Mount St. Helena and Robert Louis Stevenson State Park:A history and guide by Ken Stanton Bonnie View Books St. Helena, California ©1993,1994,1997 |
| At the head of the world famous wine growing region known as Napa Valley, stands Mount St. Helena, a premier hiking destination in the northern San Francisco Bay area. At a modest height of only 4,339' it commands sweeping views of northern California, so good that it was once called "the Mont Blanc of one section of the California Coast Range" by famed Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. On a clear day from the summit one can see skyscrapers in San Francisco, Mt. Diablo and Mt. Tamalpais, and the snow-covered Sierra Nevada 150 miles to the east. On the very best of days you can see the volcanoes of Mt. Lassen and Mt. Shasta, the latter a stunning 192 miles to the north! |
| Highwaymen, Lovers and Tsars |
In breadth of scope, Mt. St. Helena has few peers in historical interest. Its mountainous terrain
has served as backdrop for scores of colorful characters:
Learn about Buck English, who robbed stages on the mountain for 20 years,
eventually caught in the greatest manhunt in Napa County history and sent to San Quentin.
Find out how Edward Muybridge, one of the early great pioneers
in photography, shot a man in cold blood in a lover's quarrel and got off scot-free.
Is the legend true that a niece of the Tsar of Russia made the first
ascent of Mt. St. Helena in 1841?
And why did it take 100 years and two trips around the world
for one of the earliest botanical collections in California to finally be named and catalogued? |
| The Rich and Famous |
| Authors Richard Henry Dana and Jack London, journalist Bayard Taylor, actresses Ethel Barrymore and Olivia de Haviland, Calistoga founder Sam Brannan, philanthropist James Lick are a few of the famous people to visit the area. The most famous visitor of all was Robert Louis Stevenson. Near death from tuberculosis, he and his new bride Fanny Osbourne honeymooned for 7 weeks in the summer of 1880 in a rustic shack on Mt. St. Helena, where Stevenson regained his health. Many believe he never would have lived to write his most famous books without the cure he found on the mountain. His book about the people he knew and time he spent there, Silverado Squatters, is a minor classic. |
| A look inside ... |
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Mt. St. Helena, a history and guide is a unique resource that took years of research,
used hundreds of diverse sources and integrated them into a readable, personalized text.
From its ancient geologic beginnings to the newest additions to Robert Louis Stevenson State Park,
you will find everything of interest has been included. In chapter 7 discover why Mt. St. Helena
is volcanic but not an extinct volcano, and why even today people still believe the myth.
Chapter 1 discusses the native american Wappo people, the oldest tribe in California, who considered
the mountain so sacred they would not climb its summit. Before the wine industry there was cinnabar, gold and silver. Chapter 4 describes how one of the biggest mercury strikes in U.S. history descended on the mountain like a storm between 1875 and 1900. It also highlights the Silverado Gold and Silver Mine whose lower mine tunnel [ Stevenson called it the "Treasure Grotto"] inspired scenes in his greatest book Treasure Island. Chapters 5 and 6 reveal the incredible diversity of plant and animal life waiting to be discovered by the adventurous. Mt. St. Helena is home to 200 species of animals like bobcat, mountain lion, black bear, ring tailed cat, fox, coyote, the beautiful endemic Mt. St. Helena Mountain King Snake and many birds of prey including the endangered Peregrine falcon. Other chapters detail the history of the state park, the story behind all of the mountain's place names and finally the summit hiking guide. Today, Mt. St. Helena (named for the mother of Roman Emperor Constantine the Great) is a major bay area recreation destination. Hikers of all abilities will find challenge on the summit climb, mountain bikers will thrill on the high speed 6 mile descent, rock climbers will discover pocketed volcanic face climbing of high quality, and skiers can test their mettle when winter snows fall one or two times per season. Mt. St. Helena, a history and guide is really 3 books in one -- a human history of the mountain, a natural history guide, and a hiking and recreation guide. It will shed light on a fascinating and not so well known corner of California history. |
| Chapter 4 from the book! |
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Buck English There could be no more perfect recipe for making a miscreant than the family life of Lawrence Buchanen "Buck" English. A feud of the Hatfield/McCoy type raged between the Englishes and the Durbins for years, despite the fact that Buck's father was married to Pauline Durbin. Three of Buck's brothers died violent deaths, by lynching, knife and gun fights. B.F. English, the father, made a thirteen-year old Buck swear to kill Parry Durbin, his brother-in-law, to avenge the death of Parry English. Robbing his first stage at 22, Buck was in and out of prison most of his adult life, but managed to die a natural, albeit premature death in 1915. On the way he became Mount St. Helena's most infamous highwayman.