The San Luis Obispo County
CAGenWeb Project

On Thursday last this city lost one of its most respected citizens, in the person of Mr. James G. Abbott, who died at his residence after a brief illness. Deceased had resided in San Luis Obispo but a little more than one year, but in that time he had made a large number of friends who will deeply deplore his death. Mr. Abbott was born in Aurora, Erie County, New York, in 1827. In 1832 his father’s family removed to Michigan, where he was raised. At the breaking out of the Mexican War Mr. Abbott, then a young man, residing in Illinois, enlisted and served through that war. He came to California in 1852 and settled in Napa County, and subsequently removed to Nevada and Oregon, in both of which States he engaged in the cattle business. While residing in Winnemucca, Nevada, in the fall of 1878, he was waylaid and beaten in the streets of that town, and received injuries from which he never fully recovered, and which no doubt were the primary cause of his death. Three men committed the outrage, and the object was robbery. In 1880 he came to this county and purchased several acres of land in the northern portion of the city, and planted a large orchard, intending to engage extensively in the business of fruit-raising. Last fall he married Mrs. Nancy J. Wright of this city, and fitted up an elegant home which he was prepared to appreciate after successfully passing through the vicissitudes of a busy and eventful life. But he was not destined to long enjoy the comforts which he had provided. On Saturday last he was taken with pneumonia, and on Thursday morning died. He leaves a widow and two brothers, S. H. and A. Abbott, who reside in this city, and two married sisters, one of whom lives at Ukiah in this State, and the other in Missouri. Mr. Abbott was buried yesterday, the funeral being conducted under the auspices of Chorro Lodge of Odd Fellows, of which he was a member.

Myron Angel was editor of the Reese River Reveille during the most exciting and prosperous period of its history, and after severing his connection with it was for a number of years, first, editor, then San Francisco correspondent of the White Pine News and other Nevada papers. This gentleman is a native of the State of New York, born in Oneonta, Otsego County, December 1, 1827, a descendant of the first Puritan pilgrims who landed on Plymouth Rock. His father, William Angel, desiring to advance the prosperity of Oneonta, established a newspaper in the village, and in this office the subject of this sketch often assisted in the mechanical and editorial departments, although then very young. In 1835 his mother died, and in 1842 his father, leaving him an orphan in his fifteenth year. The boy, inheriting a fair property, was enabled to acquire a fine education from district school to Hartwick Seminary, thence, in 1846, to the Military Academy at West Point, from which institution he resigned to join the excited throng bound for the gold mines in the newly-acquired regions of California. At the date of the discovery of gold his elder brother, Eugene Angel, was practicing law in Peoria, Illinois, having recently been admitted to the bar, and was anxious to join the “Peoria Pioneers” in the journey overland. Urging the cadet to join him in Peoria, Mr. Angel, in January, 1849, started on his journey, crossing Pennsylvania to Pittsburgh by stage, that being the only conveyance at the time, the New York and Erie Railroad only reaching to Port Jervis, on the Delaware River, and from Pittsburgh to St. Louis by steamboat, thence a short distance up the Illinois River by boat, and a toilsome journey in mud-wagons to Peoria. In April the pioneers left that city, destined for St. Jo, on the Missouri, on the “utterly utter” verge of civilization. The treachery of the Captain of the steamboat on which was that part of the company in which was Angel’s party changed the fate of the young emigrants by landing at Weston and refusing to proceed to St. Joseph, this deciding the party to take the Arkansas and Gila route, instead of the direct route to the gold mines via the South Pass. On the steamer was Captain William K.irker, an old mountaineer, who had been guide to Colonel Doniphan in his march through New Mexico a few years previously. He told of gold mines in the Rocky Mountains, far richer than those of California, and a large sum was paid him by a collection of Illinois and Missouri people, who then made up a company. Late in May the journey was undertaken, and in July prospecting parties entered the Rocky Mountains on the Rio Sangre de Christo, and other localities which have since become famous for their mineral wealth, but, being entirely ignorant of the occurrence of gold or how to obtain it, found nothing. The mines of the Pike’s Peak region were then condemned, and the route taken again for California, or somewhere, the travelers hardly knew where. Captain Kirker, the guide, said he knew of mines on the Gila River, and he would take them there. The Captain was only playing his party, as he had a family at Albuquerque, and he only wished to have an escort to take him safely there. The long journey was pursued many hundred miles south, along the Rio Grande, then westward into Sonora to the head of the Rio Santa Cruz, then northerly through Tucson to the Pima villages on the Gila River. From this point the two brothers Angel, becoming impatient to reach their destination—it being then October—went in advance of the train, each taking a small pack of clothing and food; and, after a journey of severe fatigue, reached San Diego about the middle of November, ragged and famished. The train which had been left behind dragged its weary way along, and in the spring of 1850 reached the mining region in Mariposa County.

At San Diego was a small hermaphrodite brig, about to sail for San Francisco, and would take passengers at $100 each, the passenger to furnish his own subsistence. As a great favor, the owner of the brig accepted $150 as passage money for the two, that being the size of their pile after buying some provisions for the voyage. About half a dozen others who had reached San Diego with sufficient means, also went as passengers, leaving near one hundred destitute emigrants bewailing their hard fate. A few days afterwards, the steamer Oregon called in on her way from Panama, and took all remaining, free of charge.

