USA > California > San Francisco County > San Francisco > Men and memories of San Francisco in the "spring of '50" > Part 11
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Mr. Daniel Lockwood died in Newark, N. J., several years since.
Mr. Joice, is and has been for many years, a notary, and bids fair to live a half century longer, if one may judge by his step and man- ner on California street; and better still, by the ground he will get over, and the steep hill- sides he can climb, in a day's shooting, coming in full of spirit and fun, when some of the boys are lame and disagreeably quiet. We hope he may bag his game for many years to come, for we do certainly like good-natured men.
Swift & Brother, James and S. C. Swift, were general merchants on Sacramento street, between Montgomery and Kearny, in the spring of '50. John B. Bourne, a brother-in-law of one of the firm, was employed with them. The fire of June 14th, '50, burned them out. Mr. Bourne went on a voyage of speculation to Callao in the following October, returned in the spring of '51, and rented one of a block of stores on Long Wharf, adjoining the storeship Apollo. Mr. Bourne hired this store of Mr. Chase, a carpenter, who built and owned the block.
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Saturday evening Mr. Chase called in for his rent-rents were payable in advance-which Mr. Bourne paid-$1400 per month. This was about sunset, and before midnight his store, as well as his rent money, had disappeared. Mr. Bourne seems just as well able to-day to bear misfortune as he was twenty years ago.
John A. McGlynn was City Recorder, and his office was in the City Hall in '50. Dan. C. McGlynn was a dealer in paints and oils on Sacramento street, near Montgomery. Their homes and their interests have been with us ever since that time, and they are worthy citi- zens.
Balley & Hooper were merchants on the cor- ner of Montgomery and Pacific in 1850. We think Mr. Balley was afterwards of the firm of Edwards, Balley & Co. Mr. B. was an unselfish, benevolent man, and lost his life by an act of courtesy to a lady, who was one of a party com- ing down the Sacramento river to San Francisco. When the steamer came to the bay, the sudden change of atmosphere caused the lady to ex- press her fear of taking cold, if she remained on deck. Mr. Balley immediately removed his cloak and wrapped it about the form of his fair
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companion, but this act of gallantry cost him his life, as he then contracted a cold from which he never recovered.
John H. Saunders arrived in San Francisco on the twentieth of June, 1850, on the steamer Tennessee. S. R. Throckmorton, Lieut. Beale (subsequently Surveyor-General of California), Messrs. Berri and May (of Davidson & Co.), James L. King, Leonard Skinner, Chetwood & Edwards, and many others well known, were on the same steamer. Mr. Saunders has since been City Attorney for San Francisco, and State Sen- ator from San Francisco. He is a virtuoso, a skillful amateur musician, and a generous, honor- able man.
Thomas G. Cary was with Macondray & Co. in 1850, and subsequently was one of the firm. Mr. Cary was a merchant, a scholar, a student, . an ichthyologist; an accomplished master in self-defense, a gentleman, and a rare good fellow. He left California about ten years since, and has been very busily occupied nearly all that time in the museum of zoology at Harvard Col- lege, Cambridge, Mass.
I. Friedlander was a busy man in San Fran- cisco in 1850, and has been ever since. He is a Field Marshal in California's army of specu- lators-marshals his forces, and moves with
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mighty results. He has brains and sagacity, generosity, honor and gratitude, and never for- gets a favor from high or low; but any unfair- ness toward Mr. Friedlander has not been found remunerative.
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CHAPTER XXIII.
THE road or track to the Presidio, twenty years ago, was not as comfortable for a drive as at the present day. No level way for vehicles along the hard, steep-sloping hill, corrugated with rain-washed ruts and ugly gulleys. It was a most uninviting ride for those in the saddle; but to drive in a vehicle across that old Pre- sidio road, was neither safe nor pleasant. There were many ways of scaling the hill-we mean to say pathways to the hill-but the most trav- eled was the one off Powell street, near Wash- ington Square. The hard adobe soil in summer was like stone, and in the rainy season gummy, sticky and disagreeable. The steep, shelving, uneven way, making the carriage perpetually seem as if it were just toppling over, or sliding down the precipitous hill, was very trying to the nerves of those penned in upon the back seat; and when we remember that old, uneven, rutted, gulley - worn road, we wonder how we ever had the courage to travel it in any
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way, other than in the saddle. Like all prim itive roads, it wound up over the highest, most toilsome way, past cattle-pens and corrals, brick-yards and butcher's shambles, the ground all the way looking as baked and hard as slag or adamant, with no sign of vegetation, but everywhere a surface, seemingly blown bare by the continuous winds of summer. After the rains, 'twas difficult to believe in such a change. The tender emerald grass and dotting wild flowers, the soft, soothing air, winning us to forgetfulness of the harsh summer gales, parch- ing the skin, fretting the eyes, and spoiling the hair and temper. In the dry, dusty season, it was pleasant to come upon the little grove of trees where Leonidas Haskell's house stood, and where he afterwards built three cottages, one of which was occupied by John C. Fre- mont. Trees were very grateful to the eyes of San Franciscans in those days, when homes and gardens and shrubbery were not yet planted, and hearts were not rooted to the country, en- twined with the old associations and affections belonging with "home" in every clime.
