It’s free museum weekend in Butte County and I will be giving a free talk at the Pioneer History Museum in Oroville. Please come and meet me, enjoy the museum, and learn about Alvin Coffey and Black Slavery in Gold Rush California. It’s a fascinating and little-known topic.
Jennie Carter, African-American journalist writing for The Elevator, predicted the future of California in all its scenic variety and human diversity.
Oroville, June 13, 1869
Mr. Editor,–California as a part of Uncle Sam’s domains is truly an important part, and that she will furnish homes for thousands of Europe’s poor, Asia’s industrious and Africa’s once despised is a thing only of days. To know the greatness of our state one must ravel its length and breadth, visit its mountains and valleys, hills and plains. California embraces all climates; it has regions of perpetual summer, and Sierras where eternal winter reigns, fields ever bright with perennial green, and forests always glowing with Autumnal beauty.
Oroville, the county seat of Butte County, is a pleasantly located town, connected by Railroad with Marysville, and of course, easy of access to San Francisco, the city of cities of California. From Marysville here is one continuous plain, a level country sparsely settled although a great part of the land is under cultivation, but I should think from what I saw not properly cultivated.
(Jennie thought the farms of the valley lacked the “neatness and thrift” of New England farms, due to the “ever-restless feeling” of money-making of California folks.)
Oroville was small — 1425 residents in 1870. Jennie found “very few colored people” living in Oroville. She admired the streets and houses of Oroville.
That the people of Oroville are imbued with taste is manifest in the improvements made, the regularity of the Streets — the comfortable houses and yards full of fruit trees and flowers. I think I have seen no prettier place in California for a home than Oroville. It is a mining town, but surrounded by land fit for agriculture which argues well for the continued prosperity of the place.
Jennie Carter: A Black Journalist of the Early West, pp. 73-74 (excerpts)
The local paper (the Weekly Butte Record) didn’t impress her as anything better than an “itemized journal” that “answers the people for an advertizing medium,” but didn’t offer much beyond that. Nevertheless, she saw in Oroville not only a pleasant town, but a place rich with agricultural promise.
Jennie occasionally used stories from her husband’s life to illustrate her writings. In 1866 she had married Dennis Drummond Carter in Nevada County, California. Dennis was born free in Virginia in 1814. After the death of his father, his mother took her family to Philadelphia to preserve their freedom. He came to California around 1852, not long after the harrowing incident recorded here.
He was a popular musician and band leader in Nevada City. He was also considerably taller than the average man. In the following column Jennie calls him Mr. Trask (since she wrote as Ann J. Trask).
Mud Hill, December 12, 1868.
Mr. Editor.– “Six feet two inches;” so said Mr. Trask to an inquiry in regard to his height. I told him I thought he was mistaken; he said not, for he was measured, and had his measurement recorded at Harper’s Ferry in the summer of ’51, as he was returning from Sulphur Springs, Va., where he had been for several weeks with the other members of Frank Johnson’s band.
Judge his indignation when he arrived at Harper’s Ferry; he was asked who he belonged to, if he had any scars upon him, and then measured, and told he would have to stay over night as no colored person could travel after 4 o’clock P.M. He stood up and in his wrath I guess he was six feet three inches, he pronounced curses on that State. They then threatened him with the lash, and he told them to proceed, that the first one to lay hands on him would die. And their courage was no greater then than years after, when John Brown, with a handful of men frightened the whole State, for they told Mr. Trask they knew he was a free nigger, he was so independent, and they have long since suffered all the curses Mr. Trask pronounced upon them. . .
Born free, living in Philadelphia, associating with men and women, respected as a gentleman, the insult will never be forgotten. And when anyone asks him his height he will say six feet two inches, and think of that occurrence.
Jennie Carter: A Black Journalist of the Early West, p. 53
I wish I could find a photograph of Dennis and Jennie Carter but I haven’t seen one so far. Dennis Carter was active in community affairs, serving on juries, running for office, active in the Republican Party and the Masons. He died in 1894, having survived his wife by 13 years.
Letter from Nevada County. Mud Hill, May 3, 1868
Mr. Editor:– All women admire the beautiful. Here lies a broad field for woman’s talent–painting, sculpting, music, all the fine arts. Here her intuitive faculties can have full play; she can work around her own fireside–and gentlemen, there are many artists among us who adorn their own homes with what you are pleased to call knickknacks. All these things have given her pleasure in creation, and if encouragement were given, more than one Edmonia Lewis might gratify our vision with beautiful creations in marble.
