San Francisco County
Biographies
R. G. Davis, president of the Sterling Furniture Company, is one of the early pioneers who came to California before the historic days of '49; and, unlike most of the old Californians, came seeking a home rather than gold. That he found a congenial home is evident in the fact that he has been a continuous resident of the Golden State for over forty-two years.
Mr. Davis' remote ancestors emigrated from Scotland and Wales in colonial days
and settled in North Carolina, where his parents were born and married; and from which State his grandfather fought in the
Revolutionary war under General Nathaniel Greene. Before Mr. Davis' birth
his father, P. I. Davis, moved to East Tennessee and there owned a large
plantation and a number of slaves. Meeting with financial reverses, he
afterward removed to Missouri and carried on farming in that State.
In the beginning of 1848 Peter Lassen, the noted trapper, frontiersman and
stockman, went to Missouri, and soon afterward made the acquaintance of Mr.
Davis; and by his flattering description of California, its genial climate and
fertile soil, induced Mr. Davis to come with his family to the new El Dorado.
April 3, 1848, they, in company with thirty-nine other families, set out from
St. Joseph, Missouri, to make the perilous journey across the plains, well
equipped with ox teams and provisions, and Peter Lassen as guide. On
reaching Salt Lake City they first learned of the discovery of gold at Sutter's
mill. Proceeding on the bend of the Humboldt river,
the company there divided, the party containing Mr. Davis and family under the
leadership of Lassen, coming by the Oregon and Black Rock route. In
crossing the Sierra Nevada mountains they wandered
about for sixty days, cutting their way through an untraveled
wilderness, with great difficulty, being compelled to leave their wagons, and
their women and children riding on the backs of the oxen. Nearly worn
out, and with their provisions running low, they stopped in a deep canon (sic),
where a party of miners overtook them, having followed their trail, supposing
them to be prospectors; and the miners kindly assisted them in finding their
way down from the mountains, thus enabling them to escape before the winter
snows began to fall, else they might have suffered the terrible fate of the
Murphy and Donner party. They reached what is
now Red Bluff, October 31, and from there made their way to Lassen's
son's ranch, now Senator Stanford's celebrated Vina
ranch. Having lost everything else, Mr. Davis traded his cattle for the lease
of a part of Lassen's ranch, and leaving his wife
with three of her children, he took the two oldest
sons and went to the mines on Feather river. While their father was
making a rocker with which to wash out gold, the boys worked in a claim, R. G.
Davis receiving $25, and his older brother $35, a day. When the rocker
was finished they took a claim and worked it from early in November until
January 1, during which time they cleared up $4,000. Provisions were
high, however, making living expensive. Mr. Davis, Sr., paid $125 for 100
pounds of poor flour, and potatoes and onions sold at $1 apiece.
They returned to the ranch in the Sacramento valley, and in the spring went
into the mines again, remaining until August; and Mr. Davis and several others who
were working with him took out $60,000. Mrs. Davis, a very estimable woman,
died on the ranch that year, and her death was a severe stroke to the
family. In the spring of 1850 they removed to Santa Clara county, and
there the father and sons, including R. G., engaged in farming for a number of
years. The subject of this memoir followed farming seven or eight years
in Santa Clara county, and also in Contra Costa county; was some years in the
furniture business in Sacramento, and has been prominently identified with the
same line of merchandising in San Francisco, as a member of the Sterling
Furniture Company, first as manager of the manufactory and for several years
past as its president. Mr. Davis is an energetic, well-poised business
man who commands universal respect and esteem from those who have dealings with
him, because of his integrity and honesty.
In 1853 he married Miss Jane Hanschurst, a native of
Vermont, who came around Cape Horn in 1850, in company with her mother and
brother. She died in 1888, leaving two children, Mary D., the wife of H.
A. Moore, the general manager of the Sterling Furniture Company; and Ellen D.,
the wife of Dr. G. F. G. Morgan.
During the late war Mr. Davis was a staunch Union man, and has since been a
Republican, but not a radical partisan. He is a thorough Californian and
proud of the State of which he has been a citizen since its birth. Though never
having sought political office, he was elected and served on the Board of
Supervisors in Contra Costa county. He is an
honored member of the Society of California Pioneers and of the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows. He was born in East Tennessee, in 1831.
Transcribed 1-20-05
Marilyn R. Pankey.
Source:
"The Bay of San Francisco," Vol. 1, pages 690-692, Lewis Publishing Co,
1892.
© 2005 Marilyn R. Pankey.