doc241 - Schoenherr Home Page in Sunny Chula Vista

pending American invasion, there were only about seventy men capable of bearing
arms.
The foreign settlers living in San Diego in 1845, according to Crosthwaite's recollection,
were: Himself, Henry D. Fitch, Don Juan Warner, Abel Stearns, John Forster,
Captain John S. Barker, Thomas Wrightington, John Post, Peter Wilder, John C.
Stewart, Thomas Russell, Caesar Walker, Captain Edward Stokes, an English carpenter
known as "Chips," Enos A. Wall, Albert B. Smith, and two negroes named Allen B. Light
and Richard Freeman.
Frequent reference has been made to Alfred Robinson and William Heath Davis.
Robinson was a native of Massachusetts who came here in 1829 as clerk of the ship
Brookline. He was baptised as José María Alfredo before 1833, and early in 1836 married
at Santa Barbara, Ana María, daughter of Captain José de la Guerra y Noriega.
This wedding is the one described in Dana's book. The following year he and his wife
went to Boston. He returned in the Alert in 1840, and remained two years. His employment
in these days was as clerk and supercargo of different ships. In 1849 he returned
to California as agent for the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, and in later years was
engaged in some real estate transactions in San Francisco. His Life in California is a
standard work and one of the best of its kind. They had eight children. Mr. Robinson,
although of a somewhat reserved disposition, was a competent man and his standing in
California was good. He deserves to be remembered among the pioneers who saw
clearly, and judged with common sense.
William Heath Davis was born at Honolulu in 1821, and came to California as a
boy on the Louisa, in 1831. In November, 1847, he married María de Jesus Estudillo,
daughter of José Joaquin Estudillo. His wife lived in San Diego when young, and Mr.
Davis's book is full of information about the life here in early days. For many years he
was one of the most prominent merchants in San Francisco, and engaged in some of
the largest trading ventures on the coast. He took little part in public affairs, but was a
thorough and successful business
Page 140
man. He resided at San Diego for a short time and part of his account of his life here is
used in the following chapter. He was one of the founders of New San Diego, and built
the first wharf there in 1850, a circumstance of which he was always proud, although
the venture was not a financial success. In 1889 he published his Sixty Years in California,
which is one of the most interesting and informative books ever written about California.
In this book, like Alfred Robinson, he stands up manfully in defense of the
Californians--that is, of the better families, such as that into which he married.
He is still living in Oakland, California, and has a new set of reminiscences written
and ready for publication.
Page 141
A Dance in Old San Diego
It is on the bough-roofed dancing-floor,