When we had passed Mr. Haskell's house, we were descending the western slope of the hill, and turned southward a little way; then down again westwardly to the little lane, past
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the brick yard to the little grocery, making the corner of the block where the French gardeners cultivated their vegetables for the city markets. The Sutter street railroad uses this same road now for their Harbor View track. In those days, the road abruptly descended to a little hollow, which was impassable often in the rainy season, obliging the traveler to skirt the high bank on the north side, at the edge of the gar- den on the other side, kept by another citizen of La Belle France. Beyond this little hollow, was another very abrupt little rise, which brought you to the road leading to the " La- guna," or Washerwoman's Bay, where Ansel I. Easton's laundry was busy at work upon the P. M. S. S. Co's linen-a never-ending labor in those days of Panama travel. Mr. James Laid- ley has built a residence on this spot, and has changed the appearance of things beyond recog- nition. Farther on were cow-sheds and barns, and milk-ranches, a little wayside inn, where soldiers, with a day's liberty from the Presidio barracks, might come and enjoy lager and lib- erty combined. A few cottages were beside the road, at intervals, until the Government Reserve was reached, and the Presidio, which was then a few dilapidated, old adobes, some long, shed- like barracks, and a cottage or two for the
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officers' quarters-no more like the Presidio of to-day than the fort at Fort Point now is like the one built by the old Spaniards. Leaving out the question of utility, the old fort was far more picturesque and charming to visit than the red brick, angular, menacing pile of defense now usurping its place. We must confess to the belief that the old Spanish fort would have made a short and sorry fight, as compared with ยท its mighty successor. Still, we shall always re- member the old one, and our visits to it, with a pleasurable feeling, which never could be awak- ened by any amount of intimacy with the fort of to-day.
There was such an air of romance about the old, gray, crumbling walls and moldering ram- parts; such a mute significance upon the face of everything within those silent walls, upon the cliff that overhung the foamy beach. The decaying gun-carriage, with wheels half buried in the weeds and grass; the rusty, old, iron ring we stooped to lift, and found it fast in the old plank scuttle; some hidden cell, or water-tank, provided for a siege. The weather- worn embrasures, that scores of years ago framed in the faces of seaward-gazing sentry, and com- mandante, grave and thoughtful-now, but the basking-place where sea-birds rest awhile, blink-
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ing in the warm sunlight, and gathering fresh strength, again sail out upon the winds, and scream above the sea, whose monotone beating its cadence on the rocky shore had, years ago, sung the old fort to everlasting rest.
This was the end of the Presidio road. Horse- men often went on over the hill beyond the fort to Point Lobos, and to the cliff, where now the Cliff House stands, and halted to watch the pla- tyrhynchus of Cuvier, now popularly known as Captain Foster's sea lions. The man of to-day, lounging luxuriantly in a cane chair upon the broad, sheltering balcony, leisurely watching through a good glass the clumsy gambols of Captain Foster's stock, with the best of viands, wines and fragrant weeds at his command, has the advantage of him who, in the saddle or on foot, breasted the winds and dust over the heavy path, with its ending on the open cliff-shelter- less and supperless. Some went on by the beach to the old Ocean House, and in to the Mission by the hill where the Industrial School now stands. Some by another way, between Lone Mountain and the other hills, where, near a little lake, stood a small wayside house, whose occupant dispensed milk-punch, refreshing, rich and cool. This way led to the Mission (nearer than by the beach) across the open, primitive
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and unfenced country, upon whose broad-spread- ing acres most of the thoughtless riders looked, as upon so much dirt; while a few, with saga- cious foresight, seized the opportunity, making for themselves great fortunes.
