Butte County
Biographies
CHARLES L. STILSON
CHARLES L. STILSON.--A student of the
history of early days in California,
who himself has a number of interesting collections pertaining to the Indians
and to the early coinage and the mineralogical resources of the state, Charles
L. Stilson is an entertaining conversationalist and a
well-known attorney at law, who came to Butte County in 1863. His grandfather, Abner Stilson, was born in Stonington,
Conn., and settled near Rochester,
N. Y., where he had a farm. Then he moved to Butler County,
Ohio, and in
1835 went to Elkhart County,
Ind., where he died. His father, also named
Abner, was born at Rochester;
and he likewise went to Elkhart County,
where he followed the jeweler's trade. He was known to everyone as a patriot,
and raised a company for the
Mexican War, although it was never called into active
service. He died in Goshen, Ind.
Charles
L. Stilson's mother was Melissa Denman before her
marriage, and her birthplace was in Connecticut.
On both sides of her family she came from Scotch descent, and she died in the
same month as her husband. She was the mother of three children, all
boys, who accompanied their uncle
and aunt to Wisconsin and settled in Walworth
County, near Lake Geneva.
Thomas
H. Benton Stilson was in the Civil War, a member of
Company A, of the Seventh Wisconsin
Volunteer Infantry. He was killed in the Battle of Petersburg on July 31, 1864.
James McCord Stilson enlisted in the Union service.
He was familiarly known as Mac Stilson. He was a
member of Company A, of the First Wisconsin Cavalry, and came to have some
knowledge of the incidents connected with the attempt by Jefferson Davis to
escape the Union forces. He says that Jeff Davis did not try to escape in a
woman's dress, as was stated, but simply had on a dressing gown worn in those
days. Mr. Stilson participated in the capture of the
famous Confederate chief, near Irwinsville,
Ga., and received his proportion of the
reward offered by Congress, July 27, 1868. Mr. Davis was in full rebel uniform,
and Mr. Stilson carried the news of his capture to Macon,
Ga., and was the first to report his
apprehension to General Wilson at that point. James McCord Stilson
came, in 1868, to Chico, where he
still resides. For years he has been statistical correspondent for the Judd
Farmer, and also sends the accredited crop reports of Butte
County to the authorities in Washington.
He has a large collection of Indian relics, of which he has a good knowledge.
Charles
L. Stilson was born at Goshen,
Ind., August 10, 1844. He was three years
old when his parents died, in 1847; and he was then taken to Lake
Geneva, Wis., and later removed to Genoa,
that state. He attended first the public school, and then Peet's
Academy, under the direction of the well-known educator, Emerson W. Peet. Having completed his studies there, on attaining his
fifteenth year he joined a surveyor's corps and carried the chain in southern Wisconsin
and northern Illinois. He resided
in Genoa for several years, and
then went to Shelby County, Mo., where he was employed as a clerk in the L. B. Parmalee store in Shelbyville. While in that district he
saw many stirring incidents of the Civil War--the frequent encounters of
Northern and Southern troops or sympathizers and the irresponsible
bushwhackers. He also traveled a good deal, going over most of the states and
seeing such places as Kansas City, Denver
and Omaha, when they were mere
hamlets. In 1860 he made his first trip to this state. At Shelbyville,
Mo., he had met Dr. H. J. Glenn, who had
come East to gather mules, and on his return accompanied him and a Mr. Wilson
across the plains with a drove of mules, returning East via Panama in 1861. In
1862 Mr. Stilson went to Cerro
Gordo, Iowa, where he taught
school.
From
the latter place Mr. Stilson returned to Genoa,
Wis., but soon afterwards he came out to California,
traveling by way of New York, and on the steamer Moses
Taylor to Panama, and then up the
coast on the steamer John L. Stevens, from which he landed in San
Francisco in May, 1863. He had a letter of
introduction from a Mr. Bliss, a merchant of New York, and secured a school in
Stockton; but finding he had to wait until September before the school could be
opened, he struck off for Feather River, Butte County, to try his luck at
mining, but like many another tenderfoot, he found that "all that glitters
is not gold" and his dreams of a bushel of the yellow dust in a very short
period and a triumphant return home were shattered. He worked for a short time
in a store owned by Senator George C. Perkins, at Oroville, and from there, on
July 3, 1863, came to Chico. Here
he began clerking in the store of Major John Bidwell, commencing at a wage of
one hundred fifty dollars a month and his board. He had learned telegraphy and
so he attended to telegraph and express work. While operating there a dispatch
came through one day stating that Mac Stilson had
captured Jefferson Davis in Georgia, and of course this was highly gratifying
news to Charles. Some friction had arisen as to the location of the first public
school building in Chico. The
citizens decided upon Mr. Stilson as being the
teacher most satisfactory to the two factions and he taught in the new building
for eight months. This was in 1864. He continued with Bidwell for three years.
