California, Butte County, Oroville
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Original Site
First Liberty Pole
In The West
1857
Bicentennial Replica Dedicated
200th Anniversary of Old
Glory, June 14, 1977.
Oroville Heritage Council
(Seal of the American Revolution Bicentennial 1776-1976)
(Patriots & Patriotism) Includes location, directions, 3 photos, GPS coordinates, map.
Original SiteFirst Liberty Pole
In The West
1857
Bicentennial Replica Dedicated
200th Anniversary of Old
Glory, June 14, 1977.
Oroville Heritage Council
(Seal of the American Revolution Bicentennial 1776-1976)
(Patriots & Patriotism) Includes location, directions, 3 photos, GPS coordinates, map.
Randall & McDermott
For the Glory of God and Country
This is one of the finest surviving examples of Bishop Lamy's French-inspired gothic architecture in New Mexico. Completed in 1906, it is constructed of locally quarried stone instead of traditional adobe. Among its adornments is a painting of Nuestra Senora de Los Angeles (Our Lady of the Angels) given to the nearby Pueblo of Pecos by the King of Spain in the early eighteenth century.
The Plum Valley House, built in 1854 by John Bope, was constructed of hewn logs and whip sawn lumber. It was a toll station on the Henness Pass Road between Marysville and Virginia City. It is named for the wild plums which grow in the area.
Constructed in the late 1878s, by the early argonaut, J.F. Bovee, to house a clothing store and tavern. In 1928 David H. Casey, the 1918 Marine Corps Light Weight Boxing Champion, acquired the building. He ran a meat market with a “speak easy” in the basement. With the end of Prohibition came the name “Casey’s Place” and the slogan “Beer, Booze, and Bull.” After Casey’s death in 1974, his family ran the business until January 1978. The present owners, Mel and Becky Wilkerson, acquired Casey’s Place in 1982.
Alleghany, “The Treasure Town,” was made up several mining camps; Smith’s Flat, Kanaka Flat, Wet Ravine, Cumberland and Kanaka City. All were established within a few months period in 1851, with Smith’s Flat being the first.
California’s Sixteen to One has been producing gold for over one hundreds years. More than one million troy ounces of gold have been mined from its tunnels. In 1853 the Knickerbocker Drift Mine was started, later led to the development of the Tightner Mine which became a portion of the Sixteen to One. In 1896 Tom Bradbury located the Sixteen to One vein. On October 6, 1911 J.G Jury, W.I. Smart & H.K. Montgomery incorporated the Original Sixteen to One Mine. In one day, December 17, 1993, they removed over 2,600 ounces of gold. The mine is famous for specimen gold including “The Whopper”: 141 ounces of crystalline gold.
By the night of May 8, the Confederate army was in firm possession of Spotsylvania Court House. With Lee entrenching, Grant looked for opportunities to attack. Reports from the front indicated that the Confederates were in force on both their left and right flanks, leading Grant to believe that they must be weak in the center of the line. Hoping to exploit this weakness, he issued orders for a general assault to take place just before sunset on May 10.
One hundred and fifty yards ahead of you is the Bloody Angle, perhaps the most hallowed site on any Civil War battlefield. The Bloody Angle is a small bend in the Confederate works within the much larger Muleshoe Salient, a huge outward bulge in the center of General Robert E. Lee’s six-mile long defensive line. For 22 hours on May 12 and May 13, 1864, combat raged here.
West Newton in 1870 was a thriving town, serving riverboat travel on the Minnesota River. It consisted of a hotel, a livery stable, a brewery, a sawmill, a wagon works, two blacksmith shops, three saloons, and many dwellings that made the town an important shipping center.
Like Lee, General Ulysses S. Grant recognized the Muleshoe’s weakness and made plans to exploit it. On May 12, just after dawn, 20,000 men of General Winfield S. Hancock’s Second Corps stormed across the field in front of you—from left to right—and swept over the Confederate works, capturing 3,000 men and 20 cannons. It was one of the most successful Union attacks of the Civil War.
Fighting at the Muleshoe Salient focused on a slight turn in the Confederate earthworks, to your right-front, known as the “Bloody Angle.” The Angle occupied a small knoll that commanded adjacent parts of the Confederate line. Whoever controlled the knoll controlled the Salient. For 22 hours Union and Confederate soldiers vied for possession of the Angle, firing across the works or engaging one another in grim, hand-to-hand combat.
Artist Alfred R. Waud sketched these Union soldiers under fire here on May 12, 1864. Lee’s counterattacks had driven the Union troops out of the Muleshoe, and here they are shown under cover on the outside of the Confederate trenches. Waud’s perspective was just a few feet from where you are now standing. It is the most immediate depiction of the fighting near the Bloody Angle that day. Waud labeled his sketch, “The toughest fight yet.”
The sharp turn in the Confederate works here is called the “East Angle.” It marks the apex of the Muleshoe Salient and was one of the most vulnerable points on Lee’s line. Lee fortified the place heavily and placed upwards of 30 cannon in and around the works here. But on the night of May 11, fearing the Union army was about to march south, he pulled those guns out of the line. For Lee, it was a rare and grave misjudgment.
In the dank, pre-dawn light of May 12, 1864, Confederates huddled along these muddy works could hear the rumble of Union troops coming toward them. Moments later the first of 20,000 Union soldiers poured over the works like a wave, engaging Confederate defenders here in furious hand-to-hand combat.
For 22 hours combat raged on the landscape in front of you. Although the fighting extended for half a mile, the battle focused on (and became identified with) a slight bend in the Confederate lines known thereafter as the Bloody Angle. The fighting here consisted of sustained, close-range rifle fire punctuated by Union attempts to storm the Confederate works.
These modest mounds are all that remain of the Muleshoe Salient’s once-formidable earthworks. Begun by the Confederates on the night of May 8, the works were four feet high, with a two-foot-deep trench. Dirt from the trench was thrown against the outer face of the logs to create a bulletproof barrier. As an added measure of safety, the defenders left a small gap beneath the top log through which they could fire without exposing their heads.
At 2 a.m. on May 13, 1864, General Lee declared a new line of works a half mile behind you ready, and the Confederate troops in the trenches here quietly withdrew. They had bought the Confederacy what it most needed that day: time. But every minute had come at a fearful cost. It’s likely that as many as 17,000 men fell killed or wounded in the fighting at the Muleshoe Salient. It was the longest sustained combat of the Civil War.
Just before 6 p.m. on May 10, 1864, 5,000 Union soldiers led by Colonel Emory Upton—formed in deep masses rather than traditional battle lines—emerged from the woods ahead of you and dashed across this field. They reached the main confederate line here.