The Russ family came to California on the ship Loo Choo, with Stevenson's Regiment, and were, altogether, we believe-father, mother, sons and daughters-twelve in number. The old house at the corner of Sixth and Harrison streets, on the block known as Russ' Garden, was standing a year or two since. J. C. C. & A. G. Russ, goldsmiths and jewelers, lived there in 1850, and had their store on Montgomery, between Pacific and Broadway.
Russ' Garden was a famous suburban resort twenty years ago for the German citizens' May- day festivities, Sunday-school picnics and mis- cellaneous merry-makings. The garden was a little, dry knoll in the middle of a swamp, and the rider who came along the narrow road built from Folsom street to the garden, mired his horse if he deviated in the least from the track. As late as '55, we have seen horses and cows swamped on both sides of the Folsom street plank-road, and on the east side of the road leading to the garden. To-day it would be
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difficult to see any traces of the old neigh- borhood; all seems alike south of Market street. The Russ family had a house on Bush street, just above where the Russ House stands. A large, three-story, wooden hotel used to occupy part of the ground on Montgomery street now covered by the Russ.
Mr. Otto Kloppenburg, formerly City Treas- urer, kept a grocery store on the Russ House corner of Bush and Montgomery. Peyser Bros. kept a clothing store on this block for twenty years or more, and took the corner of Bush street when the Russ House was built. There they remained until within a few months, when they sold out their lease to Mr. Raphael, who carries on the same business. The Russ family have always been good citizens, and deserve the fortune which has come to them by the appre- ciation of the land they had the prudent fore- sight to secure and improve.
Gladwin & Whitmore were merchants on California street, between Montgomery and San- some. Horace M. Whitmore, of this firm, was always an enthusiastic Californian, a firm be- liever in his adopted State's eventual perma- nence, commercially and agriculturally, in its climatic advantages, and their certain influence in its future population. It was through Mr.
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Whitmore's persistent labors, with the invalu- able aid of Professor Davidson, of the United States Coast Survey, that the Limantour Fraud was detected and thwarted. Others have claimed the credit of that exposure, but the merit be- longs where we have placed it. Mr. Whitmore was the first to agitate the widening of Kearny street, and followed up the enterprise with that tenacious, patient industry of purpose in a good cause, which was ever the business of his life. Few men in San Francisco had made so much happiness for so many people, by genuine, unos- tentatious kindness and charity, as Horace M. Whitmore. In 1849, Mr. Whitmore purchased the house built by Rodman M. Price, on Cali- fornia street, below Dupont, where he lived until the time of his death, two years since. Mr. Whitmore never was away from the State after his arrival, in 1849. He left a large estate, in which is the block known as Trainor's Row, on Kearny, corner of Sutter street.
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CHAPTER XXIV.
THE three-story wooden house on Dupont street, just south of the Congregational Church, on the southwest corner of California and Du- pont, and occupied so many years by Mr. Tal- lant, the banker, was bought from the cargo of a wrecked ship, by General Cazneau, in the spring of 1850. Mr. Joseph Capprise, of Bal- timore, superintended its erection. This house was fitted and prepared for building in the East, and shipped for California.
On the fourth of July, '50, this house was gaily decorated with flags of all nations-a novel proceeding in San Francisco, exciting much attention. Among the floating bunting was the green banner and its golden harp, which gave rise to the rumor that it was the residence of the Irish Consul. The old house, which stood so many years high up on the embank- ment, is now lowered to the street level, and changed past recognition.
General Thomas N. Cazneau, Hon. H. H.
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Byrne and Mr. Joseph Capprise came to Cali- fornia on the same ship. The General looks no older than on the day of his arrival; but his two companions are sleeping in the necropolis, for whose inhabitants the sea sings everlast- ingly a mournful threnody.
The house of which we have elsewhere spoken, as erected by Judge Burritt, on the northwest corner of Stockton and Sutter streets, in 1851, was made and fitted for building, and shipped in Boston for San Francisco. Its twin was erected in Benicia by General Frisbie, and is at present, we believe, occupied by Captain Walsh. We have a vindictive feeling for the rascal who tried a few months since to burn the old house in San Francisco, which has long been a pleasant sight to the citizen who knew only its comfortable, home-like, Elizabethan exterior through so many long years, that it had become like the kind face of an old acquaintance. But those who were more fortunate, and knew the welcome of its interior in Lucien Hermann's and Dr. Bowie's time, can never forget the genuine hospitality, nor the fascinating conversational power of their courteous hosts.
