William Green Russell son of Elizabeth Pierce page 1

William Green(bury) Russell
Son of Elizabeth Pierce

Founder of Denver Colorado
Confluence Park is a park encompassing the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South Platte River. The park marks the area where gold was discovered in 1858 by William Greeneberry Russell. This gold discovery contributed to the founding of Denver.

http://coloradogoldexperience/historic-locations

http://www.findagrave.com/William Green Russell

Family links:
Children:
Mary Elizabeth Russell Robbs (1853 - 1923)*
Martha Jane Rosalee Russell Marshall (1862 - 1912)*

Inscription:
Capt. Russel's Co Ga Cav Confederate States Army

Burial:  Briartown Cemetery
Briartown  Muskogee County
Oklahoma, USA

William Greeneberry Russell gender: Male birth: 1820 Pickens Co., South Carolina death:24 AUG 1877 Briartown, Muskogee Co.,OK burial: Briartown Cemetery, Briartown, OK AFN:5NMV-F3X Parents father: James R. Russell (AFN: 5NMV-1KR ) mother: Elizabeth M. Pierce (AFN: 5NMR-2KJ ) Marriages (1) spouse: Susan Willis (AFN: 5NMV-F7R )

Birth: 1819 Death: 1877, USA
William Green Russell was a prominent native of Geogia who traveled west to Colorado where he discovered gold at Little Dry Creek in July 1858. Russell Gulch near Denver, CO is named after him. He married a Cherokee woman. Mattie Marshall was his youngest daughter(and is buried near him). Hazel Marshall Petty was the daughter of Mattie, granddaughter of William. His grave is marked by a monument approximately 6 feet tall (now broken) which resembles the Washington monument.

Inscription(which is no longer readable): In memory of our Beloved Father- W. G. Russell- Aug. 24, 1877-66 years ole. "An amiable Father here lies at rest, as ever God will his image bless. The friend of man, the friend of truth, the friend of ages, the guide of truth.

2. James2 Russell (Anthony1) was born About 1790, and died about 1835 in Leathers Ford, Lumpkin Co., Georgia. He married Elizabeth Pierce in December 1818, Edgefield District, South Carolina.

Children of James Russell and Elizabeth Pierce are:
+ 3 i. Martha Anne Russell, born about 1819 in South Carolina.
+ 4 ii. William Greenberry3 Russell, born about 1820 in Pickens Co., South Carolina; died August 24, 1877 in Briartown, Canadian District, Cherokee Indian Territory.
5 iii. Mary Russell, born about 1823 in Hall Co., Georgia. She married Joe Rouse.
6 iv. John Riley Russell, born December 24, 1825 in Hall Co., Georgia ; died September 25, 1899 in Goingsnake District, Cherokee Nation, Indian Territory. He married Frances McClure.
7 v. Joseph Oliver Russell, born about 1828 in Hall Co., Georgia; died about 1906. He married Jane Robertson.
8 vi. Levi Jasper Russell, born February 17, 1831 in Georgia; died about 1908. He married Mary Roe.

William Russell's parents were James Russell and Elizabeth Pierce. William is buried in the Briartown Schoolhouse Cemetery. His wife's maiden name was Susan "Sukie" Jane Willis. They had at least one daughter (Martha Jane Rosalee Russell 1862 - 1912) who, along her husband (John Pleasant Marshall March 17,1866 - 1944), is buried next her father. "Sukie's" parents were William Pickens Willis and Mary Jane Daughtry. Mary Jane was approximately 1/4 Cherokee and a direct descendent of Moytoy, the first principal chief of the Cherokees
 James Huggins

4. William Greenberry3 Russell (James2, Anthony1) was born about 1820 in Pickens Co., South Carolina, and died August 24, 1877 in Briartown, Canadian District, Cherokee Indian Territory. (Muskogee) He married Susan Jane Willis, daughter of William Willis and Mary Dougherty.

Children of William Russell and Susan Willis are:
16 i. John Randolph4 Russell, born January 11, 1847; died October 08, 1874 in Colorado.
17 ii. William Henry Russell, born September 01, 1848 in Lumpkin Co. or Dawson Co, Georgia; died after 1908.
18 iii. Mary Elizabeth Russell, born October 15, 1853 in Lumpkin or Dawson Co, Georgia; died 1923 in Muskogee Co., Oklahoma. She married (1) T. Cooper Howard. She married (2) Alex Robbs.
19 iv. Thomas Russell, born about 1856 in Dawson Co, Georgia.
20 v. Benjamin Russell, born about 1858 in Dawson Co, Georgia; died about 1859 in Dawson Co, Georgia.
21 vi. Martha Jane Rosalee Russell, born November 05, 1860 in Lumpkin or Dawson Co, Georgia; died about 1912. She married John P. Marshall.
22 vii. Walter Raleigh Russell, born March 30, 1864 in Dawson Co, Georgia; died August 27, 1894 in Canadian District, Cherokee Nation, Indian Territory.
23 viii. Frances L Russell, born January 09, 1866 in Dawson Co, Georgia; died September 03, 1899 in Memphis, Shelby Co., Tennessee. She married Higgins.
24 ix. Robert Lee Russell, born July 09, 1868 in Dawson Co., Georgia; died March 31, 1948. He married Maud M. Beavers.

William Greeneberry RUSSELL [Parents] was born 1820 in Pickens Co., South Carolina and obtained a marriage license 25 May 1845 in Lumpkin Co., Georgia. He died 24 Aug 1877 in Briartown, Muskogee Co., OK and was buried in Briartown Cemetery, Briartown, OK. William married Susan WILLIS.

Susan WILLIS "Sukie" was born 22 Jan 1827 in Dawson Co., Georgia and obtained a marriage license 25 May 1845 in Lumpkin Co., Georgia. She died 2 Jul 1893 in Dawson Co., Georgia. Sukie married William Greeneberry RUSSELL.

They had the following children:

		M	i	John Randolph RUSSELL was born 11 Jan 1847 and died 8 Oct 1874.
		M	ii	William Henry RUSSELL was born 1 Sep 1848 and died 1908.
		F	iii	Mary Elizabeth RUSSELL was born 15 Oct 1853 and died 1923.
		M	iv	Thomas RUSSELL was born 1856 in Lumpkin Co., Georgia. He died 1859.
		M	v	Benjamin RUSSELL was born Oct 1858 in Dawson Co., Georgia. He died 1859 in Dawson Co., Georgia.
		F	vi	Martha Jane Rosalee RUSSELL was born 5 Nov 1860 and died 1912.
		M	vii	Walter Lee RUSSELL was born 30 Mar 1864 in Dawson Co., Georgia. He died 27 Aug 1894 in Canadian Dist. Cherokee Nation..
		F	viii	Frances L. RUSSELL was born 9 Jan 1866 and died 3 Sep 1899.
		M	ix	Robert Lee RUSSELL was born 9 Jul 1868 and died 31 Mar 1948.

Many families in the area of Hall, Lumpkin, Dawson and Forsyth Counties probably used the name Greenberry in honor of William Greenberry Russell--especially families that were closely connected to the Russell family. William Greenberry Russell was born 1818/19 in Edgefield, SC. His parents moved NW of Gainesville, GA in about 1822 and settled on the Chestatee River (which was the border of the Cherokee Nation), not far from the location where the gold mining town of Auraria later sprang up. Green was married in 1845 to Sukie Willis, a mixed-blood Cherokee.

In late 1848 Green Russell led a party of miners (including Georgia neighbors and Cherokee friends from Indian Territory) to California in search of gold. He returned home in 1850 via ship from San Francisco to the Isthmus of Panama to New Orleans. In the summer of 1850, he returned to California, taking his younger brothers and other Georgia neighbors. After 2 successful years, the brothers returned to Georgia with a sizable fortune. Green purchased the 500-acre Savannah Plantation near Hightower (now in Dawson County) for $10,000.

In 1857, Green, his brother Oliver, two Pierce cousins, and friend Sam Bates went to Kansas Territory to acquire farm land. They learned of the discovery of small amounts of gold in the Rockies by some Cherokee friends in Indian Territory. In 1858, Green Russell formed an expedition of 104 men (including 30 Cherokee) to explore the Rockies. They arrived at Ralston Creek (at the based of the Rockies in Colorado) on June 2, 1858, and after very discourgaging results, by July 13, 1858 the majority of the party abandoned the endeavor. Only 13 remained, including Green, his brothers, Pierce cousins and close friends. By October they had prospected a significant amount of gold dust and the news spread across the country and set of the Pikes Peak Gold Rush. Green returned to Georgia that fall to organize a new party and purchase supplies. His brother Levi remained behind and established a winter camp at the mouth of Cherry Creek, at its confluence with the South Platte Rive!
r. The settlement was named Auraria. Across Cherry Creek, a rival settlement sprang up called Denver. In 1860, the two mining towns were combined into one town named Denver. (The above information was abstracted from the notes of Charles Dorman Thomas).

I don't know what the origins of William Greenberry Russell's middle name were. I'm sure there was some significance to the name Greenberry when his parents named him. But, by 1840 Green Russell was already very respected in the mining region around Auraria, GA, and many families had begun using the name Greenberry--whether in honor of him, or whether they just liked the sound of it, I don't know.

Dan Pierce
Saugus, Calif.

On June 24, 1858, half-Cherokee William Greenberry "Green" Russell, and his brothers John Riley Russell, Joseph Oliver Russell, and Levi Jasper Russell from Hall, Georgia (near Auraria, Georgia), spur the Pike's Peak Gold Rush (1858 to 1867) in Colorado when they discover traces of gold along the Colorado's South Platte River (known collectively as the "Cherry Creek diggings") some three miles upstream from the confluence of Cherry Creek (near the present Alameda Avenue bridge). The area is now under rail yards, highways, warehouses, and parking lots.

Generation 1
Anthony Russell m. Margaret Black

Generation 2
James Russell [ 1790? - 1835 ] m. Elizabeth Pierce [1793 - 1855]

Generation 3
Children of James and Elizabeth:
1. Martha Anne Russell [ 1819?- ? ] m. William Odom

Martha Jane Russell was my great, grandmother. According to my mother she was known as Martha Jane within the family, though many sources list her as Mattie.

Martha Jane married John Pleasant Marshall a native of Bell County, Texas. Bell County is where Green Russell's brother, Levi settled, following the Civil War, and it stands to reason that Martha Jane and John Pleasant met during a family visit to Texas.

Martha Jane and John Pleasant settled for a time in Briartown, OK, later moving back to Bell County and then back again to Oklahoma. They had several children, of which my grandfather was the youngest male. Following Martha Jane's death, the family return to Bell County... though several of the children, stayed in Oklahoma.

I am more than happy to supply dates and more information as I have spent many years working on this family line.

Leslie.
2. William Greenberry Russell [ 1820 - 1878] m. Susan Willis (also sited as McClure) [1827 - 1893]

SUSAN WILLIS, b. January 22, 1827, CNE [Dawson Co, GA]; d. July 02, 1893, Dawson Co, GA; m. WILLIAM GREENBERRY RUSSELL, May 25, 1845, Lumpkin Co, GA; b. Abt. 1820, Pickens Co, SC; d. August 24, 1877, Briartown, Canadian Dist, CNW.

