no social or political organization, except the family. Sut- ter's Indians were Neoshenams.
The Yoents inhabited the Kern and Tulare basins and the middle part of San Joaquin Valley. They had better organization and lived in regular villages, The Wintoons, Hoopas, and other small tribes lived on the Upper Sacro- mento and Trinity River, and their history does not im- mediately concern this work.
The valley Indians did not mannfacture bows. They had no cedar wood, and had to bny it of the mountaincors. Cedar, when dry, is very brittle, and the bow-maker mointed the wood every day with deer's marrow, to make it tongh and flexible. The bow was made from the white, or sap, of the tree, was seraped and carefully polished, so as to bend evenly, after which deers' sinews were split and glued on to the back, nntil it became convex in form. The glue was made by boiling doer and elk bones. A large bow was abont five feet long and very strong, requiring a powerful arm to bend it. The string was made of soveral strands of sinew, and would bear as much strain as a half-inch rope. Arrows were made of willow, buckeye, or reeds; war-arrows, with flint heads; arrows for game, without heads, and in sections, so that they could be shortened or lengthened, according to distance. Ten days was required to make a first-rate bow, which was valued at five dollars; arrows were worth twelve and a half cents a piece; shell moncy, from five to fifteen dollars a yard. A young wife was worth from twenty to thirty dollars; but widows and lewd women were not market- able at all.
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Print VII
HISTORY OF NEVADA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA
CHAPTER IX
Sir Francis Drake's Discoveries The Fabulous Straits of Anian -- Arctic Weather in June -Russian Invasion -Native Animals-Various Facts and Events.
For many years it was supposed and maintained in Eng- land that Sir Francis Drako was tho original discoverer of San Francisco Bay; but it is now considered certain that he novor found tho entrance to that inland sca. Drake was a buccaneer, and, in 1579, was in tho South Seas looking for Spanish ships to phundor, under the pretext of oxisting war botwoen England and Spain. Ho had two other pur- poses to subserve in behalf of tho English Goverument; to discover a new routo from Europo to the Indies, and to find a now territory northward, that would rival the Spanish- Amorican possossions in natural woalth. A rich trade had sprung up botween the Philippine Islands aud Spain; every year a Spanish galleon from the Malayan Archipolago crossed the Pacific to Acapulco, freightod with the richest morchan- diso, and this, Captain Drako was on the watch for, and did eventually capture.
At that timo navigators universally believed that the Amorican and Asiatic continents were separated only by the Straits of Anian, which wero supposed to lead eastward to tho Atlantic, somewhore about Newfoundland. This long- sought northwostern passage Drake was in search of. In the autmnn of 1578 Drako brought his little fleet of three vessels through the Straits of Magellan, and found the Pacific Ocean in a stormy rago, and, having been drifted about Cape Horn a couple of months, he concluded that the continent was thicro at an oud; that tho Atlantic and Pacific Oceans there united thoir waters; and ho very naturally came to the con- clusion that a similar juucture of seas would be found at the north, Having captured the great Spanish galleon, and finding himself overburdened with rich treasure, Drake wantod to return to England. He did not care to encounter the stormy waters of Cape Horu, and expecting to find a hostilo Spanish fleet awaiting him at the Straits of Magellan, he determinod to make his way home by a new and hitherto unknown route, the north-eastern passage. On the 17th of June, 1579, he entered what the historian of the expedition called " a faire, good bay, within thirty-eight " degrees of latitude of tho line." That exactly corresponds with what is now known as Drake's Bay, behind Point Reyes. There, although it was in the month of June, his men " com- " plained griovonsly of the nipping cold." Drake having given up the perilous north-eastern passage by way of the fabulous Straits of Anian, sailed away for England by way of
the Philippine Islands and the Cape of Good Hope. It is probable that while off the north-west coast, Drake saw the snowy crest of Mount Shasta and some of the Oregon peaks, and concluded that he had got near enough to the North Pole. At any rate, it is clear enough that he never passed through the Golden Gate, or rested on the magnificent waters of San Francisco Bay.
