George Calvert Yount

Grave of George C. Yount

George Calvert Yount (1794-1865) was the first United States citizen to be ceded a Spanish land grant in Napa Valley (1836). Skilled hunter, frontiersman, craftsman and farmer, he was the true embodiment of all the finest qualities of an advancing civilization blending with the existing primitive culture. Friend to all, this kindly host of Caymus Rancho encouraged sturdy American pioneers to establish ranches in this area, which was well-populated before the gold rush.

[from http://www.sonic.net/~laird/landmarks/counties/600-699/693.html]

Arrived in California February 1831.

Was a Free Mason.

General Vallejo suggested that George Yount become a Catholic and a naturalized citizen of Mexico, since this was necessary to obtain a Mexican land grant. In 1835 he was baptized as Jorge Concepcion Yount. His land grant, Rancho Caymus in Napa Valley, Cal., of two square leagues (equal to 11,814.25 acres) was received in 1836.

On October 21, 1843, Yount received a new land grant, Rancho La Jota, of 4,453 acres on Howell Mountain.

Father McCarthy mentions the Donner Party tragedy, and the part George Yount played in their rescue. James and Margaret Reed, who were members of the party, were guests of George Yount at his Yountville home.

Find A Grave Memorial# 8437299

George Calvert Yount Memorial

Birth: May 4, 1794 Burke County North Carolina, USA Death: Oct. 5, 1865 Napa Napa County California, USA

As a young child George migrated with his parents to Cape Girardeau, MO. He later became a trapper and started on his journey to California. Yount arrived in Napa Valley, California in the 1830's and was given a land grant by the Spanish government. He planted the first grapevine in the Valley, which later became famous for it's vineyards. The town of Yountville, California was named after him. Yount is a legend in Napa Valley, and is credited with having an important role in the rescue of the infamous Donner Party.

1) The Napa Register. 05/28/1959. Yountville Pioneer Is Honored - BY VIRGINIA HANRAHAN

YOUNTVILLE — An early October issue of The Napa Register in 1863 printed the following sad tidings from the village of Sebastopol (now Yountville):

"Died, Thursday, Oct 5, 1865 at his residence, George C. Yount, after an illness of a year's duration. Funeral from residence Sunday, Oct 8, at 11 a.m."

Endowed by nature with robust frame, strengthened and knit together by the employments and hardships of mountain life, he withstood the assaults of disease beyond expectation of the most hopeful. Born in North Carolina in 1794, he emigrated to Missouri, and, more than 30 years ago, become the first American to take up abode here in 1836."

Many Friends About 300 friends came to the Yount abode on Caymtss road to pay their respects as his remains lay in the casket His friend, the Rev. J. L Ver Mem of the Episcopal Church, gave the sermon at the funeral. When the hearse left the house it was immediately followed by two aged Indians, who had been at Caymus Rancho from the first, leading Yount's favorite horse, saddled and equipped. They were fol¬lowed by a cortege of 125 car¬riages and a long train of horsemen.

Yount was buried with Masonic honors. On Feb. 8, 1868, The Napa Register announced that a handsome monument for Yount's grave had been completed at the Pritchard and Hevrin Marbleworks in San Francisco.

2) Napa Daily Register. 05/05/1928.

Unveiling Ceremony As a Grave Marker

At a very impressive ceremony held at the Yountville cemetery on Wednesday afternoon of last week at 2 o'clock, a bronze marker was unveiled at the grave of George C. Yount, California pioneer and veteran of the War of 1812. The marker was placed by Fredonia Chapter of San Francisco, Daughters of the War of 1812.

Assisting in the program were: Mrs. H. B. Pinney, regent of Fredonia Chapter; Rev. M. S. Mackerricher, Worshipful Master E. E. Retzer of Yount Lodge, No. 12, F. and A. M.; C. H. Miller, chaplain of Fredonia Chapter; H. W. Sanders of Richmond, T. B. Dozier Jr. of San Francisco, great grandson of George C. Yount; Nathan F. Coombs, descendant of one of Napa's oldest families; Misses Pauline and Thelma Dozier, descendants of Mr. Yount; Hilary Helsley, bugler, and the Napa Boy Scouts.

3) Napa Daily Register. 04/04/1928.