More About SUSAN WILLIS: 1851 Siler roll: Lumpkin Co, GA, fam# 10, roll# 1888 as Susan Russell 1852 Chapman roll: Lumpkin Co, GA, fam# 10, roll# 2029 as Susan Russell 1882-84 Hester roll: fam# 684, roll# 2448 as Susan Russell (widow)

3. Mary Russell [ 1823 - ?] m. Joe Rouse
4. John Russell [ 1825 - ? ] m. Frances McClure
5. Joseph Oliver Russell [1828 - 1906] m. Jane Robertson [ 1838 - 1936 ]
6. Levi Jasper Russell [ 1831 - 1908 ] m. Mary Roe
Generation 4
Children of Wm "Green" and Susan Russell
1. John Randolph Russell [ ?1855 - 1874 ]
2. Mary Russell
3. Thomas Russell[ 1856 ]
4. Benjamin Russell [ 1858 - 1859 ]
5. Henry Russell
6. Rolley Russell
7. Robert Russell
8. Frances Russell m. ? Higgins
9. Mattie Russell [1865] m. ? Marshall

Green Russell and Gold
by Elma Dill Russell Spencer
University of Texas Press
Austin [TX] and London

[page 5]

. . . The Russell family was not native to Georgia. They came from South Carolina in 1822, when Green was only two years old and his sister, Martha Anne, but three. His father, James, was of British descent, that on Anthony Russell, who came to America during Revolutionary times. in the family it was said that Anthony came as a surgeon in the British Navy, but sympathizing with the American cause, took        [page 6]       
up residence on the eastern seaboard. About the time James was old enough to start out for himself, gold was discovered in North Carolina. A nugget weighing seventeen pounds was found in Cabarrus County in 1799 on the Reed plantation, the first gold discovered anywhere in the United States. Four years later another chunk weighing twenty eight pounds was picked up in the same location. Production soon spread to other areas but was heaviest in Burke and Rutherford Counties. The gold ore was transported with difficulty to the Philadelphia mint, and with the arrival of gold went rumors of its discovery.

James Russell, young and adventuresome, followed the wake of the rumors. Leaving Pennsylvania, he went south and west into the unsettled foothills. Travel was difficult and slow, and James looked for gold in the rugged country as he went along. He did not discover any new outcroppings, but he did gain experience in the proven fields.Then with a true prospector's zeal and ever hopeful he pushed on farther and farther, never content until the next ravine was crossed, the next hillside reached. Gold traceable in the western range of North Carolina lured him across the state, and finally into Pickens District, South Carolina.

Trouble was again brewing with the British, and when war brokeout James enlisted in the South Carolina militia at Abbeville. This was in 1813. Five years later, in December 1818, he married Elizabeth Pierce, of a Virginia and South Carolina family. The ceremony was simple,performed by Justice of the Peace Barrett Freeman, in Edgefield District, her brother Reuben and her sister Nancy serving as witnesses. The young Russells then lived in Pickens District a few years,but when Hall County, Georgia, was opened up they moved there with their two small children.This had been Cherokee country until July, 1817, when it was ceded by treaty with the Indians to the state of Georgia. The following year Hall County was created out of it. Few white people inhabited this untamed territory, but by 1821 a small village named Gainesville was incorporated there. It was on a beautiful spot long known to the Indians, where two trails converged, one from the north, the other following the water divide that ran east and west, Numerous clear springs made it a good camping site for the Indians, and after the
[page 7] Cherokees were pushed west of the Chattahoochee it attracted white settlers. Usually people moving to new country looked for good water, limber, and land for crops, and this place seemed promising. Little did the newcomers dream that the hills beyond would yield up rich gold ore-or perhaps James Russell did. Anyway he settled his family northwest of Gainesville in the hills, not far from the Cherokee line. There the Russells' third child, Mary, was born in 1823, a year after they moved into Hall County. Three sons were to follow: John Riley, born in 1826; Joseph Oliver, in 1828, the same fateful year when gold was discovered in the vicinity; and Levi Jasper, in 1831. Elizabeth Russell, liking family names for her children; had called her first son, a very red little baby, Greeneberry-inappropriate as it seemed. Green never liked the name and managed in time to live it down, but to his mother the appellation, William Greenberry Russell, had distinction and meaning. She hoped he would add luster to it.



Background material for "Cherokee Gold" was furnished primarily by E. Merton's Coulter's Auraria, Marion L. Starkey's The Cherokee Nation, and Andrew W. Cain's History of Lumpkin County for the First Hundred Years,
1832-1932. . .

 Green had made his first visit to Colorado with the Cherokees in 1849. In 1858, a second party of prospectors led by William Green Russell became the first to discover placer gold in paying quantities. The Colorado Gold Rush was on!

In 1858 and 1859, the first Colorado Gold Rush took place when the William Green Russell party found "colors" while prospecting along Cherry Creek, Ralston Creek, and Newlin Gulch, near present Denver. In July, 1859, at the Gregory diggings near Blackhawk, the first "arrastra", a Spanish ore-crushing device, was built. At the same time, placer gold was found and worked at Buckskin, Mosquito, Hamilton, Tarryall, Montgomery, and Fairplay on branches of the South Fork of the South Platte River, in the northeast section of South Park.

RUSSELLVILLE
For a few exciting months, Russellville felt like Colorado's gold-rush capital. The town rose five miles southeast of here in late 1858, after William Green Russell discovered a few gleaming specks in his pan at Russellville Gulch. His find brought a horde of prospectors-an advance wave of the Pikes Peak gold rush. With its busy placer diggings and clusters of tents, Russellville brimmed over with promise; but its nuggets, although pure, were too scarce to make fortunes. In the spring of 1859 the real gold rush began in the Central Rockies, about seventy-five miles northwest of here, and Russellville's boom abruptly busted. Nearly deserted, the settlement survived for a time as a passenger way station, but by 1880 this hopeful gateway to the gold fields had become a ghost town.

John H Gregory
jhgregory.html 

Daniel C Oaker

Soon the urge to go west was back and D. C. started for Colorado. Leaving in September of 1858 from Omaha with a party of prospectors, he arrived in Denver on October 10^th of that year, with Olive staying behind.  D.C. and party met up with the Green Russell party to inspect their claims. Thinking that finding gold would hold a good outcome for them, D. C. decided to return that November to Iowa for the winter. Having had access to William Green Russell’s journal, D. C. used it to write a pamphlet called the “Pike’s Peak Guide & Journal” which touted the Colorado gold fields and helped to lead green miners into thinking that gold could be picked up off of the ground.  From the book “The Great West” by Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden: “In the spring of 1859, Green Russell’s journal was printed by Major D.C. Oakes, with descriptions of the best routes to the new Land of Promise. This book, full of glowing descriptions of the Land of Gold, was extensively circulated throughout the Eastern States and caused thousands to leave their homes and turn their faces westward to the land of untold treasures.” This pamphlet, as it was also called, took off and helped to cause a hundred thousand hopeful would-be gold miners to travel west to Colorado, but this was somewhat short-lived.  As D. C. returned to Colorado in the spring of 1859 with a sawmill, he crossed paths with the disappointed miners and their families.  He felt their rage when he saw that he was buried in effigy and almost lost his sawmill when a large group, returning east, threatened to destroy it. The group finally let D. C. pass after yelling “hard names” at him

below Karen Mitchell Huerfano history pages

Once again, Francisco Fort Museum will honor the pioneers of Huerfano County at the annual celebration to be held this Saturday, July 30, in La Veta.

This year's special honorees will be the descendents of what is called the Georgia Colony, or those settlers who traveled west from the Old South following the Civil War.

The first Georgians to come to the future state of Colorado were members of a gold prospecting party. Notable among this party were William Greeneberry "Green" Russell (1820-1877) and Joseph Decatur "Kate" Patterson (1836-1910).

Russell had trekked through the Pikes Peak country in 1849 to join the California gold rush. Along the route, he noted potential ore-bearing formations in the Rocky Mountains. He returned to the South in 1852 with the intention of going back to the mountains to search for gold.

In 1858-1859 Patterson joined Russell for a prospecting trip to Colorado. Accompanying them were a group of about 30 Cherokees.

Another companion, Russell's cousin James H. Pierce, actually found gold by panning a dry creek near Denver. However, the area became known as Russell Gulch.

With the beginning of winter and enduring copious snowfalls, the miners decided to retire to the eastern plains for the season. They established a camp on the South Platte River and called it Auraria after their hometown in Georgia. The name was eventually corrupted to Aurora.

President Abraham Lincoln issued a call for volunteers for the Union Army in 1861. The Georgians had heard rumors of an impending Civil War and even encountered some prejudice from abolutionists. While many miners were returning to their homes in the Midwest and Eastern states, the Southerners quietly made plans to return to support their home state.

The Georgia men started south, intending to head for Texas as fast as possible, and from there go due east. Their only foes, they reckoned, would be Indians along the route, especially in eastern New Mexico and western Texas.

Their path brought them through Pueblo to the old Hicklin ranch on the Greenhorn. Zan Hicklin was an old friend of Patterson and Russell, and made the party welcome.

The Georgians noted Hicklin's fine fields of crops, his orchards and scenery. The ranch was not that far from the old Santa Fe Trail and the party followed this to Fort Union, New Mexico.

Slipping by federal troops at the fort, the party continued east despite rumors of depredations being carried out by the Comanches upon travelers.

The party was armed well, had plenty of munitions, food and other supplies, and many wagons and livestock. However, a silent enemy struck -smallpox.

One of the victims was Joshua Potts, a widower with six children. Green's brother Dr. Levi J. Russell fought the disease as best he could in the prairie wilderness, and mortalities were few.

But the disease and caring for the patients necessarily slowed travel for the caravan, and federal troops appeared. The Southerners were arrested and, when all were able to travel, marched back to Fort Union. Russell and Patterson and their party were held at the fort until the spring of 1863 when they were paroled. Far from being the humiliation they felt it was, the "imprisonment" at Fort Union may have saved them from the marauding Comanches, who murdered scores of whites during the early 1860s.

Some of the Georgians returned to Colorado, while others, worried about the safety and condition of their families at home, returned east.

When the Georgians arrived back at their homes in northern Georgia and southern North Carolina, they found their slaves gone, their families hungry and often homeless, many of their fathers and brothers buried on the battlefields of the Old South. They pitched in to repair and restore the properties, but the condition of the postwar South were very hard on those who lost the war - even though these Georgians been far away and noncombatants.

The men must have spent many long and sleepless nights considering their plights and planning for a better future. Always, they remembered the clear air and gold-laden streams of Colorado.

And so a caravan, led by Russell, left the South in the spring of 1870, headed west. One of this party was Parson Asbury H. Quillian and family who became long-time Huerfano County residents.

The party traveled with oxen and mules, tar-pole wagons, whatever they could find to carry the choicest of their worldly possessions. How wrenching it must have been for the women to choose which of grandmother's quilts to take, which of their featherbeds, dishes and other family heirlooms.