. . . How proud we all feel of our own Miss Greenfield, and rejoice when the Anglo Saxon race had given to the world no sweeter singer than our own Black Swan.
What adorns our own homes more than pictures? Good pictures have a refining influence on the mind, and who of us would be without the portrait of the great and good Lincoln? Let us encourage our children in the use of the pencil and if the artist lurks there we shall soon perceive it. . .
The great world of letters is open to women, and those that have leisure know not, until perused, the pleasure derived from good books as companions. There is no scandal, no backbiting, no recriminations, no criticisms of surroundings, and when you close the book, then put your reflections on open paper.
Jennie Carter: A Black Journalist of the Early West, pp. 33-34 (excerpts)
Some time ago I wrote about Jennie Carter, who lived in Nevada City and wrote letters and columns for the Elevator (San Francisco) newspaper. At the time I didn’t have a book about her, but now I do, and I plan to give you more of her enjoyable and encouraging writings.
The book is Jennie Carter: A Black Journalist of the Early West, edited by Eric Gardner and published by the University Press of Mississippi. Gardner has collected all the columns he could find, but some issues of the Elevator are missing, and Jennie may have written for other periodicals under other names. Like many 19th century writers, she used a nom de plume. At first she called herself Ann J. Trask, and claimed to be a woman some twenty years older than she really was, living at “Mud Hill” in Nevada County. Most of her columns are signed “Semper Fidelis.” Who knows what other pseudonyms she may have used for other publications.
Her early columns were directed at children, but she soon found herself writing for everyone. She had great hopes for the young rising generation, free from the bondage of the past. She wrote:
Children, you hear a great deal said about color by those around you, see attention given white persons by your friends that is wholly unmerited, while those of darker skin are treated with cool neglect. Such are wrong, and that you may avoid like mistakes I write this for you to read. Let your motto be, civility to all, servility to none. Those reminders of bondage we must get out of the way as soon as possible; and while we would treat all with respect, we should not talk about color, light and dark, black and white.
It is a mistake to think we are elevated by having white associates. Ten to one they are ashamed to be seen in our company, and only endure us for the help we give them in doing their drudgery. . . .
Now children, we do not expect to get the older ones right in this matter, but we want you to come up right, for nations and people, like individuals, have to form characters. I wish to impress it upon all that we are passing through a transition state, forming a character that shall tell on millions yet to come, and this world is looking on with over critical eyes to see us assume our places among men. . . .
Throw away prejudices of caste and color. Strive to grow in ways mental, moral, as well as physical. Let our young men adopt none of the vices of the Anglo-Saxon; our young women have all refinements of those around them, and the dear children every encouragement to study. Oh, that we might awake to the importance of a thorough, universal education. It is already acknowledged that we have the capacity; let not the world say that we lack the energy.
Jennie Carter: A Black Journalist of the Early West, pp. 4-5
Wise words! But Jennie didn’t always write in a moralizing mood. She often told stories drawn from her childhood, and painted pictures of everyday life. In the next few days I’ll give you more from “Semper Fidelis.”
February 25th and 26th is Free Museum Weekend in Butte County, with more events and activities than anyone could possibly fit into one weekend. All participating museums, galleries, and cultural centers will offer free admission from 10am-4pm all weekend, and not only that, each museum has a new exhibit or extra offering for the weekend.
I’ll be in Oroville, speaking at the Pioneer History Museum on “Alvin Coffey and Slavery in California.” Come meet me at 2:00 p.m. — I’d love to meet you. The museum has a great collection sure to please any history buff.
Before or after you can visit some of the other great history venues in Oroville: the C.F. Lott home, the Chinese Temple, the Butte County Historical Society Museum, or Bolt’s Antique Tool Museum. So many choices!
Our very own Bard of Butte, poet Pres Longley, penned this valentine one hundred and sixty years ago. It appeared in the Weekly Butte Record on February 28, 1863, and undoubtedly touched many a lonely miner’s heart.
