Contra Costa County CA Archives History - Books .....Early History And Settlement- Part 3 1882 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/ca/cafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com June 22, 2005, 7:06 pm Book Title: History Of Contra Costa County, California The history of the settlement of any county of California follows so sequentially, and is so closely allied to the history of the Pacific Coast in general, and this State in particular, that to commence the chronicling of events from the beginning naturally and properly takes us back to the early discoveries in this portion of the globe, made by the hardy old voyageurs who left the known world and charted seas behind them and sailed out into an unknown, untraversed, unmapped and trackless main, whose mysteries were to them as incomprehensible as are those of that "undiscovered country" of which Hamlet speaks. In the year 1728 a Dane named Vitus Bering, was employed by Catharine of Russia to proceed on an exploring expedition to the northwest coast of America and Asia, to find, if possible, an undiscovered connection between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. On this voyage he solved the riddle and gave to the world the straits which now bear his name. On his return he tendered to the Empress the handsome skins which he had procured on his cruise, and so delighted was she, and so excited was the cupidity of capitalists from other countries, that soon settlements were established on the coast, and the collection of furs commenced. In 1799 the Russian American Fur Company was organized and located in what is now known as Alaska; Sitka was founded in 1805; and for many years the neighbors of the Russ were the Austrians and Danes. Now came the British. An association known as the King George's Sound Company was organized in London in 1784, for the purpose of making a settlement on the Pacific Coast, whither many of their vessels found their way up till 1790. Between the years 1784 and 1790, the coast was visited by ships of the East India Company, and about the last-named year craft of the United States were first seen in these waters. The ship Columbia, Robert Gray, Captain, arrived at the Straits of Fuca, June 5, 1791, and traded along the coast, discovering the Columbia River, which he named after his vessel, May 7, 1792. In 1810, a number of hunters and trappers arrived in the ship Albatross, Captain Smith, and established the first American settlement on the Pacific Coast. In the same year, under the leadership of John Jacob Astor, the Pacific Fur Company was organized in New York, and in 1811, they founded the present town of Astoria, at the mouth of the Columbia Biver. The British, however, soon after wrested it from their hands and drove all the Americans out of the country, many of whom found their way into California. Between the years 1813 and 1822, save deserters from vessels, and those connected with trading-posts, there were no Americans on the coast. In his "Natural Wealth of California," Titus Fey Cronise informs us that from 1825 until 1834 the whole of the California trade was in the hands of a few Boston merchants. A voyage to this coast and back, during that time, was an enterprise of very uncertain duration, generally occupying two or three years. The outward cargo, which usually consisted of groceries and coarse cotton goods, had to be retailed to the missionaries and settlers, as there were no "jobbers" in those times, and neither newspapers, telegraphs, nor stages through which to inform customers of the ship's arrival. The crew had to travel all over the country to convey the news, which occupied considerable time. It was this portion of their duties that caused so many of them to desert their ships. They saw so much of the country, became so charmed with the freedom, ease and plenty that prevailed everywhere, that they preferred to remain on shore. Each of these vessels generally brought several young men as adventurers, who worked their passage out for the privilege of remaining. Many of the early settlers, whose children are now among the wealthiest citizens of the State, came to California in this manner. The outward cargo being disposed of, the homeward one had to be procured. Sometimes, when the season had been too dry, or too wet for the lazy vaqueros to drive the cattle into the Missions to kill, there were no hides nor tallow to be had. On such occasions the vessel was obliged to remain till the next season, when a sufficient number of cattle would be slaughtered to pay for the goods purchased, as there was no "currency" used in the country, except hides and tallow. First in California of an alien race to settle was John Cameron, but who had assumed his mother's maiden name of Gilroy, and was thus afterwards known. He was born in the County of Inverness, Scotland, in the district of Lochaber, in the year 1794, and in the year 1813 arrived in Monterey, in one of Her Britannic Majesty's ships, on- board of which he was rated as coxswain of the captain's gig. From here he deserted, with a comrade known as "Deaf Jimmy," and waiting, carefully hidden, until the vessel had departed, the two friends, in their search for employment, found their way into the Santa Clara Valley. Gilroy established himself at the little town of San Ysidro, now generally called Old Gilroy, in contradistinction to the new town of Gilroy, where he married and remained till his death, which occurred in July, 1869. His confrere came to the north of the Bay, and died in Sonoma County. At this time there were not half-a-dozen foreign settlers in the whole country, save the Russians, who, it will be remembered, then occupied Bodega and Fort Ross, on the coast, while from San Francisco to Los Angeles there were only eight ranchos, the property of Mexican colonists. Prior to the year 1820 the manner of living was most primitive, and had it not been that horses were plentiful the mode of locomotion would have, of a necessity, been confined to pedestrianism, for, as there