Saturday Night Lecture by Karen E. Willard

Family Table 1. Alexander Hamilton Willard & Elinor McDonald 1. Austin James Willard, b. 1808 in Missouri  2. George Clark Willard, b. between 1808 & 1812  3. Alexander Hamilton Jr., b. 12 February 1812  4. Eliza Martha Willard, b. 21 July 1814 in Missouri  5. Roland Rudolph Willard, b. 1 June 1816  6. Christiana D. Willard, born May 1819, perhaps at St. Louis Missouri?  7. Joel Willard, b. 9 March 1822 at Gasconade county, Missouri  8. Nancy A. Willard, born 4 August 1824 near Elk Grove, then Michigan Terr., now Wisconsin  9. Narcissa C. Willard, b. about 1826-27  10. Eleanor C. Willard, b. 31 December 1828 in Wisconsin  11. Lewis Augustus Willard, b. 28 December 1831 in Wisconsin  12. Willis Willard, "died when young"

Nancy was born in 1824, at about the same time as the Willards moved to Wisconsin from Missouri.  In 1832 when she was 8 years old, her father and her 4 oldest brothers spent the summer fighting the Sauks & Foxes in the Black Hawk war, under the command of her uncle, Henry Dodge (later the first governor of Wisconsin Territory.)  In 1836, when she was 12 years old, her brother George was murdered.

In 1843 Nancy married David Feathers   and took over the care of his children, and also began having her own.  In 1847 the family is spotted in the Territorial Census, living very close to her brother Hamilton and her sister Christiana. The next year Charlotte is born, and word arrives in Wisconsin of the discovery of gold in California.  In 1849 Nancy's brothers Austin, Alexander Jr aka Hamilton, and Roland travel to NY and board a ship going around the tip of South America to San Francisco. Her sister Eliza Martha goes overland to the gold fields with her husband.  While they're gone, in 1850, Nancy's 2 year old daughter, Charlotte, dies.	Family Table 2. David Hamilton Feathers & Eliza Moore Thomas Moore Feathers, b. 1831  Henry Wilkinson Feathers, b. 1833  David Hamilton Feathers Jr., b. 1835  John Feathers, b. 1836  Caroline Feathers, b. 1837  Amelia Wilmina Feathers, b. 1840  Eliza Moore Feathers, b. 12 August 1842  wife Eliza dies September 12, 4 weeks after the baby's birth.  David Hamilton Feathers & Nancy A. Willard  m. 5 June 1843 Ellen Clara Feathers, b. 1844 also known as Nell  Jane A. Feathers, b. 1846, aka Jennie  Charlotte Feathers, b. 1848  Catherine Elizabeth Feathers, b. 1851, aka Kitty  Lewis Willard Feathers, b. 1852, aka Willie  Elizabeth Mary Feathers, b. 1855	Age if still alive when their mother died & age at Nancy's death. 11        28    9        26    7        24    6        23    5        22    2        19   newborn   17              15             13             dead              8              7              dead

In 1851, except for Alexander Jr, Austin, and Eliza Marth, the Willard kids return to Wisconsin, this time via the Isthmus of Panama. They were full of stories of California and urged the Wisconsin relatives to move West. Also this year, gold was discovered in Jackson County, Oregon, setting off a rush to the region around Jacksonville. And Kitty was born.

In 1852 Nancy and David went to see California for themselves, going by ship to San Francisco via Cape Horn. At the same time Alexander Sr. headed up the overland trek of most of the rest of the relatives to California. While Nancy was in California "Willie" was born, or he was born just before they left.

In 1854, for reasons not yet known, Nancy and David and their kids sailed back to Wisconsin, going by way of Panama.

In 1855 Elizabeth Mary was born, only to die the following year.
 

The Letter:

In 1857 a young fellow, 22 years old, joined the Feathers' household there in Wisconsin. His name was William Charles Sanderson Jr.  In 1859 Nancy's brother Roland dies in California, leaving his Franklin ranch to his father. A bit later "Nell" marries William Sanderson and the whole Feathers family joined a wagon train to go back to California, this time overland.  In June of 1859, 150 miles short of Fort Laramie Wyoming, and 10 weeks since they left Wisconsin, Nancy wrote The Letter.  It is addressed to her sister-in-law, the wife of Alexander H. Willard Jr. And this is placed at the bottom of the letter, as was usual practice then. A transcript is in the Descendants of Henry-2 Willard, the 2nd Supplement to the Williard Genealogy. The original letter is held by L. Spencer Leister, who generously allowed it to be displayed here this weekend.

