Monkey Block San Francisco's Golden History
Monkey Block San Francisco's Golden History
S3 Ep3 Hudson Bay Co. in Yerba Buena and William Glen Rae 1845
The story of the Hudson Bay Company, in Yerba Buena, has been reduced to a few sentences that are very Hudson Bay Company-centric. “That place was miserable, and we didn’t make any money, so we left.” It always felt like the guy who says, “Yeah, well, I didn’t want that job, anyway.”
Today’s episode is peripherally about the English Hudson Bay Company’s short-lived post in Yerba Buena. But, it’s mostly about the people involved at the store, whose credit to that history has been lost over the last two centuries. And, they deserve to have their story retold to a current audience. Maybe, retelling this story today, it can become a part of early San Francisco's history, again. Once you hear the story, you’ll know what I mean.
I will respectfully tell this story, and, need to provide advisement to my listeners that this episode contains a delicate topic that can be challenging for some people. We discuss self-harm and I’ll dance lightly around any details.
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<radio tuning>
I love the Jackson Square area of the San Francisco Financial District, aka the original footprint of Yerba Buena, for how many historical landmark plaques you find when you casually walk around. The area is dense in early San Francisco history and has the plaques to prove it.
There is one historical marker that consistently grabs my attention. I’ve read it several times and something in my gut told me what I’m reading was an oversimplification of the actual story. Like there was something else there I needed to explore. The topic has come up many times in my research and yet, what I’m reading felt off. I wish I could explain it better than ‘a hunch’, but that’s what it is.
The story of the Hudson Bay Company, in Yerba Buena, has been reduced to a few sentences that are very Hudson Bay Company-centric. “That place was miserable, and we didn’t make any money, so we left.” It always felt like the guy who says, “Yeah, well, I didn’t want that job, anyway.”
Today’s episode is peripherally about the English Hudson Bay Company’s short-lived post in Yerba Buena. But, it’s mostly about the people involved at the store, whose credit to that history has been lost over the last two centuries. And, they deserve to have their story retold to a current audience. Maybe, retelling this story today, it can become a part of early San Francisco's history, again. Once you hear the story, you’ll know what I mean.
I will respectfully tell this story, and, need to provide advisement to my listeners that this episode contains a delicate topic that can be challenging for some people. We discuss self-harm and I’ll dance lightly around any details.
If you’re ready, here we go… <swoosh>
It’s 1840 and the English-based Hudon Bay Company, the oldest chartered company in the world, decides to open a post on the Westcoast in addition to their already existing 1831 post in Stockton. This was the world’s largest company, so decisions weren’t made willy-nilly. Their assessment was based on analyzing the Westcoast’s major trading locations, Monterey, Santa Barbara, San Pedro, San Diego, Yerba Buena, and San Luis Obispo. Oregon was also considered but was a distant second to California.
Location-wise, Monterey was an obvious choice, but it already had well-established merchant stores, so it would be hard to compete in that market. San Pedro was the next best choice, except for location (I’ll get into that in a second) and the associated startup costs with that town were also a negative. Yerba Buena? It only had two merchant stores, so not much competition, yet a lot of money was moving in and out of that year-round protected, and safe to anchor any time of year, Yerba Buena Cove. <ding>
Yerba Buena was quietly on the map specifically because of the hide and tallow smuggling after sea otters were nearly hunted to extinction, so Yerba Buena was an up-and-coming. Based on their analysis, Yerba Buena was the best overall choice.
But, other countries, including Mexico, feared Hudson Bay’s interest in starting that Westcoast location was really England’s attempt at monopolizing trading before taking over Alta California.
Jacob Primer Leese currently owns the shorefront storehouse (part store part house), which he initially started in 1836 up the hill on current-day Grant Ave, and in 1838, moved to the shorefront location to become the very first house on current-day Montgomery Street. After three years, in 1841, Leese had done so well in three years that he planned to sell his house store and retire with his wife and kids in Sonoma.
Leese’s Yerba Buena store was ideally located half a block up from the actual water’s edge, at current day Montgomery and Commercial Street, now called Emperor Norton Place of Commercial Street. You have to walk halfway up that block to ‘be there’ at the actual spot.
In 1841, Yerba Buena, despite only having six houses/families, was producing enough revenue for the Hudson Bay Company to consider opening a post. And, with Leese selling his house store, which has proven to be a money maker, they purchased Yerba Buena’s most expensive property to set up shop. It’s like buying a rental property that already generates rental income. You know what it can produce.
