California Biographies Mendocino and Lake Counties, California Transcribed by Peggy Hooper This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm Source: History of Mendocino and Lake Counties, California With Biographical Sketches History by Aurelius O. Carpenter And Percy H. Millberry Illustrated, Complete In One Volume Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, California, 1914 WILLIAM BELL ELLIOTT, father of Mrs. Celia H. Dewell, was born in 1788 in Randolph county, N. C, of English and Scotch extraction. In Grayson county, Va., he married Elizabeth Fatten, and they first emigrated west to Missouri, coming from that state to California in 1845, as above related. Mr. Elliott was a leading member of the "Bear Flag party," and he and two others took General Vallejo to the old settlers' fort after the old General had been taken prisoner; but he was never even handcuffed. Soon after coming to Lake county Mr. Elliott put up the first gristmill here, in 1855. He had erected the mill originally at the head of Napa valley, where he operated it for three years before moving it and setting it up in Lake county. He built a mill race, diverting the waters of Clover creek to supply it and turn the waterwheel, but the only remains of the old mill now in existence are the stone buhrs, which lie in the yard of his old home, now occupied by his grandson, Will K. Dodge. The race has been filled in and its channel is used as a garden by Mr. Dodge's family. The house which Mr. Elliott erected, in 1855 (now occupied by Mr. Dodge), was probably the first frame dwelling in Lake county, and was certainly the most substantial residence in the county at the time. Mrs. Elliott died in October, 1869, at the age of fifty-seven years, Mr. Elliott died on the old place in Upper Lake. They were the parents of eleven children, of whom we have the following record : Churchill died in Missouri when twenty-one years old (unmarried), before the family came to California. Mary died in Missouri at the age of twelve years. Alberon was killed by the Indians at Pyramid Lake, while on his way to what were known as the White Pine mines; he married Henrietta Parker, and their two children, William and Jesse, both now deceased, grew up at Upper Lake; William left children, and some of his grandchildren now reside at Lakeport. Emsley was killed in Texas while discharging his duties as deputy sheriff, being shot while attempting to arrest a negro; he left four children, two of whom are living at McCray station, in Mendocino county, north of Cloverdale. Com- modore, who died in Mexico, left five children. Emily died in infancy in Missouri. Celia H. married Benjamin Dewell. Thomas, a farmer, living on Clover creek, in Lake county, married Ellen Dennison and has three children. William died in Texas, unmarried. Elizabeth Jane, born December 15, 1841, first married Charles Perkinson, a pioneer of Lake county, by whom she had two children, a son that died and Clara Mabel, Mrs. Wilson, with whom she is now living at Fort Bragg, Mendocino county; by her second husband, Samuel K. Dodge, she had three children, one son and one daughter dying, and William K. surviving and living on the old home place of his maternal grandfather, which his mother owns ; her third marriage was to Henry Wilson, who is also deceased. James, the youngest child of William B. Elliott, died when five years old.