California Gold Rush Merchant; the Journal of Stephen Chapin David. Edited by Benjamin B. Richards
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California gold rush merchant; the journal of Stephen Chapin David. Edited by Benjamin B. Richards Huntington Library Publications California Gold Rush Merchant The Journal of Stephen Chapin Davis Edited by Benjamin B. Richards The Huntington Library San Marino, California, 1956 COPYRIGHT 1956 BY HENRY E. HUNTINGTON LIBRARY AND ART GALLERY Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 56-12476 The publication of this volume has been assisted by The James Irvine Foundation Publication Fund of the Huntington Library PRINTED BY ANDERSON, RITCHIE & SIMON: LOS ANGELES DESIGN BY JOSEPH SIMON Contents page vii Introduction page 3 The Journal, 1850-1854 page 105 Notes page 119 Index FOR JANET vii Introduction IN JULY 1850 a seventeen-year-old New England boy, Stephen Davis, and his brother Josiah sailed from New York City via Panama for San Francisco and the California gold fields. They were California gold rush merchant; the journal of Stephen Chapin David. Edited by Benjamin B. Richards http://www.loc.gov/resource/ calbk.072 but two of the thousands of Argonauts who were seized by the gold fever and journeyed to the Sierra foothills. Many of these adventurers have left accounts of their experiences; some of them are clear and well written, others are no more than a letter or two written home or a journal valiantly begun but trailing off into silence once the trip was under way. Among the journals that have been discovered, the diary of Stephen Chapin Davis is unusual because the author sees the gold rush through the eyes of a merchant rather than a miner. And while it is true that many young men left home to seek their fortunes, contemporary passenger lists reveal that few were under twenty years of age. Stephen's well-composed diary is therefore all the more remarkable. In making four Panama crossings he never fails to mention a passing ship; he tells us the cost of goods and services, and he speculates, however briefly, on the prospects and present condition of business in the many places he visits. Through his concise day-by-day entries he emerges as vital and enthusiastic as though his daily and nightly jottings written by candlelight, on shipboard, or under a tent roof had just been put down within the past few days instead of one hundred years ago. Stephen was an engaging prototype of the Horatio Alger heroes. At thirteen he was at work in the textile mills, and at viii sixteen he went to sea. For a year he hawked papers. When he sailed the first time for California he purchased five hundred copies of the latest New York editions and disposed of them at Panama, Acapulco, and San Francisco. That such a practice was not uncommon is attested to by Bayard Taylor in his classic Eldorado. On his supply trips to San Francisco young Davis brought back newspapers to the diggings, well aware of the salability of news to men far from home. His motto, “Perseverance, Energy and Economy,” ingenuously set down in his journal at Long Bar as a constant reminder to himself, was an expression of traditional American virtues. He was deeply interested in religion and devoted to church-going. Indeed one has the feeling that the life of a missionary, after university training, would have suited him perfectly. No picture of the diarist is available; whether he was tall or short, dark or fair is not so important to our understanding as to know that he was sober and God-fearing by training and conviction, loyally devoted to his family and friends, and unusually single-minded in his quest for financial success. California gold rush merchant; the journal of Stephen Chapin David. Edited by Benjamin B. Richards http://www.loc.gov/resource/ calbk.072 Stephen was born February 16, 1833, on “the old homestead” near Dunstable, Massachusetts; he died twenty-three years later on October 4, 1856, presumably of tuberculosis. His father Mial had died in March of 1844. Two years later, having disposed of the farm and stock, Stephen and his brothers Josiah, Stilman, Mial, and George, his sister Lucy, and their mother moved to neighboring Nashua, a flourishing town of five thousand inhabitants on the Merrimack River just across the state line in New Hampshire. The boy immediately went to work in the Nashua Manufacturing Company's textile mills, and later did odd jobs for the family of Elder George Evans in Manchester. In the fall he enrolled at the Nashua Literary Institution, a school conducted by David and Louisa Crosby. In March 1847 the family was again stricken. Their beloved Lucy contracted typhoid fever and died. Though Stephen, Mial, and their mother also came down with the same disease, they