William Vincent Wells
Born(1826-02-02)February 2, 1826[1]
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
DiedJune 1, 1876(1876-06-01) (aged 50)
Napa, California, U.S.
Occupation(s)Author and editor
Known for
  • The Life and Public Services of Samuel Adams (1865)

William Vincent Wells (1826–1876) was an American author and journalist, best known for his three volume biography of his ancestor Samuel Adams, the 4th Governor of the state of Massachusetts.[2]

Early life and education

William Vincent Wells was born in Boston in 1826, the son of poets Thomas Wells (1790–1861) and Anna Maria (Foster) Wells (1795–1868). He was a great-grandson of Massachusetts Governor Samuel Adams (1722–1803), and an uncle of mathematician Webster Wells, architect Joseph Morrill Wells, and silent film actress Mai Wells. William Wells grew up in Boston where he was educated "at the common schools of that city,"[3] but in 1834, his father left home to join the Navy, serving aboard the frigate USS Potomac as schoolmaster, and serving, from December 1836 until July 1838, aboard the USS Constitution as private secretary to Commodore Jesse Elliott, Commander of the Navy's Mediterranean Squadron. During his father's time abroad, Wells's mother earned her living as an educator (the historian Sidney Perley wrote in an 1889 sketch that "Mrs. Wells' chief attention was given to her school for young ladies").[4] She and her children lived in South Carolina during at least part of the couple's separation.[5]

William Wells probably didn't accompany his mother on her journey to the South. According to one family historian, Wells "went to sea, when a young boy, in a vessel belonging to his mother's cousin, Epes Sargent."[6] Writing in 1876, the author of Wells's obituary noted: "He started out from Boston at an early age to follow the sea, and before he had reached his majority found himself Second Mate of a Boston ship in the European trade, which position gave him opportunities, when in European ports, of visiting Art Galleries and other objects calculated to improve the mind and cultivate the taste."[7]

California Gold Rush

The California Gold Rush was precipitated by James W. Marshall's discovery on January 24, 1848, of a gold nugget in the raceway of a sawmill he was building. By the fall of 1848, news of his discovery had attracted a large number of prospectors from Mexico and South America, and by the end of 1848, would-be prospectors in New England began to form stock companies to arrange transportation to California. Some went by land, others by sea. One of these, the Boston and California Joint Stock Mining and Trading Company, was organized at the end of 1848, its membership limited to 150 men. William Vincent Wells was among them, and was elected First Mate of the company's 700-ton ship, the Edward Everett. The company left Boston in January 1849 and sailed into San Francisco Bay on July 6. Among the diverse items in its cargo was a small steamship christened the Pioneer, intended to carry supplies to the gold fields. The company appointed Wells to be Captain of the steamship, and in a letter sent back home, he wrote:

I have only a few minutes to tell you we are alive and well. The Company has dissolved. The votes of a majority in the mines did it. Being among those engaged in transporting provisions up by boat I did not hear of it until now. I am at present bound up to join Lull at the mines.[8] We are to operate together while the mining season lasts. The dividend will amount to about $175 per man. The company dissolved after about two days’ digging. One-half of them would not work. I made one trip up to Sacramento as Captain of the Pioneer, the first steamer to run on the river. We have sold her to Simmons and Hutchinson for $6000.[9] The [Edward Everett] will not fetch more than $15,000; I can go Captain of her for $300 a month if I wish.[10]

But rather than becoming a sea-captain, in October 1853, Wells became a part owner with his brother-in-law James Davenport Whelpley of the San Francisco newspaper the Commercial Advertiser.[11]

Honduras

On March 14, 1854, Whelpley published a notice that he was no longer the proprietor and editor of the Commercial Advertiser,[12] and presumably Wells also sold his share. Having read published news reports of gold deposits in Honduras along the Patuca River, and the willingness of the Honduran government to grant exclusive mining rights to entrepreneurs able to raise sufficient capital, Wells, Whelpley, and several others formed the Honduras Mining and Trading Company. They traveled to Honduras where they obtained extensive grants of land and valuable commercial privileges from the government, commenced building steamers and barges to navigate the river, and began recruiting colonists willing to settle in Honduras.[13] In January 1855, a newspaper reported that Wells was in Honduras investigating the feasibility of a new route for an inter-oceanic railroad to rival the one then under construction across Panama.[14]

Meanwhile, in May 1855, American mercenary William Walker (1824–1860) led a force of 110 men on a private expedition to Central America with the intention of forcibly establishing a colony based on slave labor in Nicaragua. Walker managed to take control of the country and had himself elected president in July 1856. Whelpley later claimed that Walker then went to Honduras to forcibly establish a colony there. Accompanied by an armed party of fifty men, Whelpley went to Honduras to protect what he could of his investments there, but was detained by force by Walker for nearly a year, and impressed into service as a surgeon and physician.[13]

Wells and Whelpley failed to establish a colony in Honduras, but Wells persevered, publishing in 1857, Explorations and adventures in Honduras,[15] a book The New York Times called:

