Monterey-Santa Clara-Tulare County CA Archives Biographies.....Briggs, H. W. 1819 - ************************************************ 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 January 16, 2007, 1:28 am Author: Luther A. Ingersoll, Editor (1893) H. W. BRIGGS was born in Rome, Oneida county, New York, August 25, 1819. He resided with his parents, attending the public schools, until the January after he was twelve years old, when he entered the store of his cousin, Lyman Briggs, in Rome. He served as a clerk at Rome and Watertown until 1838, when he went to his parents in Lake county, Ohio. In 1840 he resolved to go South for the purpose of teaching, as he was very well fitted for that life, he having kept up his studies and read extensively on law questions. He went to Tennessee an entire stranger, but was fortunate enough to get a school at Beech Grove Seminary, in Giles county, Tenn. In 1847, July 4, he married Miss Mary Stinson, one of his pupils. That year the negro question was beginning to agitate the people, and his wife's family were all Presbyterians and opposed to slavery, although they owned slaves; a number of the family concluded to make their home in the free States, and after visiting a number of the Western States finally settled at Troy, in Davis county, Iowa, where our subject again went into mercantile life, and acted as Postmaster, School Trustee and "boss" generally. While here he was elected County Commissioner, Supervisor, and when the Board of Commissioners was abolished and the County Judgeship, having all the supervisors' and probate business; when criminal jurisdiction was created, he was elected to that office, as a Whig, although the county was a few hundred Democratic. This office he held four years, after which he resumed merchandising. In May, 1855, his wife died, leaving five children, one girl and four boys. In June, 1856, he married Miss Julia E. Willey, of Genesee, New York. In the same year he made up his mind to remove to California, where he had a brother, Rev. M. O. Briggs, and in the spring of 1859 he started with his family and a number of the neighbors across the plains with an ox team and quite a herd of cattle. After all the usual hardships of the trip, our subject arrived in Santa Clara county October of that year and bought a farm at Berryessa, and as he knew as much about farming as Greeley did he calculated to get rich. While threshing his first crop, in July, 1860,he accidentally fell into the cylinder of the thresher and lost his right leg. Panning did not look very encouraging after that. In the fall he was elected to represent Santa Clara county in the State Legislature, and attended the very important session of 1861, was the author of the Sunday law, which a recent Democratic legislature repealed. In the spring of 1861 he was appointed Register of the Land Office at Visalia, which position he filled for six years, and a portion of that time was the efficient, editor of the Visalia Delta, which was published by his son. After enduring from three to seven spells of chills per season for six years he removed to Gilroy in 1868, and again engaged in mercantle [sic] life. He held the position of Postmaster there for sixteen years, until he went out with his party. In June, in 1887, he came to Pacific Grove, and, finding the climate, associations and conditions just suited to his notions of comfortable life, he concluded to stay right here the few years of life remaining to him. Politically he is a Republican, out and out, and belongs to I. O. O. F. & A. M., I. O. of G. T., and Knights of Honor. The children of our subject are as follows: H. M. Briggs, a merchant of Modesto; Walter, lumber merchant of Riverside, Calfornia, [sic] but by trade a mechanic; Mary B., the only living daughter, widow of Dr. J. E. Benn, of Gilroy. She served for several years as Postmistress of Gilroy, and in that capacity she proved herself a woman of great executive ability. She is also an accomplished musician. Judge Briggs is without doubt the busiest and most prompt business man in Pacific Grove. He is a man of genial manners, is well posted on all matters of public or local importance, and thousands flock to his office every season to confide in him their business affairs and ask the advice which is always forthcoming. This gentleman resides in a beautiful home, which is a bower of floral beauty. A son of our subject, the late Rev. Eugene Briggs, had the misfortune to lose his eyes at the age of nine years, but he was well educated in a school for the blind, became a fine musician and music teacher, and finally entered the ministry and preached for ten years, without intermission, as an evangelist, traveling throughout the entire State of California. This wonderful man was a thorough Bible scholar, having read that book through from cover to cover fifteen times, using the raised letters and reading by feeling. He officiated as pastor of a church at Downey, California, and erected a church edifice at that place. His death occurred at Crystal Springs, California, in 1890. Judge Briggs is now seventy-three years of age. For president he cast his first vote for William Henry Harrison, and expects to cast what will probably be his last vote, for the grandson, Benjamin. Additional Comments: Extracted from: Memorial and Biographical History of the Coast Counties of Central California. Illustrated. Containing a History of this Important Section of the Pacific Coast from the Earliest Period of its Discovery to the Present Time, together with Glimpses of its Auspicious Future; Illustrations and Full-Page Portraits of some of its Eminent Men, and Biographical Mention of many of its Pioneers, and Prominent Citizens of To-day. HENRY D. BARROWS, Editor of the Historical Department. LUTHER A. INGERSOLL, Editor of the Biographical Department. "A people that take no pride in the noble achievements of remote ancestors will never achieve anything worthy to be remembered with pride by remote descendants."-Macaulay. CHICAGO: THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY. 1893. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ca/monterey/bios/briggs461gbs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/cafiles/ File size: 6.5 Kb