On the 8th of December, 1849, the two brothers landed in San Francisco, in the rain and mud of a severe winter, in a condition that can better be imagined than described. A few days thereafter an incident occurred that helped much to relieve them of want, when employment was unattainable. They had left in the wagon a trunk well filled with valuable books, some clothing, etc. To lighten the load, this was thrown out at the crossing of the Colorado. At that time Lieut. Cave J. Coutts was in command of some soldiers stationed there (since called Fort Yuma), and, seeing the trunk as jetsam, on the sand, he examined it, and finding the books, papers, and clothing of a cadet, quickly put it on an ambulance, and hastened after the departed train. Finding that the object of his search had gone before, he pushed through to San Diego, but was still too late to overtake the owner of the things he had rescued at so much trouble. The kind officer then put the trunk in charge of a gentleman going to San Francisco, with instructions to hunt up the owner and restore him his property, with the warm regard of a brother soldier. The trunk thus reached its destination, and the valuable books it contained sold for such prices as aided to pass the hardships of a winter which proved the last to many young and homesick pioneers.

The summer of 1850 was spent in mining at Bidwell’s Bar, on Feather River, with rather poor success; and in 1851 the two brothers settled on a ranch at a place since called Angel’s Slough, near the Sacramento River, south of Chico. In 1856 they purchased a mining claim at North San Juan, Nevada County, and, joining with others, commenced opening it by tunnel. In this enterprise about $40,000 was expended and lost. The brothers had continued inseparable until 1860, when the elder, Eugene Angel, went to the eastern slope, in the Washoe excitement, and was killed at the massacre at Pyramid Lake, May 12, 1860. Myron Angel in the meantime had become editor of the Placerville Semi-Weekly Observer, in which situation he continued until the spring of 1860, when he returned to San Juan to take charge of his mining interests there. Upon the breaking out of the war, he offered his services to the Governor of California, and received the appointment of Captain of Infantry. Upon this being announced, the San Juan Press, of October 5, 1861, said:—

No fund had been supplied for maintaining and forwarding recruits, and this Mr. Angel did until his own funds were exhausted. Then came the pressing demand for his time to attend to the business of a failing mining enterprise, in which his all was invested, and although appealed to by Colonel Judah, a West Point friend, who then had command of the Fourth California Volunteers, he was compelled to withdraw from the service, hoping for another opportunity when his business would be better arranged. That time, however, did not offer. After writing for various papers, in 1863 he became editor of the Reese River Reveille, which is told in the sketch of that paper. While in that position he wrote several reports on the mines of eastern Nevada, assisting Mr. J. Ross Browne in his “Report on the Mineral Resources west of the Rocky Mountains.” A little book he wrote about this time on his favorite theme of the resources of eastern Nevada, had the distinction of being published in French in Paris, and in German in Leipsic, the translator into French being Emil de Girardin, who paid the author the compliment of saying it was the best English he had ever translated. Mr. Angel was editor-in-chief of the Reveille until 1868, when he left and became editor of the Oakland daily News, in California; then of the State Capital Reporter, of Sacramento; then of the White Pine News, of which paper he continued as San Francisco correspondent and agent until 1875, when he again became editor of the Oakland News. While acting as newspaper correspondent in San Francisco he also wrote for other publications, the principal being a “Pacific Coast Business Directory and Gazetteer,” of which two editions were published, one in 1871, and the other in 1876; also the historical and miscellaneous matter for the San Francisco Annual Directory. The Pacific Coast Directory comprised all the region west of Dakota and Wyoming, and contained the most complete account of the history, geography, and resources yet published. While performing these labors he was engaged in a mammoth mining enterprise, in company with Mr. M. D. Fairchild and Hon. John Daggett, in making a canal, and opening a large hydraulic mine in El Dorado County. After an expenditure of over $100,000 the enterprise came to a halt for want of funds. fortune again slipping away, and the faithful pen or pencil found to be the only safe reliance. Mr. Angel, when asked his employment, said, “I mine for a fortune, but I write for a living.” September 22, 1879, he was married to Charlotte Paddock Livingston, daughter of Rev. Joseph Paddock, an accomplished lady, whose acquaintance extended from the days of their youth.

In the county of San Luis Obispo, at his Rancho San Miguelito, on February 24, 1874, Miguel Avila died, aged seventy-six years. The circumstances of his death were singular. He had been accustomed to reside at a house called the “Rancho Quemado,” about a mile and a half distant from the rancho house of San Miguelito, of which rancho he was the grantee. Here of late he was accompanied by an old Mexican, who, on the morning of the 24th last, left him in the act of going to the creek for the purpose of bathing. The Mexican returned during the day and found the old man absent, but thought nothing of it, as Don Miguel had previously informed him that he was going to town that day. Late in the evening the same man found the deceased at the regular watering place, near the house, quite dead, and nearly naked, and apparently as though many hours had elapsed since his decease. No marks of violence were found on his person. An inquest was held by Mr. George W. Barnes, acting Coroner, and the verdict was to the effect that deceased died of causes to the jury unknown. Don Miguel Avila had been well known in this county since the American occupation. His rancho was immediate to the landing, and covered all the ground previously used for wharf purposes. He left a numerous family. Under the Spanish rule he was Alcalde of the pueblo of San Luis Obispo. He was a man of more than ordinary education in his own language, but failed to acquaint himself with the language or the ideas of the race which succeeded his own in the occupation of the country. He left a valuable inheritance to his children, and died highly respected by all.