Statewide County CA Archives History - Books .....Early Navigation 1891 ************************************************ 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@gmail.com November 28, 2005, 9:50 pm Book Title: Memorial And Biographical History Of Northern California EARLY NAVIGATION. Doubtless the first navigation on the Sacramento River was conducted by the Russians from Sitka Island, who were located at Ross and Bodega on the coast, and engaged in trade in furs, hides, tallow, etc. They were in this region prior to 1840, carrying on trade with the interior up to the time of their selling out to Captain Sutter; but the hostility of the Spanish Government and the expense of maintaining their position finally caused them to abandon the field. At that time also there was in this part of the country an agency for the Hudson Bay Company. In 1841 Sutter purchased the property of the Russians, including a small schooner of forty tons' burden, with which (hey had made short voyages along the coast. The first record we have of its appearance up the Sacramento River was in August of that year, though probably it had been upon its waters previously. This may be considered the date of the commencement of American commerce upon this stream. According to the terms of Sutter's bargain with the Russians, he was to furnish a given quantity of grain each year for their settlement on the Northwest coast, and the transportation of this product every fall to the bay was a part of the regular trade upon which this vessel entered. She was manned and subsequently commanded by Indians selected from Sutter's domesticated tribes, and for a long time was the only "regular packet" on the river. After performing a number of important offices during the war, she was taken down to San Francisco in the spring of 1848, to carry thither the tidings of the discovery of gold. She continued to be the largest schooner on the river up to the period when the commerce with the mines began. The Brooklyn Mormons also owned a launch called the Comet, which made three trips to the settlement on the Stanislaus, and was the pioneer on the San Joaquin. The voyage from San Francisco to New Helvetia, or Sutter's Fort, as Sacramento was then called, and back to the city, occupied from two to four weeks. In the spring of 1848, when the rush for gold set in, the San Francisco Star (of May 20) thus ironically alludes to the first embarkations: "Fleet of launches left this place on Sunday and Monday last, bound 'up the Sacramento River,' closely stowed with human beings led by the love of filthy lucre to the perennial-yielding gold mines of the north, where 'a man can find upward of two ounces a day,' and 'two thousand men can find their hands full'—of hard work." May 27 the same editor said; "Launches have plied without cessation between this place and New Helvetia during this time (since the discovery of gold). The Sacramento, a first-class craft, left here on Thursday last, thronged with passengers for the gold mines—a motley assemblage, composed of lawyers, merchants, grocers, carpenters, cartmen and cooks, all possessed with the desire of suddenly becoming rich." He also stated that at that time over 300 men were engaged in washing gold, and parties were continually arriving from every part of the country. San Francisco was soon made to present a desolate appearance on account of the sudden departure of her principal citizens for the gold field. During the first eight weeks a quarter of a million dollars' worth of gold was taken to that city, and during the second eight weeks $600,000 worth. By this time (September) the number of persons in the diggings was estimated at 6,000. "An export at last!" was the exclamation of the San Franciscan editor; "and it is gold." The first vessel whose tonnage exceeded that of the "launches" was the schooner Providence, Hinckley, Master, which ascended the Sacramento in April, 1849. For several years previous she had been engaged between Tahiti and the Sandwich Islands. Her burden was less than 100 tons. In March that year Samuel Brannan purchased the Eliodora, a Chilian vessel, filled it with goods and started up the river in April. The Joven Guipuzcoana, a Peruvian vessel, and other large sailing vessels of first-class dimensions, soon followed. At the date of their arrival about twelve stores and tenements graced the locality of Sacramento. Meanwhile several vessels of considerable size also ascended the San Joaquin to Stockton. On the success of the Joven Guipuzcoana were founded the plans of the first steam navigation companies. Her trip to Sacramento demonstrated the practicability of navigation by such large vessels as the McKim and the Senator, which soon followed. In the month of May the crowning exploit in the history of sailing vessels was performed. This was the trip of the Bark Whiton, Gelston the master, to Sacramento in seventy-two