were no roads, there were no vehicles, while the wheels of those which existed were innocent of fellah, spoke, hub and tire. Not a hotel nor house of public entertainment was to be found throughout the length and breadth of the land, while there was no sawed timber, that used for building being hewn with axes by Indians. A fire-place or stove was unknown in a dwelling, nor did these come into use until 1846, after the American occupation. In the year 1823 application was made by Francisco Castro to the Mexican authorities for the San Pablo Rancho, and by Ignacio Martinez for that of Pinole, each to the extent of four leagues. In the following year these gentlemen, the actual pioneer settlers in what is at present Contra Costa county, constructed adobe residences, planted vineyards and orchards, erected corrals for their stock and otherwise commenced the work of reclaiming and improving. How few were the settlers then. Their nearest neighbors were the Peralta family at San Antonio, and the Castros at San Lorenzo. In 1826, Jose Maria Amador acquired and settled upon the San Ramon Rancho, but either of these were within the confines of which we write. The next accession to the strength of the little coterie was in the year 1828 when Valencia occupied the Acalanes Rancho, (at Lafayette), Felipe Briones the rancho which bears his name, and Moraga the Redwood Rancho, or Lagunas Palos Colorados. Soon after locating, however, Briones was slain near where now stands the town of Clayton by some Indians, who had made their way from the San Joaquin plain on a predatory expedition for horses, some of which they were driving away. Salvio Pacheco, during this year, came to the Rancho Monte del Diablo, and established himself near where the village of Concord has since sprung, where he resided until his death on August 9, 1876, at the ripe age of eighty-five years. About the same time application was made by Dona Juana Pacheco, a widow, for the Rancho San Miguel, and having acquired it dispatched her nephew Ygnacio Sibrian to occupy it, while she maintained her residence in the Pueblo de San Jose, Sibrian building an adobe residence near Walnut Creek, not far from the present home of William Rice. These persons afterwards obtained grants of four leagues each. Upon the San Ramon Rancho Mariano Castro, and Bartolo Pacheco settled during the year 1832, near where Leo Norris resides; while about the same period, William Welch, a Scotchman by birth, petitioned for and obtained the tract of land known as the Welch Rancho, on which a portion of the county seat, Martinez, is located. Welch did not long reside on his property in consequence of the hostility of the Indians; he therefore removed his family to San Jose, and afterwards established a head-quarters at the place near Walnut Creek, now known as the Welch Homestead. In this year, or in 1833, the Romero brothers settled in Tice valley and made application for a grant to the sobrante, or vacant land, which lay between the Ranchos of San Ramon, Welch, Acalanes and Moraga, a prayer which was denied many years after. In the year 1835 thirty citizens, styling themselves as of the Ranchos of the north, that is of districts to the north of the Bay, presented the following petitions to the Governor, which are produced as being a portion of history connected with Contra Costa. It is a desire on their part to belong to the jurisdiction of San Jose", rather than that of San Francisco: "To His Excellency the Governor: "The residents of the adjoining ranchos of the north, now belonging to the jurisdiction of the port of San Francisco, with due respect to your Excellency, represent: That finding great detriment, and feeling the evils under which they labor from belonging to this jurisdiction, whereby they are obliged to represent to your Excellency that it causes an entire abandoning of their families for a year by those who attend the judiciary functions and are obliged to cross the Bay. Truthfully speaking, to be obliged to go to the port by land, we are under the necessity of traveling forty leagues, going and coming back; and to go by sea we are exposed to the danger of being wrecked. By abandoning our families, as above stated, it is evident that they must remain without protection against the influences of malevolent persons; they are also exposed to detention and loss of labor and property, and injury by animals. There is no lodging to be had in that port, where, for a year, an ayuntamiento is likely to detain them, and, should they take their families, incurring heavy expenses for their transportation and necessary provisioning for the term of their engagement, there is no accommodation for them. Wherefore, in view of these facts, they pray your Excellency to be pleased to allow them to belong to the jurisdiction of the town of San Jose, and recognize a commission of justice that will correspond with the said San Jose as capital for the people in this vicinity; wherefore, we humbly pray your Excellency to favor the parties interested by acceding to their wishes. "San Antonio, San Pablo, and the adjacent ranchos north, May 30,1835." It is unnecessary here to produce the names of the signers of the document; rather permit us to dwell upon the changes rung by time since then. Seven and forty years ago the Bay was indeed a veritable "sea of trouble" to those rancheros; it is now crossed in half the number of minutes that years have elapsed. Where there were no accomodations, the finest and best conducted hotels in the world have sprung up as if by magic, while travel by land has been rendered secure, inexpensive, comfortable and expeditious. Such a wonderful transformation is hard to realize, but the facts speak for themselves. In due course of time the document was received at Monterey. Let us follow it: Under date August, 12, 1835, it was endorsed: "Let it be kept to be reported to the deputation." September 1st, it was docketed: "On this day the same was reported and referred to the Committee on Government," who, September 5th, reported as follows: "Most Excellent Sir:—We, The Committee on Government, being required to report upon the memorial, with the parties subscribed thereto, made to the Political Chief on the 30th day of May last, find that the said memorial is grounded upon good reasons and public convenience; but as the subject should be considered upon proper reports for a due determination, the Committee is of opinion that the reports of the Ayuntamientos of the towns of San Jose and San Francisco are required for that purpose: Therefore the Committee offers, for the deliberation of the most Excellent Deputation, the following propositions: 1st—That this expediente be referred to the Ayuntamientos of the towns of San Jose and San Francisco, in order that they report upon said memorial. 