By winter, they reached the banks of Apache Creek, where Russell settled on some fertile land. Others of the party settled nearby, along the Huerfano at Huerfano Butte and west into the Huerfano Valley.

Patterson had stayed in Colorado and married Martha Potts, the eldest daughter of the man who died of smallpox on the plains, and her brothers and sisters lived with them. For a time, they lived in a large plaza near the settlement of St. Mary on the Huerfano, near the now Kimbrel ranch: Perry Kimbrel was a member of the Colony.

In 1865, Patterson began receiving letters of inquiry from his family in the South, who wondered if they, could find better conditions on the frontier. Colorado had become a territory in 1861 and many of the early settlers, especially around Canon City, had hailed from the South.

Convinced the long trip was preferable to staying in Georgia and North Carolina, a party led by Samuel Patterson Sr., Green's father, and James L. Patterson, Green's cousin, left their homes in 1869 and; about six months later arrived along the Huerfano. These families sought out farm sites and settled along the Huerfano River from the Butte to west of Gardner, and along the Cucharas above and below La Veta.

Among these settlers were the Andersons, Bakers, Bruces, Barnards, Browns, Chastains, Dodgions, Erwins, Esteses, Garrens, Gribbles, Harrises, Kimseys, Kincaids, Kirbys, Kitchens, Ownbeys, Phillipses, Praters and Willburns, many familiar names even 135 years later.

Some of these names are those of present Huerfanos, while some are place-names. The Bakers, for instance, settled on Baker Creek for which the original Panadero Ski Resort was named.

Bob Bruce of La Veta, of Bruce and Kimsey ancestry, may well be the only third generation Georgian left in the county. He is 93 years old.

Rather oddly, one Marshall Willburn was a member of the Colony; now we have Marshal Harold Willburn in La Veta.

Dodgeton Creek in Cuchara was named for the man who settled on that waterway, Jackson "Jack" Dodgion. The name has been corrupted. Most of the Dodgions moved on during the 1880s but some have returned to visit during the ensuing years.

While the others of the Georgia Colony were content with farming and raising livestock on their new places, Russell still had the gold bug in him. He wandered across old La Veta Pass to some ancient Spanish diggings along Grayback Creek where officers and enlisted men from Fort Garland were placer mining. Although he called his haul "poor man's diggin's," Russell continued to pan gold from the stream for many years. In response, early residents of the little gold mining town named it Russell. Later it became known as Placer but the sign on Highway 160 still Bays Russell. Of course it is just a wide spot in the road now, with a few old cabins and a highway department dome barn.

Other relatives and inlaws of the first Georgians continued to make their way west through the next two decades, with the last waves of immigrants arriving in the mid-1890s. Some of these families were the Alexanders, Egglestons, Smiths, Kirlees, Parkses, Martins, Hayeses and many others. Some families stayed but one winter and finding it too harsh for their Southern veins, continued west to California.

In fact, most families ended up on Colorado's Western Slope or on the West Coast eventually, many dying there after trekking clear across America. For many years a La Veta Day was celebrated in California where many scores of expatriots gathered to swap stories about their families' adventures along the route from Georgia and in Colorado.

Every year there are fewer descendents of the Georgia Colony left in this area, but every year Francisco Fort hosts visitors coming to photograph tombstones, see photographs and experience the flavor of Huerfano County left engrained in them by stories told by grandparents and great-grandparents.

Thank you, Georgia Colony, both visitors and Huerfanos, for your legacy.

Contributed by: Chris Morton

This is the report of Lieut. George L. Shoup, Second Colorado Infantry (Union) concerning the capture of the Greene Russell party. Taken from US House Documents, No. 58, General Index to War of Rebellion, 56th Congress, Second Session, 1900-1901, Book #4209.

No. 2

Report of Lieut. George L. Shoup, Second Colorado Infantry

FORT UNION, N. MEX., December 1, 1862.

SIR: I have the honor to report that, in obedience to your orders, No.--, October 26, 1862, I left your camp, at mouth of Utah Creek, Canadian River, to pursue, and if possible overtake and arrest, a party who had gone down that river. I had with me Sergeant [S.G.] Marvin, Corporal [A.W. Allen], and 17 privates; also Dr. Rankin, Indian Agent Stapp, and Interpreter Delisle.

The first day, about 2 p.m., after marching about 25 miles, we discovered one of their camps. From the appearance of the ashes, the tracks of the animals, and other signs in and around camp we judged it to be at least three days old. Forming an estimate from the distance they had traveled the day previous to encamping here I concluded that they must be some 80 or 90 miles ahead of me. This camp was about 10 miles from the Fort Smith road and about 15 miles from the Canadian River, between the road and river. I had some knowledge of the country for about 250 miles down the Canadian River from Utah Creek. I knew a trail on the north side of the Canadian that intersects the Fort Smith road about 225 miles below the mouth of Utah Creek. I had Marched over that trail in September last, while scouting after Indians. It was then reported to me to be shorter than the Fort Smith road.

The party of whom we were in pursuit were evidently trying to leave the country without being detected. The direction they were traveling would indicate that they were going to Fort Smith. They were following a trail that had been recently made by horses, mules, and pack-animals, about 40 in number. This led me to believe that they might be part of the same party. I afterward ascertained that this trail had been made by Mexicans, who were trading with the Indians, and would join at some point below. It was also evident that they knew of our presence in that part of the country. I feared that they might have spies, who would watch our movements, and as I was following, to all appearances, a superior number, I feared I might be led into some trap and get surprised ourselves by them. I therefore concluded to cross the river and follow the trail that leads down the north side, and march as rapidly as possible to the junction of the trail with the Fort Smith road. Having arrived at this conclusion, I informed Sergeant Marvin of what I had determined on doing, and instructed him to march that evening to the river, and, agreeing to meet him that night some time, I took one man and followed the trail to the next camp, hoping I might gain some more information concerning the number, character, &c., of the party. I discovered, while riding to their next camp, distant about 10 miles, and which I supposed to be a noon camp, that there were 5 wagons; also that there was a lady with the party. I here turned about and joined my men the same night.

After arriving in camp, on October 30, at a point about 175 miles below the mouth of the Utah Creek, I concluded to reconnoiter the country southward in search of the Fort Smith road, as I had been informed by my guide that the Fort Smith road came near the river opposite this camp. I took Corporal Allen and Private [James] Baird, rode cautiously to the river and crossed over, but was not successful in finding the road. Thinking that we must soon come to the road, we road on southward about 15 miles till about midnight, when I gave up the search, turned about, and rode for camp, where I arrived next day about 11 a.m., and immediately resumed the march for the junction of the trail with the road.

On November 2, about noon, I arrived at a point opposite where the Fort Smith road comes to the river from the bluffs, and about 250 miles below the mouth of Utah Creek. I placed a spy on the lookout on a high bluff, where he could see across the river and watch the maneuvering of any party on the Fort Smith road from many miles either way. Examining the road, I found that the party of whom we were in search had not yet passed. There being a village of Indians a few miles below, I concluded to go down to the village with their agent (Stapp), to see and have a talk with them, and then return by way of the Fort Smith road to meet the truant party. I was not out of sight of my last camp before my spy on the lookout discovered the party approaching and immediately informed me of the same. A spy was immediately concealed in the bluff opposite them to watch their movements, and, if possible, ascertain their number, means of defense, &c. I marched down the river about 8 miles, and concealed the men and animals in a grove of timber near the river. Several Indians were seen during the evening, but none came to our camp, which was found to be about 8 miles above and about mile from the river. They had too many dogs for a night surprise.

About 11 o'clock at night some one was heard hallooing opposite our camp across the river. I went down to the river bank and saw three men on the opposite shore. One of the men asked me, in broken English, if they could cross the river. I replied that they could easily ford it. My first impression was that it was a detachment of the party above, who had gone ahead and had mistaken our camp for theirs. By this time some of my men had come to me, and we were ready to arrest them as they came out of the river. Just before they reached the shore we discovered that they were Indians. I recognized one of the Indians to be an old friend of mine. He commenced hallooing, and other Indians came across. I told them that we had come down on a friendly visit, and told them that we had some presents for them at our camp. I asked them if they knew who the party was in the camp above. They professed to be ignorant of the existence of another party in the vicinity, and they at once suspected treachery on our part. They thought it impossible that we could come from the same direction and not know who the other party was. However, I, with the assistance of Agent Stapp, convinced them that we had no other than friendly feelings towards them; that we were telling them the truth, &c.; that if the party on the other side of the river above were traders I would not molest them; but if they were going to Fort Smith or to any other part of the Confederacy I must take them back. I told the Indian who could talk English that if he would go to their camp early in the morning, ascertain whether or not they were traders, their number of men, their kind of arms, &c., I would reward him for so doing. I told him upon no consideration to let them know of our presence in the vicinity. I then gave them a midnight meal and they left.

The next morning at day-break we crossed the river, and I selected a good position to surprise the party. Concealed our horses behind a bluff, about 250 yards from the road, leaving a guard with them, while we took our position behind a bluff within a few feet of the road -- a most excellent place to surprise a party coming down the road. The Indians came around us in considerable numbers. Their suspicions were again aroused, and the messenger had not gone up to the camp, as agreed upon the night before. But we soon allayed all suspicion again, and Indian Thomas (who speaks English), after receiving instructions to be very cautious and discreet, started for the camp above. About two hours later he returned, bringing a note, directed to the chief of the Comanche Nation, signed Russell & Co. The substance of the note was that they were a party of 18 white men, from Las Vegas, N. Mex., bound for Fort Smith. I told the Indians I should take the party back with me. The Indians were all animated, and wished to participate in the capture of the party. They were instructed that we thought ourselves equal to the task. They still insisted on helping us, and said that they would be governed by my orders. I then told them that if any of the party should escape then they might take them prisoners, and I would reward them for so doing. This satisfied them. They concealed their animals behind a bluff near ours and made great preparations for a fight.

About 11 a.m. the party came in sight. The Indians came very near revealing our whereabouts by assembling on a bluff near by, and, by their great anxiety to see all that was going on, they held their heads so high that they were seen by the party approaching, who, on seeing the Indians acting in this manner, suspected an attack from them; consequently they halted at the distance of a quarter of a mile, examined their arms, and made every preparation for a battle with the Indians, and then moved on. I had previously ordered that the word "Surrender" should be the signal for my men to spring up, with muskets cocked and aimed, on our opponents. I let them come fully into the trap set for them, when I commanded them to halt and surrender. They were completely surprised. They were watching the Indians, and did not think of danger so close by. I repeated the command to surrender, which command they immediately complied with by dropping their arms without showing resistance. I took from them 6 double-barrelled shotguns, 8 rifles, 6 revolvers, 10 mules, 10 horses, 10 sets of harness, 10 bridles, 10 saddles, 1 side-saddle, and 5 wagons. I searched their persons and baggage for papers, taking from them any and all papers liable to be of any service whatsover in furnishing evidence for or against them. In answer to questions asked as to where they were going the majority answered to their homes in Georgia, two or three to Fort Smith, one to Cherokee Nation, one to Kansas, and one to Missouri. At the time of their surrender they had three cases of small-pox among them. In searching their baggage I found some treasure--gold dust, watches, chains, rings, &c., all of which I allowed them to keep.