The Reverend Fletcher, chaplain of Drake's Expedition, must have been a terrible old story-teller. He says that when off the coast of Oregon, in the month of June, "The " rigging of the ship was frozen stiff, and the meat froze as it " was taken off the fire." Moreover, saith the same veracious parson, "There is no part of earth here to be taken up, " wherein there is not a reasonable quantity of gold and sil- " ver." These arctic regions and golden treasures were found along the ocean shoro between San Francisco and Portland.
Another English buccaneer, Thomas Cavendish, appeared on the Pacific coast iu 1586, and plundered the Philippine galleon of 122,000 pesos iu gold, besides a valuable cargo of merchandise. The pirate ran the vessel into the nearest port, set her on fire, liberated the crew, and made his escape to England.
It is supposed that one of the extensive Smith family was the first white man who crossed the Sierra Nevada from the States, but this fact is not altogether certain. In the sum- mer of 1825 Jedediah S. Smith, the head of the American For Company, led a party of trappers and Iudians from their camp on Green River across the Sierra Nevada and into the Tulare Valley, which they reached in July. The party trapped for beaver from the Tulare to the American River, and had their camp near the present site of Foisom. On a second trip Smith led his company further south, into the Mojave conutry on the Colorado, where all except him- self and two companions were killed by the Indians. These three made their way to the mission of San Gabriel, near Los Angeles, which they reached in December, 1826. In the following year Smith and his party, left the Sacramento Valley for the settlements on the Columbia River, but at the month of the Umpqua they were attacked by Indians and all killed except Smith and two Irishmen, who, after much suffering, reached Fort Vancouver. Smith returned to St. Lonis in 1830, and the following year was killed by Indians, while leading an expedition to Santa Fé. His history is no less adventurons and romantic than that of the famous Captain John Smith, of Virginia.
In 1807 the Russians first appeared on the coast of Cali- fornia. The Czar's ambassador to Japan came down from
Sitka, ostensibly for supplies, and attempted to establish communication between the Russian and Spanish settle- ments. The better to effect his purpose he became engaged in marriage with the Commandante's daughter at San Francisco, but on his way back to obtain the sanctiou of his Government he was thrown from his horse and killed. The lady assumed the habit of a nun, and mourned for her lover until death. In 1812 a hundred Russians and as many Kodiac Indians came down from their northern settlements aud squatted at Bodega, where they built a fort and main- tained themselves by force of arms until 1841, when they sold the establishment to Captain Sutter and disappeared.
In 1822 Mexico declared her independence of Spain, and established a separate empire. When the Indians at San Diego heard of it they held a great feast, and commenced the ceremonies by burning their chief alive. When the mis- sionaries remonstrated, the logical savages said: " Have you " not done the same in Mexico ? You say your King was " not good, and you killed him; well, onr captain was not " good and we burned him. If the new one is bad we will " burn him too. "
The State of California was originally divided into twenty- seven counties. The derivation of the several names adopted is given by General Vallejo:
San Diego (Saint James) takes its name from the old town, three miles from the harbor discovered by Viscaino in 1602
Los Angeles County was named from the city (Cindad de los Angeles) founded by order of the Viceroy of New Spain in 1780.
Santa Barbara was named after the town established in 1780 to protect the five adjacent missions.
San Luis Obispo, after its principal town, the site of a mission founded in 1772 by Junipero Serra and Jose Cavaller.
Monterey, after the chief town, which was so named by Viscaino in honor of his friend and patron, the Viceroy, Count of Monterey.
Santa Cruz (the Holy Cross) was named from the mission on the north side of the bay,
San Francisco, named in honor of the Friars' patron Saint.
Santa Clara, named from the Missiou established there in 1777.
Contra Costa (the opposite coast) is the natural designa- tion of the country across the bay from San Francisco.
Marin County, named after a troublesome chief whom an
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PUBLISHED BY THOMPSON & WEST.
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9. NEW SHAFT.