Leese sells his property to the Hudson Bay Company for $4,600 dollars ($162,739 today). Not bad considering he purchased the land for $25 ($827 today).
From the “Journal of Henry A. Peirce” on November 30, 1841, Pierce calls this Yerba Buena purchase “the best of the not more than half a dozen houses”. The house is said to be the first two-story house in Yerba Buena, made of wood with wood shingles in an old-fashioned Dutch style. It stood out from the other five houses for several reasons. The Hudon Bay Company’s analysis determined it would cost more to build a house, and of the six houses, there weren’t any houses to rent. So, the purchase of a house was literally their only choice.
James Douglas, a Hudson Bay employee, took part in the initial analysis and noted that the company will “Have to learn the language and become accustomed to the peculiar manners of the people, and the routine of business pursued in California before they can compete on even terms. From the growing trade and importance of San Francisco, I consider it the most favorable point for a mercantile house.” This is a side note, but please note it’s 1841 and he used San Francisco to describe Yerba Buena, as was commonly done everywhere in the world except in California, where the young Yerba Buena and the long-established District of San Francisco existed side by side.
So, Douglas warned Hudson Bay they would need to adapt business and assimilate to the country if they wanted to be successful. Let’s see how this goes.
With the newly purchased house store, William Glen Rae is put in charge of heading up the company’s first permanent post on the West Coast. Who is William Glen Rae? He’s the main character in today’s story.
Let’s discuss that main character before arriving to the West Coast.
<swoosh> Rae was born in 1808 in Orkney, Scottland, the son of a Hudson Bay Company agent. He moved to Canada in 1827, and in 1837, Rae married Eloisa McLoughlin, a woman who was ¼ Ojibwe and ¾ Western European. Eloisa’s father was also an employee of the Hudson Bay Company as was her grandfather.
In 1839, Eloisa gives birth to their first child, John. Then, shortly after giving birth, baby John, Eloisa and Rae move to a Hudson Bay Russian Alaska outpost where Rae is made Clerk in Charge. Eloisa writes that living was tough in Fort Stikine where “hard drinking and fighting was a way of life”.
Thankfully, for her family, or so she thought, two years later, in 1841, Rae gets a new assignment in California, so they hop on the ship Beaver where, while in transit, she gives birth to their second child, a girl named Margaret Glen on March 21, 1841. Eloisa is a tough woman and from what I found, she proves that over and over.
Eloisa describes Yerba Buena as “a vibrant, interesting Spanish community in the growing town”.
Despite a California drought that started in 1840, and a near-extinction sea otter population, the Hudson Bay Company, without having yet transitioned themselves to hide and tallow trading, continued with opening the Yerba Buena post in 1841. California has pivoted to hide and tallow by this point, so Hudson Bay is late to the party.
Rae, in a letter from October 14th, 1841 writes to his Hudson Bay manager, who happens to be his father-in-law, “This has been the most unfavorable season for California that the oldest inhabitant in it, recollects. Since February 1840, there has been little, or no rain, and the consequence is a total failure of the crops, the quantity sown not being reaped, in most cases a scarcity for grass which has so much reduced the cattle that the farmers are unwilling to kill them as they would obtain only the hide.” If your cows are skinny because you don’t have the rain to produce what they need to eat, you aren’t going to get much tallow or meat from a skinny cow. Just a small hide. Or, you can hold off on the slaughter and hope for more rain later on. And, that is what California Rancheros did.
Speaking of rain, just the year before the drought, William Heath Davis Junior wrote about the winter of 1839 -to early 1840, saying the Bay Area had 40 straight days of heavy rain, yet the following two years (that the Hudson Bay Company arrived during), will be a drought.
The Hudson Bay Company is off to a rough start just based on weather conditions, a shortage of hide and tallow, sea otters, but also related to their lack of experience in ‘how things work around here’.
Let’s discuss how the Hudson Bay Company struggled to acclimate in California. In 1841, when the Hudson Bay Company intended to bring in their first ship with merchandise, they asked the Mexican government if they could bring their merchandise first to Yerba Buena without first going to Monterey to pay taxes. <record scratch> I guess they either didn’t know or didn’t want to know, how smuggling worked in California? You don’t ask for permission.
From Mexico’s side, they know a large ship from a large company will be coming in. First stopping in Monterey is the legal way to do business, and this is how they legally make their money. In this case, means big dollars/pounds are arriving. But the Hudson Bay Company assumed because they were the Hudson Bay Company they could ask for such a favor and receive it. They learned how little Mexico cared who they were and were equally unprepared for the greeting they would receive on that first visit.