Patriotic Group Will Honor George Yount

Fredonia Chapter of San Francisco Daughters of the War of 1812, will unveil a marker on the grave of George C. Yount, pioneer of California, at the Yountville cemetery on Sunday, May 2nd, in tribute to his service in the War of 1812. The organization has been searching for graves of veterans of that war and is placing beautiful markers on each one found. Appropriate ceremonies are held in dedicating the markers. George Calvert* Yount was born in North Carolina in 1794, where be grew to young manhood and enlisted for service in the war against England in 1812. He arrived in California in 1831 and was the first settler in Napa valley, locating near Yountville, which later became a village and was named in his honor. He was one of the leaders of the group rescuing the Donner party. Mr. Yount was instrumental in organizing one of the Masonic lodges in California, that being at Yountville. Later the headquarters of the lodge was moved to Napa, but it is still known as Yount Lodge, No. 12, F. and A. M. The ceremony of dedicating the marker will start at 2:30 p.m. and is to be attended by descendants of Mr. Yount, members of the Daughters of 1812 and others who may desire to be present. Assistance in arranging the program was given the organization by Worshipful Master Earl E. Retzer and other members of Yount lodge.

4) Napa Register. 05/28/1964.

Native Daughters to Honor Yount at Memorial Services (Article on George C. Yount)

George C. Yount Parlor 322, Native Daughters of the Golden West, will honor Napa County's earliest pioneer Saturday in Memorial Day services at 1 p.m. at the Yount grave in Yountville Cemetery. The public is invited to participate in the service at the site, designated State Historical Landmark 693, and to view the handsome monument and the ornate wrought iron fence surrounding the grave which have been recently restored by the parlor as a community service.

Following the brief ceremonies, the Native Daughters will serve coffee and cookies in Yountville Park.

Program

The program will include greetings by Parlor President Margaret Fagiani; invocation by the Rev. Arthur Wilson, Episcopal chaplain at the Veterans Home; a wreath-laying service by Native Daughters; remarks by Director Ray Schulze of the Yountville Cemetery Association, who will assist the parlor in sponsoring the ceremonies; military honors by a color guard, bugle corps and firing squad under the direction of the Veterans Home Adjutant, O.K. Andrews; and a benediction by the Rev. A. McCall of the Yountville Community Church. Barbara Dulinsky and Eleanor Valenzuela are co-chairmen of the annual memorial service. The pioneer to be honored was born in North Carolina in 1794, and after his family emigrated to Missouri in 1804 he led the life of a trapper and n hunter and fought in the War of 1812.

Earliest Pioneer

History records that Yount set out for California in February of 1831, earning him the rank of one of the earliest pioneers on the Pacific Coast. For some time he was the only American in the territory between Mission Sonoma and the quarters of the Hudson Bay Company to the north. In March, 1836, Yount secured the first land grant in this area and cleared the wilderness. On his Napa Valley site he built a Kentucky-type block house, a grist mill and saw mill, fought off the Grizzlies and unfriendly Indians, and made the first wine in Napa Valley from grape cuttings he planted to a vineyard from stock given him by the Padres of Mission Sonoma. Yount's Caymus Rancho became the last regular stopping point for the pioneer and early settlers. Yount died in October, 1865, at the age of 71, and was buried in the town which bears his name in the center of Napa Valley.

According to Mrs. Fagiani, The Napa Register announced on Feb. 8, 1868, that a "handsome monument for Yount's grave has been completed at the Pritchard and Hevrin Marbleworks in San Francisco." The monument, which cost $5,000, took four weeks to erect.

Family links:

Parents:

 Jacob A. Yount (1752 - 1819)

Spouse:

 Eliza Gashwiler Yount (1811 - 1886)*

Children:

 Robert Wilds Yount (1819 - 1843)*

 Elizabeth Anne Yount Sullivan (1826 - 1855)*

*Calculated relationship

Burial: George C. Yount Pioneer Cemetery Yountville Napa County California, USA

Created by: Soul Seekers Record added: Feb 25, 2004 Find A Grave Memorial# 8437299

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/8437299/george-calvert-yount

https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/yount-george-calvert

George Calvert Yount, trapper and pioneer settler of California, was born near Dowden Creek in Burke County. His grandfather, John Jundt, a native of Alsace, moved to Lancaster County, Pa., in the mid-1700s when he was a child, changed his name to Yount, and settled in North Carolina. George C. was the son of Jacob, who served with General Nathanael Greene in the American Revolution, and Marillis Killian Yount; in 1804 the family moved to Cape Girardeau, Mo.