2d—That after which, the same be returned for determination. "MAN'L JIMENO, "SALVIO PACHECO." "Monterey, September 10, 1835.—At the session of this day the most Exalted Deputation has approved the two propositions made in the report of the Committee on Government. "MANUEL JIMENO." "Monterey, September 28, 1835.—Let this expediente be forwarded to the Ayuntamiento of the town (pueblo) of San Jose Guadalupe, for a report upon the prayer of the foregoing memorial, and to that of San Francisco for the like purpose. The Ayuntamiento of the latter town will, moreover, give a list of the residents of the vicinity of the same. Don Jose Castro, senior member of the most Excellent Territorial Deputation, and Superior Political Chief of Upper California, thus commanded, decreed, and signed this, which I attest. "JOSE CASTRO. "FRANCO DEL CALSELLO NEGRETE, Sec'y. "In pursuance of the foregoing Supreme Order of Your Excellency this Ayuntamiento begs to state the following: That with regard to the residents on the northern vicinity, now under the jurisdiction of San Francisco, and who in their memorial prayed to be exempted from belonging to that jurisdiction, having indispensably to cross the bay, or to travel upwards of forty leagues; while on half their way they can come to this town (pueblo), under the jurisdiction of which they formerly were, which was most suitable and less inconvenient to them; this Ayuntamiento thinks that their prayer should be granted, if it is so found right. "ANTONIO MA. PICO, "IGNACIO MARTINEZ. "JOSE BERRYESSA, Secretary. "Town of San Jose Guadalupe, November 4, 1835." In a response, or rather a remonstrance, the complaints of the petitioners were treated as frivolous by the Ayuntamiento of San Francisco, who rebuked them for their want of patriotism; and were asked if their service of having traveled a paltry forty leagues could bear the slightest comparison with those of others who had journeyed hundreds of leagues in the interior, and some who had gone on public service from San Francisco to San Diego. About the year 1836 Jose Miguel and Antonio Mesa, two brothers, settled near Kirker's Pass, on the New York Rancho, and were granted two leagues under the name of Los Medanos; and at the same period Miranda Higuera and Alviso made application for and obtained three square leagues of land, known as the Canada de los Vaqueros. Jose Noriega also, at this epoch, had granted to him the Rancho Los Meganos, which, in 1837, he sold to Doctor John Marsh. This brings us to the first American settler in Contra Costa county. Doctor John Marsh left the United States in the year 1835, proceeded to New Mexico, and after traversing a portion of Old Mexico, crossed the Colorado at its junction with the Gila, and entered Southern California. He afterwards traveled northward, and in 1837 purchased the Los Meganos Rancho which has since been popularly known as the Marsh Grant. This tract of land, which he describes as being about ten miles by twelve in extent, he designated the Farm of Pulpunes, whence in 1846, he indited a letter to Hon. Lewis Cass, which was first published in 1866 by the Contra Costa Gazette, to whose columns we refer the reader. In that communication he informs Mr. Cass that it had been usual to estimate the population of California at five thousand persons of Spanish descent, and twenty thousand Indians. This is declared to be an error, the actual number being in round numbers, seven thousand Spaniards, ten thousand civilized or domesticated Indians, and about seven hundred Americans, one hundred English, Irish, and Scotch, with about a like number of French, Germans and Italians. The Doctor farther remarks: "Within the territorial limits of Upper California, taking the parallel of forty-two degrees for the northern and the Colorado River for the southeastern boundary, are an immense number of wild, naked, brute Indians. The number of course can only be conjectured. They probably exceed a million, and may perhaps amount to double that number. The far-famed Missions of California no longer exist. They have nearly all been broken up, and the lands apportioned out into farms. They were certainly munificent ecclesiastical baronies, and although their existence was quite incompatible with the general prosperity of the country, it seems almost a pity to see their downfall. The immense piles of buildings and beautiful vineyards and orchards are all that remain, with the exception of two in the southern part of the territory, which still retain a small remnant of their former prosperity." He goes on to inform his friend of the salubrity of California's climate; its topographical beauties and advantages; its agricultural possibilities; its then commerce; its government, and the manners and customs of the Indians, all a valuable addition to the early history of California. The Doctor established his residence in a small adobe building not far from where he built the famous "Stone House," where he lived a most solitary life, having but few neighbors whose homes averaged a distance from his of from twelve to forty miles. The owners of the ranchos usually employed a few vaqueros to herd and take care of their stock, who were generally mission or christianized Indians; the rancheros themselves being