Douglas recounted, “The request was denied; accordingly, the Cowlitz sailed for Monterey, where she was promptly boarded by six officers of the customs who flocked down to our vessel like vultures to their prey," After the realization that their big name didn’t call the shots, duties were paid and the goods headed for the San Francisco. I can’t find the source to support this but I did read that on their first visit, the duties and taxes were 50% of the merchandise's worth, which was not an unusual story for those who didn’t know to conceal the expensive merchandise, or offload it before pulling into the port, and in addition to these things, to bribe the customs agent.
Despite all that upfront analysis, Hudson Bay didn’t understand, or want to understand, the dance you did once you arrived in California. But, the taxes and duty thing, they were warmly welcomed.
In 1842, Simpson writes, "Among the light-hearted and easy-tempered Californians, the virtue of hospitality knows no bounds; they literally vie with each other in devoting their time, their homes, and their means, to the entertainment of a stranger."
But, despite all that hospitality, Hudson Bay now attempted to have their ships licensed, so they didn’t have to pay the duties and taxes each time. But, that request was also denied. <whomp-whomp>.
Douglas admitted, “Our way of doing business is not going to produce a profit”.
Doing business with Californios was a delicate courtship from the moment you anchored offshore at any official port of entry. You danced with the customs agent. Told them how wonderful their country was and how well they looked. Their wife was the most beautiful of all ladies. That was before you started the bribery.
After you complete that bribery, and come on land, or even if you bypassed the legal port of entry and go right to Yerba Buena (unannounced, Hudson Bay Company), then you establish friendships, which was at least one, if not two days, before talking business with the individuals on land. In Alta California, you showed you were invested in a long-term relationship by selling merchandise on credit, to be paid over the next two or three years…or at all. This showed you trusted them enough to pay you back…in time, or ever. An example of ‘or ever’ was John Sutter who notoriously made large purchases on credit and never payed anyone back.
Maloney, Alice B. “Hudson’s Bay Company in California” writes that the Hudson Bay Company did not allow for selling on credit and that made Rae’s job of doing business in California even harder. Never mind the dwindling sea otter population and the drought that was hindering the hide and tallow Rae was supposed to be selling merchandise for. Hudson Bay Company wasn’t willing to acclimate to Alta California.
In a letter Rae wrote from Yerba Buena, November 1, 1842 to his bosses boss, Sir George Simpson, providing an update of the first few months of business. This is one paragraph from his lengthy letter, “The trade here has been very much depressed the past year, on account of the number of vessels on the Coast and the great influx of goods. The collections consequently have been much smaller than was expected and the merchants have been disappointed. Not less than fourteen vessels having been in this bay and many with larger amounts out than the Company.” In the same letter he writes, “I have had many difficulties to struggle with in my business, but on the whole have the pleasure to know that I have succeeded better than any commercial interest here.”
Interestingly, he mentioned in 1842, fourteen ships arrived in Yerba Buena Cove for trading in less than a year. And, with more merchandise than even the Hudson Bay was arriving with, creating an oversupply and less demand. History has understated the actual commerce coming in and out of Yerba Buena, naturally, as it was illegally occurring, before the United States took possession in 1846.
Hudson Bay’s long-established system of cash or barter, and no credit, would not be departed from, despite advice to acclimate. The people of Mexico had no money. They were accustomed to buying their goods from the ships on credit, and eventually paying for them in hides and tallow when they could, not upfront with cash.
By no surprise, Hudson Bay Company found few customers.
It didn’t take long for Alexander Simpson, another Hudson Bay employee, to sour on the idea of Yerba Buena and didn’t feel business was going well after the first year. In 1843, their records show the Hudson Bay Company made $8,758 ($364,272 today). But, William Heath Davis writes that Hudson Bay was doing good business.
Now, doing good business and being profitable can be two different things. And, also to a small operation, perhaps they were doing well, but to the world’s largest company, ‘doing well’ in that context might be small potatoes for them.
Meanwhile, back in Yerba Buena, Rae was making friends and fitting in with his new home. William Heath Davis describes his friend Rae as a tall and handsome Scotsman, of 230 pounds. Davis doesn’t mention that Rae only has one eye, I believe it was from a war-related accident, in 1827. Thomas Larkin describes Rae “of large size, robust and healthy.”