A nine months' labor and travel, it has appeared a valuable and satisfactory book, historically, critically, and with reference to its end, which is to induce the settlement of Eastern Honduras by Americans. The personal narrative of travels are a literal, but beautiful and well worded narrative of the journey, adventures, and researches of the author in Eastern Honduras.[16]

Biography of Samuel Adams

Efforts to prepare a biography of Samuel Adams date back to 1815 when his grandson Samuel Adams Wells (1787–1840) began to compile what remained of his papers, an effort interrupted by his death but resumed by Wells's nephew William V. Wells, who completed in 1865 a three-volume biography entitled The life and public services of Samuel Adams. The younger Wells described his intent in writing the book in its introduction:

…to represent him as he appeared to those who personally knew him, — friends and enemies, — to show the great space he filled in the Revolution, and to disclose, by means of his own private letters and trustworthy contemporary evidence, the measures by which he so largely aided in accomplishing American liberty.

Clerk to the Mayor of San Francisco and final years

When Thomas Henry Selby, a Republican, was elected Mayor of San Francisco at the end of 1869, he appointed Wells to be his Clerk, which office he held throughout Selby's term (ending December 1871). Selby's successor, William Alvord, also a Republican, appointed Wells to the same position during his term (ending November 1873). Wells acted as Clerk for several months for Alvord's successor, Mayor James Otis, "but by this time, his health had so essentially failed that it was unequal to the duties and responsibilities of the position." Wells retired in the summer of 1874 from public life.[7][17]

Wells died on June 1, 1876, in Napa, California at the Napa Insane Asylum. The author of Wells's memorial in the Daily Alta, writing after "more than a quarter of a century's intimate acquaintance and intimate friendship," recalled his, "...high appreciation of [Wells's] mental capacities, his indomitable energy, his wonderful activity of mind and body, until disease which had silently and unsuspected made its attack, developed suddenly in a form which defied all human skill."[7]

Wells had married Laura Ann (Wheelock) Jones on January 19, 1854.[3] She died on March 9, 1880, and a few weeks before her death, the Daily Alta announced a benefit concert:

A musical matinee is to be given at the Bush Street Theater on the afternoon of Thursday the 26th instant, for the benefit of the widow of the late William V. Wells, who was clerk of Mayors Selby and Alvord, and, previously, for a long time a prominent journalist of this city. Mrs. Wells will certainly be pleasantly remembered by many of our readers as Laura Jones, a soprano singer of far above average merit, who sang for many years in church and concert in this city. For the benefit matinee, many of our most prominent artists have promised their services. Among them are the Misses Jovita and Eugenia Ferrer, Miss Rightmire, Mr. Louis Lisser, the Schmidt String Quartette, Messrs. Julius and Gustav Hinrichs, Ernst Schlotte, Ferdinand Urban, Manro Solano, M. T. Ferrer, and others...Tickets may be obtained at the leading music stores, or of Mrs. Wells at 1512 Bush Street.[18]

Both William Wells and Laura Wells were buried in San Francisco's old Masonic cemetery.[19]

Bibliography

Writing by William V. Wells (in journals)

  • William V. Wells, "Broad Away — No.1," in The Pioneer Magazine, Vol. 4, No. 1 (July 1855), pp. 26–33.[20]
  • William V. Wells, "Wild life in Oregon," in Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 13, No. 77 (October 1856), pp. 588–608.[21]
  • William V. Wells, "How we get gold in California, by a miner of the year '49," in Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 20, No. 119 (April 1860), pp. 598–616.[22]
  • William V. Wells, "Fishing adventures on the Newfoundland banks," in Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 22, No. 130 (March 1861), pp. 456–471.[23]
  • William V. Wells, "The quicksilver mines of New Almaden," in Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 27, No. 47 (June 1863), pp. 25–41.[24]
  • William V. Wells, "Ascent of Popocatepetl," in Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 31, No. 186 (November 1865), pp. 681–699.[25]
  • William V. Wells, "High Noon of the Empire," in The Overland Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 1 (July 1868), pp. 21–28.[26]
  • William V. Wells, "A Court Ball at the Palace of Mexico," in The Overland Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 2 (August 1868), pp. 105–112.[27]

Writing by William V. Wells (published books)

  • William V. Wells, Walker's expedition to Nicaragua (New York: Stringer & Townsend, 1856).[28]
  • William V. Wells, Explorations and adventures in Honduras (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1857).[29]
  • William V. Wells, The life and public services of Samuel Adams (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1865).[30]
  • Oscar T. Shuck (editor), William V. Wells (contributor), Representative and leading men of the Pacific (San Francisco: Bacon and Company, 1870).[31]