very hospitably inclined, although that extended was of a most primitive nature, yet, though deprived of society and comparatively alone they were uniformly contented and apparently happy. But little attention was given to tilling the soil, further than the cultivation of the necessary beans, corn, potatoes, and melons necessary for home consumption, while nearly all the rancheros on locating planted small vineyards and orchards, many of which bear fruit to this day. What are termed "improvements" were rare; an adobe house and a corral seemed all that was desirable. In 1846 the war between the United States and Mexico broke out, and at its close in the following year, the persons above enumerated possessed, within the present boundaries of Contra Costa county, no less than forty-six leagues of land, embracing an area of about three hundred and twenty square miles. No history of a county in California would be complete without some relation of the tragic end of the Donner party; we have therefore taken the liberty of reproducing the excellent description of their sufferings from Tuthill's History of California: "Of the overland emigration to California, in 1846, about eighty wagons took a new route from Fort Bridger around the south end of Great Salt Lake. The pioneers of the party arrived in good season over the mountains; but Mr. Reed's and Mr. Donner's companies opened a new route through the desert, lost a month's time by their explorations, and reached the foot of the Truckee pass, in the Sierra Nevada, on the 31st of October, instead of the 1st, as they had intended. The snow began to fall on the mountains two or three weeks earlier than usual, that year, and was already so piled up in the pass, that they could not proceed. They attempted it repeatedly, but were as often forced to return. One party built their cabins near the Truckee Lake, killed their cattle, and went into Winter quarters. The other (Donner's) party, still believed that they could thread the pass, and so failed to build their cabins before more snow came and buried their cattle alive. Of course they were soon utterly destitute of food, for they could not tell where the cattle were buried, and there was no hope of game on a desert so piled with snow that nothing without wings could move. The number of those who were thus storm-stayed, at the very threshold of the land whose "Winters are one long Spring, was eighty, of whom thirty were females, and several children. The Mr. Donner, who had charge of one company, was an Illinoisian, sixty years of age, a man of high respectability and abundant means. His wife was a woman of education and refinement, and much younger than he. "During November it snowed thirteen days; during December and January, eight days each. Much of the time the tops of the cabins were below the snow level. "It was six weeks after the halt was made that a party of fifteen, including five women, and two Indians who acted as guides, set out on snow-shoes to cross the mountains, and give notice to the people of the California settlements of the condition of their friends. At first the snow was so light and feathery that even in snow-shoes they sank nearly a foot at every step. On the second day they crossed the ' divide,' finding the snow at the summit twelve feet deep. Pushing forward with the courage of despair, they made from four to eight miles a day. "Within a week they got entirely out of provisions, and three of them succumbing to cold, weariness and starvation, had died. Then a heavy snow-storm came on, which compelled them to lie still, buried between their blankets under the snow, for thirty-six hours. By the evening of the tenth day three more had died, and the living had been four days without food. The horrid alternative was accepted—they took the flesh from the bones of their dead, remained in camp two days to dry it, and then pushed on. "On New Year's, the sixteenth day since leaving Truckee lake, they were toiling up a steep mountain. Their feet were frozen. Every step was marked with blood. On the second of January, their food again gave out. On the third, they had nothing to eat but the strings of their snow-shoes. On the fourth, the Indians eloped, justly suspicious that they might be sacrificed for food. On the fifth they shot a deer, and that day one of their number died. Soon after three others died, and every death now eked out the existence of the survivors. On the seventh, all gave out, and concluded their wanderings useless, except one. He, guided by two stray friendly Indians, dragged himself on till he reached a settlement on Bear river. By midnight the settlers had found and were treating with all Christian kindness what remained of the little company that after more than a month of the most terrible sufferings, had that morning halted to die. "The story that there were emigrants perishing on the other side of the snowy barrier ran swiftly down the Sacramento valley to New Helvetia, and Captain Sutter, at his own expense, fitted out an expedition of men and of mules laden with provisions, to cross the mountains and relieve them. It ran on to San Francisco, and the people, rallying in public meeting, raised fifteen hundred dollars and with it fitted out another expedition. The naval commandant of the port fitted out still others. "The first of the relief parties reached Truckee lake on the nineteenth of February. Ten of the people in the nearest camp were dead. For four weeks those who were still alive had fed only on bullocks' hides. At Conner's camp they had but one hide remaining. The visitors left a small supply of provisions with the twenty-nine whom they could not take with them, and started back with the remainder. Four of the children they carried on their backs. "Another of the relief parties reached Truckee lake on the first of March. They immediately started back with seventeen of the sufferers; but, a heavy snow-storm overtaking them, they left all, except three of the children, on the road. Another party went after those who were left on