Rae hosted many gambling nights at his house, the nicest house in Yerba Buena, playing the pueblo’s favorite card games, whist and twenty-one. Rae always picked Davis as his partner because these two were considered the best card players in town.
Despite his social persona, Rae’s personal life was challenging. His melancholy and drinking were becoming notable, and daily, characteristics to describe him.
Trouble had been brewing between Californios and Mexico before 1841. The Californios wanted to break free from the Mexican Republic. Rae, despite being warned by his employer not to get involved with local politics, did just that. He became sympathetic to Alvarado and the Californios and provided guns and ammunition … and a loan to help Californios fight for independence from Governor Micheltorena. Unfortunately, California’s independence didn’t happen. Before anyone makes assumptions, based on the wording of a letter, that I’ll soon mention, I believe this was Rae’s own personal money, not the Hudson Bay’s money that he used to help fund the failed fight for independence.
Between the ammunition, the guns and the loans, we are talking $15,000 ($607,478 today). And, he’s a foreigner getting involved in local politics. To the Mexican Republic, this made him the enemy. To the Californios, they celebrated him.
After this situation, things became hostile for Rae and he feared the governor would punish him and the company for interfering after warning him not to get involved. Had Rae helped Mexico’s governor in the same way, I’m not sure this would have been seen as a problem. But, we will never know.
For certain, Rae was a heavy drinker and grew more melancholy with the weeks. Also for certain, Rae was tired of being blamed for the company’s failure in Yerba Buena. It weighed heavily on him.
The Hudson Bay Company, without having the opportunity to tell Rae (that’s another story on how that happened), decided the Yerba Buena post wasn’t as successful as they had hoped for and started the process of closing it down. Rae was seen as the reason for the failure. Again, Rae was unaware the company had decided to shut it down.
For my listeners who may be sensitive to certain topics, be advised this is where the story gets delicate if you want to continue to listen. I tell the rest of the story will respect.
A few days before January 18, 1845, Rae was having suicidal thoughts fearing he would be killed by local militants for backing the loser of the skirmish. He expressed these thoughts about killing himself to his wife, who desperately tried to talk him out of it.
Eloisa is literally days away from giving birth to their third child. Days, dear listeners. She pleaded with, him not to act on it.
On the evening of January 18, 1845, Rae wrote two letters. One letter stating in his absence, he leaves the HBC, and all his other business dealings, outstanding bills, and investments to his partner, Alexander Forbes to manage. He also has a few words for the Hudson Bay Company. The other letter is regarding his wife and children, to be sent to Oregon to live with family, in his absence.
Given the public nature of my podcast, I’m skipping the details with what comes next.
About 8 o’clock, the next morning, on January 19, 1845, Rae dies by a self-inflicted gun wound in his storehouse. There were witnesses when this occurred. The pueblo was hit hard by this news and the shock ran all the way down to Monterey.
Local speculation about the reason for his death ran rampant. From the salacious to the financial.
· That his wife discovered he had a mistress.
· That he got involved financially with the local politics.
· That he was blamed for the Yerba Buena HB store failure.
Rae’s boss and father-in-law, devastated over the news, felt it was Rae’s guilt over the store’s failing. His father-in-law spent the rest of his life mourning Rae’s death, feeling guilty for not defending Rae more than he did to the company.
Davis, writes in his book, “Seventy-Five Years in California” that Rae’s affair with a Californiana became public. And Rae, being a sensitive man, was embarrassed. Davis said Rae couldn’t forgive himself for what he had done to his wife and kids.
The only thing everyone agreed on was that Rae’s drinking and melancholy likely played the biggest role in his death.
Rae’s passing left a gap in Yerba Buena. Despite his faults, he was very well-liked.
When news of Rae’s unexpected death reached the Hudson Bay Company in England, they closed the Yerba Buena post sooner than planned.
Later that year, in December 1845 Mellus and Howard buy the now empty building from the Hudson Bay Company.
Yerba Buena wasn’t meant to be for the Hudson Bay Company, yet had they just held on a little bit longer…
Seven months later, in July 1846, the US takes possession of California and now under US control the previous trading difficulties, aka taxes, duties and bribery were removed, and the trading business boomed.
And then, in January 1848, with the discovery of gold, Yerba Buena exploded, and the Mellus and Howard store in 1849 expanded to Sacramento, Los Angeles, and San Jose. That could have been the Hudson Bay Company … had they approached California differently.