The names of the party are as follows, vis: Green Russell, Dr. D.I. Russell, J.O. Russell, Samuel Bates, John Wallace, Robert Fields, James Pierce, James Whiting, A.S. Rippy, H.M. Demsey, W.I. Witcher, William Witcher, D. Patterson, G.F. Rives, J. Gloss, W. Odem, Isaac Roberts, J.P. Potts, and family of six children, the oldest a young lady, about seventeen years of age.

I forwarded to you, by a messenger, same day, the result of the expedition, hastily written with a pencil, in which I neglected to state that there were three cases of small-pox among the prisoners, but told the messenger to be sure to tell you.

There were about 100 Indians at my camp that evening. They demanded a prisoner. They said that they had been fighting the Texans, and that they must have a man now, that they might have a war-dance. I told them repeatedly that they could not have a man; that I should start back in the morning with all the prisoners; that Agent Stapp and two others would stop with them a few days to show them that we were acting in good faith toward them, and that the agent would then bring them to our camp to receive their presents. They started a runner immediately for their head chief, Mouwa. Next morning I commenced the return march. After marching up the river about 10 miles an Indian overtook me, stating that Mouwa and other Indians were coming up the river; that Mouwa wished me to stop, as he wished to see me. I encamped about two hours, after which Mouwa came up, with about 50 other Indians with him. I gave them something to eat. We then held an interview. He wanted a man, half of the animals, arms, ammunition, &c., taken from the prisoners. I told him that was not consistent with our rules of warfare. I told them that I was willing to pay them for the information they had given us, and would be willing to pay them for all information received hereafter. I gave them some silver and other presents for the information they had given this time. Agent Stapp did the same. After talking all evening we separated the best of friends, with a good understanding. Agent Stapp and two others were to return with the Indians, stay with them three days, and then all were to go to your camp, at the mouth of Utah Creek. The next morning, we resumed our march up the river.

On the morning of November 7 Dr. Russell informed me that two of the men having the small-pox were too sick to resume the march on that day, but thought by next day they would be better, after one day's rest. I laid in camp that day. Next morning the doctor informed me that the sick were no better and could not be moved. At this time some of the prisoners were out of rations and some of them had more than eight days' rations. I had six or seven days' rations. This, when divided mount those who had none, made it necessary to make your camp as soon as possible. Acting under this impulse, I left two of the sick men and two of those who had partially recovered as attendants with two of my men as a guard, with fifteen days' rations, and leaving with them one wagon and team, while I resumed the march.

On November 11 I was met by a detachment of 10 men, sent out by you to meet me. They had but one day's rations left when I met them, their fourth day from your camp. I sent two of them forward the same day, with a dispatch to you, requesting that rations be sent to meet me.

On the 13th I met a team, sent out by you, with rations for me. The same day I arrived at your picket camp.

The general conduct and behaviour of the prisioners after their capture was that of high-toned gentlemen. They made no attempt to escape. They all say that they had no intention of joining the Confederate Army, though the majority of them acknowledge that their sympathies are with the South.

Our men in this, as in former events, deserve the highest praise for their perseverance, coolness, courage, and discretion. Sergeant Marving and Corporal Allen were untiring in their exertions for the safe-keeping of the prisoners.

I have the honor to be, captain, your obedient servant,

G.L. SHOUP

Second Lieutenant Company C, Second Colorado Volunteers.

Capt. William H. Backus.

http://www.kancoll.org/khq/1956/56_4_lindsey.htm

Wikipedia William Green Russell
William Greeneberry "Green" Russell (1818�1887) was an American prospector and miner.

Green Russell lived in Georgia and worked in the California gold fields in the 1850s. Russell was married to a Cherokee woman, and through his connections to the tribe, he heard about an 1849 discovery of gold along the South Platte River at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. Russell organized a party to prospect along the South Platte River, setting off with his two brothers and six companions in February 1858. They rendezvoused with Cherokee tribe members along the Arkansas River in present-day Oklahoma and continued westward along the Santa Fe Trail. Others joined the party along the way until their number reached 107.[1]

Upon reaching Bent's Fort, they turned to the northwest, reaching the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South Platte on May 23. The site of their initial explorations is in present-day Confluence Park in Denver. They began prospecting in the river beds, exploring Cherry Creek and nearby Ralston Creek but without success. After twenty days, several decided to return home, leaving the Russell brothers and ten other men behind. In the first week of July 1858, Green Russell and Sam Bates found a small placer deposit near the mouth of Little Dry Creek that yielded about 20 troy ounces (600 grams) of gold, the first significant gold discovery in the Rocky Mountain region.

In early 1859, Russell was drawn to the mountains by the discovery of gold in nearby Gregory Gulch. He discovered placer gold deposits in June 1859 in the valley that was soon named Russell Gulch in his honor. By the end of September, 891 men were mining gold in the gulch, and the eponymous town was built near the head of the gulch to serve the miners.[2]

Two towns in Colorado are named after Russell, both in locations where he found gold: Russellville, now an unincorporated suburban community in Douglas County, and Russell Gulch, a former mining town in Gilpin County.
[edit] See also

Pike's Peak Gold Rush
Russell's Gulch, Colorado

Wikipedia Pikes Peak Gold Rush

In 1849 and 1850, several parties of gold seekers bound for the California Gold Rush panned small amounts of gold from various streams in the South Platte River Valley at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. The Rocky Mountain gold failed to impress or delay men with visions of unlimited wealth in California, and the discoveries were not reported for several years.[2]

As the hysteria of the California Gold Rush faded, many discouraged gold seekers returned home. Rumors of gold in the Rocky Mountains persisted and several small parties explored the region. In the summer of 1857, a party of Spanish-speaking gold seekers from New Mexico worked a placer deposit along the South Platte River about 5 miles (8 kilometers) above Cherry Creek in what is today Denver.[1]

William Greeneberry "Green" Russell was a Georgian who worked in the California gold fields in the 1850s. Russell was married to a Cherokee woman, and through his connections to the tribe, he heard about an 1849 discovery of gold along the South Platte River. Green Russell organized a party to prospect along the South Platte River, setting off with his two brothers and six companions in February 1858. They rendezvoused with Cherokee tribe members along the Arkansas River in present-day Oklahoma and continued westward along the Santa Fe Trail. Others joined the party along the way until their number reached 107.[3]

Upon reaching Bent's Fort, they turned to the northwest, reaching the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South Platte on May 23. The site of their initial explorations is in present-day Confluence Park in Denver. They began prospecting in the river beds, exploring Cherry Creek and nearby Ralston Creek but without success. In the first week of July 1858, Green Russell and Sam Bates found a small placer deposit near the mouth of Little Dry Creek that yielded about 20 troy ounces (622 grams) of gold, the first significant gold discovery in the Rocky Mountain region. The site of the discovery is in the present-day Denver suburb of Englewood, just north of the junction of U.S. Highway 285 and U.S. Highway 85.[2]
A map from the late 1850s showing prominent routes to the gold regions.
[edit] The initial boom

The first decade of the boom was largely concentrated along the South Platte River at the base of the mountains, the canyon of Clear Creek in the mountains west of Golden City, at Breckenridge and in South Park at Como, Fairplay, and Alma. By 1860, Denver City, Golden City, and Boulder City were substantial towns serving the mines. Rapid population growth led to the creation of the Colorado Territory in 1861.

Huerfano County, Colorado
Georgia Colony History Page
Contributed by: Lonnie Dockery
[email protected]


THE HISTORY OF THE GEORGIA COLONY
BY
BENTON CANON

The following has been transcribed from a document photocopied from microfilm. The photocopy is of poor quality. The original document was bound, causing the first two or three letters of the first words of each sentence to be cut off.
Handwritten notes on the photocopy read:
"C. W. A. Interviews Huerfano County Pam 363"
And
"THIS IS THE BEST COPY AVALIABLE OF WHAT MAY BE AN OLD OR POSSIBLY DAMAGED ORIGINAL"
Transcribed (with all good intentions)
By Nancy Christofferson
February 11, 1997

[How this story is connected to the C.W.A., or the Civil Works Administration, is unknown. The C.W.A. was one of Franklin Roosevelt's programs to employ those affected by the Depression. However, Benton Canon, himself a prominent Huerfano County pioneer, died in December 1927, several years before the Depression began.]

The History of the Georgia Colony
By Benton Canon


The history of the pioneer colony which moved from the state of Georgia to Huerfano County, Colorado, in the early days, is a thrilling story which dates back to the boyhood days of William Green Russell and Joseph Decatur Patterson. These two men were boyhood chums, and set sluice boxes and washed the golden sands of their native state together before the Centennial State of Colorado had been staked out, or its name written on the page of history.

Joseph Decatur Patterson, known from boyhood as Kate Patterson, had heard glowing accounts of the Pikes Peak country in the Rocky Mountains from Green Russell, who had trekked over the old Santa Fe trail and across the Rocky Mountains to the California gold excitement in 1849. In 1852 Green Russell had com back to his Georgia home with $20, 000,000 worth of gold dust which he had worked out of the golden placer fields of California.

Mr. Russell prospected the Pikes Peak country as he went through to California in 1849, and also in 1852 on his way back home, and he predicted at this early period that it would, in the near future, make one of the richest gold mining countries in the United States, if not in the world. He knew that he would never be satisfied until he returned to the Pikes Peak region and made a more thorough investigation of its mineral resources.

In 1858 and 1859 Kate Patterson accompanied Green Russell on his mining expedition to the Pikes Peak country. In 1858 they brought with them from the state of Georgia a small colony of Cherokee miners, composed of about thirty men who had learned the placer mining business in their native state. They brought their shovels, picks, and pans along with them for the purpose of testing out this mountain country for gold.

One of the best miners in this colony was James H. Pierce, cousin of Green Russell, who had the credit of panning the first gold colors on dry creek, near where Denver now stands. Green Russell was near by and said: "Give me your pan and let me try in here," and he got ten cents of gold.

In 1859 thrilling reports of the discover of gold in the Pikes Peak country were circulated far and wide, and mining men from all quarters of the world began to come in to these new gold diggings. In that year Green Russell and Kate Patterson brought another colony of about two hundred experienced mining men from Georgia. These men honed [?] out the first roads and trails into Russell gulch. It was claimed that some of the richest placer beds ever found in the Rocky Mountains were found in Russell Gulch.

It was the discoveries, made by this Georgia Colony, in 1859, that bought Horace Greeley from the office of the New York Tribune to Rocky Mountains. Horace was a conservative man and "wanted to be shown" so he came out from New York City at this early period to see for himself and help to spread the news through the columns of the New York Tribune.

