A Western Tragedy

In 1961, Ox-Bow Incident author Walter Van Tilburg Clark left a teaching position in San Francisco and returned to his boyhood home Nevada to take on the job of editing The Journals of Alfred Doten.

These 79 leather-bound notebooks were written by one of the original 49ers, Alfred Doten. Spanning half a century, they are one of the best primary sources of the American West.

On Sunday March 18, 1849, the 19-year-old Alf starts his first diary on board the ship to California, where gold has just been discovered at Sutter's Mill. After a six-month voyage 'round the horn' he steps off the ship in San Francisco as an innocent, observant young man who disapproves of heavy drinking, violence, womanizing and greed. Over the next dozen years he roves across much of Northern California, trying his luck in mining camps and 'diggins' with names like places like Hangtown, Fort Grizzly and Spanish Gulch, and then moving on as he fails to strike it rich. He begins writing letters about the Wild West to his home-town newspaper in Plymouth, Mass.

In 1855 Alf suffers a mining accident when he is caught in a cave-in. For a while he is paralyzed from the waist down but gradually recovers. This incident knocks the stuffing out of him. He limps back to San Francisco, where his sister lives, and he tries to settle down at farming and ranching.

With his physical recovery comes copper fever, and then silver fever. In 1863, he crosses the Sierra Nevadas into the Washoe Valley for the great Comstock Silver Boom. He settles in Como, a new mining camp south of Mount Davidson, makes a final stab at prospecting, and fails again. Alf tries to set up a newspaper in Como, which also fails, but as a result of this journalistic foray, he is asked to join the Daily Union newspaper in Virginia City. Here he overlaps with another prospector-turned-Virginia-City-reporter, Mark Twain, by a few months.

In May of 1864, 29-year-old Mark Twain leaves for San Francisco. 43-year-old Alf settles down in Virginia City and is soon drawn into the amoral lifestyle of a rough mining town which inspired TV's Deadwood. By his mid 40's Alf has become a debauched, adulterous, greedy alcoholic who relishes lynchings, bear-baiting and cock-fights. He marries and has four children, puts on weight through heavy drinking, makes some bad business decisions and finally ends his life in Carson City as a 'bitter and lonely old bar-fly, the town drunk and figure of fun.'

As he copied out the Alf Doten journals by hand - and collated the numerous articles, certificates and photographs in the Records of Alfred Doten - Clark became caught up in the life of the aging 49er. He writes that the diaries presented in graphic and often moving detail the tragic course of single representative life through the violent transformations enforced by the... amoral life of the California Gold Rush and the Nevada Silver Rush. know of no other account of the kind, or fiction either, for that matter, which even begins to to this as fully and memorably as Alf's Journals.

For a time, Clark entertained the idea of writing a novel based on the life of Alf Doten, but he suffered terribly from writer's block in his later years. This was partly caused by his perfectionist streak, but may also have been partly due to the depressing nature of the Doten Diaries, in which he was immersed. In the forward to the massive three volume diaries, Clark's son writes that after a long day transcribing the diaries his father often wondered whose life he was living, and whether he would outlast Doten.

It must have been hard for Clark not to be affected by the decline and fall of Alf Doten. Clark himself said: '... I am so much the walking dust of Alf Doten now that I fear even high breezes will dispel me.'

On the few occasions when Walter Van Tilburg Clark surfaced from the diaries to give public lectures, he held audiences enthralled for hours. One contemporary wrote: 'He lectured for three hours. Nobody left. Nobody left and it is a crime that we did not tape that...'

Clark died of cancer in 1971, just as he finished editing Doten's journals.

It had taken him ten years.

It is a tragedy that Clark never wrote his novel about Alf Doten. But at least he has left three fat volumes of one of the most fascinating accounts of what life in the wild West was really like.

The Ox-Bow Man - a biography of Walter Clark by Jackson J. Benson
The Journals of Alfred Doten edited by Walter Van Tilburg Clark
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Ox-bow Incident

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In 1940, a young high school English teacher named Walter Van Tilburg Clark published his first novel, one of the first anti-Westerns. The Ox-Bow Incident is the story of two Nevada cowboys - Gil Carter and Art Croft (the first person narrator) - who get caught up in a lynch mob and its tragic results. The book became an immediate classic and film rights were bought within a year of its publication, then re-sold. In 1942 20th Century Fox produced a film also called The Ox-Bow Incident, starring Henry Fonda, Harry Morgan, Dana Andrews and a delightfully young Anthony Quinn.