the way; found three of them dead, and the rest sustaining life by feeding on the flesh of the dead. "The last relief party reached Donner's camp late in April, when the snows had melted so much that the earth appeared in spots. The main cabin was empty, but some miles distant they found the last survivor of all lying on the cabin-floor smoking his pipe. He was ferocious in aspect, savage and repulsive in manner. His camp-kettle was over the fire, and in it his meal of human flesh preparing. The stripped bones of his fellow-sufferers lay around him. He refused to return with the party, and only consented when he saw there was no escape. "Mrs. Donner was the last to die. Her husband's body, carefully laid out and wrapped in a sheet, was found at his tent. Circumstances led to the suspicion that the survivor had killed Mrs. Donner for her flesh and her money, and when he was threatened with hanging, and the rope tightened around his neck, he produced over five hundred dollars in gold, which, probably, he had appropriated from her store." Apropos to this dreary story of suffering, we conclude it by the narrative of a prophetic, dream of George Yount, attended as it was, with such marvelous results. At this time (the Winter of 1846-7), while residing in Napa county, of ' which he was the pioneer settler, he dreamt that a party of emigrants were snow-bound in the Sierra Nevada, high up in the mountains, where they were suffering the most distressing privations from cold and want of food. The locality where his dream had placed these unhappy mortals he had never visited, yet so clear was his vision that he described the sheet of water surrounded by lofty peaks, deep-covered with snow, while on every hand towering pine trees reared their heads far above the limitless waste. In his sleep he saw the hungry human beings ravenously tear the flesh from the bones of their fellow-creatures, slain to satisfy their craving appetites, in the midst of a weird and gloomy desolation. He dreamed his dream on three successive nights, after which he related it to others, among whom were a few who had been on hunting expeditions in the Sierras. These wished for a precise description of the scene foreshadowed to him. They recognized the Truckee Lake. On the strength of this recognition Mr. Yount fitted out a search expedition, and with these men as guides, went to the place indicated, and prodigious to relate, was one of the successful relieving bands to reach the ill-fated Donner party, And now there began to settle in the vast California valleys that intrepid band of pioneers, who having scaled the Sierra Nevada with their wagons, trains and cattle, began the civilizing influences of progress on the Pacific Coast. Many of them had left their homes in the Atlantic, Western and Southern States with the avowed intention of proceeding direct to Oregon. On arrival at Fort Hall, however, they heard glowing accounts of the salubrity of the California climate and the fertility of its soil; they therefore turned their heads southward and steered for the wished-for haven. At length, after weary days of toil and anxiety, fatigued and footsore, the promised land was gained. And what found they? The country, in what valley soever, we wot, was an interminable grain field; mile upon mile, and acre after acre, wild oats grew in marvelous profusion, in many places to a prodigious height—one great, glorious green of wild, waving corn —high over head of the wayfarer on foot, and shoulder-high with the equestrian; wild flowers of every prismatic shade charmed the eye, while they vied with each other in the gorgeousness of their color, and blended into dazzling splendor. One breath of wind, and the wide Emerald expanse rippled itself into space, while with a heavier breeze came a swell whose rolling waves beat against the mountain sides, and, being hurled back, were lost in the far-away horizon; shadow pursued shadow in a long, merry chase; the air was filled with the hum of bees, the chirrup of birds, and an overpowering fragrance from the various plants weighted the air. The hill-sides, over-run as they were with a dense mass of tangled jungle, were hard to penetrate, while in some portions the deep dark gloom of the forest trees lent relief to the eye. The almost boundless range was intersected throughout with divergent trails, whereby the traveler moved from point to point, progress being, as it were, in darkness on account of the height of the oats on either side, and rendered dangerous in the valleys by the bands of untamed cattle, sprung from the stock introduced by the Mission Fathers. These found food and shelter on the plains during the night; at dawn they repaired to the higher grounds to chew the cud and bask in the sunshine. At every yard coyotes sprang from beneath the feet of the voyageur. The hissing of snakes, the frightened rush of lizards, all tended to heighten the sense of danger, while the flight of quail and other birds, the nimble run of the rabbit, and the stampede of elk and antelope, which abounded in thousands, added to the charm, causing him, be he whosoever he may, pedestrian or equestrian, to feel the utter insignificance of man, the "noblest work of God." On the tenth day of October, 1846, there arrived in California a family whose name is indelibly associated with the history of Contra Costa. The Hon. Elam Brown and his family can never be forgotten in the chronicles of the county. After being present during the seige of Santa Clara by the mounted Californians under Colonel Sanchez, when he served in its defence, Mr. Brown passed the Summer of 1847 in the redwoods lying between Moraga valley and San Antonio, now in Alameda county, and finally purchased the Acalanes Rancho in that year, where he settled and still resides, with his wife, who came to California in the same year. The Honorable Elam Brown was a delegate from the district of San Jose to the Convention which organized in Monterey on September 1, 1849, and is one of the few surviving members of the Legislature that