San Joaquin County
Biographies
FRANK STEWART
FRANK STEWART, deceased, was
born in Sumner County, Tennessee, April 24, 1824. Both his parents were Tennesseeans by birth, and his father was of Scotch
descent. When he was three years old, his father died, and he lived with his
grandfather until he had reached the age of ten, when his mother married John
Crenshaw. As he grew up Mr. Stewart learned the saddle and harness makers’
trade, which he followed at Gallatin, Hartsville, Nashville, Tennessee;
Scottsville, Kentucky; Wellington and St. Louis, Missouri; and again at Charlottsville and Nashville, Tennessee. In the latter
place he enlisted in May, 1846, with Captain R. C. Foster, in Company C, First
Tennessee Regiment, Volunteer Infantry, Wm. B. Campbell, Colonel commanding,
for the period of one year. The regiment landed in Mexico, at Brazos Santiago,
in the latter part of June, 1846, and participated in several of the chief
battles of the war. His company having started out thirteen months previously
100 strong, returned to New Orleans with but thirty-three men, rank and file,
having last two-thirds of the original number. A year afterward, in company
with Mahlon Conner, he started for Texas. Stopping at
Memphis, he obtained a situation there. The California gold excitement breaking
out, he left Memphis in December, 1848, went to New Orleans, and made up a company of sixteen men, who determined to take the
overland route through Northern Mexico, for California. They proceeded to Matomoras, procured their animals and outfit, and on the 1st
of March, 1849, started on their long journey for California. Among the members
of the company may be mentioned Dr. Wozencraft,
Captain Frank Stewart, Messrs. F. Soule, L. Swan,
Matthias Brown, B. F. Pan, Cluff, Swain, Stull,
Donaldson, Duggs and his negro man, Faris, Eichbaum and Daige. There were two others, but their identity has been
lost. After many adventures and much trouble with the Comanche and Apache
Indians, and a great deal of suffering from the want of food and water (having
to eat mule meat on two occasions and glad to get it) they arrived here at
Stockton, on the 1st of July, 1849. They had traveled, mule-back by
way of Monclover, Chihuahua, Jonas, Tucson, and the
mouth of the Gila to their destination, an estimated distance of more than
twenty-five hundred miles in one hundred and twenty-two days. At that time Stockton
consisted of one frame building, where the Copperopolis depot now stands, a
small adobe house on the present site of the Grand Central, and two or three
dozen tents in which all the business of the place was transacted. From here
Mr. Stewart, in company with Dr. Wozencraft, Messrs. Pau/Pan, Stull, Matthias, Brown and Swan, went to Woods
creek, near Sonora, where they spent the 4th of July, but, returning
to Stockton, they laid in supplies and went to Split Rock, on the Merced river,
where they did their first gold mining. They formed smaller companies, Messrs.
Stewart, Pau and Stull remaining together. By hard
work they managed to take out about $8 a day per man, after they had labored
steadily for about fifteen days. Pau came to Mr.
Stewart one night and informed him that Stull had dug up their box of gold
dust, containing $350 worth, and was gambling it off at Monte. They went to the
gambling table just in time to see the gamblers pocket the last of their
earnings.
The gold dust had been buried
at the foot of a tree under which they camped; they dropped Stull out of their
number and Messrs. Stewart and Pau went to the
Mariposa diggings where, however, they met with little success. They then
joined a company consisting besides themselves of Major James Burney, Dr.
Payne, Mr. Shirlock, of Shirlock
diggings, Mr. Crawford and his partner Mr. Dall, Don
Juan Johnson, his son and quite a number of others, and the entire party went
to the higher Sierras to prospect for gold. This was some time during month of
August, 1849. The district was therefore unexplored and each man carried
fourteen days’ provisions. They traveled in zigzag directions, first
southeasterly and then northeasterly for eleven or twelve days, when they
arrived at what many believed to this day to be the celebrated Yosemite valley,
while others claim it was the Heche-Heche valley,
which is a few miles north of Yosemite, on a branch of the Tuolumne river; all
however are agreed that it was the grandest sight their eyes ever beheld. Mr.
