Historic Oak Hill Cemetery tour in Red Bluff

The family plot of George Luman Kingsley is an elaborate affair. He came to California in 1852 via the Isthmus of Panama and Tehama County in 1862 in the Lowery area, after being on the Sacramento River for 12 years. He settled on Red Bank Creek for four years engaging in the livestock business.

Kingsley was well known as a rifleman hunting in the Coast Range, where he obtained a lot of deer hides. He used them in a glove factory he built in 1866, when he moved into Red Bluff. The factory on Washington Street employed 15 men and turned out 500 pairs of gloves per week.

In the 1860s Kingsley erected an opera house in 500 block of Main Street on the east side.
He died Sept. 18, 1890.

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Last Saturday was the Dairyville Orchard Festival, a wedding, Celebrations of Life for Joe Harrop and Carmel Ellerman, mother of District 1 CHSRA members who were The Flying Cossacks at rodeos.

I was at the Colusi County Historical Society 2021 Fall Event when we saw and heard about the historic Oak Hill Cemetery in a tour conducted by Ana Canon and Charles Martin of the Historical Society.

Oak Hill was established in 1859 by the Odd Fellows and Masonic Lodges.

The first graveyard in Red Bluff was located on Main Street and south of Elm Street. The bodies buried there were later moved to the Oak Hill Cemetery and included: dying in 1856: John W. Ackors, Alfred J. Walton, Lella A. Williams, John N. Williams; 1857: Lilly Ackors, Susan J. Walton,  William Potter, Jr.; 1858: Tully Poore; 1859: Leon E. Estes, James C. Vestal, Georgene Hoag.

I didn’t know that there had been other cemeteries in Red Bluff, but had always assumed Oak Hill and Saint Mary’s Cemetery were the only ones.

Three bodies were removed in 1860 by order of Tehama County Supervisors, from Main Street near Ash. Then in the 1870s bodies were moved from a location between Monroe and Jackson Streets.

Our first stop was at the north-west corner of Oak Hill where the 16 bus victims of the Nov. 30, 1921 Proberta bus crash are buried. Charles Martin told us about the crash, but my notes were poor and used Google.

Children on way to high school when tragedy occurs at Red Bluff

(Associated Press Leased Wire)

Red Bluff, Calif., Nov. 30, 1921 — Twelve high school students were killed south of here today at the Proberta crossing by the collision of the school bus in which they were riding with Southern Pacific train No. 15. The automobile contained 16 children. The four injured are not expected to live.

The children were on their way from their homes at Gerber, Tehama County, to the Red Bluff high school. He said that is why buses stop at railroad crossings now.

Thanks to Ana Canon, she loaned me her notes at the conclusion of the walking tour.

Elbridge Reed, 1819-1908, was a sea captain, before landing in California on the Rob Roy in 1850. At San Francisco he built the steamer Kennebec and piled the Sacramento River between Sacramento and Marysville for awhile. In spring of 1852 came to Red Bluff, building the first frame building, which served as a hotel, stage stop and tavern in the little town which was then known as Reedsville. He erected his own brick home south of town on 200 acres in 1865. Reed ran a pontoon bridge over Reeds Creek, the Reedsville stream named after him.

Tehama County Sheriff Homer Curtis Copeland was the first sheriff in 1856. He had come to Red Bluff in 1852  to take up farming on 1,400 acres east of the Sacramento River. Copeland was a County Supervisor 1866-1878.

Another early sheriff was Charles Frederick Foster in 1878-1880. He had served with the Texas Rangers during the Civil War, and drove cattle to Tehama County in 1868, settled on a ranch near Corning. “Together with W.N. Woodson he secured land from George Hoag, a pioneer settler in the Corning area and laid out the Maywood Colony.”

George Vestal came to Red Bluff in 1857, first as a clerk, then deputy sheriff for six years, then a livery business, and in 1878 started meat markets. (I remember Vestal’s Meat Market at Walnut and Washington Streets as a child, that his son or grandson operated.) In 1888 Vestal was elected sheriff.

Sheriff John J. Bogard was murdered in 1895 on a train. “Brady and his partner, Browning, held up the S.P. express near Wheatland in 1895. Sheriff Bogard was asleep in a Pullman car and the brakeman who knew he was on the train, woke him up. He went forward to the smoking car and shot and killed Browning who was robbing the passengers. Brady came in behind the sheriff and shot and killed him.”

U.S. Senator Clair Engle, 1911-1964, graduated from Chico State in 1930, with a law degree in 1933 from Hastings College, and in 1934 he was Tehama County District Attorney until 1942. California State Senate from January to August 1943 and U.S. House of Representatives from August 1943 until January 1959. In 1959, U.S. Senate, and died from brain cancer.

James Milton Howell, 1842-1932, mausoleum, at 16 drove an oxen team to Sacramento, where he mined for a time. Became a sheep rancher with partners W. S Kinney and George Kinglsey, and their range extended from Red Bluff to Cottonwood Creek.  Owned land on Thomes Creek, and later purchased 1,560 acres more from Thomas Boardman.

Veteran’s Circle is decorated with flags on Memorial Day, and “in October, 1865 the citizens of Red Bluff placed what was said to be the first monument in the state of California to the just fallen Abraham Lincoln in  the circle at the center of Oak Hill Cemetery. This circle was later established as a Veterans Plot and an old cannon, which was referred to as ‘Black Republican,’ was placed therein facing outward towards the main entrance.

“This cannon was said to have been used by Union followers and was previously located at the foot of Pine Street overlooking the Sacramento River and was fired when there was a Federal victory.”

The Chinese Cemetery was to the southwest, behind the oleanders, but instead we stopped at the Kimball Mausoleum, where Gorham Gates Kimball, 1838-1904, rests. In 1857 he came to California by Isthmus of Panama.

Ana Canon’s notes: “Kimball’s first job piling lumber at $2.50 per day. Bought a one horse dray. California Steam Navigation Co. – Sacramento to San Francisco as porter, steward and clerk. Then worked for uncle and partner Alfred Redington in sheep and sold  mutton to Virginia City mines. In 1870 partnered with J. C. Tyler in sheep. In 1875 partnered with L.S. Welton in mercantile business. In 1876 Cone & Kimball formed. In 1886 – built Cone & Kimball building at corner or Main & Walnut. This firm became leading wool and wheat buyer of the north state. Involved in beef as well as wool, Kimball registered his cattle brand in 1861.”

An interesting tour, without time to visit J.S. Cone Mausoleum, or other historic graves.

Jean Barton has been writing her column in the Daily News since the early 1990s. She can be reached by e-mail at jbarton2013@gmail.com.