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GOLD RUSH – OWEN, Abijah Chauncey (1824-1853). An archive comprising two manuscript diaries, correspondence, logbook entries with a passenger list, a passport, and other documents related to Owen’s Gold Rush career. 18 items altogether, various places including Massachusetts, aboard the Edward Everett, Benicia, Sacramento, Marysville, Yuba City, and Bidwell’s Bar, CA, 1844-1852.
18 documents, manuscript and partially printed (some worn at folds, overall excellent, one with sealing stamp "Home Sweet Home" preserved).
“Whether digging in the wilderness wild / Or like my brother in tilling the soil / We both are trying to get a small pile / Without cessation from labor or toil” (manuscript poem).
An unusually extensive archive of an early and industrious forty-niner. Owen set sail from Boston on 11 January 1849 and is “out a digging gold for the first time” by 17 September near the headwaters of the Feather River. Abijah Owen’s letters of recommendation describe “a young man of perfect integrity & of unexceptionable morals & habits;” his passport records that he was nearly 5’9, of dark complexion and with blue eyes. He must have joined the company almost immediately after the confirmation of the discovery of gold reached rural Massachusetts, and between obtaining his letters of recommendation and setting sail lost only 9 days. His ship the Edward Everett took the Cape Horn route and arrived in San Francisco in early July. Owen records that when he and his companions, the Boston and California Mining Company, reached Sacramento they divided up their tools by auction (each man receiving $200 worth) and then he hoofed it north to begin digging near Bidwell’s Bar. He was quite successful and in his first week dug $20 worth of gold. His diary records complaints about the heat, long hours in the water, difficulty navigating the river, illness, and the scarcity of mules. In the second diary Owen mentions Sacramento’s Great Fire on election night, 2 November 1849: “Presidential Election / Sac City Burnt” is written twice. Most poignant is perhaps the manuscript poem folded up with his papers, quoted above; and his lengthy letter to his father, complaining that his partners have "vamoosed" but still proud to be sending "a bag of gold by Adams & Co. Express." Document listing available on request.
18 documents, manuscript and partially printed (some worn at folds, overall excellent, one with sealing stamp "Home Sweet Home" preserved).
“Whether digging in the wilderness wild / Or like my brother in tilling the soil / We both are trying to get a small pile / Without cessation from labor or toil” (manuscript poem).
An unusually extensive archive of an early and industrious forty-niner. Owen set sail from Boston on 11 January 1849 and is “out a digging gold for the first time” by 17 September near the headwaters of the Feather River. Abijah Owen’s letters of recommendation describe “a young man of perfect integrity & of unexceptionable morals & habits;” his passport records that he was nearly 5’9, of dark complexion and with blue eyes. He must have joined the company almost immediately after the confirmation of the discovery of gold reached rural Massachusetts, and between obtaining his letters of recommendation and setting sail lost only 9 days. His ship the Edward Everett took the Cape Horn route and arrived in San Francisco in early July. Owen records that when he and his companions, the Boston and California Mining Company, reached Sacramento they divided up their tools by auction (each man receiving $200 worth) and then he hoofed it north to begin digging near Bidwell’s Bar. He was quite successful and in his first week dug $20 worth of gold. His diary records complaints about the heat, long hours in the water, difficulty navigating the river, illness, and the scarcity of mules. In the second diary Owen mentions Sacramento’s Great Fire on election night, 2 November 1849: “Presidential Election / Sac City Burnt” is written twice. Most poignant is perhaps the manuscript poem folded up with his papers, quoted above; and his lengthy letter to his father, complaining that his partners have "vamoosed" but still proud to be sending "a bag of gold by Adams & Co. Express." Document listing available on request.