John S. Ellis had a shipping office in San Francisco, in 1850. We think the firm was Ellis
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& Goin-Thomas Goin; and that they had one office on Central Wharf, near Montgomery street, and another at Clark's Point. Mr. Ellis has since filled the office of Sheriff for San Francisco. He has resided in New York at various times, but his time in that city has always been occupied in advancing the interests of California's vini- cultural products.
Writing of Mr. Ellis' shipping office, reminds us of George W. Virgin, the shipping master, whose office was robbed by the Sydney thief, Jenkins, who was caught in the act, and hung. Mr. Virgin went from San Francisco to Siam, and became an Admiral in the Siamese Royal Navy, and a prime favorite with the Emperor, from whom he received distinguished consider- ation until his death. His Majesty made his favorite Admiral's obsequies a most imposing pageant.
Theodore C. Sanborn was of the firm of Gas- sett & Sanborn, on Jackson street wharf in '50. They were commission merchants, and lost largely in a great rice speculation. Many years afterward, we think in the Washoe ex- citement of '62-' 63, Mr. Sanborn was fortunate, and paid thousands of dollars to his old credit- ors, notwithstanding time had released him
.
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from all legal responsibility. This we know, and record the fact with genuine pleasure.
Finley, Johnson & Co. were on the corner of Washington and Montgomery streets. J. W. Austin was of this firm.
Annan, Lord & Co. were at No. 275 Mont- gomery street.
L. W. Sloat, son of Commodore Sloat, was proprietor of the Merchants' Exchange, on the corner of Washington and Montgomery streets. Mr. Sloat was a conchologist, and had in his rooms a rare collection of shells.
Hiram B. Sherman was also on the corner of Montgomery and Washington.
Burgoyne & Co., bankers, were on the south- west corner of Washington and Montgomery. John V. Plume was a partner in this banking house. We are pleased to see Mr. Plume again in our streets, after so many years' absence.
Mazera N. Medina had an office on Mont- gomery, a little north of Washington street; and Medina, Hartog & Co. were on Washington, above Montgomery.
Middleton & Hood were auction and commis- sion merchants, at 269 Montgomery street. The head of this firm was Mr. John Middleton, who is just as cool and self-controlled to-day as he was twenty-three years ago -- moves, acts, speaks,
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and seems the same. We sincerely hope that another score of years may find him as he is to-day. Two doors from the store of Middle- ton & Hood, Harry Meiggs had his office, and we, with many others, believe San Francisco would have been none the loser were his office there to-day.
P. A. Morse, counselor-at-law, had his office on the corner of Washington and Montgomery. John Nugent's office was on Montgomery, be- tween Washington and Clay.
Conroy & O' Connor were on Montgomery, north of Washington. John Rainey's store was on Montgomery, north of Washington.
James Dows & Co. were on, or next door to, the corner of Washington and Montgomery ; and we seem to remember Mr. Phelps as a sales- man for Dows & Co .- T. G. Phelps, who has since been Congressman for California, and Col- lector for the Port of San Francisco.
Beebe & Co. (S. Ludlow) were bankers on Montgomery, between Washington and Clay, in '50; and C. Marriott was a real estate broker close by. Edward S. Spear was a broker at 271 Montgomery street. Henry M. Naglee, since Gen. Naglee, was a banker on the corner of Merchant and Montgomery. Henry M. Naglee came to California as a Captain in Stevenson's
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Regiment. Manrow & Co. (W. N. Meeks) were on Montgomery, near Washington. There are many men who were then in active business in San Francisco, whom we remember, and might mention; but we must not subside into a San Francisco Directory for the spring of ' 50.
Henry Meiggs was one of the most enter- prising, generous and intelligent men who ever came to San Francisco, and his departure was one of the greatest losses that ever occurred to the city, in the taking of one individual from its population. The unfortunate complication and overwhelming liabilities which drove him from us, was a greater calamity to the prosperity of San Francisco than a conflagration or a flood. For him, personally, in a financial view, it was a great movement, and the tide which bore him through the " Golden Gate" " led on to for- tune." Now, he is the Rothschild of Peru- the man to whom the Government applies in time of need, and not in vain; nor yet did any one ever personally apply to him for aid, or for the settlement of any just debt, without satisfaction. The tribute paid to Mr. Meiggs by the late Hon. Edward Tompkins, in a letter published in the San Francisco News Letter, was the reward from one good man to another. Every just
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claim presented to Mr. Meiggs has been liqui- dated; and the accusations made by some in authority against that gentleman after his de- parture, were utterly without foundation, but were of great convenience, just then, to some whom we all know to be honorable men.