~ ~ ~ ~ He was born November 10, 1853 in Oregon, the tenth of eleven children. Family roots were in Kentucky and Missouri but like many others, the Englishes pioneered in the West looking for better opportunity. The bad winter of 1861-2 was cause for bankruptcy, and may have spurred David English into road agentry, for which he was lynched in Lewiston, Idaho. The next year, they moved on to settle in Solano County, California, near Cordelia. In 1865, downtown Cordelia was the scene of a full-scale English-Durbin shoot-out, in which Parry English died, B.F. English lost an eye and Charley English was partially crippled in one arm. Three years later, in Napa's Spanish town, the third English brother to die, Dan, was killed in a racially motivated dispute. Charley was again shot up, and again survived, with a scarred face and the other arm crippled as well.In 1870 they moved to Anderson Springs, Lake County to avoid more bloodshed. Lake County was sparsely settled then, so the Englishes found a niche for themselves and prospered. Despite their rough ways, they (especially Buck) were generous with those they liked and many friends were made. Henry Mauldin, Lake County historian, tells the story that one winter the Thorne family was desperately poor, but asked the young man to a meal anyway. Seeing they had only coffee and biscuits to eat, he promptly went out, shot another man's hog, and offered it to the Thornes. They fared considerably better after that. Loyal friends like these would keep mum later on when Buck was in trouble with the law. From petty thievery, English made the jump to big time crime by stopping the Calistoga-Lakeport stage in 1875. His efforts went unrewarded however, the express box yielding only two brass castings. Fond of making grandiose statements, he claimed the day would come when he would "make Wells Fargo weep". In the meantime he robbed several Chinese miners on the road. Buck intensely disliked the Chinese, and mistreated them at every opportunity. The law looked the other way in these cases, due to widespread anti-Asian sentiment. The English boys (Buck, Eugene, and Charley) branched off into cattle and hog rustling too, and earned the formidable ire of the Great Western Mine superintendent, Andrew Rocca. Hearing gunshots one evening, Rocca found a swaggering Buck showing off his marksmanship by shooting a handkerchief out of the hand of a friend, scaring passersby. The old world Italian gave the group a verbal lambaste like they had never heard before. Startled, they left immediately. Soon sworn enemies, Buck sent a boastful message through an intermediary that he would "tan Rocca's hide and make shoe strings out of it!". Soon after, cattle started disappearing from the Great Western property. Unmoved by the threat, Rocca began accumulating evidence on the English gang. Eventually Buck was arrested on rustling charges and sentenced to San Quentin for the first time on October 25, 1876. Good connections and a good attorney got him released after serving less than a year of a two and a half year sentence. Nonetheless, he was in and out of jail for the next six years. During his times of freedom, English expanded his activities to horse stealing and perhaps murder. According to Henry Mauldin, Buck shot and killed a man in an argument at the Middletown skating rink. He also gained notoriety by besting a professional soldier in a duel in the streets of Middletown. The soldier, a Captain Goode, was seriously wounded in the arm and leg, while Buck came out unscathed. The English boys aversion to regular work led to robbing a white farmer of $115 near Lower Lake. Charley was eventually brought to jail for this crime, one of the first to serve at the newly opened maximum security prison at Folsom. He disappeared into Mexico, and history, in 1885. Eugene escaped to Oregon to serve loyally in a militia under the alias Eugene Jones. Local historian Michael Chegywn, who has researched the English family exhaustively, has conclusively traced Eugene's freedom flight to Canada. Buck was apprehended in Coyote Valley with the tracking expertise of a Pomo Indian. He received seven years in San Quentin and served four. Upon his return in 1882, he went straight for a while, driving the Anderson Springs/Lakeport stage line. Old man English died the next year, nearly seventy years old, and Buck drifted out of the country to Ashcroft, British Columbia. Ben English Jr., the only law abiding member of the family, had settled there in the 1850's. Buck worked on wheat and cattle ranches at this time, returning briefly to bring his mother back to Canada. One imagines she was relieved to live more quietly in the last years of her life. English reappeared in Lake County in the mid-90's after a stint at Oregon State Penitentiary for robbery. The governor believed his plea of innocence and pardoned him. He showed up with a younger man named Breckenridge he met while bartending in Portland. Buck's close knowledge of the stage routes was an asset in his next, and last, escapade. In the past his stage robberies were performed on the north side of Mt. St. Helena, near the county line. This time on May 7, 1895 Buck again struck in the same vicinity, between Troutdale Creek and Rattlesnake Spring, within sight of the summer home of Adolph Sutro, one-time mayor of San Francisco. The six passengers -- four San Francisco businessmen, a Chinese man and a young boy -- were robbed of $1000. No women were aboard so Buck had no need to display his reputed gallantry toward the fair sex. Allen Palmer was again the unlucky driver for Bill Spier's stage line. Last robbed four years earlier, Palmer initially thought it was a joke. H.R. Goss from an unpublished biography of Andrew