Lines to Etna -- A Valentine She knows not, she dreams not, how fondly I love, For that feeling I cannot express; Tho' with all the charmed magic of language I strove, I would fail in the utmost distress! I tried not, I cared not, to love her at first, But her sweet sunny smile warmed my heart And made it expand till I thought it would burst, As I saw each bright vision depart. With rapture I've gazed in her pure, sweet blue eyes,-- So charmed and entranced, that the tears, Unbidden, would spring in my own with surprise, And I wished that those moments were years. I'd freely renounce all the earth's boasted fame, That ambition so proudly admires, To gain her dear love, which would make me more blest Than the prize to which genius aspires. To love one so gentle, so good and so kind, Can not be accounted a wrong; Then, as long as I live, she shall dwell in my mind And breathe in the soul of my song! But I cannot be near her,-- I'll see her no more,-- My absence she never will heed:-- In the deep shady gulch I'll be digging the ore, And trying to follow the lead. ALP Nimshew, Feb. 14, 1863
Who Etna was we do not know, but ALP was his pen name, a rearrangement of the initials of his name, Alexander Preston Longley. Happy Valentine’s Day, Pres!
Black history in California has many tales to tell of slavery and freedom. Here is just one, the story of a girl named Lucy, who proved her freedom in spite of an attempt to re-enslave her.
In the same issue of the Placer Herald, an item explained that Lucy had been set free in 1851 by James Brown Sr., but that the son hoped to “catch the girl without her freedom papers” and take her back to Missouri as a slave. Fortunately for Lucy, she had friends, included lawyer P.W. Thomas.
Happy Birthday to President Abraham Lincoln, born on February 12, 1809.
Although he never visited California, he was very aware of its importance in the Union and hoped one day to see it for himself.
To his life-long friend Charles Maltby, who served as Superintendent of Indian Affairs for California, he wrote:
“I have long desired to see California; the production of her gold mines has been a marvel to me, and her stand for the Union, her generous offerings to the Sanitary Commission, and her loyal representatives have endeared your people to me; and nothing would give me more pleasure than a visit to the Pacific shore…”
Not long before he left for Ford’s Theater on the last evening of his life, Lincoln discussed California with House Speaker Schuyler Colfax (for whom Colfax, California is named). Colfax was about to leave on a trip to California and Lincoln said to him:
“During the war, when we were adding a couple of million dollars every day to our national debt, I did not care about encouraging the increase in the volume of our precious metals. We had the country to save first. But now that the rebellion is overthrown and we know pretty nearly the amount of our national debt, the more gold and silver we mine makes the payment of that debt so much the easier.
Tell the miners from me, that I shall promote their interests to the utmost of my ability; because their prosperity is the prosperity of the nation, and we shall prove in a very few years that we are indeed the treasury of the world.”
quoted in “Abraham Lincoln and California ” https://www.abrahamlincolnsclassroom.org/abraham-lincoln-state-by-state/abraham-lincoln-and-california/
If only Lincoln had lived! As a promoter of the transcontinental railroad, he might have been on the first train the California, to see her marvelous gold mines and prosperous cities. John Bidwell, who met Lincoln in 1864, would have been happy to welcome him to his home in Chico.
Let’s begin Black History Month with a little item from early days on Rancho Chico.
What kind of men did John Bidwell hire to work on Rancho Chico? In 1849 good reliable men were hard to come by — most men were off in the hills hunting for gold. But Bidwell needed workers, and here we see him hiring a “negro man George” to tame horses. Skill was more important than color.
San Francisco Dec. 2. 1849
Dear MacK,
I arrived here after a passage of 12 days – I believe I omitted to say to you that, before I left the ranch, I made arrangement with a negro man George to tame the colts on the farm, and to stay there until next March, and to attend to all the various vaquero duties for one horse & one pr. of mochilas – He liked your Red ear horse & I promised I would try & get him of you – he is not very serviceable for the Ranch and I hope you will have no objection to it – I mention this so that you may not give any orders for him – I have not been able to get any more Garden Seeds for the Ranch – but will try tomorrow & write you again – I hope you did not omit to send what you had by Doct. Clinton.
The Steamer Oregon arrived yesterday from Panama – I learned nothing new except that the cholera is at Mazatlan – 450 passengers.
Yours truly, J. Bidwell
Bidwell had just been elected to the California State Senate. He was on his way to conduct business in Sacramento and San Francisco before going to San Jose to serve in the legislature. I am not quite sure who he left in charge at Rancho Chico — it may have been Alfred H. Stout.
We don’t know anything else about George. Not his surname, or where he was from, or where he went. We do know what he was paid for three months work with the colts: a “red ear” horse that he liked the looks of and a pair of mochilas.
Mochila was the Spanish word for a saddlebag. Nowadays the word is used for a backpack or knapsack, but George would have been asking for saddlebags to go with his horse.
goldfields 