Ann’s Adventures—Part 1

By Eilene Lyon

My 2^nd great-grandaunt, Ann Jenkins, had a short but adventurous life for a mid-19^th century woman. She was born July 5, 1831 in southwestern Ohio, oldest daughter of Henry Zane Jenkins and Abigail G. Bedford. When she was six years old, her family relocated to a newly platted Quaker town in a meadow surrounded by swampland in eastern Indiana, known then as Camden.

Her parents built and ran a small store at first, but later took up farming in rural Knox Township, Jay County. Because teachers were scarce and cost money her parents could ill afford, Ann’s Quaker mother provided much of her schooling.

Due west of the Jenkins farm lay another small rural community, Trenton, partially founded by the James and Elizabeth (Anderson) Ransom family. Ann and two of her siblings would marry Ransom offspring. Ann would be the first. At age 18, she wed William C. Ransom on her mother’s 49^th birthday, February 14, 1850.

The following year, when Ann was heavy with child, her father, Henry, headed to California to find gold, along with nine other men. Her husband planned to follow soon after, but when their daughter Cordelia came along, he agreed to stay home and be a family man…for a while.

Soon the pull of the west coast had yanked William, his brother Robert, and a cohort of young men from Jay and Blackford Counties out to sea on their way to find instant wealth. They left in February 1852. Ann and Cordelia moved back in with her mother and grandmother in Knox Township. The two older women doted on the baby.

After six months had passed and no news had reached her from California about William’s arrival, she began to fear he’d been in a shipwreck and perished. Though the trip had been a journey to hell and back, he did eventually arrive in San Francisco to resume correspondence with his wife.

William was soon begging Ann to come be with him, and leave the baby in Indiana. This latter request she would not do. But the impulse to go to William was strong. He promised her she could make good money there. Women’s homemaking skills were in high demand and short supply.

She was used to being poor, but needing to support herself and Cordelia, Ann agreed to teach school near her in-laws in Trenton. Her younger brother, Bedford, would take her there by mule on Sunday evening, and bring her home for the weekend. Cordelia stayed with grandma and great-grandma Jenkins.

Throughout the year 1853, William, missing his wife, dithered between coming home and persuading Ann to come to him. Finally, in late fall, she capitulated. Her father, gone more than two years, had scarcely been home a month. He was no doubt grateful for the opportunity to see Ann again, and meet his granddaughter. Now he had to bid them “Goodbye.”

Ann’s older brother, William Zane “Billy” Jenkins, had lost his wife, Jane Ransom, that summer. Ann and Jane had been quite close, marrying the same year, and giving birth to daughters within months of each other. Little Lizzie and Cordelia were best of buddies, nearing age three.

Ann and Cordelia, escorted by Billy (minus Lizzie), soon followed the route the two earlier groups had traveled. They took a steamboat to New Orleans, then a steamship to Panama. The trio went by train at least part of the distance across the isthmus. Then pack mules carried them the final 26 miles through the jungle to Panama City on the Pacific coast.

Another steamship journey of about three weeks deposited them on the teeming wharf at San Francisco, probably the fastest growing city on the planet at the time. Every aspect of the trip had been a kaleidoscopic whirl of new scenery, people of varying colors and costumes, unfamiliar food-sights-sounds-smells. Shipboard life had been a mix of momentary fascinations and interminable boredom. Cordelia may have had the good fortune to find playmates aboard, or not.

Soon Ann, Billy, and Cordelia had joined William and Robert Ransom in the south-bay community of Santa Clara, where the two men worked on the ranch owned by Commodore Robert F. Stockton, a Mexican War naval commander. Stockton had returned east overland after purchasing the ranch, putting James F. Kennedy in charge.

The brothers began working for Kennedy on their arrival, and made a good living by farming, rather than mining. They convinced Billy Jenkins he could easily earn two thousand dollars growing wheat alongside them. Unfortunately, 1854 proved a disastrous year for wheat growers in the San Jose Valley. But for Ann, 1854 held a bright spot: the birth of a second daughter, Marietta Alice Ransom, on September 18. Cordelia, who missed her buddy Lizzie, would have a little sister to play with.

With their farming careers going bust, William Ransom and Billy decided the time had come to finally head to the Sierra foothills where many a miner had found their fortunes to be equally precarious. Robert went home to marry Ann’s sister, Emma Jenkins, and bring her to California. Ann and her two girls were about to leave all reasonable semblance of civil life behind.

To Be Continued…

Feature image: Riverboat Ben Campbell. Ann, Cordelia and Billy would have traveled in a boat like this down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers to New Orleans.