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HISTORY OF NEVADA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA.
exploring expedition encountered in 1815. Marin died at the San Rafael Mission in 1834.
Sonoma, named after a notod Indian, who also gave name to liis tribe, The word means " Valley of the Moon."
Solano, the name of a chief, who borrowed it from his missionary friend, Father Solano.
Yolo, a corruption of an Indian word yoloy, signifying a place thick with rushes; also, the namo of a tribe of Indians on Cache Creek.
Napa, named after a numerous tribe in that rogion, which was nearly exterminated by small-pox in 1838.
Mendocino, namod by the discoverer after Mendoza, Vice- roy of New Spain.
Sacramento, (the Sacrament.) Moraga gave the main rivor the name of Jesus Maria, and the principal branch he callod Sacramento. Afterwards the great river came to be known as tho Sacramonto, and tho branch Feather River.
El Dorado, tho appropriate namo of the district where gold was discovorod in 1848.
Sntter County, namod in honor of thio world-renowned pionoer, Jolın A. Sutter.
Yuba, a corruption of Uva, a name given a branch of Feather Rivor in 1824 by an oxploring party, on account of thio groat quantitios of wild grape vines growing on its banks.
Butte, tho common French term for a monnd, in allusion to throe symmetrical hills in that county; so namod by a party of the Hudson Bay Company hunters.
Colusa, from Coluses, the name of a numerons tribe on the west side of the Sacramonto. Meaning of the word is unknown.
Shasta, the name of a tribo who lived at the base of the lofty poak of same name.
Calaveras, so namod by Captain Moraga, on account of an immense number of skulls in the vicinity of a stream, which he callod " Calaveras, or the River of Skulls." This is the reputed site of a terrible battle between the mountain and valley Indians over the fishing question.
San Joaquin, after the river, so named by Captain Moraga in honor of the legendary father of the Virgin.
Tuolumne, a corruption of an Indian word, signifying a cluster of stone wigwams.
Mariposa signifies butterfly. So called by a party of hunters, who camped on the river in 1807, and observed the trees gorgeous with butterflies.
Trinity, called after the bay of that name which was dis- | covered on the anniversary of Trinity Festival.
When first visited by the Spaniards California ahoun le l in wild animals, some of which are now extinct. One of these was called Berendo by the Spaniards, and by the natives laye. "It is," says Father Venegas, "about the " bigness of a calf a year and a half old, resembling it in " figure, except the head, which is like that of a deer, and the " horns very thick, like those of a ram. Its hoof is large, " round, and eloven, and its tail short." This was the Argali, a species intermediato between the goat and the sheep, liv- ing in large herds along the bases of the mountains; sup- posed to be a variety of the Asiatic argali, so plentiful in Northern ind Central Asia. In his journey from Monterey to San Francisco, Father Serra met with herds of immense deer, which the men mistook for European cattle, and wondered how they got there. Several deer were shot, whose horns measured eleven fect from tip to tip. Another largo animal which the natives called cibelo, tho bison, inhabitedl the great plains, but was eventually driven off by the vast hierds of domestic cattle. When Langsdorff's ship was lying in the Bay of San Francisco in 1804, sea-ottor were swim- ming abont so plentifully as to be nearly unheeded. The Indians caught them in suares or killed them with sticks. Perouse estimated that the Presidency of Monterey alone conld supply 10,000 otter skins annually. They were worth twenty dollars and upwards apicce. Beechey found birds in astonishing numbers and variety, but their plumage was dingy looking, and very few of them could sing respectably.
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The name California was first given to the Lower Ponin- sula in 1536, and was afterwards applied to the coast ter- ritory as far north as Cape Mendocino. There has been much learned speculation concerning tho probable deriva- tion of the word, but no satisfactory conclusion has been reached. The word is arbitrary, derived from some expres- sion of the Indians.
The province, as it formerly existed under the Viceroys, was divided into two parts, Peninsular, or Lower and Old California, and Continental, or Upper and New, the line of separation running near the 32d parallel of latitude, from the northern extremity of the Gulf of California to the Pacific Ocean.
