The High Ditch Trail
[North Fork Trails blogpost, April 4, 2004:Saturday morning, Catherine O'Riley and Dave Lawler kindly picked me up and we drove to the Euchre Bar Trail (EBT), on our way to the High Ditch Trail (HDT) leading away upcanyon from the Bar, where we would meet Julie and her sister, Kasa, and Ron Gould.
http://northforktrails.blogspot.com/2004/04/high-ditch-trail.html ]
Sun bright and sky blue, clear and cool, shrubs a-flower, and work to be done. We carried loppers and small saws. I struck off fast down the trail, GPS unit in hand, with propitious satellites favoring high accuracy, aiming to pause at the invisible trail to East Green Valley, and scout its route. It leaves the EBT at the top of the switchback section, where a grove of Kellogg's Black Oak (Quercus kelloggii) adorns the ridge crest. I recorded a waypoint on the GPS (I was very close to the 3080' contour) and slung my pack off.
This trail is always hard to find, and where the Dutch Flat quadrangle would have it running straight, it actually switches sharply back and forth through oak woods, and these switchbacks easily become lost in the accumulating litter of leaves and branches, and are even guarded aggressively by poison oak. I kicked leaves and rotten old limbs around, threw bigger branches off the trail, lopped poison oak, and then, hearing voices above, left, content to have restored not the bed of the trail itself, but at least its line, over the first few switchbacks.
More work is needed. This trail drops down to the pass between Green Valley's East Knoll (a fine viewpoint) and the main canyon wall, and then descends a broad, poison-oak-infested ravine to the Valley itself. Its course becomes again confused in these lower reaches.
I rejoined Dave and Catherine and, GPS unit tracking my course, immediately left them again on an intermittent jog down the EBT. I found that it is less than one mile down to the house site near the base of the trail, at the 2200' contour, and covered the distance in fourteen minutes, or a little less. The true course of the trail is perhaps a sixth of a mile north from where depicted on the Dutch Flat quadrangle. I recorded a waypoint and continued towards the bridge.
A hundred yards or so down the EBT brings one to the trail forking left to the High Ditch Trail. I put my pack down and did some serious lopping. Hundreds of small conifers are sprouting up in an area largely given to Canyon Live Oak over recent centuries; and now, without wildifire, about to become a crowded stand of Douglas Fir with a weakening Canyon Live Oak understory. I felt little remorse at felling some dozens of these coniferous weeds. A distinct trail connects the EBT to the HDT alog the shortest possible route, and in a few minutes, with Catherine and Dave and I all lopping away, we had this old trail exposed to view and easily passable.
The HDT itself has benefited from lopping, much, recently, by Julie, and we added our mite while making good time on the easy, nearly level ditch. This ditch was blasted out from cliffs in places; it is rather large, and yet appears only to have brought water to the diggings at Euchre Bar itself. It must have cost someone, or more likely some company of someones, quite dearly in its day. I wonder whether their golden harvest ever settled that expense. The HDT very nearly coincides with the 2000' contour.
About a quarter mile on the HDT brings one to the confluence of the NFAR, and the NFNFAR. The latter stream suddenly appears directly beside the HDT, and near 100' below, blending an emerald crystalline clarity with foaming white rapids. In general, the HDT traverses steep slopes studded with rocky outcrops and draped with a fine old gnarled forest of Canyon Live Oak (Quercus chrysolepsis).
We caught up with Kasa and Julie just past a springy area where trees have fallen and blocked the HDT. Julie found a way to lop through masses of shrubs and avoid the trees, and she and Kasa had just then roughed in an excellent path, through what had been a major obstacle.
A half mile in on the HDT brings one to a major garbage site, a gravel bar gold miner's camp with all kinds of gear and garbage and strange debris. The magnitude of the problem is shocking and sickening. One despairs of every carrying all that mess out. A helicopter?
A well-defined old trail drops down the steeps above the HDT to this bar.
But we forged ahead, towards the upstream end of the ditch, and soon arrived at a long broad pool roiled by a small waterfall, and found sunny boulders beside the pool, and had lunch. The ditch was still all of 25 feet above the river, but just there a rocky eminence jutted into the canyon, making sheer cliffs along the line of the ditch, and no trace at all of a blasted ledge, or any continuation.