He reached Denver in the early spring months when the streams were running high. It is said that upon his arrival at Denver he promptly bartered a mule, bridle and spurs, and took the trail to the new gold diggings on Clear Creek and in Russell Gulch. He got along nicely for a few miles until he came to the crossing of Clear Creek, and found the old pioneer, Jim Baker, building a toll bridge across this mountain stream.

The creek was running bank full and Jim Baker warned Mr. Greeley that there was danger in crossing mountain streams when water was running high. Horace Greeley was not the kind of a man who could afford to wait, but used his spurs on the mule vigorously. Man and mule plunged in to the water and went under the waves. Jim Baker and his men fished them out. Mr. Greeley's old white went under the wild waves and was seen no more.

Jim Baker finally helped Mr. Greeley across Clear Creek, and he reached the gold diggings in Russell Gulch in due time. Here he met Green Russell, Kate Patterson and their Cherokee miners at work with pick and pan, shoveling golden sand into the sluice boxes. He also watched these pioneer miners make their daily "clean up" of gold dust and gold nuggets, taken from the sluice boxes and placed in buckskin sacks. He acknowledged that he "had been shown" and that he was convinced that this Pikes Peak country had a wonderful future as a mining district.

In 1860, while the Georgia boys were busy working their claims and sacking their gold dust, they heard rumors of war between the north and south. In 1861, President Lincoln called for an army of seventy five thousand soldiers to fight the southern states and war was declared against their country. Members of this Georgia mining colony began to lay down their shovels, picks and pans, clean up their sluice boxes, and quietly prepare for a journey back to their native state, to help their folks at home fight the battles of their country.

They held frequent meetings during the winter of 1861-1862, and one night [?] Green Russell and Kate Patterson, with their group of miners started back to their Georgia home to enlist in the southern army.

The company was well supplied with covered wagons, camp equipage, guns [?] and ammunition to defend themselves against the Indians. They went down California Gulch, near where Leadville now stands, without informing the public where they were going or what they proposed to do.

Early in the fall of 1862, they trekked over the old emigrant trail to Pueblo, and camped, under the big cottonwoods on the south bank of the arkansas river. Here they met a number of men to whom they explained, in a quiet way, the object of their expedition, making some valuable additions to their company.

The next camping place was at the Hicklin Ranch on Greenhorn Creek, which was in what was then Huerfano County. Zan Hicklin was a noted character in the early days of Colorado. He was a friend of Green Russell and Kate Patterson. He was also a "dyed in the wool" Missoure [sic] Democrat, and his sympathy was with the South. He skilfully [sic] played both sides and the middle in the Civil War controversy, but his firends [sic] could always rely upon him. His ranch was a typical Mixican [sic] hacienda, and was operated with Mexican labor in true Mexican style.

When these pioneer miners saw the corn that was grown on the Hicklin ranch, in the fall of 1862, they were amazed and favorably impressed with Huerfano County, as will be noticed later in this narrative. They were charmed with the majestic beauty of the old greenhorn mountain, the Sangre de Cristo Range, and the historical Spanish Peaks, all of which were in Huerfano County and in close procimity [sic] to the old Santa Fe Trail, leading from Pueblo to NewMexico, over which this company was travelling to reach the Pecos river and ultimately the border of Texas.

The writer of this narrative can give only an incomplete list of the names of the members of this Georgia cavalcade, as follows: William Green Russell and Joseph Decatur Patterson, the promoters and managers of the expedition, Dr. Levi J. Russell, J. Oliver Russell, both brothers of Green Russell, and James H. Pierce, cousin of Green Russell. These five men were gentlemen of the true southern type- and no pioneers, in the early days of Colorado, stood higher in the communities where they lived and were known- than these men.

Others [sic] members of this historic band were: Samuel Bates, Isaac S. Roberts, (alias Sam Jack), William Wisher, John Wisher, Robert Field [?], Mr. Rippie, Mr. Demsey, John Glass, and the Joshua P. Potts family, composed of father and six children-Miss Martha M. (about 20), William (about 16), Melissa and Malinda (twins about, 10 ), Matilda (about 6) and the youngest daughter, Mary.

Late in the fall of 1862, the objects of this expedition leaked out, and the military forces at Denver were ordered to pursue Patterson Russell and their followers, overhaul them and march back to Fort Union, New Mexico, to be held there as prisoners of war. In the meantime they had been advised of the Government's action, and at once the company was put under "whip and spur", along down the old Pecos River trail, which was leading this unfortunate caravan into the jaws of death-at the hands of the Comanche Indians.

Meanwhile, rumors of war with the Comanche Indians came from all directions, and some members of the expedition weakened and turned back, but the brave southern men whose names are mentioned above, were determined to stick to the trail and fight their way through the savage Indian country.

Presently it became apparent that fate had decreed otherwise- and marked the expedition for failure. They were overtaken with an epidemic of small pox in this wilderness. Josh[u]a Potts died, and his remains committed [sic] to mother earth-and left to sleep alone in that desert country. The passing of Mr. Potts left a family of six orphan children and brought sadness and sorrow in to the camp.

The expedition had to go in to permanent camp and care for the sick and the afflicted. Had it not been for Dr. Russell, who gave them medical attention, death would have called many more of the company. During this trouble, a detachment of Government troops arrived on the scene and arrested all members of the company. As soon as the sick were able to travel, they were all marched back to Fort Union, and held there as prisoners of war.

The commanding officer took possession of the personal property of the miners also of their buckskin sacks, filled with gold dust and nuggets from the placer mines of Colorado. He furnished the prisoners comfortable quarters for the winter, looked after the sick and disabled, and treated them well in all respects.

While Green Russell and his companions were sadly disappointed and humiliated at the result of their adventure, the army officer at Fort Union, who was in close touch with the Indian situation, told these Colorado pioneers that there was not one chance in a thousand for them to have got [?] their way through the Indian beyond the Texas border.

Afterwards, the members of the party themselves concluded, that instead of their failure being a misfortune, it was really the utmost good fortune- that fate did not allow them to cross the Texas border into the hostile Comanche country. It was considered a certainty that the little company would have been attacked by the redskins: the men would have been murdered, and the women and children would have been taken into captivity and subjected to a torture-worse than death.

Early in the spring of 1863, the prisoners were released on parole, and allowed to go their way. Green Russell, his two brothers, and James H. Pierce, his cousin, returned to Denver. Later, Green Russell went from Denver to the Indian territory and worked his way back to his family at their home in Lumpkin County, Georgia, where he had left them in 1859. His two brothers worked their way through to Texas, and lived in that state the remainder of their lives. Dr. Levi J. Russell died at ___gle, Texas, March 23rd, 1908. Joseph O. Russell passed away at his home in Menardvillle, Texas, October 28th, 1906. Green Russell died in __arto__, Indian Territory, August 24th, 1877.

The story of Green Russell's last journey to Colorado in 1870, was told by the late Thomas J. Quillan [sic], in a series of letters to the writer of this narrative. Mr. Quillian was a member of Green Russell's company

In the Russell caravan, which set out from Georgia in the spring of 1870, were Parson Asbury H. Quillian and family, Anderson Graham and family, Sam Bates, a boy whom Green Russell had raised. Russell settled at the foot of Greenhorn Mountain, his ranch being at the head of Apache Creek.

Green Russell was a natural hunter and miner. The writer feels that it was a privilege to know this distinguished '58er, and to be with him on his annyal [sic] fall hunt a number of times. Russell did some placer mining in Grayback Gulch, west of La Veta. It was said that Mrs. Russell had a sprinkle of Cherokee blood in her veins, and so every one of the Russell children was entitled to several hundred acres of land in Indian Territory. There were three boys and three girls. The eldest son, John, was a mining man; he lost his life in a mine accident near Leadville. The oldest daughter, Mary, married a man by the name of Howard in La Veta.; they moved afterwards to the little town of Mears, west of Salida. The writer remembers another son, named Henry. Green Russell washed out gold dust to the value of tens of thousands of dollars. He gave away money freely to the needy and unfortunate.

It has been said that there are two kinds of men born in this world. One kind lies down when they see trouble approaching their way. The other stands pat and fights it. Joseph Decatur Patterson realized that he and Green Russell were defeated in their undertaking to reach their Georgia home and join their friends and relatives in the ranks of Lee's Army of the south, but Kate Patterson did not lie down and consider himself down and out.

While in Fort Union, he had met many noted men of the Rocky Mountain country. Among them were Ceran St. Vrain, Richens L. Wooten [sic], Lucian B. Maxwell, Kit Carson, Governor A.C. Hunt, Governor Gilpin and others who used their influence in having the Georgians released. St. Vrain urged Mr. Patterson to take his little colony and settle in the Huerfano valley. After mature deliberation he concluded to go back to Huerfano County and settle there.

Mr. Patterson first unfolded his plans to Miss Martha M. Potts, the oldest of the unfortunate orphan children, and invited her to join his proposed colony for settlement in Huerfano County, Colorado, and also to become his wife. After some consideration she accepted both propositions, and they became engaged while they were still held as prisoners of war. When this engagement was announced, the officers and soldiers at Fort Union made up a purse of three hundred dollars, and presented it to Miss Potts as a wedding present. The gift was highly appreciated and brought happiness to those orphan children in the wilderness.

Mr. Patterson and his bride-to-be journeyed to Huerfano County and were married there in the spring of 1865. They located a ranch near the historical Huerfano Butte and adjoining the home of John W. Brown and family, who was the first American with a family to settle in what was know as the upper Huerfano. Mr. Patterson developed a valuable place, and lived on it for thirty years, selling out in 1895. He moved to Mancos, Montezuma County, where he engaged in mining in the La Platte [sic] mountains.

In 1865, after the civil war had ended, Kate Patterson began to receive letters of enquiry from his relatives and friends in Georgia, concerning this western country. In 1869, he arranged with his father, Samuel Patterson, Sr., and his cousin, James L. Patterson Jr., to guide [?] a trip to southern Colorado and investigate the country, with a view of moving a colony of home seekers from Georgia to Huerfano County.

In the fall of that same year these men rode over the fertile landscape to the east of the Sangre de Cristo range; they recognized the vast resources of the county in coal mines, and they saw opportunities for farming and stock-growing on the public domain. Returning home, they induced some of their friends to move to the land of promise. A number of Georgians settled here in 1869; others came in 1870 and 1871. There were about five hundred newcomers from Georgia and the Carolinas, most of the emigrants bringing their families. Nearly all of them located in the Cuchara and Huerfano valleys.

The chief credit for this emigration belongs to Joseph Decatur Patterson, James L. Patterson and Green Russell. This movement from the south to Huerfano County lasted for years after 1871. The Pattersons are gratefully remembered, for they were pu[b]lic benefactors. The arrival of these Southerners added hundreds to the population of our county in the early seventies; they were a good class of people- industrious and thrifty. The Georgia colonists, as they were called, are to be found in many neighborhoods of this county.

