goldfields

In San Francisco, on Saturday, September 8, 1883, William Sharon, a former U.S. Senator from Nevada and a wealthy man about town, was arrested on a charge of adultery. This was a surprise to all who knew the senator since his wife had died in 1875. As far as anyone knew, the senator was a widower.

Not that he deprived himself of female companionship. He was known to have had a series of young ladies whom he paid to be available. He could afford the luxury, since he was a multi-millionaire, having made his pile in the Comstock Lode. Mining operations and real estate deals had made him the “King of the Comstock” and he used some of his profits to build two luxury hotels, the Palace and the Grand Hotel on Market Street.

The charge of adultery was brought by William Neilson, a shady character recently arrived from Australia, who was acting on behalf of Sarah Althea Hill, a young woman who claimed to be Mrs. William Sharon. Although books on the case usually refer to her as Sarah, she actually used her middle name and was called “Allie.”

Miss Allie Hill was well known in San Francisco society, but not as Mrs. William Sharon. She had come to California from Missouri in 1871 with her brother, Morgan Hill (for whom the town of Morgan Hill is named.) She had inherited enough money from her deceased parents to support herself and claimed that she initially met Senator Sharon when she went to him for investment advice.

Allie claimed that she had a marriage contract signed by Sharon and herself, which he insisted on keeping secret when he was running for reelection to his senate seat. He claimed that the contract was a forgery. Interviewed about the scandal, he told a newspaper reporter, “I am a pretty old fish and that kind of bait won’t catch me.”

The Grass Valley Daily Union, 13 September 1883 (note the error of “Miss Aggie Hill” rather than Allie)

He was indeed an old fish at sixty-five, and Miss Gertie Dietz, his current paramour, was only the latest in a long sequence. Allie Hill was thirty years old when she started her relationship with Sharon. He said he had paid her $500 a month to be his mistress, and as a young lady who liked to dress in the height of fashion, she easily managed to spend that amount. If he had stopped paying her monthly stipend, then she had good reason to seek another way to get money out of him.

The charge of adultery was dismissed by the court. Allie then sued for divorce, alimony and division of community property. This meant she would have to prove that they were married.

Next: The Source of the Story

The story of Senator Sharon and Sarah Althea Hill is told in full in Sarah and the Senator, by Robert H. Kroninger, published by Howell-North Books in 1964. This is the source of my information. Another more recent book about Sarah (or Allie) is Enchantress, Sorceress, Madwoman by Robin C. Johnson (California Venture Books, 2014), but I have not seen that book.

California Spring, by Albert Bierstadt

Albert Bierstadt’s painting is a romanticized view of spring in California, and yet I think we know that sometimes, if you go to the right spot at the right time, and close one eye, so that the electrical wires and the paved roads and the vehicles disappear, California in spring looks just like this. Blue sky, heaps of white clouds, cattle grazing on green hills spread with wildflowers, and a river winding through the landscape — that’s the beauty of California in the spring.

Bret Harte saw the other side of spring in California — the spring that brings rain, overflowing rivers, and mud, until it all turns to dry grass, dust, and searing heat — and then he wrote this ode to Spring.

California Madrigal

The month of March brings the beginning of spring in California. Trees are in bloom and soon the rains will cease. Enjoy it while it lasts, “ere the summer’s begun,” because as Harte says, in California, spring “obtains but one month in the year,” and before you know it, it will be 101º in the shade.

I had planned to drive to Sacramento today, but this wet and windy weather is keeping me home. My journey can wait until next week. As it happens, the weather on February 25th, 1862, was nearly identical.

Sacramento Daily Union, 25 Feb. 1862

But at least we don’t have boats in the streets.

Sacramento in 1862

The Great Flood of 1862 filled the Central Valley of California like an enormous lake. The rain started in November, and heavy rain and snow continued to fall throughout the winter, causing flooding that lasted well into spring. The city of Sacramento, built where the American and Sacramento Rivers meet, had constructed a levee to keep the river water out of the city. Instead, it acted as a dam, containing water in the city, as water flowed in from higher land to the east.

The Great Flood of 1862

For more on the Great Flood, here is a good article. from activenorcal.net.

Could it happen again? These intense weather events are predicted to happen every 100 to 200 years. But we now have levees, dams, and bypasses in place to shift the water away from urban locations.

On Sunday I went to San Francisco — we traveled via Hwy. 113 and Knight’s Landing, crossing over the brimful Sutter Bypass, one of the channels that takes excess water out of the Sacramento River. Here is a lovely video, shot recently by John Hannon, showing the Sutter Bypass. Near the end you will see Hwy. 113 crossing the bypass, which is wider, though shallower, than the river.

Here is a little more on the water tower on the M & T Ranch. Liz Stewart and John Gallardo alerted me to the existence of a drawing of the ranch in Butte County Illustrated, a book that was published in 1877. The pictures from this book are available online at Meriam Library Special Collections Historical Photograph Collection.

Ranch of D. M. Reavis

As you can see, the Reavis Ranch was quite the spread. And you have to admire the fine horses, bulls, and cows that ornament the corners. But it’s hard to see the water tower in this picture, so here is a closeup.

You can see that in 1877 or a little earlier, when the drawing was made, the tower was no more than a box on stilts. It had yet to be enclosed.

Here is another photo of the tower — other pictures in the album have the date March 21, 1922. By this time the ranch was owned by James D. Phelan, the mayor of San Francisco. The photo comes from the Phelan Photograph Album collection at the Bancroft Library, accessible at Calisphere.

There are several other photos of the Reavis Ranch in this collection — pictures of a few outbuildings and fields, such as this one.

Back to Butte County Illustrated — In the upper left corner of the drawing is a picture of Reavis’s famous race horse, Blackbird.

John Bidwell wrote in his diary in 1874:

Fri. December l8.
Somewhat hazy – & clear – Drove to Reavis’ ranch with Van Vliet — Saw Blackbird