Stewart traveled with his company a day or two eastward and then set back for
Mariposa camp. On their way back about noon one day, they reached a grove of
the largest trees eyes ever beheld; they stopped to lunch and measured some of
the largest trees, which proved to be ninety-five feet in circumference; this
discovery is now known to the world as the “Mariposa big trees.” Nothing
further of note transpired except an occasional brush with the Indians, who
dogged their trail during the entire trip of twenty-one days. They arrived at
their camp with scarcely strength enough left to dismount from their animals,
having to subsist for the last seven or eight days upon beans and tea a one.
Leaving that camp, Messrs.
Stewart and Pau went to the Tuolumne river four miles
below Hawkin’s Bar, where they mined successfully for
several weeks, taking out from two or three ounces per day each of fine gold.
About the latter part of October, Mr. Stewart separated from Pau and came to Stockton, loaded forty pack mules with
miners’ supplies, took them to Don Pedro Bar, on the Tuolumne river, put up a big tent and started a store. About the
latter part of the same year he closed out his entire stock of goods and
returned to Stockton. He spent the winter here and at San Francisco and managed
to get rid of the money he had made the fall previous. While in San Francisco
he tried hard to obtain employment and succeeded on but one occasion only.
Andrew Bell hired him to help raise a house on Telegraph Hill, for which he
received a five-dollar Moffit gold piece: that was
the only time he succeeded in hiring himself out in California. About the
latter part of February, 1850, he and a party of others chartered a schooner to
take them to Stockton, cooking, eating and sleeping on the deck. In Stockton he
met his old friend and comrade, now General Frank Cheetham,
who generously supplied him with money to take him up to the Calaveras mines.
After mining there a short time he bought a small train of pack mules, returned
to Stockton, got credit for goods enough to load them up, and proceeded to the
camp, Jesus Marie, where he put up a tent and recommenced in business. He
continued packing goods from Stockton and trading in various parts of Calaveras
County till October, 1850, when he returned to Stockton, which was thereafter
his home. He served for a time as deputy under Dr. Ashe, at that time Sheriff
of the county. Afterward he opened a harness shop on the south side of Main street between Hunter and El Dorado. Later he followed the
same business at the stand afterward occupied by Dan Riordan. A short time
before the war he went out of the harness business and resolved to take life
easy, about his only vocation being money loaning. When the war broke out he
became restless and again embarked in business, buying land and speculating,
with success, in partnership with J. D. Peters. He built the Eureka warehouse,
and was thereafter largely interested in banking, farming and buying wheat in
several counties, and was one of the best known and most reliable business men
in the San Joaquin valley. Latterly he took more interest in the Mexican War
Veterans’ Association than in any other organization with which he was
connected, and was its president. He was also an honorary member of the
Stockton Guard, and gave that company substantial aid. He was a member of San
Joaquin Lodge, No. 19, F. and A. M.; Stockton Commandery,
No. 8, Knights Templar; Centennial Lodge, Knights of Pythias;
San Joaquin Society of California Pioneers; the Stockton Board of Trade, and an
exempt member of Eureka Engine Company. He was also president of the First
National Bank from the time of its first organization till his death and a
large stockholder in most of the other banks.
His death occurred in this
city, July 27, 1883, the result of an accident while sampling grain on flat
cars on the Copperopolis Railroad track. His death was sincerely mourned, not
only in this city, but throughout California, he being well known and popular
in the State. His wife, to whom he was married in this city, at the Episcopal church, by Rev. M. McDonald, was formerly Miss Bettie Payne,
a native of Covington, Kentucky, and daughter of Willis and Nancy (Joyner)
Payne. Her father was born in Cynthiana, Kentucky, in 1810, and her mother at
Columbia, Tennessee, in 1812. Mr. Payne died in Covington, in 1846, and in 1851
Mrs. Payne came to California with her family, locating in Stockton, where she
now resides.
Transcribed by: Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
An Illustrated History of San Joaquin County,
California, Pages 454-456. Lewis Pub. Co. Chicago, Illinois 1890.
© 2009 Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
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