DIFFICULTIES
Davis said of his close friend:
“Rae was much respected. He was liberal to those less favored by circumstances than himself, frequently giving little presents to persons who came to his store of things most needed by them. His table was always finely supplied with the best of everything, and he had a generous sideboard and entertained a great deal of company.”
“Spear and Rae were the chief entertainers. There being no hotels at that time, the hospitality of the town mostly upon these gentlemen. The captains, supercargoes and other strangers were always welcome at Rae’s house, and it was a pleasure to him to entertain them. He had the true California nature and feeling in this respect.”
Rae was ultimately buried at the Mission Dolores Cemetery. Ultimately. There’s more to his burial story. The details don’t seem appropriate in my podcast.
In doing my research to verify Rae was actually buried at the Mission Dolores cemetery, I noticed two William Rae’s. William Glen Rae and … William Rae Junior who was less than a month old when he was buried next to his father. Elouisa lost her husband and her newborn baby within two or three weeks of each other.
Epilogue
The details are now lost from the Yerba Buena Hudson Bay Company story. And, the lives of William Glen Rae and his wife Eloisa are hidden within the historically accurate landmark plaque that reads, “On this block, then on Yerba Buena’s waterfront, stood the California headquarters of the Hudson Bay Company. In 1841, William Glen Rae purchased the property and started operations. This venture caused wide speculation about British intentions. Inadequate profits, a declining fur catch, and pressure of U.S. expansion caused Hudon Bay Company to end California Operations.”
This is my opinion. The Hudson Bay Company didn’t fail in Yerba Buena for one or two reasons. Maybe their expectations were unrealistic from the beginning.
Certainly, the long communication times between England and California, the drought, their unwillingness to assimilate to California’s way of doing business, Rae’s involvement with local politics, his alcoholism, and his depression were also factors.
But, a huge factor was the United States’ Manifest Destiny. Things were becoming hostile for all non-Americans, Californios included, as Americans began moving into California to claim it for the United States, one year later, in 1846.
Nathan Spear and William Heath Davis had a successful merchant store on the next block. Leese did so well with his store that he retired early. But, the Hudson Bay Company did not.
Per Rae’s request, Elouisa and her two surviving children moved to Oregon. Her story continued along with her willingness to survive over and over.
There are two very well-written resources I mostly used for this episode. “The Hudson Bay Company in San Francisco” by Anson S Blake for the California Historical Society 1949 and the second part titled the same with (Concluded). I have links in my transcripts.
I provide more information about Rae’s final letters, and the story regarding all his burial locations at www.buymeacoffee.com/monkeyblocksf go to the Post section.
You can find all of today’s cited and uncited sources at https://monkeyblocksf.buzzsprout.com/
Interact with Monkey Block at facebook.com/MonkeyBlockSF, where I post photos and comments about upcoming episodes and other early San Francisco randomness. or find us at twitter.com/monkeyblocksf Honestly, I don’t really do much with the Twitter site.
Thank you for listening. This is Monkey Block, retelling forgotten stories, about people and their role in San Francisco’s golden past.
Eloisa McLoughlin Rae
https://www.nps.gov/people/eloisamcloughlin.htm
Buried William Glen Rae at Mission Dolores
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/111655881/william-glen-rae
Blake, Anson S. “The Hudson’s Bay Company in San Francisco.” California Historical Society Quarterly 28, no. 2 (1949): 97–112. https://doi.org/10.2307/25156161.
Blake, Anson S. “The Hudson’s Bay Company in San Francisco (Concluded).” California Historical Society Quarterly 28, no. 3 (1949): 243–58. https://doi.org/10.2307/25156182.
Maloney, Alice B. “Hudson’s Bay Company in California.” Oregon Historical Quarterly 37, no. 1 (1936): 9–23. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20610973.
Burns, Thomas P. “The History of a Montgomery Street Lot in Yerba Buena from November 4, 1837, to June 14, 1850.” California Historical Society Quarterly 11, no. 1 (1932): 69–72. https://doi.org/10.2307/25178122.
Where Rae was originally buried
Watson, Douglas S., and Wash’n A. Bartlett. “An Hour’s Walk through Yerba Buena, Which Later Became San Francisco.” California Historical Society Quarterly 17, no. 4 (1938): 291–302. https://doi.org/10.2307/25160797.
Voght, Martha. “Scots in Hispanic California.” The Scottish Historical Review 52, no. 154 (1973): 137–48. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25529017.
His letters are here.
The Beginnings of San Francisco – details about his reburial.