During his early residence in Chico,
Mr. Stilson, like many emigrants, felt it his duty to
write the eastern press. He wrote a letter to the Chicago Tribune in which he
stated that the Bidwell Ranch, consisting of twenty-five thousand acres, in
character, richness of soil and productiveness, was superior to any farming
section in the United States, the
famous Dalrymple
and Alexander Farms in Illinois
not excepted. Among other things, he stated that as he wrote there was a hot
north wind blowing and the thermometer stood at one hundred fourteen degrees.
In later years, when the Colfax-Richardson party went through Chico
on their overland trip to Oregon
they stopped for dinner at the old Chico Hotel. Jennie Bross,
the daughter of the editor of the Chicago Tribune was a member of the party.
She said to Mr. Stilson, "You should have
written another letter because father made no change in yours, other than
changing your hot north wind to a hot south wind." Mr. Stilson
made no reply, but when they arrived in Portland,
Miss Bross wrote him that, from their experience with
the north wind in August, her father stated that after this if Mr. Stilson wrote "hot north wind" he would not
change it.
Mr.
Stilson's next important step was the formation of a
partnership with Charles L. Pond, the two starting a store in 1868, on Main
Street, in a building they had erected for that
purpose. They carried a stock of hardware and implements, including
header-wagons and other modern machinery; and since both were enterprising,
they made a success of the business.
In
June, 1886, Mr. Stilson was appointed county clerk,
to fill a vacancy caused by the death of Frank Peachy; and thereafter he was
elected to the office for four successive terms, serving nine years in all, in
that official capacity. During this time he maintained his residence in Chico.
On the completion of his last term as county clerk, in January, 1895, Mr. Stilson started his law office here. During his terms in
office he had studied law, and on November 24, 1894, he was admitted to
practice in the California courts
and since then has carried on a general law practice. Mr. Stilson also has extensive ranch interests. He owns a farm
of two hundred twenty acres in Stilson
Canyon, three miles
east of Chico, of which he has devoted eighty acres to the
cultivation of fruit; and there he raises preaches, prunes, pears, olives,
oranges, lemons, pomelos, commonly known as grape
fruit, and almonds. The balance of the acreage is devoted to stock-raising. For
the past fifteen years he has maintained his own packing-house for handling his
fruit.
As
one of the results of Mr. Stilson's public
spiritedness, he obtained the franchise for a street-car line here, the
undertaking to be financed by San Jose capital; but at the last moment such
opposition developed to foreign capital that he gave up the effort. He was the
principal organizer of the Chico Gas and Water Company, in the year 1874. The
works were built and the town and was piped for both gas and water under his
supervision; his associates were A. Bullard, George F. Nourse
and J. W. Gilkyson. For many years, also, from its
organization, Mr. Stilson was secretary of the Butte
County Agricultural Society. This society built the fair grounds on which were
held the successive county fairs which did so much to advertise the resources
of this section of the state. The society maintained a race track, which proved
to be one of the fastest in the world and it was on this track that Goldsmith
Maid, driven by Budd Doble, made her record. The
Diamond Match Company now have their holdings on the
same site.
Charles
L. Stilson was married in San Jose
to Miss Emma Dolliver, a native of Ohio.
She resided in Iowa for a time, and about 1865 or 1866
came to California with her
mother, crossing the great plains in wagons drawn by
ox-teams. Her father died at Fremont, Ohio.
Mrs. Stilson is related to the Dolliver
family of Iowa. Mr. and Mrs. Stilson are the parents of two children: Eleanor F. is a
graduate of the Chico State Normal and of the University
of California. She taught school
for six years in Los Angeles, and is now a successful
business woman in Chico, where she
has a well-appointed art store and floral establishment in the same building
with her father, also acting as his stenographer. Lois W. is a graduate of the
Chico State Normal. She is a well-known musician and is the wife of J. Paul
Miller, a well-known attorney in Sacramento.
During
the troublous times of the Civil War, Mr. Stilson
served four years with the Chico Light Infantry in which he was commissioned
first lieutenant; and out of the full company only five members survive at this
writing. Decidedly a sponsor for popular and higher education, Mr. Stilson worked hard to secure the State
Normal School for Chico;
and for ten years served as a trustee of the local schools. In all such work he
was ably assisted by his good wife. Always an ardent Republican and a Unionist,
he has long served on the Republican County Central Committee.
In
November, 1863, Mr. Stilson was made a Mason in Chico
Lodge, No. 111, F. and A. M., and the following year was made Master of the
lodge, at that time being the youngest Master of a lodge in California.
Transcribed by Sande Beach.
Source: "History of
Butte County, Cal.," by George C. Mansfield, Pages 497-498, Historic Record Co, Los Angeles, CA, 1918.
© 2007 Sande Beach.
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