Butte County
Biographies
EUGENE EDMOND FOREN
EUGENE EDMOND FOREN.—One of the patriotic company of men, of whom we have all too few left to us, is Eugene Edmond Foren, veteran of the Civil War, and a well posted man in all western enterprises that are synonymous with the early days of California. He was born in Columbia Falls, Washington County, Maine, May 8, 1846. His father was Michael Foren, a native of Ireland, where he married Mary Tanker, and whence he came to this country and engaged in farming, in Maine, where he died. Eugene Edmond Foren was the youngest of seven children. He was raised at Columbia Falls and received his education in the public schools. In 1863, he enlisted in Company B of the Thirty-first Maine Volunteers, and was mustered in at Augusta. He was sent south with the Army of the Potomac and saw action in the battles of North Anna, Cold Harbor, Mine Run, the Battle of the Wilderness and others. In 1864, at the Battle of Spottsylvania, he was severely wounded in the chest, and after he had fallen was wounded in both hips by the explosion of a shell. He was sent to the hospital in Washington, D. C., until after the close of the war, when he was honorably discharged in November, 1865. Mr. Foren then returned to Maine, and after he had recovered sufficiently he engaged in lumbering and logging in Maine. He received his pension from the day of his discharge.
In 1872, he came to Truckee, California, and followed lumbering and mining at San Juan, until hydraulic mining was prohibited. In 1880, he came to Butte County and entered the employ of John Hupp, at Hupp’s Mill and later worked for his son, George Hupp. Mr. Foren was next with the Sierra Flume Company and worked at logging under Barney Cussick. He then worked as logger with the Diamond Match Company. In 1910, he quit logging and entered the employ of the veneer plant of the Diamond Match Company of Chico. The following year he entered the employ of the City of Chico as sewer inspector, which place he has held ever since. He built his own residence, at 939 Walnut Street, where he has a family orchard and also owns two other residences adjoining.
During all these years Mr. Foren has been interested in mining. He was superintendent of the Paint Mine, above Magalia, where ocher was mined. He owned and ran the Emancipation Mine at Lovelock and owned the Hastings Mine at the forks of Butte Creek. He worked at mining in the winter and at logging in the summer for over thirty years.
Mr. Foren was married, on December 17, 1888, at the Chico Hotel, to Mrs. Helen J. (Woodruff) Bingham, who was born at Blue Hill, Maine. She was raised at Machias, and was the daughter of William Otis and Jane D. (Snowball) Woodruff, farmers of Maine, of old New England families who were pioneers of that country. The Woodruff and Bingham families were among the founders and first settlers of Machias, and were prominent in the upbuilding of that region. Members of these families served in the Revolutionary War. Mrs. Foren’s grandfather, Otis Woodruff, was a farmer, and her great-grandfather Jonathan was a surveyor who surveyed much of the land in the State of Maine; he was also a large land-owner. Mr. and Mrs. Foren have one child, Eugene Edwin, who is an engineer in the employ of the Mammoth Copper Mine at Kennett. Mr. Foren was made a Mason in Addison, Maine. His politics are those of the Republican party. He is one of the best posted men regarding the mineralogy, geology and mining resources of the Sierra Mountain Region.
Transcribed
by Sharon Walford Yost.
Source: "History of
Butte County, Cal.," by George C. Mansfield, Pages 1160-1161, Historic Record Co, Los Angeles, CA, 1918.
© 2009 Sharon
Walford Yost.
Golden Nugget Library's Butte County Biographies