held their first session in San Jose. Among the names of those who arrived in California in 1846, besides Mr. Brown, and who afterwards became interested in Contra Costa, were: Nathaniel Jones, the first Sheriff of the county, J. D. Taber, James M. Allen, Leo Norris, John M. Jones and S. W. Johnson. Most of these gentlemen are still alive and look good for many more years of usefulness. We now come to the eventful year of the Discovery of Gold, but in introducing the reader to the circumstances attending the finding of the precious metal, we would first desire to put him in possession of the fact, that the prevailing opinion that the first discovery of gold in California was that made at Sutter's Mill is an erroneous one, and must therefore give way to the evidence furnished by Mr. Abel Stearns of its earlier discovery by some six years, in the vicinity of Los Angeles. Mr. Stearns has now been a resident of California nearly, if not quite, forty years, and is widely known as a man of unquestionable veracity. The following Icttct1, stating some of the facts relating to the early discovery of gold, was furnished in response to a request of the Secretary of the California Pioneers: "LOS ANGELES, July 8, 1867. "Louis R. LULL, Sec'y of the Society of California Pioneers, San Francisco: "Sir—On my arrival here from San Franciseo, some days since, I received your letter of June 3d, last past, requesting the certificate of the assay of gold sent by me to the Mint at Philadelphia in 1842. I find by referring to my old account books that November 22,1842, I sent by Alfred Robinson (who returned from California to the States by way of Mexico,) twenty ounces California weight (eighteen and three-fourths' ounces Mint weight) of placer gold, to be forwarded by him to the United States Mint at Philadelphia, for assay. "In his letter to me, dated August 6, 1843, you will find a copy from the Mint assay of the gold, which letter I herewith inclose to you to be placed in the archives of the Society. "The placer mines, from which this gold was taken, were first discovered by Francisco Lopez, a native of California, in the month of March, 1842, at a place called San Francisquito, about thirty-five miles northwest from this city (Los Angeles.) "The circumstances of the discovery by Lopez, as related by him, are as follows: Lopez, with a companion, were out in search of some stray horses, and about mid-day they stopped under some trees and tied their horses out to feed, they resting under the shade, when Lopez, with his sheath-knife, dug up some wild onions, and in the dirt discovered a piece of gold, and searching further found some more. He brought these to town and showed them to his friends, who at once declared there must be a placer of gold. This news being circulated, numbers of the citizens went to the place and commenced prospecting in the neighborhood and found it to be a fact that there was a placer of gold. After being satisfied most persons returned; some remained, particularly Sonorenses (Sonorians), who were accustomed to work in placers. They met with good success. "From this time the placers were worked with more or less success, and principally by Sonorenses (Sonorians), until the latter part of 1846, when most of the Sonorenses left with Captain Flores for Sonora. "While worked there were some six or eight thousand dollars taken out per annum. "Very respectfully yours, "ABEL STEARNS." It is also a fact fully established that the existence of gold was known to the aborigines long prior even to this date. Let us turn, however, to that epoch which has earned for California the name of the Golden State. Who does not think of '48 with feelings almost akin to inspiration? The year 1848 is one wherein was reached the nearest attainment of the discovery of the Philosopher's stone which it has been the lot of Christendom to witness. On January 19th gold was discovered at Coloma, on the American River, and the most unbelieving and cold-blooded were, by the middle of Spring, irretrievably bound in its fascinating meshes. The wonder is the discovery was not made earlier. Emigrants, settlers, hunters, practical miners, scientific exploring parties had camped on, settled in, hunted through, dug in and ransacked the region, yet never found it; the discovery was entirely accidental. Franklin Tuthill, in his "History of California," tells the story in these words: "Captain Sutter had contracted with James W. Marshall in September, 1847, for the construction of a sawmill in Coloma. In the course of the Winter a dam and race were made, but when the water was let in the tail-race was too narrow. To widen and deepen it, Marshall let in a strong current of water directly to the race, which bore a large body of mud and gravel to the foot. "On the 19th of January, 1848, Marshall observed some glittering particles in the race, which he was curious enough to examine. He called five carpenters on the mill to see them; but though they talked over the possibility of its being gold, the vision did not inflame them. Peter L. Weimar claims that he was with Marshall when the first piece of 'yellow stuff' was picked up. It was a pebble weighing six pennyweights and eleven grains. Marshall gave it to Mrs. Weimar, and asked her to boil it in saleratus water and see what came of it. As she was making soap at the time, she pitched it into the soap kettle. About twenty-four hours afterward it was fished out and found all the brighter for its boiling. "Marshall, two or three weeks later, took the specimens below and gave them to Sutter to have them tested. Before Sutter had quite satisfied himself as to their nature, he went up to the mill, and, with Marshall, made a treaty with the Indians, buying of them their titles to the region round about, for a certain amount of goods. There was an effort made to keep the secret inside the little circle that knew it, but it soon leaked out. They had many misgivings and much discussion whether they were not making themselves ridiculous; yet by common consent all began