Julie and Kasa left us soon after Ron Gould (who had hiked to Humbug Canyon) joined us.
Ouzels zoomed up and down the river, chattering. Sawtooth Ridge soared 2000' above us, across the NFNFAR.
We decided to scout upstream, having heard from the good Steve Hunter that a road dropped down to the NFNFAR about a quarter mile up, from the Rawhide Mine Road. Perhaps we could pull off a loop. Turning the base of the cliff through dense willows and alders and over large boulders, we broke free onto a long and broad expanse of bedrock. The up-ended quasi-slates of the Shoo Fly Complex had been planed nearly flat, like a giant's sidewalk, and we could just stroll along and admire the view. A marvelous little stretch of river. A giant boulder of white quartz marked the beginning of the Giants' Sidewalk.
It looks much as tho the High Ditch took its water from the NFNFAR in the Giants' Sidewalk area, and carried it in a wooden flume down around Cliff Corner to where the ditch itself began.
Passing a side canyon, really a ravine, we saw an old bridge, with massive dry-laid stone abutments, a little ways above. We climbed to inspect it and found Steve's road, a curious little thing, just barely too narrow for a jeep, and often bolstered with old-looking dry-laid stone walls, along the downhill side. The bridge itself is made from three tree trunks, decked with two-by-fours nailed across. Following the road down, to the north, we reached some minor miner shacks, in a fairyland of dry-laid stone retaining walls, strangely perfect and made with an artistic flair, all overhung and hidden within the live oak forest. We dropped our packs and explored up and down and sideways.
Several gold dredges were in the area, and we found evidence that this is a mining claim on Tahoe National Forest lands. We were near a section line, as I found later, when I plotted my GPS track data on the Dutch Flat quadrangle, on my computer, at home. A rope and cable spanned the river just upstream, with a kind of trolley hanging from pulleys. Glacial outwash deposits across the river had been mined for gold in days long gone by.
After a time we hit the road and followed the narrow little thing on up the canyon wall, occasionally observing traces of an older mule trail, and in less than half a mile reached the Rawhide road, the last few hundred yards looking like nothing more than someone's aimless exercise with a bulldozer. We had stumbled upon a historic trail, or trail-and-road, one I had really never heard of, tho long suspecting the aimless bulldozing must really have aimed at the river.
Afternoon shadows lengthened and sheltered us from the sun as we slowly climbed the rough road. I observed little patches of glacial outwash, or maybe re-worked till, in two locations during our climb, at elevations 2400 and 3000 feet. The river below is at about 2000 feet.
Soon enough we passed the Rawhide gate and then another half mile brought us to our cars. On the way out, Catherine and Dave and I stopped at Casa Loma and walked down to the railroad tracks to enjoy the view of Giant Gap in the afternoon. It is one of the greatest views in California.
All in all, a very nice day, and I must say, that High Ditch Trail is a real winner. Thanks Julie!
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| North Fork Canyon, view southward, from Moody Ridge, April 4, 2005 |
Captain Weimar
[North Fork Trails blogpost, April 4, 2006:Recently I shared with you Stephen Powers' 1873 article about the Nisenan Maidu, as it appeared in the Overland Monthly. In another message, I mentioned that Chief Weimar had "made his mark" on the 1851 treaty negotiated with the Maidu, in which they gave up all claims to their ancestral lands in exchange for one rather large reservation, extending from the Sacramento Valley on the west to Chicago Park on the east, and from Bear River on the south, to Deer Creek and the South Yuba on the north.
http://northforktrails.blogspot.com/2006/04/captain-weimar.html ]
That is one of the treaties with the California Indians which, when sent to the U.S. Senate for ratification, was instead placed in a sealed secret archive, not to be opened for fifty years, in 1903; the Barbour Treaties.
So, who is this Chief Weimar? A Nisenan, for whom the town of Weimar was named. He appears in several Gold Rush diaries and books, almost always referred to as "Captain" Weimar, although the spelling of his name varies widely. Alonzo Delano wrote a nice Weimar story, in which he and Weimar and Simmons Peña Strong ventured into the local high country on a camping trip, in 1853.