Herewith is and [sic] incomplete list of Southerners, who settled in Huerfano County in the seventies, or not much after:

John Alexander and family
William Kimsey and family
Charles Anderson and family
James Kincaid, single
Hiram Baker and family
Joseph Kincaid, single
Homer Barnard and family
Jasper Kirby and family
Virgil Barnard and son
John Kirby and family
Sam Bates, single
Leander Kirby and family
John Brown and family
George Kitchens, single
Jasper Bruce and family
Andrew McAdams [?] and family
Charles Carroll and wife
Pinkey [sic] McLain, single
Samuel Carroll and wife
John McClure and family
Abner Chastain and sons, Elisha and Worth
Benjamin Chastain and family
Andrew McClure and family
Berry Chastain and family
John Medill and family
Thompson Chastain, single
Martin Moore and family
John Denton, single
Columbus Moss, single
A. J. Dodgion and family
Mrs. Harriet Ownby and family
C. L. Dogion and family
J. D. Patterson, single
J. P. Dorsey
James Patterson, single
James Erwin and family
Nathan Patterson and family
Uncle Johnny Erwin and wife
Robert Patterson, single
Thomas Erwin and family
Albert Phillips and wife Rachel
William Erwin and family
Isaac Prator and family
C. F. Estes and family
Asbury M. Quillian and family
Pink[n]ney Estes, single
Robert A. Quillian, brother and sister
James Garren and family
Green Russell and family
Jesse Garren, single
Lycurgas A. Sallee
Anderson Graham
George Sutton and family
Esekiel Gribble and family
Jesse M. Walker and family
James Gribble, single
Marshal Wilburn, single
Dr. John Gribble and family
John Harris and family
_____Hayes, single
Albert Jullon[?]
Perry T. Kimbrel, single


Supplementary

T. J. Quillian was in correspondence with Benton Canon during the years 1922-1923. Mr. Quillian's letters contain much historical material, but as his sketches are rather jumbled, it becomes necessary to divide them and place each presentation in its proper category.

Only the few items, relating to the Georgia Colony, will be given a place in this chapter. Tom Quillian writes:

Gardner, Colo.
April 25, 1922

Mr. Benton Canon
Grand Junction, Colorado

Dear Mr. Canon:

Enclosed you will find a short sketch of father and mother, also the names of their children; this job of writing is not very well done, but maybe you can use it, after all, it is not the specific act that counts, but rather the reason for having done so��.

Green Russel [sic] in Huerfano County
By
Thomas J. Quillian

"The spirit of adventure is the mot--- of commonwealths," so one has remarked, now [?] this is of Colorado. The story of the coming of William Green Russel and other adventurers to the Rocky Mountains in 1858, has been told again and again. The story of his last trip to Colorado, in 1870, is not so well known. It is told here by a man who was one of the party. Although he was then only eight years old, he vividly recalls the circumstances and jots down his reminiscences in the hope that they may be of interest to others.

Smiley's History of Denver, p. 453, contains a letter from Green Russel's daughter, Mrs. Martha Marshall. According to her, Green Russel came to Huerfano County in 1872. She is mistaken, the trip was made in the year 1870.

It was some time in 1869 my father, Asbury H. Quillian, began to bring Green Russell home to dinner. We were then living in Auraria, Georgia. When he called father and mother talked and talked about Colorado. Mr. Russell held the view that this country was about perfect. The climate was the best, the soil the richest, the water the purest, and the game most plentiful. He told us of a region called the "Huerfano County", and that he regarded it as an ideal place to live. Compared with the red clay hills of a worn out mining country, impoverished by war, the region of the Huerfano, undoubtedly looked good to my parents. Russell talked to other men and painted in glowing colors, the many advantages of the Rocky Mountains region. The men were impressed�and finally concluded to "go West".

On a beautiful day in 1870, May 1st, we all met at the appointed place, near Auraria. There were four families and two single men, Sam Bates and John Odom. Russell's family travelled in wagons drawn by ox teams. Anderson Graham and family travelled in a tar-pole wagon, drawn by a span of mules. My father and family travelled in a tar-pole wagon drawn by a yoke of oxen. Another family started, but did not reach the Mountains.

One thing became apparent very soon. Mr. Russell was in no hurry. It was a very leisurely journey, taken partly for his wife's health. He wanted her to enjoy the ride. Some days the wagons covered only ten miles. Mr. Russell took life seriously, and yet he wanted t get some enjoyment as he went along. He had six fox hounds for hunting, and hunting occupied a good share of the time of these emigrants.

While Russell was rather quiet, thoughtful man, he liked a joke. Once in Mississippi, where the people seemed particularly busy building houses and planting crops, a man asked where we were going.

"To Colorado," responded Russell.

"Why don't you stop here-there's plenty of work," observed the man.

"We are not hunting work," Russell replied laconically.

The man was noble. Father's money was almost gone, his oxen were played out, and he began to look out for a place to stop. Russell bought a magnificent yoke of oxen. One was named Big and the other they called Tom. Then he came to father and said to him: "Parson, I want to buy your oxen. I will give you eighty dollars for them and loan you Tom and Big to drive to Colorado." So father did not stop, but drove Russell's fat oxen to Colorado.

At Bentonville, Arkansas, we bought supplies to last us across the plains. In this town lived John Russell, a brother of Green Russell. We drove on through the south-west corner of Missouri, thence into Indian Territory. That was when I first began to chase Indians. Father never liked to travel on Sunday, but when Russell moved-the rest followed. We had been watching [?] the tribesmen going to church. Along came five young bucks, mounted upon prancing ponies. The red men all had pistols. And I was scared. I was driving the loose cattle in the road. I shied to make way for the Indians Instantly they whirled about us they passed me and let out some unearthly yells. I ran for the wagons. To say that I was running, is putting it mildly. I beat the ponies to the wagon where father had stopped-and was standing with a smile on his face. I have always doubted the sincerity of the worship of those Cherokees that Sunday.

Green Russell's wife had a little Indian blood in her veins. Russell himself, had many acquaintances among the civilized Indians�and also among the wild tribes. Just how long we were in Indian Territory I do not remember. It was a hunter's paradise. We saw thousands of prairie chickens and some deer.

We crossed into Kansas near where Coffeyville now is. We continued north to Fort Scott, a Government post. One day an army officer rode out to meet us and asked if we wanted an escort. Graham, who had been a captain in the confederate army, answered "No"!

From Fort Scott we travelled northwesterly to the Great [?] Pacific Railroad. We were in the buffalo country. We saw thousands and thousands of buffaloes every day. Men shot them from the windows of the trains. Hundreds of bison lay on the ground where they fell. They were not even skinned. It looked like a sinful waste.

The people we came across on the plains supplied us with buffalo meat, and we gave them of [sic] fresh milk. We never saw an Indian on the plains. One night we camped on sand creek, the scene of Colonel Chivington's massacre. There were great numbers of arrow heads and cartridge shells every where on the ground.

We crossed the Arkansas at Rocky Ford; then we drove along the river on the 22nd of September. It snowed. We saw great flocks of ducks and geese. Father shot a goose. We travelled over the country to the Huerfano river, passing the Craig and Doyle ranches. Ou[r] last camp was at the place where Apache creek empties into the Huerfano. That was some time in October. Russell had at last reached the spot that was in his mind � the [gar?] den of the world, wood and water being plentiful, and the grass in abundance for his little herd of cattle. Nearby was Greenhorn Mountain, full of wild game, ready for the hunter.

Russell suggested that father take his family to the [hom]e of Mr. J. W. Brown, and this pioneer settler entertained us royally. Father soon found work at one dollar a day; he boarded himself. After a while mother got over the ague. In the winter she was employed to teach school.

Before long father was preaching. In the spring of 1872 we moved to Beulah, then called "Maes' Hole". He planted some crops and did ----ers work at odd spells. Russell was still living on Apache creek. He left in 1874 for an old Spanish placer mine in Costilla County. The grasshoppers had destroyed his crop, and he was getting pretty low financially.

He seemed somewhat discouraged. I saw him only once afterward. I remember hearing him say that they were just about making ---res. It must have been in the late summer of 1877 that he started back to his old home in Georgia. He died, August 24th, 1877, somewhere in Indian Territory. His family went to their farm in Georgia.

In the spring of 1875 we again had planted a crop, and again the grasshoppers harvested our grain. Then we moved and settled in Huerfano creek, this time, near the mountains on Williams Creek, rather homesteaded it, and later, when I became of age, I also homesteaded along side of the place. There we lived until father died, in 1899. Father preached all the time except for two or three years before his death-when he was no longer able to travel."

It appears that some one had accused Green Russell of [in] fidelity of the United States Government, or of having taken up arms against the northern army. . .

Relative to this accusation, Tom Quillian writes, under date of May 7th, 1922,:

"As to Green Russell having taken the oath of allegiance-when he was turned loose at Fort Union, I don't think he did. I think he was paroled and worn [sic] not to taken up arms against the United States Government. I remember very distinctly of having heard this thing talked of many times, and always heard that the Russells, at least, were paroled."

"As to Green having organized a company of soldiers, there is not a word of truth in it. Green Russell was not a warlike man-he was a man of peace. No doubt, he had had many adventures, but he never boasted, The only time I ever heard him speak of having taken any part in a fight, was to speak of having seen a man holding another man by the collar, pushed him against a door, whereupon he drew back and struck a powerful blow at the man's face, which Russell parried by striking the fellow's arm-so that instead of hitting the poor man in the face-he struck the door jam with his fist.

"I know Green Russell never had any idea of taking up arms against the United States Government; to begin with he believed in the [un]ion, as a great number of the mountain men of Georgia did; neither did he believe in slavery. Russell was firm believer in the dignity of labor; he worked himself, and tried to teach his boys to work."

"Had he ever taken any part in the war, I would have heard it. He was a brave man and not ashamed of what he had done during the war, neither were any of the other Georgia men, that I have known, ashamed of their war records. The reason they came to Colorado, was because they were [no]t altogether in sympathy with the majority of the residents of Georgia. They had been loyal to their state, and fought bravely in the confederate army, but after the war was over a lot of them wanted to get away from the [state?]; they clearly saw the fallacy of human slavery, and these men and their descendents, are standing today for human liberty and the dignity of manual labor".



It is generall[y] conceded that Kate Patterson and his father, "Uncle Sammie"- did more work in "moving" the Georgia colony to Huerfano County � than any other one man connected with the enterprise.

"In fact, as Mr. Canon writes, "Samuel Patterson made it the ---ing work of his life, and the descendents of the Georgia colonists, should ---e to it that a suitable monument is erected to this public benefactor, who did so much towards the settlement of our County."

Benton Canon continues, and further writes:

"Joseph Decatur Patterson was born in Union County, Georgia, in October ??th, 1836, and died at the town of Mancos, Montezuma County, Colorado, January 9th, 1910. His noble wife, Martha M. Potts-Patterson, was born near [Na?]shville, Tennessee, April 14th,1846, and died at her home in Mancos, in [192]1, at the age of 76 years.

"The Pattersons were the second American family to settle in Huerfano County in the early spring of 1863, and no family was better known, or more loved by the early pioneers of southern Colorado, than these good people. The latch st[r]ing to the door of this early pioneer home always hung on the outside, and was free to use by all who came that wa[y]."