Writing about William V. Wells

  • "Adventures in Honduras," a book review in The New York Times, August 1, 1857, p. 2.[32]
  • "Wells's Life and Services of Samuel Adams," a book review in The North American Review, Vol. 102, No. 211 (April 1866), pp. 614–619.[33]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Wells gave his date of birth as February 2, 1826 on his US Passport Application, November 17, 1864. His date of birth is given as January 31, 1826 in Descendants of John Adams, Samuel Adams, Josiah Bartlett, and Carter Braxton, Signers of the Declaration of Independence, Collections of the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia (May 1899), pp.46–70.
  2. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (1865). The life and public services of Samuel Adams: being a narrative of his acts and opinions, and of his agency in producing and forwarding the American Revolution; with extracts from his correspondence, state papers, and political essays. Boston, MA: Little, Brown & Company. OCLC 680973. Retrieved July 24, 2022.
  3. 1 2 Foster, Joseph (1947). Colonel Joseph Foster: his children and grandchildren. Cleveland, Ohio. Retrieved July 21, 2022.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  4. ↑ Perley, Sidney (1889). The Poets of Essex County,Massachusetts: By Sidney Perley (Public domain ed.). S. Perley.
  5. ↑ She was living there in 1834, and may have been living there still in 1837, when the Charleston-based Southern Literary Journal published her ironical short story, "Auto-biography of Amelia Sophia Smink." in its August issue.
  6. ↑ Born in 1784, Sargent was a Gloucester ship's captain and in later life a Roxbury merchant.
  7. 1 2 3 "William Vincent Wells," in the Daily Alta California, June 3, 1876.
  8. ↑ Louis Richard Lull (1826–1894). Wells's father, Thomas Wells, married as his first wife, Belinda Lull (1794–1818) who was Louis Lull's half-sister.
  9. ↑ Simmons, Hutchinson & Co.
  10. ↑ Howe, Octavius Thorndike (1923). Argonauts of '49. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Retrieved July 21, 2022.
  11. ↑ "Publication of the so called Secret Circular". Sacramento Daily Union. Vol. 7, no. 942. March 31, 1854. Retrieved August 6, 2022.
  12. ↑ "Retired," Sacramento Daily Union, March 20, 1854.
  13. 1 2 Record of the Class of 1837 in Yale College. New Haven, CT. 1873. pp. 110–119. Retrieved February 8, 2022.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  14. ↑ "San Francisco Correspondence". Sierra Citizen. January 13, 1855. Retrieved August 6, 2022.
  15. ↑ Wells, William V. (1857). Explorations and Adventures in Honduras (First ed.). New York: Harper & Brothers. Retrieved March 18, 2022.
  16. ↑ "Honduras". The New York Times. August 1, 1857. Retrieved August 6, 2022.
  17. ↑ "Brevities," in the Daily Alta California, August 7, 1874.
  18. ↑ "Benefit of Mrs. W.V. Wells" in the Daily Alta California, February 15, 1880.
  19. ↑ Note: the Masonic Cemetery was located west of Masonic Avenue, north of Turk Boulevard, and east of Parker Avenue. The cemetery closed in the late 1930s, and bodies were exhumed and moved to Colma, California.
  20. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (July 1855). "Broad Away – No. 1". The Pioneer Magazine. 4 (1): 26–33. Retrieved August 7, 2022.
  21. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (October 1856). "Wild Life in Oregon". Harper's New Monthly Magazine. 13 (77): 588–608. Retrieved March 16, 2022.
  22. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (April 1860). "How We Get Gold in California". Harper's New Monthly Magazine. 20 (119): 598–616. Retrieved March 16, 2022.
  23. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (March 1861). "Fishing Adventures on the Newfoundland Banks". The O. 22 (130): 456–471. Retrieved March 18, 2022.
  24. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (June 1863). "The Quicksilver Mines of New Almaden". Harper's New Monthly Magazine. 27 (47): 25–41. Retrieved March 17, 2022.
  25. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (November 1865). "Ascent of Popocatepetl". Harper's New Monthly Magazine. 31 (186): 681–699. Retrieved March 17, 2022.
  26. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (July 1868). "High Noon of the Empire". The Overland Monthly. 1 (1): 21–28. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  27. ↑ Wells, William Vincent (August 1868). "A Court Ball at the Palace of Mexico". The Overland Monthly. 1 (2): 105–112. Retrieved July 7, 2022.
  28. ↑ Wells, William V. (1856). Walker's Expedition to Nicaragua (First ed.). New York: Stringer & Townsend. Retrieved March 18, 2022.
  29. ↑ Wells, William V. (1857). Explorations and Adventures in Honduras (First ed.). New York: Harper & Brothers. Retrieved March 18, 2022.
  30. ↑ Wells, William V. (1865). The Life and Public Services of Samuel Adams (First ed.). Boston: Little, Brown, and Company. ISBN 9780608395357. Retrieved March 18, 2022.
  31. ↑ Shuck, Oscar T. (1870). Representative and Leading Men of the Pacific. San Francisco, CA, USA: Bacon and Company. Retrieved March 18, 2022.
  32. ↑ "Adventures in Honduras". The New York Times. August 1, 1857. Retrieved March 18, 2022.
  33. ↑ The North American Review, vol. 102, no. 211, University of Northern Iowa, 1866, pp. 614–19, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25107936.
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