In the excerpts below, he is named "Captain Wemah," and I can't refrain from remarking about the significance of that title.
It is really Spanish—he was "capitan" Wemah. And why is that?
The Spanish and Mexican influence in California was confined almost entirely to the coastal region. Indian who escaped from the Missions made their way into the Central Valley and Sierra foothills. When Captain Wemah was a child, there well may have been escapees from the Missions sheltering with his very tribe. Among these Indians of different tribes, Spanish would have become a lingua franca, just as Stephen Powers remarks that English had become their lingua franca, in the 1870s.
But that is the 1870s. Consider the 1830s and 1840s. Sutter builds his fort near the confluence of the American River and the Sacramento River. He hires many Indian laborers. Of all these Indians, there are those fresh from the hills, who know nothing of modern civilization, and there are those with some kind of background with the Spanish and Mexicans. These latter will speak Spanish, and perhaps some English. They will ride horses and dress as Europeans. They will often be the bosses who manage the wilder Indians, on the job.
Within the broader more tenuous parts of the sphere of influence of Sutter's Fort, was much of the territory of the Nisenan. This is illustrated by the experiences of some of the Donner Party, the Forlorn Hope group, who, when at last they staggered down into the foothils below Greenhorn Creek and north of Bear River, on the old trans-Sierran Indian trail we call the Donner Trail, encountered a village of Indians. Among them was one who was mounted and spoke some Spanish.
Spanish is also spoken by the Nisenan in the excerpts below.
So. although we cannot know for sure, a couple of possibilities occur to me, about Captain Weimar.
1. He was an actual employee of Sutter, who parlayed his position at the Fort into the chieftaincy of the Nisenan.
2. He was a foothills Nisenan not involved at all with Sutter, but was thrown together with hordes of Mexicans, other Indians who spoke some Spanish, and the motley crew of Americans and Europeans in California in 1848, when Indians thronged the brand new diggings. He was already a Nisenan "chief" and, because all Indians of any degree of civilization (and thus, a degree of Spanish) were accorded the honorific, "capitan," Weimar assumed it as his right.
Well, at any rate. From "Sketches of travels in South America, Mexico and California," by S.M. Schaeffer, I will extract passages which bear upon the Nisenan and Captain Wemah. Schaeffer was mining for gold near Grass Valley at the time.
*******
January 1, 1851. There were several encampments around here of native Indians, (the Digger tribe;) and one day, when working alone, some distance from my cabin, I was honored with a visit from several squaws, nearly every one of whom had a ''papoose'' strapped to her back. They were out hunting and digging wild onions and tender roots, which grew there; and they laughed heartily at my incessant digging and washing dirt, and signified that Indian no work, but ''American much work, ugh,'' Their faces were besmeared with tar, which I was informed indicated the decease of a friend or relative.
Whilst I enjoyed a laugh at their expense, they were equally merry at the appearance I presented, so we were all pleased. Finally they went off, and I could hear them laughing at the idea of a man working and earning his support ''by the sweat of his brow.''
*******
Thursday, January 30th. Five or six young men and myself agreed to take a short walk through the woods, ostensibly for ''prospecting,'' but in reality to visit ''Capt.'' Wemah's Indian camp. Our ''prospecting amounted to the figure 0,'' but our visit to the Indians was interesting and highly gratifying. Their encampment was located in a lovely valley, through which ran a never-failing stream. Their council house was in the centre of the camp; around it were the wigwams, constructed of bark, each having a hole in the centre of the roof, through which issued the smoke from the fire beneath.
The entrance to their palatial mansions was an aperture just large enough to admit one person at a time in a stooping posture. On a large rock I noticed several squaws—quite pretty and of fine figure, nearly nude, pounding acorns, out of which they make soup and bread.
The ladies were courteous and affable, and were pleased with our visit, but apparently surprised at receiving so much attention from us. When the acorns are fully ripe, the squaws saunter forth, collect immense quantities, place them in their storehouse, and when needed, pound them to a coarse powder, which they prepare in a proper manner for the lazy chiefs.