The Gulf of California-called also the Sea of Cortez, and the Vermilion Sea-is a great arm of the Pacific, which joins that ocean under the 23d parallel of latitude, and thence extends north-westward inland abont seven hundred miles, where it receives the waters of the Colorado and Gila Rivers. It is a hundred miles wide at the month, widens further north, and still further on contracts in width, till ics shores
become the banks of the Colorado, The Peninsular, or California side of the Gulf, was formerly celebrated for the size and beauty of its pearls, which were found in oysters, They were obtained with great ditlienlty, from tho erovices at tho bottom, by Indian divers, who had to go down twenty or thirty feet, and frequently wero drowned, or dovoured by sharks. In 1825 eight vessels engaged in tho fishing, ob- tained, altogether, five pounds of pearls, which were worth about ten thousand dollars. Sometimes, howovor, a single magnificent pearl was found, which compensated for yours of labor and disappointment. Some of the richest in the royal regalia of Spain, were found on the California Gulf.
Peninsular, or Lower California, lying between tho Gulf and tho ocean, is about 130 miles in broadth whoro it joius tho continent at the north, under the 32d parallel. and nourly in the samo latitude as Savannah in Georgia. Thonce it runs sentli-oastward, diminishing in broadth and terminating in two points, tho one at Cape San Imoas, in nearly the same latitude as Havana, the other at Cupo Palmo, 60 milos north-east, at the entrance of the Gulf.
Continental California extends along the Pacific from tho 32d parallol, where it joins the Peninsula, about 700 miles, to the Oregon line, nearly in the latitudo of Boston, Tho Mexican Government considered the 42d parallel of latitudo as the northern line of California, according to a treaty with the United States in 1828.
Greenhow, writing in 1844, says: "Tho only mino as yet " discovered in Upper California is one of gold, situated at " the foot of the great westernmost range of mountains, on " the west, at the distance of twenty-five miles from Angeles, " the largest town in the country. It is said to be of extra- " ordinary richness."
The animals originally found in California were buffalo, deer, elk, bear, wild hogs, wild sheep, ocolots, pumas, benvers, foxes, and many others, generally of a species different from those on tho Atlantic side. Cattle and horses were introduced from Mexico, and soon ovorran the country, and drove ont the buffalo and othor of the large animals. One of the worst sconrges of the country was the chapul, a kind of grasshopper, which appeared in clonds after a mild winter, and ate up overy green thing.
Little or no rain fell during the years 1840 and 1841, in which time the inhabitants were reduced to the verge of starvation.
It is a remarkable fact, that the Golden Gate is nearly in the same latitude as the entrance of Chesapeake Bay and the Straits of Gibraltar.
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HISTORY OF NEVADA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA.
In 1844 tho town of Monterey, the capital of Upper Cali- fornia, was a wretched collection of mud, or adobe, Houses, containing about 200 inhabitants. Tho castle and fort con- sisted of mind walls, behind which were a few worthless guus, good for nothing but to scare the Indians.
In 1838 the Russian settlements at Ross and Bodega con- tained eight or nine hundred inhabitants, stockaded forts, mills, shops, and stables, and the farms produced great abundance of grain, vegetables, butter, and cheese, which were shipped to Sitka. The lazy Spaniards were bitterly hostile to the industrious Muscovites, but durst not meddle with them. At last, having maintained their independent colony thirty-one years, thoy sold out to Captain Sutter, and quietly moved away.
Quint CHAPTER 8
THE AMERICAN CONQUEST.
Fremont and the Bear Flag- Rise and Progress of the Revolution-Com. modoros Sloat, Stockton, and Shbrick-Castro and Flores Driven Out Treaty of Pence Stockton and Kearney Quarrel Fremont Ar- rested, etc.
