Appearances Notwithstanding: Uncle Jeffs Song

 Before we go any further I need to hit a few notes from the bittersweet melody that is Uncle Jeff's song.  Such a man has never lived to tell the beautiful and sad tale of his life in two completely separate cultures one of which is now practically extinct due to the other.

Thomas Jefferson Mayfield came over the Pacheco Pass into the San Joaquin Valley in the spring of 1850 and he was 5 or 6 years old.  The town of Sacramento had been formed in February of 1850 and his family was one of the earliest American pioneers to explore the interior of the big valley.  These events are chronicled in a book created by anthropologist and historian Frank Latta, who created snapshots of people's lives on the final frontier that will be preserved forever.

The land was untamed with raging rivers feeding massive lakes and green rolling hillsides covered in oak trees and wildflowers.  The water was filled with fish, and birds so numerous they darkened the sky above the marshlands and prairie where Grizzly bears weighing up to 2200 pounds hunted whatever they wanted, including people, all year long, never going into hibernation because the weather was so mild and the prey so plentiful.

Uncle Jeff described his voyage into the Golden State as the closest thing to heaven on earth he had ever seen or heard of, with wildflowers and animals on the hills the likes they had never seen.  "It was like God himself painted the hillsides..."

From what I remember, Uncle Jeff's description of events to Frank Latta of those wild valley days must have been at least a partial inspiration for the opening scene of the tv show Little House on the Prairie.  

The only thing is the description Mayfield gave was more beautiful than any director might create with a half-dead hillside and some phony flowers on a set in Simi Valley.  I have personally witnessed glimpses of the natural wonder that once was.  Through historical accounts and sometimes art or old photos I can travel to these places in my imagination.    
That has always been my problem, I can never find the words, and oftentimes photos do not give justice to the world I see, because appearances are notwithstanding.  

To be continued...

Appearances notwithstanding part 3

 From San Francisco, young Asbury and his comrades engaged in piracy and guerrilla warfare.  Their intent was to disrupt the US government and lend aid to the rebel war effort by marauding for gold in California and through piracy on the pacific ocean, then sending the money on to Jeff Davis.  

But young Asbury learned more than a few sympathetic ears were willing to give a dollar or two for the cause, to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

At the end of the war, a similar secret society would pop up, and they adopted the identical tactics of terror and piracy which began in the Asbury Harpending SF chapter of the AGC, and they called this new secret society the KKK.  

Yes, that's right.  

The earliest progenitor to the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan developed its tactics and tested their skills in San Francisco with rebel spies and saboteurs during the war, and that's a fact jack.  

Ultimately Lil Asbury proved to be a traitor to the United States and in 1864, he was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for treason.

President Abraham Lincoln, who actually turned out to b a bit of a southern sympathizer himself, decided to pardon all the political prisoners the government obtained during the civil war even though he probably shouldn't have.  

In 1864, after only four months locked up for the crime of treason against the United States of America, Asbury Harpending was released from the old Broadway Jail in San Francisco and became a free man once again.

FYI: The old Broadway jail was destroyed by an earthquake in 1906.    

So where does any 0 and 2, multi-millionaire, Frisco traitor go after catching a presidential pardon for treason?  

You guessed it, Kern County.  Only it wasn't called Kern yet, but it would be soon if Lil Asbury had anything to do with it.  Back then it was only part of Tulare and Los Angeles Counties and it was known as Indian Country.  

To be continued.......

Appearances notwithstanding part 2

 

The story goes, That in order to avoid prosecution because of the 1860 debacle with Walker in Nicaragua, the teenaged Asbury Harpending took 5 bucks from his father and split for California which was the final frontier.  

By the time young Asbury arrived in San Francisco, he had parlayed his 5 dollars into 250 by selling fresh fruit to the other passengers on the ship.  Proving his merit as a privateer from early on, four years later Asbury was the founder of a town.  

That's why we say appearances notwithstanding.  

Asbury was a hustler with the Midas touch for ripping people off and he learned there was less work and as much money to be had in selling overpriced goods to miners than there was in actual mining. 

During the civil war young Asbury knocked around California avoiding combat in a war he helped to create but expected others to fight.  

He and his confederates operated what we would consider a terror cell out of San Francisco aligned with the pro confederate Knights of the Golden Circle.   The purpose of this organization in California was to establish strongholds on the west coast.  

For all intents and purposes, young Asbury was a spy and became the west coast bagman for the KGC, personally accumulating about 2 million dollars of wealth by the end of the civil war.  

There is no exact figure for the amount of money Harpending actually transferred from the west coast to confederate coffers, but he made at least 1 well-known trip to Virginia for a drop and to return with mail and dispatches for enemy operators in San Francisco. 

 

Prior to the war the KGC group advocated for the expansion of the United States into Mexico and points south establishing even more slave-holding territories for representation in congress.  They actually wanted to form a country including the south, all of Mexico, and the Caribbean with Havannah Cuba being the capital, and these would be countries of the golden circle, with the golden circle meaning slaveholding countries.  

 Their leader was an American general named George Washington Lafayette Bickley who planned but failed to execute a coup against Lincoln in 1860.  

If the plot succeeded the conspirators would have replaced President-elect Lincoln on innaguaration day with the former vice president and Democratic candidate, General John C. Breckinridge.  Breckinridge would eventually assume command of confederate forces during the civil war, and ultimately became their secretary of war.

As I have pointed out previously,  who in the hell covers these topics if I do not?

 

The town called Havilah which young Asbury founded, sits in the shadow of a mountain named after a Confederate general by members of the KGC to show the expansion of their territory to include the west. 

I wonder how much of a hand Harpending had in the naming of Mt. Breckenridge, I mean he was the founder of the town which became the county seat.  Either way, it doesn't look good, just saying.  The truth is often inconvenient.  

  

to be continued...

 

     

Appearances notwithstanding part 1

 A river flows out of Eden to water the garden and from there divides into four rivers. The first is named Pishon; it flows through Havilah where there is gold. The gold of this land is good. The land is also known for its sweet-scented resin and the onyx stone.

Genesis 2:10

You probably forgot about the fact the old Ghostown called Havilah, California was originally the capital city of Kern County, and to tell you the truth I actually forgot it too.

    

After a failed attempt at establishing a colony under the command of a former San Francisco newspaper editor, and self-appointed president of Baja California, General William wacko Walker, a confused teenager, and insane jackass in his own right named Asbury Harpending set up shop and he called the spot Havilah, based on the abundance of gold and onyx in biblical accounts of such a place in the book of Genesis.  

Was there gold?  Sure there was.  

In abundance?  If you say there was, but maybe it wasn't being mined in that town.

In 1859 this rich kid leaves his daddy's plantation in Kentucky to go to college, and he becomes brainwashed.  In 1860 Asbury along with a group of kids from the school he was attending ran away seeking to join the treacherous swine William Walker who was attempting to set up a pro-slavery anarcho-fascist colony in Nicaragua, sound familiar?  

Asbury was only 15 years old at the time when his party was intercepted by US federal authorities en route to join Walker's army he avoided capture and then went back home to Kentucky. 

It's a good thing he never joined Wacko Walker's Army because a coalition of Central American countries sent their armies and defeated this group of American, mostly southern, democrat pirates.  William Walker was ultimately executed by the government of Honduras in 1860. 

So where does any 0 and 1, pro-slavery rich boy from Kentucky named Asbury go to avoid being charged with starting an illegal war overseas, while simultaneously avoiding combat in the American civil war?

You guessed it, California.

To be continued...