When I was at high school in California, The Ox-Bow Incident was required reading. I remember I found it hard-going. I recently picked it up again, and still found it hard-going. Although I love Clark's vivid descriptions of the Nevada desert, by today's standards the plot is very slow-moving. For me the biggest flaw is the great number of characters, each described vividly the first time but never again. I had trouble keeping them all straight and found myself flipping back to see who was who.

For me, the film overcomes many of the book's drawbacks. The twenty-plus characters are easily identified when you see and hear them. The interiors and exteriors are dramatic. (Although some of the outdoor scenes were glaringly filmed on a set and not on location.)

In the book, the contents of a letter written by one of the hanged men is never revealed. In the film, Gil Carter (Henry Fonda) reads the letter aloud to all the men in the lynch mob in the penultimate scene in the saloon. (below) In this moving scene, Carter's eyes are obscured by the hat brim of Art Croft (Harry Morgan). This is obviously a carefully framed composition. What does it signify? That justice is blind? That the characters were blind? That we can't always see the whole picture?


The final scene of the film is a perfect bookmark to the opening scene of the film.

Though dated, I found The Ox-Bow Incident deeply moving. It was a nominee for the Academy Award in 1943, but lost out to Casablanca.

Clark taught creative writing at the University of Missoula in Montana and San Francisco State before moving to Reno to become the writer-in-residence at the University of Nevada. A strikingly handsome man, even into his 60's, Clark often wore the same clothes: blue socks, grey slacks, a blue turtleneck and a maroon jacket. He died in Virginia City in 1971, aged 62.

Clark wrote several other novels, as well as some poetry - and he edited the extensive diaries of Alf Doten - but he never wrote anything as acclaimed as that first novel. I suggest you see the film The Ox-Bow Incident first, and then read the book.
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Fun Chariot Facts

by Caroline Lawrence, author of The Roman Mysteries

1. Circus is Latin for circle. In the context of racing, it means the chariot racing-track or hippodrome. The Circus Maximus in Rome was the biggest one and seated nearly a quarter of a million* (250,000) people.

2. Unlike the heavy chariots used in most Hollywood depictions, (including all the Ben Hur films), racing chariots were very light and small. They needed to go as fast as possible, and were probably made of wicker and leather. Driving one would have been like surfing a basket on wheels.

3. Most chariots were pulled by ungelded stallions; two for a biga (2-horse chariot) and four for a quadriga (4-horse chariot). As many as 12 teams ran in each race.

Re-enactor from Nîmes should have reins round his waist

4. A charioteer would tie the leather reins around his waist and put a sharp knife in his belt. If he was thrown from his chariot he would try to cut himself free as he was being dragged along. Whenever a chariot crashed, the crowd would yell out 'naufragium!' which means 'shipwreck!' in Latin.

5. Chariots completed seven circuits, marked by dolphins (sacred to Neptune, god of the sea and also of horses) and eggs (sacred to Castor and Pollux).

Charioteer of the Blue faction from Ostia

6. Charioteers wore leather helmets and jerkins in green, blue, red or white: the colours of their factions (teams).

7. Some charioteers began training while they were still children, and many stars of the hippodrome would have been in their teens.

8. A charioteer or horse who had won over a thousand races was called a miliarius.

9. Chariot racing was the most popular spectator sport in ancient Rome – even more popular than gladiatorial combats. Races were not held every day, but only on special occasions or festival days.

10. The Circus represented the Cosmos and every aspect of the hippodrome was symbolic:

The obelisk on the spina (central island) represented the sun.
The water of the euripus (canal in the spina) represented the sea.
The race track itself represented the earth around the sea.
The 4 faction colours represented the four seasons:
(red = summer, blue = autumn, white = winter, green = spring)
The 7 laps the horses had to run represented the days of the week.
The 12 carceres (starting gates) represented the months of the year.
The 24 races held per day represented the hours of the day.
(Yes, Romans divided their days into 24 hours, too)

11. Boys called sparsores had the dangerous job of running onto the track to sprinkle water on the track to keep down the blinding, choking dust. They got the water from the central reservoir and used pots, bowls or water skins to sprinkle it. It was a dangerous job and they sometimes got trampled. 