to hunt, though with no great spirit, for the 'yellow stuff' that might prove such a prize. "In February, one of the party went to Yerba Buena, taking some of the dust with him. Fortunately he stumbled upon Isaac Humphrey, an old Georgian gold-miner, who, at the first look at the specimens, said they were gold, and the diggings must be rich. Humphrey tried to induce some of his friends to go up with him to the mill, but they thought it a crazy expedition, and left him to go alone. He reached there on the 7th of March. A few were hunting for gold, but rather lazily, and the work on the mill went on as usual. Next day he began ' prospecting,' and soon satisfied himself that he had struck a rich placer. He made a rocker, and then commenced work in earnest. "A few days later, a Frenchman, Baptiste, formerly a miner in Mexico, left the lumber he was sawing for Sutter at Weber's, ten miles east of Coloma, and came to the mill. He agreed with Humphrey that the region was rich, and, like him, took to the pan and rocker. These two men were the competent, practical teachers of the crowd that flocked in to see how they did it. The lesson was easy, the process simple. An hour's observation fitted the least experienced for working to advantage." Slowly and surely, however, did these discoveries creep into the minds of those at home and abroad; the whole civilized world was set agog with the startling news from the shores of the Pacific. Young and old were seized with the California fever; high and low, rich and poor, were infected by it; the prospect was altogether too gorgeous to contemplate. Why, they could actually pick up a fortune for the seeking it! Positive affluence was within the grasp of the weakest; the very coast was shining with the bright metal, which could be obtained by picking it out with a knife. Says Tuthill: "Before such considerations as these, the conservatism of the most stable bent. Men of small means, whose tastes inclined them to keep out of all hazardous schemes and uncertain enterprises, thought they saw duty beckoning them around the Horn, or across the Plains. In many a family circle, where nothing but the strictest economy could make the two ends of the year meet, there were long and anxious consultations, which resulted in selling off a piece of the homestead or the woodland, or the choicest of the stock, to fit out one sturdy representative to make a fortune for the family. Hundreds of farms were mortgaged to buy tickets for the land of gold. Some insured their lives and pledged their policies for an outfit. The wild boy was packed off hopefully. The black sheep of the flock was dismissed with a blessing, and the forlorn hope that, with a change of skies, there might be a change of manners. The stay of the happy household said, 'Good-bye, but only for a year or two,' to his charge. Unhappy husbands availed themselves cheerfully of this cheap and reputable method of divorce, trusting time to mend or mar matters in their absence. Here was a chance to begin life anew. Whoever had begun it badly, or made slow headway on the right course, might start again in a region where Fortune had not learned to coquette with and dupe her wooers. "The adventurers generally formed companies, expecting to go overland or by sea to the mines, and to dissolve partnership only after a first trial of luck, together in the ' diggings.' In the Eastern and Middle States they would buy up an old whaling ship, just ready to be condemned to the wreckers, put in a cargo of such stuff as they must need themselves, and provisions, tools, or goods, that must be sure to bring returns enough to make the venture profitable. Of course, the whole fleet rushing together through the Golden Gate, made most of these ventures profitless, even when the guess was happy as to the kind of supplies needed by the Californians. It can hardly be believed what sieves of ships started, and how many of them actually made the voyage. Little river-steamers, that had scarcely tasted salt-water before, were fitted out to thread the Straits of Magellan, and these were welcomed to the bays and rivers of California, whose waters some of them plowed and vexed busily for years afterwards. " Then steamers, as well as all manner of sailing vessels, began to be advertised to run to the Isthmus; and they generally went crowded to excess with passengers, some of whom were fortunate enough, after the toilsome ascent of the Chagres river, and the descent either on mules or on foot to Panama, not to be detained more than a month waiting for craft that had rounded the Horn, and by which they were ticketed to proceed to San Francisco. But hundreds broke down under the horrors of the voyage in the steerage; contracted on the Isthmus the low typhoid fevers incident to tropical marshy regions, and died. "The overland emigrants, unless they came too late in the season to the Sierras, seldom suffered as much, as they had no great variation of climate on their route. They had this advantage too, that the mines lay at the end of their long road; while the sea-faring, when they landed, had still a weary journey before them. Few tarried longer at San Francisco than was necessary to learn how utterly useless were the patent mining contrivances they had brought, and to replace them 'with pick and shovel, pan and cradle. If any one found himself destitute of funds to go farther, there was work enough to raise them by. Labor was honorable; and the daintiest dandy, if he were honest, could not resist the temptation to work were wages were high, pay so prompt, and employers so flush. "There were not lacking in San Francisco, grumblers who had tried the mines and satisfied themselves that it cost a dollar's worth of sweat and time, and living exclusively on bacon, beans and 'slap-jacks,' to pick a dollar's worth of gold out of rock, or river-bed, or dry ground; but they confessed that the good luck which they never enjoyed, abode with others. Then the display of dust, slugs, and bars of gold in the public gambling places; the sight