hours from San Francisco, and 140 days from New York. She went up with her royal yards crossed, without meeting with a single detention, though she was a vessel of 241 tons' burden and drew nine and a half feet of water. The first steamboat that ever plowed the waters of either the bay or the rivers of this State arrived at the port of San Francisco, October 14, 1847, owned by Captain Leidesdorff, a man of remarkable enterprise, who was the chief instrumentality in laying the corner-stone of San Francisco's prosperity. She was packed on board a Russian bark from Sitka. Leidesdorff had carried on a trade with the Russians at their American settlement for seven years previous; and, hearing that a small steamboat was in use upon their waters, he sent up and purchased it for his hide and tallow commerce on the small streams leading from the inland embarcaderos to the bay. The vessel, not exceeding forty tons' burden, was put together under the lee of Yerba Buena Island, was named "Little Sitka," and on the 15th of November, 1847, steamed out under the management of a Russian engineer who had superintended her construction. From a swivel gun mounted upon her bow was occasionally fired a salutation. She successfully rounded the island and arrived in port, hailed by the cheers of a multitude. This boat was long, low, and what the sailors termed very "crank." The weight of a single person on her guards would throw one of her wheels out of water. Her first trip for business was made down to Santa Clara, with indifferent success. Her next trip was up to Sacramento, in the latter part of November, 1847, and safely arrived at the embarcadero of Sutter's Fort. Nearly a month elapsed, however, before her return; and in the meantime various were the jokes and jibes "launch"-ed at her and on the proprietor, who nevertheless persisted that he would yet "make the smoke fly on the bay," and hand the name of his first steamboat "down to dexterity," as he pronounced the word. On the 12th of February following (1848) this little steamer was swamped by a norther while lying at anchor at San Francisco Bay. It was raised, the engine taken out, and the hull converted into a sailing vessel which served well for years. The engine, after having rusted on the sandy beach for a long time, was finally made to do duty in a small domestic manufactory in San Francisco. The little steamboat enterprise just described was, however, more a freak of will than the demand of business. But to whom belongs the having first projected the running of good steamboats for traffic after the great tide of gold emigration had set in, it is difficult to say. The first vessel propelled by steam entering the Bay of San Francisco was the California, February 28, 1849. The excursion of the steamship Oregon from San Francisco to Benicia and back, April 21 of the same year, was the first trip of a steam vessel of any magnitude into any of the interior waters adjacent to the main bay. It was indeed a successful and magnificent excursion. Prior to this, however, announcements had been made that steamboats were on their way from the East to California, to ply on the rivers here. The first of these announcements was issued from the office of the old Placer Times, when that journal was first started at Sutterville, in April, 1849. It was printed in the form of a handbill, at the order of some of the proprietors of that place. May 19, the following advertisement appeared in the Times: "Ten thousand cords of wood. We wish to employ any number of men that may call, to cut wood at Sutterville for the use of the steamers. George McDougal & Co., Sutterville, May 15, 1859." Of course the wood was never cut. During the summer of 1849 a number of steamboat enterprises were on foot, and the keels of several small vessels, brought by some of the ships chartered by the gold hunters, were laid at different points on the river and bay. The first of this series of which we have any record was one of about fifty tons burden, put together at Benicia, the material having been brought from the East by way of the Horn on board the Edward Everett. She made her first trip to Sacramento, August 17, 1849. About this period also were established the first regular express lines in the State, two commencing business between here and San Francisco, to take the business of the regular mail, which was at that time the subject of bitter complaint and unsparing ridicule. August 25, another small steam boat from Philadelphia began to ply the river, accommodating some thirty passengers and "running about seven knots an hour." About the first boat advertised for regular trips between this city and San Francisco appears to have been the Sacramento, in September, 1849, commanded by Captain John Van Pelt. She had two engines of sixteen horsepower, could carry about 100 passengers, besides freight. She was built about where Washington now