12. Winners in a chariot race received three things: 
A palm branch to symbolise victory.
A 'crown' (usually a wreath) also standing for victory. 
A purse of money as a prize to be spent, perhaps split between charioteer and the owner of the faction. 


The title of my 12th Roman Mystery, The Charioteer of Delphi, is based on a famous statue from Greece. But it was still buried at the time my book is set, so I couldn't refer to it in the story. Instead, I tell the story of how a Greek youth from Delphi named Scopas might have become Scorpus, one of the most famous charioteers in Roman history.

You can watch modern re-enactors playing with chariots HERE.

illustration by Richard Russell Lawrence © Copyright Roman Mysteries Ltd.

*At a conference in London in June 2014, scholar Tayfun Oner says this figure is far too big. He reckons the Circus Maximus could take only 100,000 people. You can watch his visualisation of a race in the hippodrome of Constantinople HERE.

Read about the only circus found in Britain (so far) HERE.

Four factions clearly visible in this mosaic from Rome

[The Charioteer of Delphi and all the Roman Mysteries are perfect for children aged 9+, especially those studying Romans as a topic in Key Stage 2. Carrying on from the Roman Mysteries, the Roman Quests series set in Roman Britain launched in May 2016 with Escape from Rome.]

P.S. This blog was updated August 2016 for the 6th screen adaptation of Lew Wallace's Ben Hur: A Tale of the Christ 

Mystery of Topless Twain

by Caroline Lawrence, author of the Western Mysteries

I was reading Paul Fatout's Mark Twain in Virginia City the other day and came across this interesting observation: 'Among the many pictures of Mark Twain, not one is smiling...'

I looked through my own archives and found that indeed, there seem to be no pictures of Mark Twain smiling. How surprising for America's foremost humorist, dry humorist notwithstanding...

One explanation might be that Twain's bushy mustache - adopted in around 1864 - hid any upturning of the corners of the mouth.

Another explanation might be that like certain actors of the 60's - the 1960's, that is: not the 1860's - he had bad teeth and was loath to expose them. My dad once told me that is why the French actor Jean-Louis Trintignant rarely smiled.

scar on his upper lip?

Or do I detect a scar on the right upper lip in this photo of him still in his teens? Where did he get the scar? Was it an embarrassing reminder of something?

Another explanation might be that Victorian subjects did not often smile for photos.

However, neither did they take off their shirts to reveal manly, hairy chests.

When I tweeted for help, asking if there really were no pictures of him smiling, @TwainHouse came up with the startling image at the top of this post. (I have used my usual photoshop filter to make it look more striking. You can see the original, undoctored image HERE.)

Now I know that American photographers of the 1860s - 1890s often photographed corpses and bawdy girls, but never have I seen a topless literary lion like Mark Twain.

Why, oh why?

Olivia "Livy" Clemens

Had he just emerged from a hot mine? Or a hot bath?

Was this a medical picture for the benefit of his doctor?

Was it a romantic Valentine's Day photo for his wife, Livy?

Was it because he lost a bet? Or won a bet?

Maybe he was just proud to be in such good shape at the age of 48 or 49.

One clue might be the date of the photo.

@mtpo, the Mark Twain Project at the Bancroft Library in Berkeley, say the photo was taken in 1884 by Towlueson in Hartford, Connecticut. What was Mark Twain doing in 1884? According to the excellent TIMELINE at Mark Twain House, he was on a lecture tour. Huckleberry Finn was to be published in the last month of that year. Could it be that Mark Twain decided to take his own raft trip down the Mississippi?

Perhaps someone from The Mark Twain Project or the Mark Twain House will enlighten me.

In the meantime, I can't help recalling one of Mark Twain's funniest quips: 'Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.'

