Solano County Biographies

HENRY DOUGLASS RICHARDSON

Transcribed by Kathy Sedler

This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm

 
was born in Maumee, Ohio, October 18, 1847.  His father�s name was George, and 
mother�s, Mary Louisa Richardson, who moved from the place of his birth about 
one year thereafter to the city of Buffalo, New York, in which place he was 
apprenticed to the printing business, which he was engaged in at the breaking 
out of the Rebellion.  At the time of the raid into Pennsylvania, in 1863, the 
74th regiment of the N.Y.S.N.G. was called out and sworn into the national 
service.  At the time the subject of this sketch was a drummer in company �G,� 
of that regiment, and with them went to the scene of conflict.  After the battle 
of Gettysburg, the riots at New York and other cities took place, the regiment 
was transferred from Pennsylvania to New York city, where it remained until the 
riots ceased, when they were ordered back to Buffalo and there mustered out of 
the U. S. service.  Immediately following, Mr. Richardson shipped in the navy, 
for one year, sent to New York. and was attached to the U.S.S. store ship 
�Courier,� that was employed in carrying ammunition and provisions to the South 
Gulf squadron.  The last voyage in this ship was from Boston bound for New 
Orleans, which place she never succeeded in reaching as she ran on the reef at 
Lyniard�s Keys, Abbaco Island, and was sunk within an hour after she struck, in 
the dead hour of night.  The crew, with Mr. Richardson among the number, were 
enabled to reach the shore by the aid of the ship�s small boats in safety.  The 
island was barren of vegetation, but the crew were enabled to subsist on bread 
that was saved and large green turtles that were caught.  For sixteen days they 
remained on the Island, until one of the boats that had been fitted up and, with 
a crew, of which Mr. Richardson was among the number, sent to Nassau, N.P., for 
assistance, which was secured in shape of a schooner that was lying in that 
port, partly loaded with old junk that had been gathered for shipment to the 
United States.  The schooner came to the island for the remainder of the crew, 
some ninety in all.  But before she was ready to depart for the States, the 
yellow fever broke out that caused a further detention on the island; several of 
the castaways sickened and, in a short time, died.  Finally the scourge abated, 
and the vessel proceeded to New York and went into quarantine and the crew 
transferred to the U.S.S. �Union,� from which ship Mr. Richardson was 
discharged, his term of enlistment having expired.  From New York he went back 
to his home in Buffalo, and remained until just before the close of the war, 
when he re-enlisted in the navy and again went to New York; and, at that time, 
the U.S.S. �Pensacola� was being fitted out for the Pacific Squadron, and to 
which man-of-war Mr. Richardson was sent aboard as ship�s printer.  The vessel 
came out to California in 1867, calling in at all of the principal ports on the 
Atlantic as well as the Pacific side of the continent.  In 1869, his service 
having expired, he went to San Francisco and started in the printing business 
for himself, but, it not proving as remunerative as expected, he sold the 
establishment and came to Vallejo, February 22, 1870, and secured a position on 
the �Vallejo Evening Chronicle,� where he remained for some three years, and 
then was engaged in the cigar and tobacco trade for himself, on Georgia street, 
opposite the Bernard House, for a year and a half, after which time he gave it 
up and went to work on the navy yard, in charge of the government printing 
office, and remained until March 1, 1879, when he secured a position as �local� 
on the �Vallejo Evening Chronicle,� where he is engaged at the present time.  
Mr. Richardson is a Republican in politics, and, during his residence in 
Vallejo, has three times been elected as a delegate to the Republican County 
Convention.  On March 23, 1876, he was married to Miss Jennie Alice Pratt, of 
and at Grass Valley, California, who was born in Utah, May 29, 1858, and is now 
21 years of age.  The lady�s father and mother�s name was Mr. W. O. and Mrs. C. 
Pratt.  They have had two children born unto them, one of whom a daughter, Mabel 
Alice, is living; the first, also a daughter, having died when an infant.  Mr. 
Richardson is a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and other 
societies.  In the Odd Fellows� Order he has attained the highest rank 
obtainable in the Subordinate and Encampment branches of the Order, and for the 
past four years has been successively elected to the office of M. W. District 
Deputy Grand Master, of that Order, for this District, comprising all of the 
Lodges in Solano county.  Mr. Richardson, at one time, was President of Neptune 
Hose Company, and one of the trustees of the Odd Fellows� Library Association at 
its organization.  He has, at various times, been solicited to accept the 
nomination for office under the county or city, but has declined each and all 
that have been tendered him.
 
History of Solano County � San Francisco, Cal. - Wood, Alley  & Co., East 
Oakland, pub 1879, pp 385-386