stands, opposite the northern portion of Sacramento City, and the captain, who became a sort of Pacific Vanderbilt, made successful and regular trips with the vessel as far down as "New York of the Pacific," where passengers and freight had to be transferred. About the same time a little steam dredge, brought out by the Yuba Company, was set up in a scow and started on a trip up the Feather River, carrying a quantity of bricks, at $1.00 each for freight (!), and lumber at $150 per 1,000 feet. Two months after her arrival she was sold at auction for $40,000. The next boat was the Mint, also a small one, put up at San Francisco, which was really the first steamboat to make successful trips with passengers and freight all the way between that city and Sacramento, beginning in the middle of October, 1849. The propeller McKim was the first large vessel that ever navigated the Sacramento River by steam. She had doubled Cape Horn and arrived at San Francisco, October 3, and was immediately put in order by her San Francisco agents, Simmons, Hutchinson & Co., for the Sacramento trade. She drew eight feet of water, and many doubted whether she could ascend the river to that point; but she arrived there on the 27th of that month, amid the cheers of an immense crowd lining the shore. The fine old steamer Senator became her rival November 6, 1849. During these times the fare from Sacramento to San Francisco was $30. The little steamer called the Washington was the first that ascended as far as Vernon, at the mouth of Feather River, to which point she made regular trips. In April, 1850, the AEtna, a very small steamer, ascended the American as far as "Norristown," the first and probably the last time that point had ever been reached by a steamboat. May 8, 1850, the Jack Hayes reached the town of Redding at the head-waters of the Sacramento River, within forty-five miles of the Trinity Diggings. Among those who first took their place on the route between this point and Yuba City, at the month of the Yuba River, the early rival of Marysville, was the little steamboat Linda, in the fall of 1849. The steamer New World Was built at New York city, purposely for a trip to California, in the fall of 1849 and spring of 1850. It was 320 feet long, and of 530 tons' burden. The proprietor, William H. Brown, becoming financially embarrassed, had to take the sheriff in as partner. The latter employed deputies to go and remain on board during the launching, and to make assurance doubly sure he went upon board himself, but was unknown to the captain, Ed. Wakeman. The vessel was held to the port of New York by law, and the launching was ostensibly for the only purpose of getting the boat into the water. Steam, however, was raised previous, to the launching, and the sheriff, incognito, inquired what it meant. The reply was, "To wear the rust off the bearings and see that the engine worked well." But the captain, after steaming around the harbor awhile, put out to sea, against the protests of the sheriff. The captain and his crew, being more numerous than the sheriff and his posse, put them ashore in row boats, and came their way around Cape Horn to California! They made a fine voyage, and arrived at San Francisco July 11, 1850. For a long time thereafter the New World and the Senator made alternate trips between Sacramento and Benicia. Afterward she was employed in the coasting and oceanic trade, and some years ago was overhauled at San Francisco and transformed into a magnificent ferry-boat, and as such is now employed on the bay. Captain Wakeman was, at last accounts, a resident of San Francisco, which he has made his home ever since coming to the coast. In pioneer times steamboat explosions were common, several occurring almost every week in 1850, and some of them were fearfully destructive of life and property. That was before the era of modern safety engines, but many of those explosions were due either to defective boilers or careless engineers, or both. Occasionally a terrible explosion occurred as late as 1856 or later. Additional Comments: Extracted from Memorial and Biographical History of Northern California. Illustrated, Containing a History of this Important Section of the Pacific Coast from the Earliest Period of its Occupancy to the Present Time, together with Glimpses of its Prospective Future; Full-Page Steel Portraits of its most Eminent Men, and Biographical Mention of many of its Pioneers and also of Prominent Citizens of To-day. "A people that takes no pride in the noble achievements of remote ancestors will never achieve anything worthy to be remembered with pride by remote descendents." – Macauley. CHICAGO THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY 1891. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ca/statewide/history/1891/memorial/earlynav115ms.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.poppet.org/cafiles/ File size: 14.9 Kb