IN tho Spring of 1845, John C. Fromont, then a brevet- captain in the corps of United States Topographical En- gineors, was dispatched on a third tonr of exploration across tho continent, and was chargod to find a better ronte from tho Rocky Mountains to the month of the Columbia River. This was his ostensible business, but there is reason to be- liove that he had other and private instructions from the Government coucoruing the acquisition of California in view of tho pending war with Mexico. Fremont reached the frontiers of California in March, 1846, halted his company a lundred miles from Monterey, and proceeded alone to have an intorviow with General Castro, the Mexican Com- mandante. He wantod permission to take his company of sixty-two men to San Joaquin Valley to recruit their ener- gies before setting out for Oregon. To this Castro assented, and told him to go where he pleased. Immediately there- after the perfidions Castro, pretending to have received fresh instructions from his Government, raised a company of three hundred nativo Californians, and sent word to Fremont to quit the country forthwith, else he would fall upon and annihilate him and his littlo band of adventurers. Fremont sent word back that ho should go when he got ready, and then took position ou Hawk's Peak, overlooking Monterey, and raised the American flag. At this time neither party had heard of any declaration of war between the United States and Mexico.
Fremont's party consisted of sixty-two rough American borderers, including Kit Carson and six Delaware Indians, each armed with a rifle, two pistols, a bowie-knife, a· d toma- hawk. Castro manonvered ronnd for three days with his cavalry, infantry, and field-pieces, but, with true Mexican discretion, kept well ont of rifle-shot; and, on the fonrth day, Fremont, perceiving that there was no fight in the gascon, struck his camp and moved at his leisure towards Oregon.
At Klamath Lake, Lientenant Gillespie, of the United States Army, overtook Fremont's party, with verbal dis- patches, and a letter from the American Secretary of State, commending the bearer to Fremont's good offices. That was all; what the verbal dispatches were is still unknown. Fremont returned to the Sacramento Valley, and encamped near the Marysville Bnttes. He found the American settlers greatly alarmed by Castro's war-like proclamations, and had no difficulty in raising a considerable company of volunteers, a party of whom marched on the post of Sonoma, captured nine brass cannon, two hundred and fifty stand of small arms, and made prisoners of General Vallejo and two other persons of importance. Eighteen men were left to garri- son the place, under William B. Ide. Castro fulminated another proclamation from his headquarters at Santa Clara, calling on the native Californians to " rise for their religion, " liberty, and independence," and Ide issued another at So- noma, appealing to the Americans and other foreigners to rise and defend their rights of settlement, as they were about to be massacred or driven out of the conntry. The settlers re- sponded numerously and with alacrity, and, after one or two skirmishes, repaired to Sonoma, declared an independent State, and raised the now celebrated Bear Flag. That his- toric standard consisted of a piece of cotton cloth with a tolerable likeness of a grizzly bear, done with a blacking- brush and berry-jnice, and now belongs to the California Society of Pioneers.
In the meantime Fremont was organizing a battalion at Sutter's Fort, and having heard that Castro was moving in force on Sonoma, he made a forced march to that point with nine.y riflemen. Thence Fremont, Kit Carson, Lieutenant Gillespie, and a few others, crossed to the old fort at San Francisco, made prisoner the Commandante, spiked all the guns, and returned to Sonoma. There, on the 5th of July, 1846, he called his whole force of revolutionists to- gether and recommended an immediate declaration of inde- pendence. This was unanimously assented to, and the bear party was merged into the battalion, which now numbered one hundred and sixty mounted riflemen. Next day it was
determined to go in pursuit of the proclaiming Castro, who was said to be entrenched at Santa Clara with 400 men ; but when the battalion had crossed the Sacramento at Sut- ter's Fort, they learned that Castro had evacuated the Santa Clara country and fled to Los Angeles, whither they resolved to follow him, 500 miles away. At this point news was re- ceived that the American flag had been raised at Monterey, and that the American naval forces would co-operate with the monnted riflemen in the effort to capture Castro. Then the Bear Flag was hauled down, giving place to the stars and stripes, and Fremont aud his men set out overland for Los Angeles, after the declamatory but fugacious Castro, who will live in history as the "Captain Bobadil" of that brief but stirring revolution. Up to this time nothing had been heard of a declaration of war between Mexico and the United States.
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