Rocca relates: "He made a jocular reply, but one of the robbers jumped to the horses' heads, and both leveled their guns. The weapons and the profanity which accompanied a threat to blow the driver off the box took all the humor out of the situation and the driver and passengers awaited the will of the highwaymen... The highwaymen went about their work like old hands at the business, one in particular being as cool as if he was collecting taxes... The particularly cool robber is about five feet eleven inches in height, the other and shorter is about five feet eight inches. They both wore masks, and each was nearly covered with a dark gray duster, beneath which showed overalls and old shoes. They both wore black slouch hats ... The taller man did all the talking as well as all the searching. They were both armed with old-style Colt's revolvers, and cursed and swore at everyone, particularly the Chinaman." The Chinese man, in fact, was beaten and had his legal papers stolen. Palmer was then told to throw down the strong box, which was broken open with a hatchet. Inside were only worthless packages. The driver of another rig, Byrd Hunt, passed by just then and Buck greeted him by name, much to Byrd's surprise. He hurriedly moved on. Then the two men, still masked, walked off in the direction of Oat Hill. When the news reached the authorities, Napa and Lake County sheriffs couldn't decide who had jurisdiction, so English and Breckenridge got a 16 hour head start. The combined force of police and citizens lost the pair for three days. By the time the desperados had reached Berryessa Valley, their feet had given out, so they boarded the stage to Napa. English was recognized by a young farmer of the area who had known him in earlier days. He alerted the driver who telephoned Sheriff R.A. Brownlee. District attorney Theodore Bell wandered into the sheriff's office just then and was deputized on the spot. With J.N. True and Johnny Williams, the four man posse crowded into a two seated surrey to intercept the stage. They had hoped to wait in ambush on the north side of Mt. George but the stage had already topped the pass. As the two vehicles met, Sheriff Brownlee recognized the tall man beside the driver as English, holding a shotgun across his knees, and Breckenridge just behind him. "Stand them up!", he ordered, but a well practiced English blew the gun out of Brownlee's hands, destroying the weapon. An answering shot wounded Buck, but he stuck a gun to driver John Gardiner's head and shouted "Drive fast or I'll blow your head off!" Another shot from Bell tore open Buck's left side, and he was seen to sag against Gardiner as the stage shot down the grade. With Bell in pursuit, the stage rolled to a stop after the wounded bandit had fainted from pain. Breckenridge gave up without a struggle and both were transported to Napa. So ended the wildest manhunt in Napa County's history. As English lay near death, the first words he uttered to Sheriff Brownlee, when he regained consciousness were, "How many of you fellows did I kill?" Miraculously, no one had been even seriously wounded, to the outlaw's disappointment. Fifty-two buckshot were found in his body and no one expected him to live. The Englishes though, were a tough lot, and live he did. The young district attorney Bell, only 23 at the time, prosecuted the case successfully, getting a life term for English and 25 years for the accomplice Breckenridge. Bell's career catapulted to a large San Francisco law firm and later to California and national politics. An attempt to break jail in Napa was foiled and the now recovered English was transported to San Quentin for the last time, to serve 17 years of his life sentence. While there he may have rubbed elbows with some of the Whitecap murder gang, Osgood, Staley, Cradwick, and Blackburn. Sentenced five earlier for a Ku Klux Klan style killing of a woman, they had committed their crime almost within a stone's throw of Buck's last holdup. In 1912 nearly 60 years of age, English was released a final time, a changed man. It had been Buck's work to make the rounds of the prison every night and light the lamps. He instructed his successor in the task and, as he approached the gate, he looked back anxiously at the lamps of the prison yard. "I'm afraid I'll have to come back and give him another lesson," he said as he bade his friends good-bye. At the news of his release, Andrew Rocca, still remembering the old threat, commented to his daughter with a wry, sarcastic smile, "I wonder if he still wants my hide for shoe laces!" Buck English was taken under the care of a patron named Luke Fay for the last three years of his life. He was buried in Colma, California in 1915. ~ ~ ~ ~ Despite his record, Buck English had all the makings of a first class citizen. One Sunday early in January, 1878, the faithful of Middletown became edgy when Buck walked into the little wooden church and sat in the rear pew. He and his friends listened to the 45 minute sermon politely, then headed off for a drink at one of the many saloons in town. There Buck entertained the crowd by repeating the sermon word for word, even mimicking the minister's voice and mannerisms. It was said that, by harnessing that exceptional memory through study and discipline, he could have been one of the state's smartest men. Born into the right family, there's no telling what he could have achieved. His lawless upbringing, however, practically condemned him to the life he led. |
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