 
She died on August 14 near Salt Lake City. Notice the ages of David Feathers' children at this time. In the 1860 Census: Nell and William Sanderson are settled in Cottonwood near her Uncle Austin Willard, Uncle Alexander Jr., and her Aunt Eleanor. They were not far from where her Grandpa Alexander Sr was living in Franklin along with her Uncle Lewis. Living with Nell and William is her 8 year old brother Lewis Feathers aka Willie. 14 year old Jane Feathers is living with her Uncle Joel over in Clear Lake, where Joel was surveying for Napa County. It is unknown where 9 year old Kitty was living. It is unknown where David Feathers himself was.
 

Meanwhile, throughout the Northwest, the timber grew tall and wide. Logging was one of the earliest industries, although it was confined to the coast, for reasons of good transportation of the wood to its markets, primarily San Francisco at first, until late in the 1800s when the railroad made shipping of inland wood products feasible. Before and during the California gold rush, settlers were coming to Oregon looking for cheap land. The Riddle family was one of the first to come to the region of the South Umpqua River, in 1851.

Their donation claim was north of Cow Creek Falls, in the vicinity of "Old Piney", where deposits of nickel were later discovered. William Riddle was more ambitious than the average pioneer, a trait he passed on to his kids. Their first Oregon house was made of hewed logs. It's location was at today's 445 Cow Creek Road, in modern Riddle.

In the 1860s, the valleys along all the creeks and rivers hereabout were either open, or covered with Oak trees. The tall conifers, such as Douglas Firs or Western Red Cedars, grew farther up the slopes from the major waterways.

When the settlers first came, the South Umpqua Valley economy was based on agriculture. Wheat, oats, corn, barley, vegetables, and fruits. Perishables were consumed locally until the railroad to Portland was completed. There were two flour mills in the area. We lunched next to the remains of one of them today. Raising livestock was the greatest source of cash income, as the animals could walk themselves to market on the roads and developed trails. Cured hams were hauled overland by wagon to the gold mines in Jackson county, south of here, and sometimes to Scottsburg on the coast for shipping to San Francisco.

At least one story has David Feathers, called the Reverend David Feathers, a Baptist minister, coming to the area of Cow Creek Valley ( modern Riddle ) in 1863 or so, from California. I don"t yet know where he was in 1860 and have no other traces of this tale.
 

About 1864 or 1865, Ellen Clara "Nell" and William Sanderson Jr moved from Yolo county, California to Myrtle Creek. You'll recall that Nell was Nancy Feathers' oldest child, born and married in Wisconsin.  Ellen Clara and William's first two kids were born in California. Their third, Nancy Sanderson, was either born in California or Myrtle Creek -- there are conflicting records. Their fourth and last child was definitely born in Myrtle Creek.

Family Table 3. Ellen Clara Feathers & William Charles Sanderson Jr. George David Sanderson, b. 1859  Frederick Thomas Sanderson, b. 1862  Nancy A or Clollie Sanderson, b. 1865  William Charles Sanderson III, b. 1867

Riddle was not in existence when Ellen Clara and William moved from California. John Hall platted Myrtle Creek in 1865. Myrtle Creek may have looked very much like this 1880 picture shortly after the Sandersons arrived. On the left, on what is now Main Street, is the John Hall house. William bought 24 acres from the Irelands and settled down. William and Ellen Clara bought numerous other pieces of property, large and small, in Myrtle Creek, in nearby Riddle, and towards Canyonville.
 

By the time the Sanderson family left the area, Myrtle Creek no doubt looked like this 1915 picture.

One record says that William was the first postmaster in Myrtle Creek, and Lavonne spent hours looking for the location of the first post office there ( so that we could visit it today ) and in trying to confirm this assertion. All with no luck. The official list of all postmasters in Myrtle Creek does not have William's name on it. A solution to the postmaster mystery may lie in the discovery that William was one of the early postmasters of Riddle (in 1895). And when the town of Riddle became the City of Riddle, William was elected one of the trustees.
 

Of Ellen Clara and William's four children, only two reproduced: Frederick Thomas Sanderson and William Charles Sanderson III.  Nancy Sanderson married, but she and James Gilmore had no children.  The oldest boy, George David Sanderson, drowned, along with his Uncle Lewis Willard Feathers, in 1864. David was 5 years old and Lewis "Willie" was 11 years old.  These two deaths are the best evidence that the Sandersons came to Oregon as early as 1864.  Ellen Clara, George David, and Willie are buried side by side in the Riddle cemetery.

