Butte County CA Archives History - Books .....Hamilton 1882
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com January 27, 2006, 1:39 am

Book Title: History Of Butte County

HAMILTON.

    General Bidwell was one of the first white men to visit the place where the
town of Hamilton afterwards stood. It was in 1848, after returning from his trip
to San Francisco, he, in company with others, camped for the night on the bank
of Feather river. While supper was being prepared, he wandered out on the bar
and discovered some small particles of light, scale gold. During the following
year settlements were made in the vicinity, and in the spring of 1850, several
parties were living at Hamilton. One of the first to take up his abode here was
a Mr. Hamilton, a nephew of Alexander Hamilton, who, in company with A. N.
Morgan, proceeded to lay out a town. This year was prolific in towns, several of
which intervened between Hamilton and the southern line of the county. Hamilton
became a candidate for the county-seat at a very early age, and at the election
of June 10, 1850, received 196 votes, casting herself a vote of seventy-eight.
On the twenty-seventh of September, she was successful, and became the capital
and seat of justice. Shortly after the removal of the officers to Hamilton,
there were three hotels running at the place, besides old Mrs. Nichols'
boarding-house. The landlords were Edward Taylor, who had purchased his house of
a Mr. Dehton, Tom Gray and A. W. Morgan. Seneca Ewer, who practiced law, kept a
store, also; and another was subsequently run by Burrows & Cheeseman. Besides
these establishments, there were two saloons that dealt in a fine article of
nose paint.

    On the eighteenth of October, 1850, a license to run a ferry-boat across the
Feather river at Hamilton was granted to Clark Holdings. Hamilton was a busy
place for three years. It was intended that it should be the head of steamboat
navigation, but few boats ever visited it. Among the then residents of Hamilton
were Mr. and Mrs. Lathrop, afterwards of Oroville, and a Mr. Duncan. While the
county-seat was at Hamilton, a man sent from Colusa county to the county-jail,
on some heavy charge, committed suicide in his cell, by cutting his boots into
strips and hanging himself with them. After the removal of the county-seat to
Bidwell, the town languished, and finally disappeared altogether. In 1854, the
Hamilton hotel was run by C. C. Catlett. Mr. Taylor's hotel was conducted by him
until 1855, when it was burned to the ground. Mr. Robert Moore is now the sole
occupant of the town-site, and one visiting his pleasant home can hardly think
that a busy little village was once here.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

HISTORY OF BUTTE COUNTY, CALIFORNIA,
IN TWO VOLUMES.

I.
HISTORY OF CALIFORNIA FROM 1513 TO 1850.
BY FRANK T. GILBERT.

The Great Fur Companies and their Trapping Expeditions to California.
Settlement of the Sacramento Valley. 
The Discovery of Gold in California.
BY HARRY L. WELLS.

II.
HISTORY OF BUTTE COUNTY,
From its Earliest Settlement to the Present Time. 
BY HARRY L. WELLS AND W. L. CHAMBERS.

BOTH VOLUMES ILLUSTRATED WITH VIEWS AND PORTRAITS.
HARRY L. WELLS,
517 CLAY STREET, SAN FRANCISCO
1882.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1882, by HARRY L. WELLS, in
the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.

FRANCIS, VALENTINE & Co., Engravers & Printers
517 Clay St., San Francisco


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