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Peter Lassen - Danish Pioneer of California (13 pages)
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Page: of 13
Historical Society of Southern California
cisco fire of 1906. Still, Lassen was so Prominent that a rough
chronology of his activities can be set down. From 1831 to 1839
he lived in Keytesville, where he did blacksmithing, and also
joined the Masonic Order. He is reported to have used his
meager military training in organizing a local militia there to
fight the Indians, and he was soon its captain,
In this community he became acquainted with John A. Sutter,
who left for Hawaii and California in 1838. Lassen followed him
the next year, taking the overland route to Oregon, wintering on
the Willamette River near present-day Oregon City. In the
spring of 1840 he took ship down the coast to Bodega Bay and
? then to Santa Cruz. There he may have bought some land, but it
is more likely that he worked for Isaac Graham. In any case he
built the first sawmill in northern California, and in less than two
years this versatile craftsman milled some 50,000 feet of lumber,
made saddles and furniture, and was able to leave in 1843 with
one hundred mules and extra cash.
With Indian assistance he drove his herds northward and established a ranch on the Cosumnes River, not far from Sutter’s.
It must have been here that Lassen hosted the mysterious and
extraordinary Swedish traveler, G. M. af Sandels, otherwise
known as Emanuel Edelhjerta or Waseurtz af Sandels, who left
[116]
Peter Lassen
the following record: “We employed a cuple of days to this job
and our quarters at night we generally took up with Master
Peter Lawson a Danish blacksmith who led a nomadic life moying his blacksmith shop and small stock of cattle horses and
rales about the rich prairys himself alway at work repairing
arms for the hunters and agricultural implements for the farmers
and he is a most extraordinary and industrious men hospitable
and kind to everybody also to the Indians who dot on him when
in the afternoon he leave off his blacksmt. work he saddle his
Lassen’s Bosquejo Rancho. Sketch by J. G. Bruff.
Reproduced by permission of the Huntington Library.
horse rides about with his rifle and kill some deer or some antelope Indians are always ther on the lookout and recieve for
carying home the half of the flesh the skins he dry for sale. His
cattle are so tame that only striking in a certain way with his
hammer on the small side of the anvill they come up about the
cottage or temporary shade regular as soldiers called at orderly.
An old Hollander a sargent live with him and make butter chees
and bread so with the venison and milk they live really comfortable both have their Indian squas but in the adjacent indian
camp and never residing with them.”
When John C. Fremont came through for the first time and
asked Sutter for a hundred mules, Sutter had only to call upon
his friend Peter Lassen, When thieves made off with two valuable horses, Lassen with John Bidwell and James Bruheim pur[117]