LITMIR.BIZ

      CHAPTER XIII

      Permanent settlement of Mariposa county's Fresno territory was slow and tedious. With only a narrow fringe of placer mines, confronting a great expanse of arid plains in the center and on the west, and backed by an equally uninviting ruggedness along the Sierra slopes, it was deemed to have few attractions for the white settler. The Indian troubles tended to hold back settlers, and so the few were restricted to the northeastern placers, with a light sprinkling of stockmen and farmers elsewhere.

      In connection with General Riley's visit to the placers, a reconnaissance of the Sacramento and San Joaquin Valleys was made with a view of establishing military posts to defend the miners and settlers. From the character of the mining population and the nature of their occupations, Riley advised that unless a strong military force were maintained on "the frontier." it would be impossible to prevent the outrages upon the Indians, and these in turn avenged by murders of isolated parties of whites. He urged that a military post be speedily established in the Kings River neighborhood, because the new gold discoveries being made in this vicinity were attracting miners, while the rapidly increasing population of the northern placers was gradually forcing the Indian to the south to congregate on the waters of Lake Buena Vista in the Tulare country. The later Fort Miller was one result, and it was the only military protection afforded the entire valley "frontier" as far south as Fort Tejon.

      The record of early settlements and events in the Fresno territory is scant. Up to 1856, it is officially a part of the archives of Mariposa County. Newspaper there was none until the Millerton Times in January, 1865. It lasted two and one-half months, and then there was a hiatus until April, 1870. Both were weekly apologies, which gave what little news they chose to gather and color in the presentation after it had been popularly threshed over during the week and was as stale as a last year's bird nest. What newspaper publicity may have been given was in faraway journals by volunteer correspondents when the mood took them to send them a few lines. The actors, who participated in the early events, have nearly all passed away, and the story is necessarily a patchwork of fugitive-recorded recollections of the pioneers and the traditions handed down through their descendants. These are not always reliable because the memory of man is at best treacherous.

      This slow settlement-process was due to various natural causes. It was scattered because the first comers located in the mountain gulches and on streams where there was gold, and the farmer where there was soil and water. Moreover the population was of the floating class, with little thought of permanency in location. Besides, the territory was so isolated and so remote from the county seat that actually for years there were communities without the semblance of authoritative government, unless in the repressive representation by the military at the fort, and it having nothing to do with matters civil. No wonder that there were excesses and that human life was valued at so little in -those wild and woolly times. For years, there was unrest because of the Indians. The nearest populous stage points were Stockton, 140, and Visalia, 120 miles, by the routes traveled then. Yet Millerton was a lively enough mining village in 1853, during which and for later years it was at its zenith, but with some of its glory and life departed on the abandonment of the fort and the removal of the soldiers in September, 1856, not to be reoccupied until August, 1863, because of rumored activities in the valley during the Civil War by adherents of the southern cause.