In 1818 Yount married Eliza Cambridge Wilds and became a cattleman in Howard County, Mo. In 1825 after a neighbor embezzled his savings, he set out on an expedition to Santa Fe. In 1827, after arriving in the West, Yount led a party that hoped to trap along certain rivers in Arizona, but the expedition failed when part of the group turned back after reaching the mouth of the Gila River. During 1828–29 he trapped in the northern part of the country, and a mountain at the mouth of the Yellowstone River was named Yount's Peak to commemorate his activities in the area.

After meeting Jedidiah Smith while accompanying William Wolfskill, Yount became interested in the exploration of California. In 1831 he traveled along the Old Spanish Trail to Los Angeles and three years later moved north to Sonoma and San Rafael. At this time he converted to Roman Catholicism and adopted Spanish forenames: Jorge Concepción. He also became a Mexican citizen. Receiving a grant of land for a ranch in 1836, Yount settled in the Napa Valley and guarded the northern frontier of California against Indian attack. After an American emigrant party arrived in the area in 1841, he sent for his family. His two daughters joined him in California, but during his long absence his wife, thinking he may have been dead, sued for divorce in 1829 and married someone else.

In the 1850s Yount began to produce wine on his ranch in the Napa Valley, and in 1855 he married Mrs. Eliza Gashwiler. A Mason, he died at his home on the outskirts of the town of Yountsville, named for him. He was buried in the Yountsville cemetery, where his grave is marked by a monument with primitive carving.

Update from N.C. Government & Heritage Library staff: Although this entry indicates that Yount's Peak was named for George C. Yount, the peak may have been more likely named for Harry Yount, who was hired as the first gamekeeper of Yellowstone in 1880 and who is also considered the first park ranger of the national park. Various sources have attributed the naming of the peak to both of the men. Some sources have also made a family connection between George Yount and Harry Yount: George was Harry's nephew. Both men did follow similar trajectories as frontiersmen and in exploring the west. Please see this article on Harry Yount from the National Park Service. Footnoted sources for the article include mention the naming question for Yount's Peak: https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/hisnps/npshistory/yount.htm. (This source also appears in the "References" for this NCpedia entry under "Additional Resources.")

Additionally, some sources indicate that George Calvert Yount may also have been called George Concepcion Yount. This detail has not been confirmed.

-- Kelly Agan, N.C. Government & Heritage Library

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“THE DAYS OF LONG AGO.

Interesting Reminiscences of George C. Yount and the Napa Valley.

In the Star’s account of Reciprocity Day, observed by the Woman’s Improvement Club, comments were made on an article written and read by Mrs. George J. Bucknall, granddaughter of George C. Yount, in which were interesting reminiscences of the pioneer and Napa valley. It is our privilege this week to publish the entire paper. Its historical value is great and gives some facts and incidents not heretofore published:

It is with pleasure that I comply with your wish that I give to you some of my early reminiscences of Napa Valley. I am very happy to be with you on this occasion and glad to be able to tell you how deeply I appreciate the honor you do me in asking me to come before this body of representative women. “Very dear to my heart are the scenes “as fond recollections recalls them to view” that I am more than happy to have an opportunity to speak. The early history if any country or place is interesting, and the story of the beginning of any particular locality is obviously a matter of some moment to those who are later dwellers therein.

In the very nature of things, those who knew Napa valley in the first half of the last century, at the time when a few Mexican landholders and wandering tribes of Indians were succeeded by the early American settlers, will ere long have passed out into the silence and there will be none left who can speak at first hand knowledge of those wonderful days that are no more.

It was my good fortune to spend much of the first eight years of my life at the home of my grandfather, George C. Yount, one of the earliest American settlers of Napa valley. My mother, the younger daughter of my grandfather, came to California form Franklin county, Missouri, in 1843 to join her father in Napa. She was barely seventeen and was accompanied by her married sister and her sister’s husband and a party of friends. From the lips of Mr. Baldridge, of Oakville, who has since passed away and who was one of the party, I heard many details of their long trip across the plains. He spoke especially of my mother who rode her own horse the greater part of that long journey, and seemed always, he said, to find something to interest her or to admire. Less than a year after my mother’s arrival she was married to my father, John Calvert Davis, an Englishman.

