Collection: Books and Periodicals

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Title: A Memorial and Biographical History of Northern California (1891) Collection Type: Books and Periodicals Publisher: Lewis Publishing Company Published: 1891 Copyright: In the public domain or published before 1925 Source(s): Google Books # of Pages: 713 Download PDF: User Login Required Download OCR Text: User Login Required

Date Scanned: 2024-07-22 00:25:09 Item Sourced From: PDF First Created: 2025-03-17 03:11:29 Last Updated: 2025-03-17 06:30:36

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

Page: of 713  

16 HISTORY OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA. by the Russians that the latter began to entertain serious thoughts of withdrawing from California altogether. There was no motive for the _ Russians to hold an ocenpancy limited by Bodega Bay on the south and the Gualala River on © the north. At best, there was but a narrow bench of seaboard available for either farming or grazing purposes.True, there was a wealth of forest back of this mesa, but they had already learned that this timber was not durable as material for shipbuilding. They had pretty well exhausted the supply ot timber from which pine pitch could be manufactured. Tan bark for the carrying on of their tanneries was their most promising continuing supply for the future. The agents of the Alaska Fur Company had already signified to the California authorities a willingness to vacate Fort Ross upon payment for improvements. Through the intricate evolutions of red tape this was transmitted to the viceroy of Mexico, and as that functionary took it as an evidence that the Russian colony at Ross was on its last lege, refusal was made on the ground that the Russians, having made improvements on Spanieh territory, with material acquired from Spanish soil, they ought not to expect payment for the same. While this is not the language, it is the spirit of the view the viceroy took of the subject. As a legal proposition this was doubtless true, but as a matter of fact, at any time after 1825 the superintendent at Ross had at his command snfiicient of the armament and munitions of war to have marched from Ross to San Diego without let or hindrance, so far as the viceroy of Mexico was concerned. These Dons and Hidalgo seemed, however, to consider their rubrics to be more powerful than sworde or cannon. As their overtures for sale had been thus summarily disposed of, the cold, impassive Muscovites pursued the even tenor of their way, and as the lands around Fort Ross became exhausted by continuous farming they extended their farming operations southward between the Russian River and Bo. dega Bay, and ultimately inland to the neighborhood of the present village of Bodega Corners. At the latter place there were several Russian graves, in the midst of which there stood a Greek cross, long after the Americans came into occupancy. The earliest American settlers in that neighborhood aver that the Russians had a grist-mil] some two or three miles easterly from Bodega Corners. Certain it is that the authorities at San Francisco had notification that the Russians contemplated oceupation for farming purposes as far inland as the present site of Santa Rosa. These rumors, whether true or not, doubtless accelerated the movement of Spanish colonization in that direction. Governor Wrangell, now having control in Alaska, seems to have taken an intelligent view of the whole situation, and realized that unless the company, of which he was head representative, could obtain undisputed possesrion of all the territory north of the Bay of San Francisco and eastward to the Sacramento, it was useless to attempt a continuance at Ross. To achieve this end the Alaska company was willing to bny the establishments already at San Rafael and Sonoma. The fact that the California authorities submitted these propositions to the Mexican government, now free from the yoke of Spanish rule, would indicate that by them such a proposition was not considered in the light of a heinous offense. Alvarado was then at the head of the California government, and no doubt he looked with great distrust, if nut alarm, upon the number of Americans who were beginning to find their way into California. But General Vallejo, who was now almost autocrat on the north side of the Bay of San Francisco, was not, probably, sv averse to Americans, as he had already three brothers-in-law of Yankee blood. Through these kinsmen, who were all gentlemen of good intelligence and education, Vallejo had become well informed in reference to the push and energy of the Aincrican people, and hence it is quite certain that he did not favor any permanent ocenpancy here by any European power. In truth, while the California government had confided itself to wordy pen