Plumas County CA Archives Biographies.....Blakemore, Robert M. 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com January 9, 2006, 6:05 am

Author: Fariss & Smith (1882)

   ROBERT M. BLAKEMORE.—Among the thousands whom the golden magnet drew to this
coast, none had more true nobility of character than Blakemore. He was a
Virginian by birth, received a fair English education in his native state, and
in company with B. F. Washington and J. E. N. Lewis, came to this state in 1849.
He was unsuccessful in mining, and began packing goods to the northern mines. In
1855 he formed a partnership with Richard Irwin, and purchased the mercantile
establishment of Clark, Wagner, & Co., on Rich bar, east branch of Feather.
While in business here, one of his former schoolmates came from Nevada, took
sick, and died. Blakemore was very much attached to his friend, and after the
burial, took a mule and went eight miles up the river, where he quarried out
several slabs of slate. These he packed back, and with chisels made by the
village blacksmith of the period, he worked out a tombstone to mark the last
resting-place of the deceased. Three weeks were consumed in this part of the
work. The slabs were carefully bolted together with iron bolts, and on the face
was inscribed, "Edward Davis, of Jefferson Co., Va." Around the grave Blakemore
constructed a stone wall and wooden palings, before the last offices prompted by
friendship were complete. Some years later a stone-cutter came along that way,
and remarked to his friends, "Boys, the man is a master of his art." Blakemore
went back to Virginia in 1865. Upon his departure, he gave all his business
interests to his partner, instead of selling out. In 1866 he was in New Orleans
in business, when he took the yellow fever and died.



Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

Illustrated History of Plumas, Lassen & Sierra Counties

San Francisco: Fariss & Smith
(1882)


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