To the best of my knowledge and belief, I was the first child born of Anglo-American parents in Yerba Buena, as San Francisco was called then. The name Yerba Buena was not changed to San Francisco until General Kearney became Military Governor in 1847.

When, on July 9th, 1846, Captain John B. Montgomery, of the Portsmouth, acting under orders from Commodore Sloat, landed with seventy men at the foot of Clay street and marched to the music of fife and drum up Clay street to Kearney street and the Plaza, later known as Portsmouth Square, and replaced the Mexican Eagle with the Stars and Stripes, I was a year and three months old. From our home of the corner of Kearney and Washington streets by baby eyes, I am told, witness this ceremony. Almost three score years and ten later, during our Exposition year, 1915, I was invited to be present at the placing of a tablet on a building on the corner of Clay and Montgomery streets commemorating Captain Montgomery’s act.

Yerba Buena at the time of my birth numbered, according to several authorities, less than a hundred and fifty inhabitants. Homes were few. There were two or three warehouses and numberless tents and shacks. The streets were unpaved, of sidewalks there were none. A wilderness of sandhills covered with scrub oak stretched out toward the Presidio and the Mission. There were gambling houses a plenty and frequent fires, and in 1851 to make matters worse an epidemic of cholera drew attention to the fact that the need for better sanitation was vital. It is small wonder that my mother found the home of her father in the heart of Napa valley, a safer, pleasanter nest for her little brood; my sister and myself and later a little brother, than the turmoil of a city in the making. So it came to pass that much of each year, until our dear mother left us, was spent under our grandfather’s hospitable roof, an adobe house of two stories. With its tiled roof and broad veranda, where a brook rippled by, and with its sweet scented Castilian roses and a clump of feathery willows near the well it made indeed a paradise for the children. The thick walls, the deep embrasured windows, the great open fireplace where grandfather melted the lead and fashioned his own bullets prior to an expedition for bear or dear, the making of candles for the family, known as tallow dips, a mysterious process to little ones, and best of all the evenings when clustered round grandfather’s knees, we listened to the wondrous tales he told of his adventures and hair-breadth escapes from Indians and wild animals, are all pictures hung on memory’s wall. There stand out also certain mental snapshots of scenes and events, some of which left their impress on heart and brain, to remain with me until both are forever stilled. Our various trips from San Francisco to Napa I remember distinctly. They were at first by schooner to Soscol where grandfather would meet us with a carryall or sometimes, when the roads were bad, with a spring wagon and four strong mules to drag us through mud in which they would sink to above their kneed, and progress was slow. I have also a vivid recollection of the Indians who at their steaming places or teniescales as they were called, indulged in something akin to Turkish baths of our day. They would make a large cavity in the ground, six or eight feet deep, and cover it tightly over with brush, leaving a small opening at the top for the smoke to pass out. In this hollow, somethings like a cellar, they would build a very hot fire, and here a number of men and women, with the scantiest of raiment possible, went through the heating process for house to the accompaniment of monotonous singing. When at last the perspiration induced by their dancing, singing and the heat, ran off their bodies in streams, they rushed out and plunged into the creek near by and remained, until they had cooled off. It was always at night that this steaming process, followed by the cold plunge, took place. Other weird ceremonies of wandering tribes where the Great Spirit was invoked with raucous cries and contortions made a deep impression on my childish mind. I remember, too, the visits of a kind old padre who would come from time to time to admonish the Indians as to their duties as Christians, and to christen new converts. They would assemble in front of my grandfather’s house and seemed deeply impressed with the ceremony.

Then there were fiesta days that I recall, when a bull’s head was roasted between stones in a deep pit, a primitive fireless cooker process. Chickens were roasted on spits over a bed of coals, always an interesting operation for the children to watch, as was the drying of beef and red peppers, and the making of beds and chairs with strips of rawhide. And there are other memories as poignant as they are permanent. My father’s death in the great four poster in the large room upstairs in my grandfather’s home, following a sudden attack of pneumonia, was my first bereavement. I was just entering into my fourth year.