The chiefs and braves never work, but spend their time in hunting and manufacturing ornaments. Whenever the squaws go out after roots and vegetables they are always accompanied by a brave, as a ''guard of honor.'' I often wished that I could converse with them. The majority of the Indians about Grass Valley were friendly to the ''whites;'' others were disposed for war—war to extermination.
*******
Wednesday, June 18th. Today was held our first Whig convention; delegates from Nevada and Rough and Ready joined us. My friend, Judge S_______, of whom I have heretofore spoken, was unanimously elected presiding officer; and the entire proceedings reminded me very much of the political conventions I had attended as ''lobby member'' in the eastern states. There was considerable discussion in relation to the office of State senator. Nevada wanted the candidate selected from her district. Rough and Ready very modestly withdrew from the discussion, and finally it was compromised by our district getting the senatorial nominee, and Nevada taking the lion's share of the candidates for the assembly.
During the morning Captain Wemah, head chief of the Indian tribe in our valley, came into the room, and as he took a seat alongside of me, I watched his countenance, feeling curious to know how the proceedings would interest him. The old chief understood about as much of the English language as a Japanese. He sat silent awhile, gazed all around the room, rose up, straightened himself, turned around, exclaimed ''ugh,'' and off he marched.
******
[July-August 1851]
Look there! ''Heigho, what is going on among the Indians?'' Why, there is to be a grand ''Pow Wow'' at Wemah's camp to-night; ''Let us go down.'' ''Agreed.''
I was anxious to be present at the beginning of the exercises, but waiting for some friends, whose business detained them later than they had expected, we arrived at the camp just in time to be too late for the grand wardance, in which participated the entire assemblage of chiefs, braves and warriors, many of whom were representatives from distant tribes who had come to attend the all-important ''big talk'' in relation to the ''pale faces.''
The squaws were not allowed to indulge in any of the sports, neither were they permitted to come within speaking distance of the council house.
Some of the warriors were profusely decorated with fancy colored feathers, beads, shells and trinkets, and liberally daubed with paint. After resting a short time, the gaily-decked Indians made for the council chamber, (a description of which, and the camp, I gave in a former chapter,) which was dimly lighted by a fire in the centre, around which the various delegations squatted in a circle.
''Captain'' Wemah, who held the important position of chief over all the Digger Indians, stood in the centre of the party, and when all were quiet—not a whisper to be heard—he commenced his opening and welcome speech, delivering it with wonderful fluency, great vehemence, and wild and violent gesticulations. During his powerful address, he was frequently applauded by his well behaved and respectful auditory. The old chief was dressed in his best suit: his coat, which had been given him by an American soldier, fitted him about as well as the garments that are put on a stick to frighten off the crows from a corn field; in one pocket he had a couple of empty bottles, in the other a huge horse pistol, which once might have been a formidable weapon, but now lacked a trigger! When he had concluded his speech, he called out—''Ven Wollupie''—''si, si, signor.'' Two stout, well developed braves seized a tub of daintily prepared acorn gruel, and placed it before their delegation; others were called, who followed their example, until every squad was supplied with a tub of gruel; then, at the signal of the ''Captain,'' each Indian dipped his unwashed hands into the delectable food, and gulped down the gruel like a half-starved pig.
After the liberal entertainment was finished, the Convention or Pow Wow was called to order, and Wemah again addressed the motley crowd, with even more earnestness than before. There were unmistakable evidences of discontent. The fire in the centre of the council house was fast dying out; the discussion waxed warm; those of the Indians who could not get inside of the chamber, clambered on the roof, and peeped down the hole in the middle, heedless of the smoke, and the vile stench which issued forth in murky clouds. Wemah danced, frothed and expostulated, but all to no purpose. The ''Pow Wow'' lost all sense of propriety, and the clever old chief stalked out in apparent disgust. No sooner had his ''highness'' retired, than every ''pale face'' inside the council was unceremoniously ordered out.
