Remembering Tuolumne…..

By Joseph Celentano, April 2003

TCMM Historical Research Committee

E-mail: JCelentano@TuolumneMuseum.org

This month's article comes from the TCMM archives in an undated interview completed many years ago with Kate Ingalls of LaGrange.

The Duckwall and the Wash Family made up the Duckwall Emigrant wagon train party.

The Duckwall party, consisting of W.J. Duckwall, his wife and six children, and three other men, were marooned on one of the granite domes southwest of Sonora Pass. They managed to free themselves from this predicament by hitching one pair of oxen to the front of a wagon, and three pair to the rear, slowly letting the vehicles down the steep granite wall. The Duckwall party arrived at Upper Relief Valley on September 27, 1853. The Wash party, a day later.

No road has ever been built over the Old Emigrant Trail and the country has remained primitive and isolated even to this day.

W.J. Duckwall was born on November 12, 1808 in Virginia. His wife Susanna Hill Duckwall was born on January 24, 1818 in Ohio. They were married on November 9, 1830 in Snow Hill, Hilsboran County, Ohio and settled in Batania County, Ohio. Mr. Duckwall spent six years of his life in Virginia before the family moved to Ohio, where he grew to manhood.

After obtaining such education as was to be had in the backwoods, young Duckwall went to Cincinnati, which then consisted of a blacksmith shop, post office and saloon. He secured a place in the grocery store as clerk, which he held for several months. He then engaged in farming and finally opened a country store of his own.

It was about this time that he met Susan Hill, the daughter of a farmer, and after a brief courtship they were married. In 1840, the Duckwalls with their children moved to Clark County, Illinois. There they remained on a farm until 1852.

They came to California by wagon train in September of 1852 and upon reaching Tuolumne County, they opened a hotel in Columbia. They came to California by the Old Emigrant Trail, also known as the Walker River Route, Their wagon being the first one that successfully passed over that perilous trail. While in Salt Lake City, Utah the Duckwalls and their children had dinner with Mormon leader Bingham Young. They exchanged their heavy "prairie schooner" wagons for lighter ones at that point of their journey.

After leaving Salt Lake City, they met scores of returning emigrants who had attempted the road but turned back because of insurmountable difficulties. They passed many abandoned or destroyed wagon parties, but Duckwall and his brave pioneer wife pushed on until they reached California.

For a short time after leaving Columbia they lived in Hopetown, Merced County where in 1859 their daughter Ann, who was twenty-one, died. The Duckwalls moved at this time to the Southern ranch, what is now known as the "White House", in Tuolumne County. The ranch is east of the North Fork of the Tuolumne River about 15 miles east of Sonora. The highest mountain in the vicinity, which is around 6000 feet, was named after Mr. Duckwall. Here they established a mountain ranch known as the Duckwall Place.

Mr. W.J. Duckwall died November 15, 1896 at the age of 88 years and Mrs. Duckwall passed away on March 10, 1905 at age 92.

Five children survived them, as follows: Mrs. Cordelia Ingalls, Mrs. Jane Burns, Sim, Visalia, Dave and Lew Duckwall.

…..and thus, another page turns in the history of Remembering Tuolumne.

April 2003