Then a baby brother who had not quite rounded out his first twelve months of life, fell asleep to wake no more. It was in the month of April and I remember how blue the Nemophilae looked – great patches of it in the nearby meadow near grandfather’s house and I remember that I went out, following the little stream, and gathered a great bouquet of them for dear little Charlie. I thought then and I think still, after all these years, that no casket ever had a more beautiful lining than that of those Baby Blue Eyes, which matched in color those forever closed. I will give you but the briefest outline of my grandfather’s history until the time of his first arrival in California in 1832. In looking back across the span of his three score years and ten more, I find revealed an unusual vista of happenings and experiences, all that an active, useful life brings of grist to the mill that grinds unceasingly on through time, working its will in the endless scheme of things. Born in North Carolina in 1794, my mother’s father, George C. Yount, my grandfather, one of eleven children constituting the family of Jacob Yount, whose forebears came from Alsace, Germany, early in the eighteenth century, went at the age of ten with his father and mother, his sisters and his brothers to Cape Girardeau in the Southern part of Missouri. That fertile and now populous State was at that time a wilderness, and brave indeed must have been the pathfinders to those then little known regions. At an early age the boys learned the use of the rifle that they might aid in protecting the family from the Indians. My grandfather on his eighteenth birthday was enrolled for military duty, and leaving Cape Girardeau he went to Camp Springs, which at present forms a part of St. Louis, and for four or five years was active in protecting different parts of the country from Indian depredations. In 1815 he was made lieutenant of a detachment of 400 men, and later under command of Colonel Boone, the son of Danial Boone, the founder of Kentucky, went to Fort Sanderson. In 1818, no more military service being required of him, he returned to Missouri and there at the age of twenty-four he married Eliza Cambridge Wilds, and lived on his farm in Howard county until some seven or eight years later. In 1926 he joined a party of trappers and traders who, under license from the Governor of New Mexico, were to trap on the Gila and Colorado rivers. After many encounters with the hostile tribes, my grandfather determined to push on to California. He reached the San Gabriel Mission in 1831 and has left an interesting account in his journal of the vast number of horses, cattle, goats and geese he saw there, and the life of the padres.

Learning of various islands along the coast where sea otter were said to be plentiful, he visited the Islands of Santa Rosa, Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara, Catalina, San Clemente and others and returned with pelts worth many thousand dollars. He built boats of sea elephant skin for otter hunting. He visited San Diego and Monterey, and from there came to San Francisco, only to hasten on for exploration of the San Joaquin and Sacramento rivers. He remained for some time at the San Rafael Mission, then went on to the Sonoma Mission and later visited the Russian military post. He became a firm friend of General M. G. Vallejo, who was for many years military commander of Upper California. Enamored of Napa valley my grandfather decided to settle down there and send for his family. I recall hearing his tell of his first view of the valley and how it affected him. Toward the close of a beautiful Spring day in March he said he was riding his good horse Hunter along a narrow trail over Mt. St. Helena from Sonoma to Napa, and suddenly the matchless valley came into view. “It was gay with early eschscholtzia, the hills were green with purple shadows in their depths laurel and live oak, willows and alders and ash met my gaze as I rode slowly down the mountain side and I exclaimed, ‘This is Paradise; it is here I would like to live and die.’” Through his friendship for General Vallejo and the venerable Father F. Lorenzo Quinfas he acquired a grant of land in Napa valley consisting of two leagues of land called the Caymus Rancho. It was a lordly domain of more than twenty square miles extending across the heart of the valley and reaching from ridge to ridge of the mountains. Many of the Mission Indians went with him to his new home and helped him build his block house near a tributary of the Napa river. The house was not only a dwelling but a fort as well. It consisted of a room eighteen feet square above, fitted with port holes through which he defended himself and the friendly Indians against the wild tribes who came down from the mountains to steal cattle and pillage. Quail and doves, bears and deer, and even mountain lion were everywhere, while the streams abounded in fish, and in low and marshy tule grounds along the river elks were found in abundance.