As a report of the great speech of the evening would doubtless be interesting, though not familiar with the Indian language, I will endeavor to give a few sentences from memory's log: '' Ingin—no cara—ugh—bah—manyana—he, ya, hi—mucho Americano fight—si hugh—capitaw—ugh fire-water, whiskey aqua no good—sleepy—ha—he—yes! ''
I passed around the camp, and stopped in front of Wemah's wigwam. There the old chief lay flat upon his face, his military coat buttoned up to his chin, around him the numerous ladies of his household. Just then a friend called to me; I looked around, and found I was the only ''pale face'' within the camp—the small hours of another day had come around. I hastened to join my companions, when we returned to our wigwams, and sought and found refreshing sleep.
*******
[August 1851]
One day, observing several acquaintances laughing heartily, I inquired the cause of their mirth, when my attention was directed to a procession of three Indians coming up the street. The first warrior was playing the jews-harp, as unconcernedly as though he had been in his wigwam, having only an apron on; the next hero was whistling, turning neither to the right nor left, but walking ahead, regardless of the loud laughing of the ''pale faces;'' his entire dress consisted of an old vest, and that unbuttoned! The last Indian was singing; he strutted proudly by, clad in a hickory shirt which he valued above price.
Whenever an Indian visited a trading establishment, the most gaudy colored handkerchiefs, calicos, &c., were shown him. Indians never value money; and I have seen them enter a store, put down their gold dust, and keep on buying until the
storekeeper would call out, ''all gone.''
I saw a finely developed brave come into one of the stores, gaze all around the room until his keen eye caught sight of a bundle of ''Arctic'' comforts, and although the weather was oppressively warm, he purchased several and wrapped them around his waist, and stalked out as proud as an emperor.
These Indians were generally men of truth; whenever an Indian requested a garment to be laid aside for him it was done, for the merchant felt sure that he would return on the promised day.
On one occasion, chief Wolupe, next in rank to Capt. Wemah, ordered a heavy cloth coat, and promised to call with the ''oro'' after two ''sleepy;'' after the two ''sleepy'' passed, in walked the chief, and with a distressed look, announced that ''Injun man play push stick—lost him money, bah, ugh;'' but he promised to come back again after one ''sleepy,'' and he did and bought the coat. They are very fond of gambling, and use sticks instead of cards.
They are a temperate people, and afraid of ''fire-water.'' They are a virtuous people, but, of course, like all human beings, their characters exhibit both good and bad traits. They never use salt on their meat; when game is brought into camp, it is thrown on the fire, roasted, and then greedily devoured, with little regard to the rules of conventional society.
Acorns are a favorite article of food, and a full supply is always kept on hand for emergencies. They are a dirty, filthy people. Their active out-door life, and abstinence from rich cooked dishes, preserved them from many ailments with which more civilized people are afflicted. The poor squaws are compelled to labor very hard. The warriors holding any kind of work in utter contempt, they had rather starve than be tied to labor. The squaws are never allowed to idle away their time; while some are employed in pounding acorns, the rest are sent out to search for succulent roots and vegetables. An acquaintance of mine expressed a desire to have a smart-looking Indian boy to live with him; he was accommodated, but after a couple of days' life among the ''pale faces,'' Indian boy vamoosed without saying, ''by your leave, sir.''
A couple of gentlemen wished to get up a grand Indian war-dance at Nevada, and while they would feast the Indians for their performance, they anticipated a considerable profit on the speculation. Captain Wemah acquiesced, and his whole tribe was soon preparing for the ''first grand exhibition by native Indians;'' and as Captain Wemah had always been friendly to the whites, he hoped for a full attendance.
Handbills were printed and distributed far and wide; great inducements set forth, and the price of tickets only two dollars each. One morning I was standing at the head of Mill street, and observed chief Wemah riding along on an old scraggy-looking pony, bowing to everybody, followed by his warriors, braves squaws and little ones; nearly every squaw had a huge willow basket strapped to her back. Away they scampered in the happiest humor, bound for the exhibition. At night I saw the captain and his train returning in the worst humor. I asked him what was the matter? he replied: ''Americana no good, bah!''
Some rowdy fellows had broken down the inclosure, stopped the performances; and the Indians were as mad as California panthers. They, however, lost nothing—they had plenty of fresh beef and bread; but the managers made a bad speculation—lost two hundred dollars. They had purchased several beeves, had them killed and dressed for the performers, but the rowdies interrupted the performances, and they sold no tickets.
*******
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