[The Case of the Deadly Desperados features the 26-year-old reporter Sam Clemens who will soon  take the nom de plume Mark Twain. This Western Mystery for kids aged 9 - 90 is available in hardback, Kindle and audio download. It will be published by G.P. Putnam's Sons in the USA in February.]

Dark & Stormy Night

It was a dark and stormy night in the Roman port of Ostia, and Flavia Gemina was in a bad mood.

‘Oh, Pollux!’ she cursed, as she pricked her thumb with a needle. ‘I hate mending. And I especially hate mending by lamplight.’

Through the latticework screen of the bedroom window came a chilly gust of night air. It brought the fresh damp smell of rain and it made the flame of the oil lamp tremble. The wind moaned and a distant rumble of thunder growled ominously.

Flavia squeezed her thumb and watched with grim satisfaction as a bead of blood appeared. ‘That will show pater to ask me to do my own mending. Now his only child is bleeding.’

As Flavia looked up to see what Nubia’s reaction would be, she caught a glimpse of herself in the new hand mirror propped up on her bedside table. It was made of tinned bronze, and was twice as big as her old one. The reflection showed a girl’s scowling face. Framed by long, light brown hair, the face had a largish nose, wide mouth, and grey eyes: dark in the dim light of the oil lamp. Displeased, Flavia gave the table a nudge with her elbow and the mirror fell face down.

Its clatter made Nubia look up. She was sitting cross-legged on her bed, grooming her dog Nipur with a boxwood comb. ‘It is better to mend in daylight,’ she said mildly, ‘lest the needle prick you.’


‘I know.’ Flavia squinted down at her mending, ‘but I prefer to use daylight for more important things.’

‘Like reading,’ said Nubia, with a smile.

‘Exactly,’ said Flavia, pushing the needle into the hem of her tunic. ‘I don’t know why pater hired Aristo to teach us Greek if he expects me to spend all day doing needlework. Anyway, Alma should be mending this, not me.’

‘Your pater says every Roman matron should know how to sew and weave.’

‘I hate the word “matron”,’ grumbled Flavia. ‘It sounds so old and stuffy.’

A flash of lightning briefly illuminated the room in eerie silver and black, showing two narrow beds, one with fair-haired Flavia and a golden dog, the other with dark-skinned Nubia and black-furred Nipur. From outside came a deep rumble that ended in a resounding crack of thunder.

At the foot of Flavia’s bed, Scuto lifted his head to give his mistress a reproachful look.

‘Don’t blame me, Scuto,’ said Flavia, without looking up from her mending. ‘This storm isn’t my fault.’

‘I like rain,’ said Nubia, as she worked out a burr from Nipur’s smooth black fur. ‘And I like storms. When you are warm and cozy inside,’ she added. ‘Not when you are outside.’

Suddenly Nipur sat up, growled and gave a single bark.

‘Oh Nipur!’ said Flavia. ‘You’re as bad as Scuto. You’re both as timid as two old mice. There’s nothing to be afraid of.’ As she glanced up at him, she saw the shape of a large man filling the doorway.

Flavia gasped, then pressed her hand to her beating heart. ‘Oh, Caudex,’ she said. ‘You nearly frightened us to death!’

‘Sorry,’ mumbled the big door-slave. ‘Only there’s someone here to see you.’

‘Someone here to see us? At this hour?’ Flavia stared at Nubia in disbelief. ‘And in this weather? Isn’t pater back yet?’

Caudex scratched his armpit and shook his head. ‘He and Aristo are still out,’ he said. ‘Besides, the boy is asking for you by name. Says it’s a matter of life and death.’

‘Life and death?’ Flavia looked at Nubia, and for the first time that evening she smiled. ‘That sounds like a mystery.’ Flavia put down her mending and took her wax tablet from the table. ‘Mysteries always cheer me up. Come on, Nubia. Let’s see what our night visitor wants.’

excerpt from 'The Five Barley Grains', a new mini-mystery from The Legionary from Londinium & Other Mini Mysteries, out early March 2010

:)

Bedbugs Cause Fire!