"Mrs. Patterson's life was tragical from childhood days. Her father trekked across the plains with his family in 1861, and cast his fortune with Green Russell and Kate Patterson in Russell Gulch. In 1862 they moved to California Gulch, where the mother died. In the fall of that same year her father joined the Georgians to work their way back through New Mexico and Texas to Georgia � in order to enter the southern Army."

"Mrs. Patterson's only brother, William, was murdered by the Indians on north veta creek in 1866. The writer was living in the Patterson home at that time�and was the last white man to see Billy Potts alive. He came to the door of my ca[b]in, showing me his gun and pistol, and also his [pon]y, saddle and bridle. He was very proud of them. He told me that he had another horse in the mountains, near north veta creek�and that he was afraid the Indians would get it. I warned him of the danger, but he was determined to go. Two Indians were seen later in the day�with the head of my friend, Billy Potts, tied to one of their saddles. His body was never found, nor any of his trappings.



Honor Pioneers of Huerfano County - Huerfano World - July 28, 2005 - by Nancy Christofferson -

Once again, Francisco Fort Museum will honor the pioneers of Huerfano County at the annual celebration to be held this Saturday, July 30, in La Veta.

This year's special honorees will be the descendents of what is called the Georgia Colony, or those settlers who traveled west from the Old South following the Civil War.

The first Georgians to come to the future state of Colorado were members of a gold prospecting party. Notable among this party were William Greeneberry "Green" Russell (1820-1877) and Joseph Decatur "Kate" Patterson (1836-1910).

Russell had trekked through the Pikes Peak country in 1849 to join the California gold rush. Along the route, he noted potential ore-bearing formations in the Rocky Mountains. He returned to the South in 1852 with the intention of going back to the mountains to search for gold.

In 1858-1859 Patterson joined Russell for a prospecting trip to Colorado. Accompanying them were a group of about 30 Cherokees.

Another companion, Russell's cousin James H. Pierce, actually found gold by panning a dry creek near Denver. However, the area became known as Russell Gulch.

With the beginning of winter and enduring copious snowfalls, the miners decided to retire to the eastern plains for the season. They established a camp on the South Platte River and called it Auraria after their hometown in Georgia. The name was eventually corrupted to Aurora.

President Abraham Lincoln issued a call for volunteers for the Union Army in 1861. The Georgians had heard rumors of an impending Civil War and even encountered some prejudice from abolutionists. While many miners were returning to their homes in the Midwest and Eastern states, the Southerners quietly made plans to return to support their home state.

The Georgia men started south, intending to head for Texas as fast as possible, and from there go due east.

Their only foes, they reckoned, would be Indians along the route, especially in eastern New Mexico and western Texas.

Their path brought them through Pueblo to the old Hicklin ranch on the Greenhorn. Zan Hicklin was an old friend of Patterson and Russell, and made the party welcome.

The Georgians noted Hicklin's fine fields of crops, his orchards and scenery. The ranch was not that far from the old Santa Fe Trail and the party followed this to Fort Union, New Mexico.

Slipping by federal troops at the fort, the party continued east despite rumors of depredations being carried out by the Comanches upon travelers. The party was armed well, had plenty of munitions, food and other supplies, and many wagons and livestock. However, a silent enemy struck -smallpox. One of the victims was Joshua Potts, a widower with six children. Green's brother Dr. Levi J. Russell fought the disease as best he could in the prairie wilderness, and mortalities were few.

But the disease and caring for the patients necessarily slowed travel for the caravan, and federal troops appeared. The Southerners were arrested and, when all were able to travel, marched back to Fort Union. Russell and Patterson and their party were held at the fort until the spring of 1863 when they were paroled. Far from being the humiliation they felt it was, the "imprisonment" at Fort Union may have saved them from the marauding Comanches, who murdered scores of whites during the early 1860s.

Some of the Georgians returned to Colorado, while others, worried about the safety and condition of their families at home, returned east.

When the Georgians arrived back at their homes in northern Georgia and southern North Carolina, they found their slaves gone, their families hungry and often homeless, many of their fathers and brothers buried on the battlefields of the Old South. They pitched in to repair and restore the properties, but the condition of the postwar South were very hard on those who lost the war - even though these Georgians been far away and noncombatants.

The men must have spent many long and sleepless nights considering their plights and planning for a better future. Always, they remembered the clear air and gold-laden streams of Colorado.

And so a caravan, led by Russell, left the South in the spring of 1870, headed west. One of this party was Parson Asbury H. Quillian and family who became long-time Huerfano County residents.

The party traveled with oxen and mules, tar-pole wagons, whatever they could find to carry the choicest of their worldly possessions. How wrenching it must have been for the women to choose which of grandmother's quilts to take, which of their featherbeds, dishes and other family heirlooms.

By winter, they reached the banks of Apache Creek, where Russell settled on some fertile land. Others of the party settled nearby, along the Huerfano at Huerfano Butte and west into the Huerfano Valley.

Patterson had stayed in Colorado and married Martha Potts, the eldest daughter of the man who died of smallpox on the plains, and her brothers and sisters lived with them. For a time, they lived in a large plaza near the settlement of St. Mary on the Huerfano, near the now Kimbrel ranch: Perry Kimbrel was a member of the Colony.

In 1865, Patterson began receiving letters of inquiry from his family in the South, who wondered if they, could find better conditions on the frontier. Colorado had become a territory in 1861 and many of the early settlers, especially around Canon City, had hailed from the South.

Convinced the long trip was preferable to staying in Georgia and North Carolina, a party led by Samuel Patterson Sr., Green's father, and James L. Patterson, Green's cousin, left their homes in 1869 and; about six months later arrived along the Huerfano. [Note: Samuel Patterson Sr. was the father of Joseph Decator (Kate) Patterson NOT William Greeneberry (Green) Russell.] These families sought out farm sites and settled along the Huerfano River from the Butte to west of Gardner, and along the Cucharas above and below La Veta.

Among these settlers were the Andersons, Bakers, Bruces, Barnards, Browns, Chastains, Dodgions, Erwins, Esteses, Garrens, Gribbles, Harrises, Kimseys, Kincaids, Kirbys, Kitchens, Ownbeys, Phillipses, Praters and Willburns, many familiar names even 135 years later.

Some of these names are those of present Huerfanos, while some are place-names. The Bakers, for instance, settled on Baker Creek for which the original Panadero Ski Resort was named.

Bob Bruce of La Veta, of Bruce and Kimsey ancestry, may well be the only third generation Georgian left in the county. He is 93 years old.

Rather oddly, one Marshall Willburn was a member of the Colony; now we have Marshal Harold Willburn in La Veta.

Dodgeton Creek in Cuchara was named for the man who settled on that waterway, Jackson "Jack" Dodgion. The name has been corrupted. Most of the Dodgions moved on during the 1880s but some have returned to visit during the ensuing years.

While the others of the Georgia Colony were content with farming and raising livestock on their new places, Russell still had the gold bug in him. He wandered across old La Veta Pass to some ancient Spanish diggings along Grayback Creek where officers and enlisted men from Fort Garland were placer mining. Although he called his haul "poor man's diggin's," Russell continued to pan gold from the stream for many years. In response, early residents of the little gold mining town named it Russell. Later it became known as Placer but the sign on Highway 160 still Bays Russell. Of course it is just a wide spot in the road now, with a few old cabins and a highway department dome barn.

Other relatives and inlaws of the first Georgians continued to make their way west through the next two decades, with the last waves of immigrants arriving in the mid-1890s. Some of these families were the Alexanders, Egglestons, Smiths, Kirlees, Parkses, Martins, Hayeses and many others. Some families stayed but one winter and finding it too harsh for their Southern veins, continued west to California.

In fact, most families ended up on Colorado's Western Slope or on the West Coast eventually, many dying there after trekking clear across America. For many years a La Veta Day was celebrated in California where many scores of expatriots gathered to swap stories about their families' adventures along the route from Georgia and in Colorado.

Every year there are fewer descendents of the Georgia Colony left in this area, but every year Francisco Fort hosts visitors coming to photograph tombstones, see photographs and experience the flavor of Huerfano County left engrained in them by stories told by grandparents and great-grandparents. Thank you, Georgia Colony, both visitors and Huerfanos, for your legacy.

GA Miners CE Scott

http://freepages.history.rootsweb.com/~cescott/miners.html

Russell Gulch

www.rockymountainprofiles.com/russell_gulch_colorado.htm

How Denver, Colorado was Founded

Georgia Prospectors Discovered the First Placer Strike

Mike Will Downey
Across Cherry Creek from Denver City - where Elitch's, the Pepsi Center and the Auraria College Campus now exist - lay the low lying settlement of Auraria, which had been organized two weeks earlier than Denver City by a Georgia prospector named William Green Russell. The first houses were rough-hewn log cabins built alongside each other on riverfront property called Indian Row, which sat southwest of the Cherry Creek and Platte River juncture. The houses had mud-chinked walls that dripped when it rained, sod roofs, dirt floors and glassless windows. Dwellers slept on straw beds and used boxes or crates as cupboards. Auraria's first trading post was established on Indian Row by merchants C.H. Blake and Andrew J. Williams, and Mormon Samuel Rooker brought the first family to the region. It is thought that Rooker's son, John, may have built the area's first real house.

Auraria founders William Green Russell and John Smith owned a double cabin on the row as did the town's first fancy gambler, New Yorker Jack O'Neil and his lover Salt Lake Kate. O'Neil was killed in March of 1859 over a card game by John Rooker, and Salt Lake Kate moved from Denver to Montana. O'Neil was buried in the settlement's first graveyard, Mount Pleasant Cemetery, which rested on a knoll in the location where Cheeseman Park is today. Also buried in the cemetery were two men executed for murder, five who had been shot, one that committed suicide, four who died of natural causes and the first hanging victim, John Stoefel, who murdered his brother-in-law, Thomas Beincroff, only to be buried in the same grave "in the interests of economy." Said to rival such greats as lawmen Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday, Marshall Tom Pollock was Denver's first executioner.

The Times, Gainesville, Georgia, Sunday, March 23, 1980
==========================================
History and Heritage 10-D

Susan Russell, wife of William Green Russell and sister to Priestly Willis, was also enumerated with two sons. Susan Russell, age 24, mixed; John A. Russell, age 4; and William H. Russell, age 3. A note stated that Wm. Russell was head of this family.

The 59ers Denver Public Library

RUSSELL, ---, of Crandall, Russell & Company, mining in Russell�s Gulch summer of 1859, mentioned in the papers.

RUSSELL, ---, of Jones, Russell & Company, Express, Blake Street, Denver in MSS Business Directory of 1859.

RUSSELL, ---, of firm of Russell, Majors & Waddell, miners outfitters were selling blankets, shirts, socks, hardware, advertized goods worth $35,000 in Denver. Mr. Hiram Lightner, in Apr 1860 was Manager.