In 1837 he built an adobe house with the help of his faithful Indian followers. Of these about a hundred made their home near him in a willow copse about a mile distant. I remember well my Indian burse. She and her husband Ambrosio had been married by the Catholic priest who came at certain times of the year to baptize and marry those who became converts and who desired to avail themselves of the privileges of the church. Much of our sewing was done by the Indian women, many of whom were fine needlewomen, and did very beautiful drawn work. Our washing, done at the stream on a large flat stone, was also done by the Indians, they using the soap root that grew everywhere in abundance and not only lathered to perfection, but whitened the clothes well at the same time. The Indian men looked after the stock and farmed, built fences and cut wood. A second grant from the government secured for my grandfather the La Jota Rancho on Howell mountain, consisting of over four thousand acres of table land heavily timbered. Here he built the first saw mill ever built in this part of the country and made the first shingles which were in great demand. He also erected the first flour mill, which I believe is still standing and is over seventy-five years old. He secured cuttings of the Mission grape and was one of the first wine makers of the State. I remember well the primitive manner in which I first saw the pressing out of the grape juice. A huge ox skin cleansed and stretched was firmly fastened to four stout stakes driven securely into the ground, and two or more stalwart Indians, girt only with their loin cloths, trampled out the vintage in truly pastoral style. Later troughs were used, the Indians crushing the grapes with their feet. The juice was run into vats and after fermenting was put in casks. My grandfather was known far and wide for his hospitality. Last year in Santa Cruz Mrs. Patsy Reed-Lewis, one of the few survivors of the ill-fated Donner party, told me again the oft-repeated story of a dream my grandfather had in which there came to him a vision of the struggle for life that was being enacted at the Southern part of Donner Lake, of his aid in forming a relief party and the supplies he sent to the starving emigrants. For months after they reached their destination several members of Mrs. Reed’s family were made comfortable under grandfather’s hospitable roof.

The Rev. Dr. Ver Mehr, an Episcopal clergyman, who, with his family reached San Francisco in 1849, and conducted a boarding school, St. Mary’s Hall, in Sonoma, for some two or three years, in his interesting book, “A Checkered Life,” dwells at length upon the unfailing friendship and kindness of my grandfather to him and his family. While visiting there throughout one Summer and Autumn, in 1860 it was, Dr. Ver Mehr wrote the prospectus and prepared the first issue of the “Pacific Churchman,” the first church paper issued in California. About that time my grandfather made a gift of fifteen acres of land to Dr. Ver Mehr, between Oakville and Yountville and here the aged clergyman and his family lived for many years. From Dr. Ver Mehr’s book I quote the following passages: “Christmas day, 1864, we passed under the rood of our friend, the patriarch Yount. Often he rode over on horseback to pay us a friendly visit, often he went to Napa to attend the Masonic lodge, for he was a Grand Master and an enthusiastic member of that body. I passed many evenings with him reading to him the ‘war news.’ He was a staunch adherent of the Union cause. How many Sundays have I seen him sitting on the shady veranda of him home reading the Holy Scriptures. How many were the links between the worthy patriarch and ourselves.” My grandfather belonged to the old school. There were no “weekend” invitations in those days. Friends were asked to come and spend the Summer or the Winter as the case might be, and hospitality, generous, unbounded, was a slogan of those days. He was a generous, large-hearted man. He gave to Yountville the land for its town site, the land for its cemetery and built a church at Yountville to be used by all denominations. He was a charter member of the Masonic lodge of Napa City. He was always especially devoted to the welfare of Indians.

In turn soldier, trader, trapper, and farmer, he led indeed, as I have said before, an active, useful life, and as one of those who laid the foundations of that prosperity which today places California at the front ranks of the most favored States in the Union, I revere his memory.

My grandfather passed away October 5, 1865. I quote again from Dr. Ver Mehr’s book where he speaks of my grandfather’s death: “The frame of the sturdy hunter, who had faced death and danger so often, who had endeared himself to Mexican, Indian and American, who had rendered service to many, injured never any one, lay still and cold, surrounded by many, many friends.”

He had chose the spot for his last resting place under a spreading oak on a sloping knoll in the little cemetery at Yountville. There looking down the beautiful valley he loved so well, the long sought land of his heart’s desire, he sleeps his last sleep, “Though on the lips of all we question, The finger of God’s silence lies.” May we not hope his rest is as sweet as those who loved him best could wish.”

- St. Helena Star (April 6, 1917)