Virginia City in the 1860's was a tinderbox. Frame houses, tents, open flames and the "Washoe Zephyr" (the strong breeze that often blows for a few days) meant that fire was a constant threat. Reporter Alf Doten was living in Virginia City in 1865. One Sunday evening in August he was attending a show at Maguire's Opera House (below: the big building between the flag and the church) when everyone heard fire alarm bells and rushed outside to see what was burning. Here's the story in his own words, from his Journal:

Sunday, Aug 6 [1865] Clear & pleasant - a little breezy... Evening went to Maguire's - performance commenced & got nearly through to the Walk around when about 9 o'clock the fire bells rang, & all hands rushed - I with the rest - Clark was with me - fire was on east of C st just south of Taylor among a lot of wooden buildings - commenced in an upper story of a paint shop - lodging room, occupied by Sam Brose (formerly of Como) and others - Sam says he was hunting bedbugs with a candle on the wall - wall of cloth and paper caught fire, and he couldnt put it out, it burnt with such rapidity - He caught up what he could and skedadled - Engines were on the ground very promptly, as usual - fire spread to buildings on each side, but it was soon subdued and extinguished - paint shop pretty well destroyed - other buildings but little damaged - loss two or three thousand dollars - Winnie Wright and Pat Barry of the H-L got hurt by some of the falling of an awning upon them - Clark & I went to Music Hall & saw the performance out...

A Western Xmas - 1864

Alf Doten was 19 when gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill in California. He sailed from Plymoth to California to seek his fortune. He spent the next two decades trying to strike gold (or silver) in California and Nevada. Finally in 1864 he went to join the staff of a newspaper in Virginia City Nevada. He overlapped another prospector-turned-Virginia-City-newspaperman by only a few months. That man was Sam Clemens, who had just started to write under the pen name, Mark Twain.

Alf Doten was not as witty or successful as Mark Twain, but he kept detailed journals of his experiences from the day he stepped onto the ship bound for San Francisco until the day he died, in 1909. He left 79 leather-bound journals, with entries in pencil. In 1973, the respected scholar and author of The Ox-Bow Incident, Walter van Tilburg Clark, published The Journals of Alfred Doten in three huge volumes. They offer fascinating glimpses in to the daily life in the American West in the second half of the 19th century.

Here for example, are some of his entries from December 1864, his first Christmas in Virginia City.

above: Alf Doten in 1866, two years after he wrote the entry below

Dec 22 - Clear and pleasant - Went up to Morton's to Forefather's dinner - some 10 or 12 sat at table - chicken roasted, succotash, pies, cakes etc, cider, wine &c - I took a bottle of that champagne along that I stole from the office - jolly time... at 6 1/2 ocl'k went to Consolidation meeting & reported it... in the evening I attended the Ladies Fair for the benefit of the Sisters of Charity...

Dec 24 - Stormy - blustery with light sprinkles of rain occasionally - Christmas eve - after got through work about 11 oclock our boys all pitched into the egg-nog, two pitchers full of which were sent into us by the saloons - sang songs & had a jolly time - drank it all up & then started out - got all the Enterprise boys out - some 15 or 20 of us in all - Dan De Quille also along - visited all the saloons - free drink with all of them - printers on the rampage - went down to Chinatown and kicked up thunder - came back - at 4 oclock Dan & I made out to get clear from the crowd & home to our beds. -

Sunday, Dec 25 - The same - blew like the devil all day - stripped several roofs of tin - blew down buildings and did much damage - Light rain most of the day - rose at 11 - turkey, pudding etc at Mrs Dill's - went up to Morton's dined there also - chicken, pudding, succotash, etc - Evening we attended Sabbath school Festival at St Pauls Church - went from there to Music Hall - then to Great Republic - I slept with Sutterly [sic] at his room -

Clem Sutterley (pictured) was a photographer and friend of Alf Doten

Dec 27 ... Was down with Higbee to visit Jessie Lester who was shot last Sunday night - had to have her right arm amputated at the shoulder joint this afternoon - poor creature, she was just recovering from the taking of chloroform during the operation, and was shrieking with pain - and in her delirium, calling on her mother...

Dec 31 ... I got through about 1 o'clock - run about town couple of hours longer, with Higbee & other policemen - lots of pistols, guns, &c being fired off to welcome in the new year. All over the City - bed at 3 or 4 - So ends 1864

MERRY CHRISTMAS & HAPPY NEW YEAR 145 years on!