RUSSELL, ---, his cabin in Auraria, was used for the earliest meeting of Freemasons, before the organization of any lodge (see pamphlet, History of Lodge No. 5, A.F. & A.M. of Colorado published Denver 1909 by Past Master Charles A. Stokes.) Other authorities state that Lehow�s cabin was the first, and no doubt both were used in 1858. (See under Masonry.) Probably all the Russells had cabin together.

RUSSELL, B. O. born in Pennsylvania Mar 14, 1821. Arrived Denver Jul 23, 1859. His name is signed as witness to statement concerning claim of L. D. Crandall in Gregory Diggings on Sep 2, same year of arrival. This paper is dated at Mountain City, and on Sep 9 he files claim to rights in Sterling Lode, and on Bobtail. The names of the company are Levi Russell, Royall Jacobs, Hiram A. Johnson, and Thomas Walker. Later, in records of the old Gregory Record seems to have met with reverses, for he makes petition to delay development of his mine, as it cannot be worked for want of proper machinery. In this he is associated with Henry Grinold.

RUSSELL, D., arrived May 28, 1859. Said to be from Missouri. Later RMN mentioned him among others as mining in Colona Diggings.

RUSSELL, D. L., in list in RMN. Name appears associated with J. Young and others, as arrivals from Missouri by Santa Fe Route, with 5 wagons, 30 men, Jun 1, 1859.

RUSSELL, Joseph Oliver, brother of the two noted ones, William G. and L. J. Russell, coming with the first Russell party from Georgia, 1858, in June. He was known in Denver as �Oliver.� Married Jane Robertson. Born Lumpkin County, Georgia Dec 24, 1828, died Menard County, Texas Oct 28, 1906. He was a cattleman there after 1870. His wife was a sister of Peter Robinson, a Texan, and cattleman there, of means. It is said that his son, Richard Robertson Russell, amassed a fortune of several millions. Eugene Parsons, in The Trail, Sep 1923, says that J. O. Russell had a large family of children. Parsons interviewed the widow, Mrs. Jane Russell, in Denver about this year, and her age then was 85 years, she was making a visit to the scenes of her husband�s early life. Her daughter-in-law, Mrs. Mattie Elizabeth Strickland Russell, accompanied her, and was interviewed also by Parson. There are some records of transactions in lots by Russell in 1859, one in Arpahoe County Land Records, Liber D, p. 126, old, which was made affecting some Auraria lots, described in the record Dec 8 of that year. J. O. Russell entered Confederate Army in 1863, going from Denver on purpose to do so. One authority states that all three of these Russell brothers were born in South Carolina. (?) Portrait of J. O. Russell may be seen in Smiley�s History of Denver, p. 184.

RUSSELL, Levi Jaspar, familiarly known as �Levi,� and also as Dr. L. J. Russell, brother of William G. and J. Oliver Russell, arrived with original Russell party from Lumpkin County, Georgia. He practiced medicine in Denver, for he was listed in the Mss. Directory of Denver among the physicians of the year following his arrival. He lived in Auraria, but in 1863, went to the newer Montana goldfields, later returning to Georgia for a visit, then going to Bell County, Texas, where he practiced medicine until much later. He died about 1908. He is said to have kept a diary during 1858, but the book seems to have been lost. He was a member of the first Town Company, and of the first Constitutional Convention during 1859, and Smiley, the historian, considers him more than any other individual the founder of Denver. He was then in Mountain City, also, where he was associated in mining with B. O. Russell, and seems also to have been tax collector in Auraria. His portrait is in Smiley�s History of Denver, p. 210. (See also under W. H. McFadden.)

�RUSSELL PARTY,� the curtain rose on the great Colorado Drama when this party unfolded their blankets at the mouth of Cherry Creek. This compiler believes that it was the grand cottonwoods, standing like century old oaks in the space between the Platte River and the Creek, that caused the Georgians, as well as many others, trappers and hunters, in the previous years, to camp on that exact spot. They are gone long ago, for nothing delights a real �settler� so much as to kill one of these monarchs. But the Green Russell party not being settlers, or anything like unto them, camped longer than they had intended to do, as did several of the parties who followed them, feeling happy and at home again, under the ancient trees, the largest ones in the country.

This was in June 1858. Eugene Parsons in The Trail, Sep 23, says that they outfitted for the plains crossing in Leavenworth May 5, leaving for Fort Riley on that date, striking Santa Fe Trail at the river in Arkansas. With Bent�s men and the Indians who joined them, the party numbered 104 souls.

They scattered to various parts of the goldfields from under the cottonwoods and probably never came all together again.

William Green Russell and his brothers, Dr. Levi Jaspar Russell and Joseph Oliver Russell, were leaders, especially the first named, as it is usually referred to as �The Green Russell Party.� It included some Cherokee Indians, also from Georgia and these and the Georgians were miners of experience. Among them we find the names of Lewis Ralston, William Anderson, Joseph McAffee, Solomon Roe, Samuel Bates, John Hampton, these having left their homes in Lumpkin County, Georgia Feb 17, 1858. In Rock Creek, Kansas, they were joined by J. H. and Dr. R. J. Pierce, relatives of the Russells. (Authorities differ as to the number in the party, some saying 70, others 170. It was a large caravan, however, and only 13 are said to have remained for any length of time in the country.) Green Russell�s second party came the following summer, and prospected the Gregory District, discovering �Russell�s Gulch� which was immediately divided into claims and soon says Hollister, about 900 men were employed, digging and sluicing, producing an average weekly yield of thirty five thousand dollars. It became necessary to convey the waters of Fall River to this place by means of a ditch, which was completed in the spring of 1860 at cost of $100,000. The canal was 12 miles in length.

RUSSELL, Thomas H., is grantee, in Auraria Dec 1859, of lot 4, block 30, in that city to Joseph Gottlieb. (Arapahoe County Land Records)

RUSSELL, William Green, left his home in Dawson County, Georgia Feb 7, 1858 for goldfields of Rocky Mountains. He, with John Russell, had travelled overland to California in 1849, returning in 1850, and made a second trip, taking with them J. O., as well as Levi J. Russell.

Later in 1852, William G. is said to have returned to Georgia rich, and he bought a large plantation in that state and settled down as a landed proprietor, while Levi, on his return with money went to Philadelphia and studied medicine. He is said to have married a woman of Cherokee descent, named Susan Willis, her grandfather, --- Daugherty, having been a half-blood Cherokee Indian. They had three sons, and the same number of daughters. His widow died 1893, the eldest son, John, was killed in Leadville by a cave in at a mine, while the youngest son was killed in the Cherokee country.

After his arrival in 1858 in Pike�s Peak region (see under the Russell Party) he was a stockholder in Auraria City, in very earliest days, mining in various places. He returned to Georgia when Civil War broke out, and became at once a Captain in the Confederate Army. He again left Georgia in 1872, and a daughter, Mrs. Martha Marshall, of Briartown, Cherokee Nation Indian Territory, gives information. He with daughter and family came again to Colorado and took up land on Huerfano Creek, sold it again in 1874, moved into Sangre de Christo Mountains, near Fort Garland. Then they all sold again, and went back to Indian Territory, where they again halted until 1877 when they moved to Briartown. Here William Green Russell died, and is buried at Briartown School House, South Canadian River, Canadian District, Cherokee Nation, Indian Territory.

He was born in South Carolina 1818, but exact date of death not given. In 1875 he returned to Denver to look after his ditch interests. In 1877-78 Mrs. Russell took the family back to Georgia where she died. Then the children sold out and returned to Indian Territory. His portrait is in History Denver, J. C. Smiley, p. 181, also in Byers, History of Colorado, p. 354. Green Russell of Mountain City was, on Sep 15, 1859, member of the committee on invitation to the Grand Ball, at the opening of Apollo Hall in Denver.

RUSSELL�S GULCH, is south of Gregory Gulch, and bounded on north by Chase Gulch. Famous mining camp of 1859, producing an average of $35,000 a week in placer gold.

RUSSELLVILLE, was five miles southeast of Frankstown. Centre of mining.

http://www.kancoll.org/articles/darnell3.htm
During the spring of 1857, Green Russell and brother, Oliver Russell, slaveholders of Georgia, arrived in the Rock creek neighborhood. From St. Louis they had come as far as Kansas City by steamboat, making the balance of the journey from there to Rock creek on foot. James and Robert Pierce, nephews, accompanied them. Green Russell and brother bought the Hall homestead from father. That winter Green returned to Georgia, and the Pierce boys purchased the farm. The Pike's Peak gold excitement started in 1858, and that spring Green Russell arrived from Georgia with a party of gold seekers who had set out from the south for the new gold diggings. They came at once to the Rock creek neighborhood, and having completed all arrangements, started for the mountains about the first of May. Among those in the Russell party were Green Russell, leader; Oliver Russell; Doctor Russell, who had but recently obtained his diploma as an M. D.; James and Robert Pierce, nephews; and Sam Bates, who came from Georgia, besides several others, whose names I have forgotten. Father was strongly urged to go, but did not care to risk it. Lebo Dodgion, a brother-in-law of father, now a resident of Grand Junction, Colo., said that John Russell, a son of Green, was with his father on this gold hunting venture, and that he was severely injured by a

page 26 Kansas State Historical Society.

cave-in while engaged in mining. He started home on foot after the accident, and is said to have died shortly after reaching there.

All sorts of fairy tales were told of fabulous riches being found in the new diggings. Sam Bates was credited with having discovered some fine particles of gold in the bed of a small stream where he had stopped to wash his face. Rumor said he washed out about $13,000 worth of gold from this pool shortly after. But no other gold was ever found in that locality.

That fall Green Russell and Robert Pierce returned to the Rock Creek neighborhood, and stopped at father's. Pierce alighted from his horse and entering the cabin threw a buckskin sack on the table, saying to mother: "Aunt Lottie, see what I've got." Mother took hold of the sack which was well filled with gold-dust and found it was not so easily lifted.

Green Russell went on back to Georgia, returning to the mountains later. By the time the Civil War broke out he had accumulated another stake, said to have been about $40,000. With this he started back for his old home in Georgia, his route this time taking him close to the Mexican border. On this trip he was captured by soldiers who robbed him of his gold before turning him loose.

Russell's wife was one-sixteenth Cherokee, and it is said he finally settled among them, spending the declining years of his life sitting on the banks of streams fishing, finally dying from exposure.
(this is incorrect LD Pierce editor of this website)

Home | LD's Family History Info | LD's PDF Help Page | Other Pierces in GA | Genealogy Links & Misc |
Joel J Pierce Mystery   | Family Reunion 1999 or 2000 | E-Mail Us!  |  PDF Info Links | Photos 
LD'S Business Eztone Chime Page | Publish Your Genealogy Electronically | LD'sBookHtml Format | 
My Mothers Family Links |  Hibbs | Faus | Luke  | Wilbanks | Abercrombie  | Cavender-Corbin-Deadman
| Scott-Woody | Lott | Return to PDF Library |Return to Reuben Pierce SC 1768 Page |
Return to James H Pierce Sr Page | Pierce Photos One | Pierce Photos Two  | Pierce Photos Three |
Pierce Photos Four | Pierce Photos Five |Hibbs Photo Page   | Faus Photo Page