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Collection: Books and Periodicals
A Memorial and Biographical History of Northern California (1891) (713 pages)
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Page: of 713
HISTORY OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA. 107
one of the prettiest towus in the foot-hills.
Quartz-mining hag recently been revived there.
Two foundries are iu operation, also an icetactory, etc.
Amador City, a mile and a half north of
Sutter Creek, is also a thriving town.
Drytown, three miles north of Amador, is in
the “ wari belt,” and most favorably situated
for fruit-raising. Sulphuret works exist here,
and also at Sutter Creek.
Plymouth, three miles farther on, is also prosperona, is the seat of a consolidated mining company which employs 225 men, mostly men of
families. Their mine has paid nearly $2,000,000 in dividends. There are also other mines
in that vicinity.
At Oleta, six miles east of Plymouth, the
curious-minded can see two genuine cork trees
(Quercus suber), twenty-eight years old.
Clinton, six miles east of Jackson, is in the
midst of a fine vineyard section.
Volcano is a mining town twelve miles from
Jackson.
Pine Grove, Aqueduct City, Buena Vista and
Lancha Plana are other towns in Amador
County.
BUTTE COUNTY.
GENERAL JOHN BIDWELL.
In the person of General Bidwell is exemplified, perhaps more fully than ever before, the
old adage, “that truth is stranger than fiction.”
It does not seein possible to one who meets him
for the first time and marks his upright form,
elastic step, and military bearing that he has been
a witness of and actor in the chief part of all the
scenes that go to make up the history of Cualifornia, from the quiet pastoral days of Mexican
rule and the mission dumination, through the
tremendously exciting times of the gold discovery and the invasion of the Argonauts, down
to the present with its wealth of orchard and
grain field. Yet such is a fact, and indeed
amid all the people of the State no one has been
a more effective worker for progress, or deserves
so highly the thanks’ and appreciation of the
people than General Bidwell. His life has been
a ro:nance, yet through it all there runs such a
thread of reality that one realizes from the first
the presence of a master-mind and listens intently to the “strange, true tale.” We present
here, as a leading figure in our sketches of piooneer Californian biography, a short outline of
the General’s life, but from information obtained
from him is made up a great part of our picture
of early days and early doings, and we take
this opportunity to record our obligation.
General Bidwell was born Angust 5, 1819,
in Chautauqua County, New York, of the sturdy
New England stock that has made itself felt
thronghout the history of this continent and
has always been in the van of progress. His
father, Abraham Bidwell, was a native of Connecticut and a farmer of no great means, but
of thoroughgoing and energetic traits, that have
been still further developed in his son. His
mother, whose maiden name was Clarissa Griggs,
was a native of Massachnsetta, a member of the
old family of that name. His youthful life was
full uf change, very tew opportunities being
presented for education or advancement. The
principal and last schooling he received was obtained at Kingaville Academy, in Ashtabula
County, Ohio; walking 300 miles to reach it
and working a whole summer to get means to
go there, at wages of $7 a month. This lack,
however, has been no real disadvantage to the
General, for he has learned so well from the
school of experience and of wide and general
reading that there are few men better informed
or with better applied knowledge than he.
In 1839, at the age of nineteen years, he left
his home to seek his fortune in the West,
single-handed and without means other than a
brave heart, backed by right resolves. He went
first to Iowa and thence to the rich new lands
just thrown open to settlement on the western
frontiers of the State of Missouri. Here in
this lovely spot he intended to make his home,
and took up some land. This was in Platte
County, at a point about nine miles from Fort
Leavenworth, but on the Missouri side of the