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| Field name | Value |
|---|---|
| Title | An account book for the Julia Ann (1845-1846) |
| Archival Reference | MS 1277 |
| Sub-collection | William A. Leidesdorff collection, 1834-1857, 1928 |
| Date | 24 Jun 1834-20 Jun 1847 |
| Document Type | Business and financial document; Non-governmental organization document |
| Contents | Miscellaneous accounts and other business records 1847-1848 detailing the transactions of Leidesdorff with prominent early settlers such as J. Limantour, Thomas O Larkin, Vincente Peralta, and Captain Guillermo Richardson.. Includes an account book for the 'trading schooner' named the Julia Anna. |
| Sub-collection Information | William Alexander Leidesdorff was born in 1810 in the Danish West Indies. His father, Alexander Leidesdorff, was a Dane, and his mother, Anna Maria Spark, was a creole of mixed-race ancestry. After conducting trade in New Orleans, Leidesdorff came to California in 1841 as master of the schooner Julia Ann, making frequent trips between San Francisco (then Yerba Buena) and Honolulu to sell hides and tallow. In 1843, he purchased a lot in Yerba Buena at the corner of Clay and Kearny streets, building a large warehouse on the waterfront in 1844 and the City Hotel in 1846. Naturalized as a Mexican citizen in 1844, Leidesdorff obtained a 35,000-acre land grant on the American River known as Rancho Río de los Americanos. A prominent merchant and landowner, Leidesdorff also served in a number of civic positions, including United States vice-consul to Mexico (appointed by Thomas Larkin in 1845) and treasurer of San Francisco. Leidesdorff died of typhus in 1848, leaving behind a vast estate without a wife or children to claim it. Legal entanglements and litigation ensued: the public administrator of the estate, William Davis Merry Howard, was removed in 1849; and Captain Joseph Libby Folsom travelled to St. Croix to locate Leidesdorff’s heirs (his mother Anna Maria Spark and her children) and purchase the title of the estate from them. After Spark discovered the enormous value of her son’s property, she refused to accept further payment from Folsom and contested the contract. Represented by Halleck, Peachy & Billings, Folsom eventually won the suit; he died in 1855, leaving the Leidesdorff-Folsom estate to be administered by his attorneys. |
| Region | American Southwest, California & Mexico |
| Subjects | Banking and Finance Naval and Maritime Fur Trade Commerce and Trade Pay and Wages Domestic Life and Living Conditions Children and Family Livestock |
| Places | Monterrey; Canaca; San Gorgonio; San Francisco; California |
| People | Leidesdorff, William Alexander (1810-1848) Cooper, John B.R. Larkin, Thomas Oliver (1802-1858) Duchworthy, Walter Thompson, J.P. Watson, James Shear, N Francisco, Sanchez Davis, William Heath (1822-1909) |
| Themes | Business, Trade & Commerce |
| Library | California Historical Society |
| Copyright | California Historical Society |