Family Table 4. Frederick Thomas Sanderson & Cora Ann Butler Maysel Ellen Sanderson, b. 1893  Lawrence Frederick Sanderson, b. 1897  Dorothy Gertrude Sanderson, b. 1901 [Margaret Templer-Carter's mother]    William Charles Sanderson III & Mary LaVernie Palmer Walter Volna Sanderson  Sidney Charles Sanderson, b. 1896  William Aubrey Sanderson, b. 1902  Lois Vayda Sanderson, b. 1906 [planned 1994 Sacramento Reunion]  Phyllis LaVernie Sanderson, b. 1911  William Carlyle Sanderson, b. 1915

Mr. and Mrs. J.Q.C. Vandenbosch

The tragedy of the double drowning was in August 1864. Earlier that year, in April, in the home of her father, the Rev. David Feathers, Jennie A. Feathers married John Bouseman Riddle.  Just before their wedding, John had bought the J.Q.C. Vandenbosch Donation Claim of 320 acres, for $800. J.Q.C. Vandenbosch was unable to do manual labor. His wife had taught the first school in Cow Creek Valley in their home. The house, which John bought along with the property, was at the lower end of what later became Mary Riddle's Prune Orchard, near the bridge that crossed Cow Creek east of Main Street in Riddle, right on the creek bank.  This was Jennie and John's home. And this is where their son was born, to a newly orphaned Jennie, for her father, David Feathers, died in July of that same year.  In October, in this same house now referred to as the John B. Riddle home, a hitherto unknown Feathers girl married Austin Rice.

On November 12, of the following year, J.B.'s brother Abner took Jennie and her small son to Roseburg to visit friends.   They left Jennie's home in the afternoon to spend the night at a home on the Dole Road, north of Myrtle Creek, before completing their journey.  J.B. had a premonition that something horrible would happen on the trip. At dawn of the next day, November 13, 1865, he mounted his horse to pursue them. He passed the home where they'd spent the night. As he topped the rise in the road, he saw the buggy entering the South Umpqua River at the ford. As the team approached the opposite shore, the front wheels came loose from the body of the buggy, and the passengers were dumped into the swollen river.  J.B. arrived in time to rescue his brother, who was clinging to brush protruding from the river. His wife and son were swept away by the current. It was three months (i.e. February 1866) before Jennie's body was found near the Oak Street bridge in Roseburg, and the child was never found. Jennie was buried in one of the early Roseburg cemeteries.  More than a year and a half later John married Mary Frances Catching, the first white child born in Cow Creek Valley, and only 15 years 8 months old at the time of their wedding.

John Riddle bought the Vandenbosch claim the same year that it was announced that the railroad would be extended from northern California clear through to Portland, Oregon. The next year the railroad route was surveyed and, wonder of wonders!, it was proposed to go right through the middle of J.B. Riddle's new possession. The first rail was formally laid in October of 1869 in East Portland and reached Roseburg in July 1872.  The tracks arrived in what John platted as "Riddles" in 1882. This is a picture of the depot John had built. That same year John built the Riddle Hotel, right near the tracks! It took 13 years to complete the next stretch to Ashland, and the final link to California was finished in December 1887, 24 years after Riddle first bought the land and 23 years after the survey showed what a wise decision that was. Pearl Yokum Lawson, a fellow early pioneer, characterized John B. Riddle as "a well known opportunist." She didnÌt appreciate his foresight! Riddles, the town, now served as the shipping center for Canyonville, Days Creek, Perdue (modern-day Milo), Tiller, and Drew.  John had "railroad fever" and opened small eating houses as the railroad tracks moved south. When he reached Medford, he operated the Nash Hotel, which was the first establishment of its kind in that city.

With the railroad to transport the produce, fruit orchards, particularly of prunes, sprang forth throughout the valley. Passengers could leave Riddles in the morning, shop or visit in Roseburg, and return to Riddles the same evening. Riddles boomed. The City of Riddle (Note the loss of the final "s") was chartered in 1893. Among the first elected officers were J.B. Riddle, president of the Board of Trustees, and William Sanderson, trustee. William by this time was an extensive landowner. The orchards shown in this picture belong to Abner Riddle, John's brother. Abner's house is at the left, just at the foot of the hill, nearly where the cemetery is now to be found.

This is the prune plant still serving Riddles in mid 20th century , gone now
 
 

John had remarried in late 1867, and it was Mary, not our Willard descendant Jennie, who partnered with him in all of his busy bustling years.  Also in 1867 the elusive Kitty Feathers resurfaces when she weds William C. Greenman in the next county south of Riddle: in Jacksonville.

picture dating from late 1800s

The first hotel that John and Mary had built burned in 1885, so in 1886 they erected this magnificent structure. It served as the social center of the entire Cow Creek Valley. Minus the porch, it still stands in Riddle today.

Finally, as a retirement home, John built a house that as nearly as possible resembled the home heÌd lived in as a child, before his parents emigrated to Oregon. Compare what his mother had left behind with the "hewed" log cabin his mother had to live in after that trip! This structure, too, still stands in Riddle.

Well," Brown, pictured here on the left with the pick hammer, had a cabin near Riddle. This picture shows him sitting in the doorway.