recovered, and ix Stephen was sent to work as office boy with the family of Dr. J. H. Graves, probably to settle the doctor's bill. We do not know when he learned that gold had been discovered at Sutter's Mill for the news reached the eastern seaboard slowly. Of more importance to the Davises at this time was their mother's marriage to Mr. J. L. Doty on March 15, 1848. Within a few days Mr. Doty and his family moved into the Davis house on Harrison Street, and that summer Stephen worked with his new stepfather in his shoemaker shop, which he did not care for. But in his leisure time he did enjoy the Cadets of Temperance and attended their meetings regularly. In the fall he was able to return to Mr. Crosby's academy. Stephen speaks of liking school but was increasingly aware of being unable to concentrate upon his studies, for in common with a great many other New Englanders he wanted to “go to Sea.” He dutifully attended classes and did his homework until the spring of 1849 when he went down to Boston armed with a letter of introduction to the shipping firm of Blanchard, Sherman & Company. He signed on as cabin boy with the brig Dudley sailing for Galveston, Texas, on March 1. Homesick, seasick, and without food for five or six days, Stephen was forced to attend the captain, J. W. Yates, who had erysipelas; but he tried nevertheless to be patient and uncomplaining. At sixteen he was eager to be independent, purposeful, and was concerned more than the average boy with the seriousness of life. California gold rush merchant; the journal of Stephen Chapin David. Edited by Benjamin B. Richards http://www.loc.gov/resource/ calbk.072 The Dudley was laden with a general cargo of tinware, pins, needles, scissors, combs, buttons, and perhaps cotton cloth and books. Watching the exchange of these “Yankee notions” for a return cargo of cotton, sugar, and molasses aroused Stephen's trading sense; later he was to show real business ability in the mining territory of California. At Galveston Stephen's abiding interest in religion again manifested itself. He attended the Baptist church, noting that galleries on three sides of the church were occupied by slaves while the lower part was reserved for the whites. He also x described the Catholic church, an elegantly furnished large red sandstone building with stained glass windows. Because of harsh treatment two sailors had jumped ship, and on the return voyage Stephen served as an able-bodied seaman. “I am drove around by the rascally mates most shamefully, but get along the best way I can.” Except that the crew sighted a large steamship headed north, which they presumed was returning passengers and gold from California on the New York-Chagres run, the trip was uneventful. Landing in New York with wages of fifteen dollars in his pocket to show for three months at sea, Stephen wandered around the city, taking special delight in P. T. Barnum's celebrated museum of wonderful curiosities, and then returned to Nashua on the New Haven Railroad. Back home he carried papers for his brother Mial, but his heart was not in his work; nor did he seem eager to go back to school. He had tasted the freedom of seafaring, and perhaps too, dreams of California, nourished by reports in the newspapers that he was delivering, increased his restlessness. We do not know the actual incidents leading to the decision of Stephen and Josiah to go to the gold country. Stephen was seventeen now and Josiah was several years older. Perhaps they realized that the booming territory would provide good business possibilities; perhaps they had dreams of striking it rich, although Stephen, who was not robust, seemed less interested in mining than his brother; perhaps they simply wanted to seek adventure. At any rate, by the time another year had passed, they had made a rather solemn agreement to set out together. Their gold rush adventure California gold rush merchant; the journal of Stephen Chapin David. Edited by Benjamin B. Richards http://www.loc.gov/resource/ calbk.072 begins with Josiah on his way to New York to secure tickets on the United States Mail Steamship Philadelphia. After a fearful Atlantic storm that wrecked many ships, they reached Chagres, eastern terminus of the Isthmian crossing. From the grass huts of Chagres they ascended the Chagres River to Gorgona in a boat propelled by three natives, then walked the remaining part of the fifty-mile transit to Panama City, having xi encountered poor food and worse lodging, mud, and drenching tropical downpours. Reaching Panama at last, they learned their ship, the California, was due in a couple of days. When their baggage did not arrive from Gorgona in time to meet the sailing date, Josiah went on to San Francisco and Stephen stayed behind waiting for their possessions.