Autograph letter signed by William Wallace Hanscom (1839-1888). Navy Yard Mare Island, California, 10 September 1857. 3 pages, 4to, on blue paper. 

The Hanscom family, originally from Maine, had relocated to California, where Wallace's father was a dry dock and railroad construction supervisor for the US Government in Vallejo, by July 1854 . 

Writing after his arrival in California, Hanscom reports on his journey west. After leaving New York, they arrived after 7 days at Kingston, Jamaica, to refuel, where he observed the local population: "There is one circumstance which to a New Englander seems rather strange [and] that is the manner in which labor is performed. That is [done] altogether by females - even carrying coal on board the vessel is performed by them by carrying it on their heads in half barrel tubs, while the males merely go around selling fruit or baskets or some such light work as that." 

The vessel then proceeded to the Panama isthmus. Hanscom refers to the city now known as Colón as Aspinwall, the name used by the US émigré community in honor of Panama Railroad promoter William Henry Aspinwall. He details the procedure after their arrival on July 16th: "we immediately went on shore to stop at the hotel. As the only chance which they have of doing business is on the arrival of a steamer, we of course had to go on shore and at our own expense obtain rooms for the night and breakfast in the morning. As the cars started to cross the Isthmus on the next morning at 8 o'clock, I accordingly engaged room for Mother, self, and Weldon at the most moderate price of $3.00 each. But of course we had to stop on shore and whatever was charged, we had to pay. Next morning at 8 o'clock we left Aspinwall in the cars for Panama where we arrived at 11 o'clock and were immediately taken on board the steamer Golden Age by a small steamboat, as the water was not deep enough to allow the Age to come to the wharf."

After further stops at Acalpulco and Manzanillo, where they "took on board $400,000 in silver bars and coin," they arrived in San Francisco on the morning of July 31st "after a most pleasant passage of 25 days."  

An excellent letter detailing the journey to California via the future site of the Panama Canal with interesting observations of Jamaica. 

[Manuscripts, Documents, Letters, Ephemera, Signatures, Autographs] [Western Americana, Western History, Western Expansion, Wild West, Gold Rush, Mining, 49ers, 1849ers, California]