Music, art, charity and society met with a great loss in the absence of Mr. Meiggs. The Music Hall, which stood where the Occidental Hotel now stands, was built by that gentleman. Mr. Leach, Mr. Beutler, Geo. Loder, Mrs. Wells, Miss Leach, Mr. Zander, and many other celeb- rities, came to California by the influence of Mr. Meiggs. The organ in Trinity Church was the gift of that gentleman. We believe no man ever went away from among us more sincerely regretted, and if he were to return, we are sure that his reception would be an ovation.
The wharf at North Beach, stretching so far into the harbor, was built by Mr. Meiggs, and is as much a feature of the city as the Plaza, or Montgomery street.
It was no inconsiderable undertaking in the early days to build such a pier; and now it is suggestive of what the builder might accomplish in our city, with to-day's facilities. Mr. Meiggs' departure from this city was an unfortunate mistake on his part, and still more unfortunate
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for the welfare of San Francisco. Had he re- mained with us, the false accusations which, by reason of his absence, certain people found it convenient to lay at his door, would have been traced then, as they since have been, to their proper source; and he would have long ago outlived his financial troubles, and won the confidence and esteem which his subsequently honorable career gives him in the minds of all just Californians. In South America, the mu- nificence of his charities, and the grandeur of his operations in business, have made his name a proverb.
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CHAPTER XXV.
IN June, 1851, the citizens of San Francisco, who had long been smothering their indigna- tion at the condition of things, superinduced by the lax administration of justice to crimi- nals, were aroused to terrible action by the detection of a burglar in the very act of carry- ing off a portable safe, which he had just stolen from an office on Long Wharf. The property belonged to George W. Virgin, who had a ship- ping office, through the floor of which the bur- glar cut an entrance, took the safe-merely a big iron box-into his boat beneath the build- ing, and pulled out into the bay. He was fol- lowed by several boats, containing men who had overheard him at his work, and when nearly overhauled, threw his booty overboard. Some of his pursuers hove to, and succeeded in grap- pling the sunken treasure and safely landing it, when it was identified. The other boats fol- lowed, and arrested the burglar after a short, desperate fight. He was taken to the rooms of
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the Vigilance Committee, and proved to be a Sydney thief named Jenkins, a low, brutal, foul-mouthed villain, of herculean frame, with thick, coarse red hair and beard. He was imme- diately tried, and convicted on indisputable testimony. He had been heard at his work, standing in his boat, cutting through the floor into the building; seen putting the safe into the boat; followed by men who never for a mo- ment lost sight of him; observed to throw overboard the stolen property, which was sub- sequently raised and recognized; and finally captured.
All of this occurred early in the evening, and by the time the trial was finished and the sentence passed, it was midnight. The bell upon the engine house tolled out upon the quiet night-the preconcerted signal. Soon, a thousand men, ready and armed for action, had assembled. The doomed man, with pinioned arms, was marched out, along Sansome, Cali- fornia, Montgomery and Clay streets, to the Plaza. A proposition by some thoughtless per- son, to hang the condemned upon the flag-staff, was scorned as sacrilege, and the crowd moved on to the old adobe, which stood on the north- western corner of the Plaza. Over a beam of the veranda, on the building's southern end,
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the rope was thrown-its other end already round the prisoner's neck, and when all was ready, the silent but determined crowd dragged him along the ground and off his feet, up to the beam. They held his body hanging there for hours, relays of men, relieving others, quiet and orderly, speaking in whispers.
There is something indescribably awful, and ominously thrilling, about a silent crowd of men in the darkness of night. Loud words of jest and laughter, or angry altercation, give explana- tion; but a dense crowd of silent men, stand- ing, mysterious and alarmingly suggestive, or moving on, with that muffled tramp, so terrible and never to be forgotten, when heard from the feet of hurrying men with silent tongues, chills the listener's blood with dreadful apprehension. Jenkins, after his sentence, was asked to see a priest, which he declined, saying he would rather have a cigar; after which he requested some brandy and water. On the way to the gallows he spoke not a word. Arrived at the fatal spot, he refused, with obscenity and curses, the renewed offers of religious consolation, and died with ribaldry upon his lips. The night was moonlit, often obscured a moment by the passing clouds, bringing out, clearly defined, and then veiling in alternate light and charitable
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