Collection: Books and Periodicals > Nevada County Historical Society Bulletins

About This Item:

Title: Volume 070-4 - October 2016 Collection Type: Books and Periodicals Collection Name: Nevada County Historical Society Bulletins # of Pages: 6 Download PDF: User Login Required Download OCR Text: User Login Required

Date Scanned: 2019-06-07 08:39:50 OCR Software Version #: tesseract 5.4.1 Item Sourced From: PDF First Created: 2025-03-17 04:06:33 Last Updated: 2025-03-17 04:06:33

Original Held At: Searls Historical Library Location: 161 Nevada City Hwy, Nevada City, CA 95959

Page: of 6  

NCHS Bulletin October 2016 Pioneers’ Reunion Register he arrived in Nevada County on April 13, 1852.° Tompkins’ first wife, Lucy Rebecca Darling, had died on May 4, 1848, in Elmira, New York, at the age of twenty-three. Their first child, Omer Alonzo, had been born on December 2, 1843. A second son, Jarvis Darling was born in 1845 and died in 1847. A daughter, Lucy Rebecca, was born on April 1, 1848, and died on August 26, 1848, three months after her mother.’ When he sailed for the California gold fields, Elijah’s son Omer was left in the care of his sister Millicent and her husband, Orin Savage. Also living in their household was Omer’s grandmother, Laura Tompkins. Losing two young children and his wife in a short span of years may have been a contributing factor to try his luck in California and start a new life. Shortly after arriving in California Tompkins made his way to Nevada County, and it is believed he first lived and mined at Little York, and at some point opened a butchering business. On July 30, 1854, he married Ruth Hope Butterfield at Little York.’ Little York was a small mining town on the old Emigrant Trial of the Truckee Route. Ruth’s brother William and her new husband went into partnership and opened a store and boarding house at Buffalo Slides on the Bear River above Dutch Flat. Ruth’s parents and siblings had moved upcountry in late 1854 and built a hotel at Omega near the river, and Ruth and her husband and her brother William relocated to Nevada City. The Hotel de Paris, where City Marshal Henry Plumer was boarding in 1857, before he was convicted of murder and replaced by Elijah O. Tompkins. (Drawing by Dave. Comstock from constemporary photo) SONAR: SS SSAA” On April 29, 1855, a son was born to Ruth and named Edward Alexander Tompkins. On June Ist of that year Elijah Tompkins was appointed Nevada County Deputy Sheriff by Sheriff W. W. “Boss” Wright, and by the end of July Ruth’s brother William also became a deputy. Ruth and her husband shared a residence on Pine Street with Charles and William Butterfield, and William’s wife Mary, when an accidental fire destroyed most of the Nevada City on July 19, 1856. Driven by high winds and flames, the fire consumed nearly all the dwelling houses and wooden business structures, and all but six of the twenty-eight supposedly fireproof brick buildings. Ten lives were lost, and monetary losses totalled more than $1,500,000, including the new county courthouse and all its public records. In November 1857, while Nevada City Marshal Henry Plumer was being tried for murder, Elijah Tompkins was appointed deputy marshal. Tompkins replaced Plumer as city marshal after that officer was convicted and resigned two months later, and Ruth’s husband was elected to a full term on May 3, 1858. (After Plumer was pardoned by the governor on the grounds that he was dying of consumption, Tompkins hired Plumer as a Nevada City constable in 1859. Apparently Plumer’s health was not dire, as in the years following his release he went from lawman to notorious criminal and was eventually hung in Montana on January 10, 1864.) any Weg Ublamd mS Map, were gery “Ysa ee — ae = par en wewreremc es tT, LLLP EDIDM) sity) te Ss red > anneal + a an 2 ees oo eK ~OOO we = ee tte es mee ee —— wa a See. ee