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Sacramento City, Nov 3rd 1850 

My Dearest Mother

Mr. Thos Gore, one of my "companions in arms" takes the steamer at two o'clock P.M. this day, for "home sweet home" and by this opportunity I will send you a line which though dull and brief I hope you will consider worthy a reception. News is rather scarce just now (which by the way is something rare, in this land) and I will have to dot down such floating thoughts and ideas as find their way in and out of my barren cranium. I sent a letter to Fanny the other day by Geo. Louthan of Palmyra, who came out last year and who goes home "carrying weight" (vide Jno. Gilpin's ride) above a "thousand pounds". He with 19 others according to Dame Rumor took out of the hills six hundred pounds troy wt. of the glittering treasure! which at the usual calculation will amount to $120,000 or the smart sum of $6000 for each individual! But the race is not to the swift, nor the battle etc. I commenced speaking of a letter to Fanny which I sent by him. Just before that I sent a bundle to all the family almost by Mr. Howerton of Knox Co near Edina. If you get all those you will have heard pretty much all the present news before this will reach you, but as there are, or will be emigrants going home for some time yet, I will try to send a line by each of them.

My health as usual is excellent. Mr. Glover had an attack of diarrhea which confined him nearly two weeks 



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but he has now recovered and with the "advice" and "consent" of his physician gone out to the unsettled part of the valley to recruit by hunting. He has a number of his old acquaintances with him and they will probably enjoy themselves very much. I shall expect him in, in a few days.

Dr Jno. L Taylor who has been practicing medicine here is now very sick, having just passed a most critical point in a dangerous disease - the dysentery. He brought it on by imprudence and kept it on by acting very foolish. He had never been sick before and was too impatient to confine himself to the room. But he is now recovering.

District Court has just adjourned after a session of 4 weeks, to meet again in January. Business not half transacted. I wish Mr. Anderson was here but dare not advise him to come; though I believe he would make a fortune in a year. Mr. Muldrow has business enough to keep one lawyer comfortable all the time, and he thinks there is no man here equal to Mr. A. I fully concur in the Col's opinion! But you must not show this to Fanny; or she will be uneasy perhaps! She would not like to be a widow for a long twelvemonth I know, and I am not now willing to do anything to make her one.
 
A friend has come in who says the boat is just starting. You will say it is a shame to write such a short letter from California, but you know dear mother I would write a ream full if I had time. Give my love to all, and tell them all to write if you please and believe me to be your most affectionate son Elisha.

P.S. I enclose a letter to R written a short time ago. 



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Nov'r 5th 1850

I break the seal to inform you that I was too late to get my letter off in time for the boat, and to fill out the sheet. Mr. Gore was in such haste to embark that he did not call as he promised. His health, though of the first order during the whole journey has been poor since entering the valley. He took a situation immediately after getting in at a large Hotel about ten miles from the city as assistant cook. I did not know what had become of him for some time but one evening when on my way up the valley, I stopped at that Hotel to get supper. I had been seated at the table but a few minutes when on casting my eyes into the kitchen through the open door I saw my former companion and fellow traveler with his shirt sleeves rolled up above his elbows and his hands immersed in a pan of hot water in which were a number of dirty plates, knives, forks, spoons, etc. I therefore concluded he was bottle washer. Strange transmogrification, thought I, as I beheld before me the graduate of Bethany College, the learned teacher, the grave, dignified and revered minister of the gospel, paddling and sloshing about in a greasy dishpan! But he did not believe in staying in this country for nothing, and so settled himself down with the first situation he could. His salary was 100 dolls, per month. He remained 2 months and finding his health growing delicate left, and went to the mines, hoping at the same time to increase his strength and his "pile". Failing in both he became discouraged and instantly started for home with just money enough I suppose to pay his expenses. Thus I am the only "white man" left out of the promising trio that started from Mo last spring full of high hopes. Our driver "Dave" is now in the mines about fifty miles from the city prostrate with sickness. I, alone, have been blessed with that greatest of earthly blessings, sound health; — how long it will be retained is known only to the merciful Giver. The cholera is still raging to a considerable extent but is probably now on the decline. The number of deaths is diminished within a few days very much. 



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Our city is rapidly improving in size and beauty. "A" street is now nearly a mile long and has been stretching itself out into the plain towards the mountains at a wonderful rate. Another year, at the present rate of traveling, it will have reached Sutters Fort, about two miles back from the city. I walked out to the "Fort" a few days since & found it to be a great curiosity; at least it was so in the palmy days
of its builders, who in the early settlement of this valley lived in a manner somewhat resembling that of the old English Barons with a host of loyal retainers about him. The principal edifice within the fort resembles on the exterior, a church, in the inside a tavern or house of entertainment. It had a bell on the roof and when the "Baron" wanted hands he had only to ring it and a thousand Indians obedient to his nod would instantly flock to him from all parts of the valley from which it could be heard. They built his houses, his stables, his fort and did all the labor he wanted performed. In return he fed them sumptuously on beef from his immense herds and at one time the neighborhood of the Fort must have presented a romantic and interesting sight. But now its spacious court is silent & dreary, its hundred abandoned and gloomy, the bell dismounted and the gay flag of Switzerland which once floated over the encampment torn down. A large portion of the walls is thrown down and the remainder are fast crumbling beneath the tooth of time and the fury of its winter tempest. A few Mexican heads peering from the ruined doors tell you that it is no longer the abode of the bold [Swiss] & a few rusty pieces of cannon [hole in MS] lying on the ground and forgotten speaks [hole] plainly that the "glory hath departed".
More anon. 

Yours affly E.C.W.