Butte County
Biographies
BENJAMIN F. POTTER
BENJAMIN F. POTTER.--While there are quite a large number of the old “boys in blue” who served in our Civil War, in the State of California, there are comparatively few of the old “boys in gray” who served in the Confederate army. Chico has, however, a worthy representative of the “boys in gray” in the person of Benjamin F. Potter, who was born in Johnson County, Mo., in 1849. His father, Stephen, was born in North Carolina, but was brought up in Indiana and Missouri. He made several trips to Salt Lake as wagon-boss for Russell and Major, and was one of the pioneers who crossed the plains to California with ox teams in 1850. He remained in California but eighteen months, when he returned home and for a time was overseer for Gen. Joseph Shelby, a farmer in Lafayette County, Mo. In 1862, he was waylaid and murdered at his home, and, in 1863, Grandfather Potter and several neighbors were killed. Stephen Potter’s wife died in 1856. They had but two children, Benjamin F. and his sister Martha.
When but thirteen years of age, Benjamin F. Potter had to shift for himself, or as it is sometimes expressed, “paddle his own canoe.” He soon enlisted in the Confederate army and served under Pap Price, in a cavalry regiment, participating in the battles of Lexington, Blue, Big Blue and Newtonia. He was in active service until the surrender at Shreveport, when he returned, being then less than sixteen years of age. He witnessed the horrors of that awful time, when brother’s hand was raised against brother. With his companions, he often went on very short rations and felt keenly the pangs of hunger. After the war he came to Dover, Mo., where he worked in a sawmill during the winter. In the spring he began freighting on the plains, driving ox teams until fall, when he went to Texas and remained over winter there, then returned to Missouri, where he worked on a farm. All his father’s belongings had been lost during the war, and he let the land go.
Mr. Potter married, in Missouri, Miss Adeline Charles, who was born in Vernon County, Mo. He farmed in Vernon County, until 1875, when he came to Chico and began working for wages, on ranches and in sawmills for the Sierra Lumber Company, and for Chapman, McKay and Company in the woods, and as edgerman at Carpenter’s Mills. In 1886 he began farming for himself, leasing land and raising grain; this he continued until orchards began to be planted, when he started to work in the orchards. In 1895, he bought a ten-acre peach orchard, which he later dug up and planted the land to almonds and grapes. He sold five acres of the orchard, but still retains the other five.
Mr. And Mrs. Potter have two children; Adeline, Mrs. Zehndner, of Oakland; and Lulu Florence, Mrs. John Briscoe, of Chico. Mr. Potter served for a time as school trustee. He is a Democrat, and has for many years been a member of the fraternity of Odd Fellows.
Transcribed
by Sharon Walford Yost.
Source: "History of
Butte County, Cal.," by George C. Mansfield, Pages 1121-1122, Historic Record Co, Los Angeles, CA, 1918.
© 2009 Sharon
Walford Yost.
Golden Nugget Library's Butte County Biographies