of men arriving every day freighted with belts full, which they parted with so freely, as men only can when they have got it easily; the testimony of the miniature rocks; the solid nuggets brought down from above every few days, whose size and value rumor multiplied according to the number of her tongues; the talk, day and night, unceasingly and exclusively, 'gold, easy to get and hard to hold,' inflamed all new-comers with the desire to hurry on and share the chances. They chafed at the necessary detentions; they nervously feared that all would be gone before they should arrive. "The prevalent impression was that the placers would give out in a year or two. Then it behoved him who expected to gain much, to be among the earliest on the ground. When experiment was so fresh in the field, one theory was about as good as another. An hypothesis that lured men perpetually further up the gorges of the foot-hills, and to explore the canons of the mountains, was this: that the gold which had been found in the beds of rivers, or in gulches through which streams once ran, must have been washed down from the places of original deposit further up the mountains. The higher up the gold-hunter went, the nearer he approached the source of supply. "To reach the mines from San Francisco, the course lay up San Pablo and Suisun bays, and the Sacramento—not then, as now, a yellow, muddy stream, but a river pellucid and deep—to the landing for Sutter's Fort; and they who made the voyage in sailing vessels thought Mount Diablo significantly named, so long it kept their company and swung its shadows over their path. From Sutter's the most common route was across the broad, fertile valley to the foot-hills, and up the American or some one of its tributaries; or, ascending the Sacramento to the Feather and the Yuba, the company staked off a claim, pitched its tent or constructed a cabin, and set up its rocker, or began to oust the river from a portion of its bed. Good luck might hold the impatient adventurers for a whole season on one bar; bad luck scattered them always farther up. * * * "Roads sought the mining camps, which did not stop to study roads. Traders came in to supply the camps, and not very fast, but still to some extent; mechanics and farmers to supply both traders and miners. So, as if by magic, within a year or two after the rush began, the map of the country was written thick with the names of settlements. "Some of these were the nuclei of towns that now flourish and promise to continue as long as the State is peopled. Others, in districts where the placers were soon exhausted, were deserted almost as hastily as they were begun, and now no traces remain of them except the short chimney-stack, the broken surface of the ground, heaps of cobble-stones, rotten, half-buried sluice-boxes, empty whisky bottles, scattered playing cards and rusty cans. "The 'Fall of '49 and Spring of '50,' is the era of California history which the pioneer always speaks of with warmth. It was the free and easy age when everybody was flush, and fortunes, if not in the palm, were only just beyond the grasp of all. Men lived chiefly in tents, or in cabins scarcely more durable, and behaved themselves like a generation of bachelors. The family was beyond the mountains; the restraints of society had not yet arrived. Men threw off the masks they had lived behind, and appeared out in their true character. A few did not discharge the consciences and convictions they had brought with them. More rollicked in a perfect freedom from those bonds which good men cheerfully assume in settled society for the good of the greater number. Some afterwards resumed their temperate and steady habits, but hosts were wrecked before the period of their license expired. "Very rarely did men on their arrival in the country begin to work at their old trade or profession. To the mines first. If fortune favored, they soon quit for more congenial employments. If she frowned, they might depart disgusted, if they were able; but oftener, from sheer inability to leave the business, they kept on, drifting from bar to bar, living fast, reckless, improvident, half-civilized lives; comparatively rich to-day, poor to-morrow; tormented with rheumatisms and agues, remembering dimly the joys of the old homestead; nearly weaned from the friends at home, who, because they were never heard from, soon became like dead men in their memory; seeing little of women, and nothing of churches; self-reliant, yet satisfied that there was nowhere any ' show' for them; full of enterprise in the direct line of their business, and utterly lost on the threshold of any other; genial companions, morbidly craving after newspapers; good fellows, but shortlived." Such was the maelstrom which dragged all into its vortex now thirty and more years ago! Now, almost the entire generation of pioneer miners, who remained in that business have passed away, and the survivors feel like men who are lost, and old before their time, among the new-comers, who may be just as old, but lack their long, strange chapter of adventures. Additional Comments: Extracted from: HISTORY OF CONTRA COSTA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA, INCLUDING ITS GEOGRAPHY, GEOLOGY, TOPOGRAPHY, CLIMATOGRAPHY AND DESCRIPTION; TOGETHER WITH A RECORD OF THE MEXICAN GRANTS; THE BEAR FLAG WAR; THE MOUNT DIABLO COAL FIELDS; THE EARLY HISTORY AND SETTLEMENT, COMPILED FROM THE MOST AUTHENTIC SOURCES; THE NAMES OF ORIGINAL SPANISH AND MEXICAN PIONEERS; FULL LEGISLATIVE HISTORY OF THE COUNTY; SEPARATE HISTORY OF EACH TOWNSHIP, SHOWING THE ADVANCE IN POPULATION AND AGRICULTURE; ALSO, Incidents of Pioneer Life; and Biographical Sketches OF EARLY AND PROMINENT SETTLERS AND REPRESENTATIVE MEN; AMD OF ITS TOWNS, VILLAGES, CHURCHES, SECRET SOCIETIES, ETC. ILLUSTRATED. SAN FRANCISCO: W. A. SLOCTUM & CO., PUBLISHERS 1882. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ca/contracosta/history/1882/historyo/earlyhis12gms.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/cafiles/ File size: 48.9 Kb