Stagecoach #2

In the 1860's there were at least half a dozen stage coaches in and out of Virginia City every day.

In a book called Resources of the Pacific Slope, J. Ross Browne gives details of the routes of a dozen stages in the 1860's. For example, Route #1 went to Sacramento California via the Donner Pass and North Lake Tahoe. It cost $20 to Sacramento but $25 back because that was the most popular direction of travel in the 60's. Another stage went down to Dayton and from there to Como across the Carson Valley. Some stagecoaches went up to an area called Humboldt and from there to Salt Lake City and the east.

As our time in Virginia City is now over, we decide to follow Stagecoach Route #2 to California. J. Ross Brown tells us exactly which towns it passed through: Gold Hill, Silver City, Empire, Carson City, Genoa, Van Sickles Station, then up the Kingsway Grade to Dagget Pass at the summit and down into California via Strawberry, Placerville and Shingle Springs, all the way to Sacramento.


It's a beautiful September morning as we get in our convertible 'stagecoach' and set out from Virginia City to follow this route. We leave at 10.00am, and five minutes later we go over the hump called 'The Divide' which marks the boundary between Virginia City and Gold Hill. The Civil War re-enactors staged a mock battle here in a quarry beside the train tracks. Of course the Civil War never got this far west, and the V&T train wasn't here in 1862, when my first book will be set. However, the Gold Hill Hotel was. It's the oldest hotel in Nevada. Sam Clemens, Dan De Quille and Alf Doten all ate there.

Down the hot, winding road through a pair of dramatic rocks (above) called Devil's Gate. This was a popular place for bandits to lie in wait to rob the stage. An old illustration exaggerates the size of the rocks by putting tiny people between them. Exaggeration was rife in the 1860's... We breathe a sigh of relief as we pass through Devil's Gate into Silver City without incident.

As we pass an abandoned mine just out of Silver City we wave to our friend 'Irish'. He runs the Comstock Gold Mine and Stamp Mill and we met him when he demonstrated how the ore stamps worked and sounded. He is a colourful character who first came to Virginia City as a 16 year old in 1958. LIke many others, the popular TV show Bonanza was what brought this region to his attention. He went back to California to be a roadie for The Grateful Dead and Willie Nelson, but now he has ended up back here in a fabulous 'boys' fort' type of dwelling on the golden, sage-dotted hills.

After Silver City, the road flattens out into the wide flat Carson River Valley. We join Highway 50 here. If we were to go left we would reach Dayton, which might be Nevada's oldest town. My great-grandmother Corinne Prince grew up there. Her father was a teamster, one of those men who drove eight to twelve-mule carriages with loads of ore going out and timber coming back. Corinne probably went to school in the Dayton School house, which was built in 1863 and is now a museum.

But our 'stagecoach' doesn't go left to Dayton. It goes right, west, to Empire. We can't really see any signs of old Empire; New Empire is a suburb of Carson City. But in Carson City we see the old mint, where my great-grandmother worked for a while, and the governor's mansion. Stages might have changed teams here in Carson, as it's about 20 miles from Virginia City.

A road west takes you towards the Sierra Nevada mountains, which are barren and rounded and steep on this side. Then the flat road curves south to Genoa. Originally known as Mormon Station, Genoa is a pleasant surprise. It's green and shady with excellent information about the pioneers and local characters like Snowshoe Joe, who was a mail carrier. Genoa and Dayton have a little rivalry going on as to which of them is the oldest town. Let's just say they are both old, founded in 1851. Richard and I stop for an espresso on the rocks at the delightful Genoa Coffee & Candy Company. We go to see the famous hanging tree before setting out south with a 'fresh team of horses.'

There are hot springs south of Genoa and today David Walley's Hot Springs is a popular place to get married. Half a mile south, on the right of the road, is Van Sickles Station Ranch, now a private residence. Van Sickles was a commissioner and in the early 60's his hotel was the first port of call once you crossed the mountains. With hot water and good food, it must have been a joy for the weary traveller. In winter you could sledge down the eastern Sierras. Van Sickles was famous for shooting a desperado called Sam Brown who had killed half a dozen men. After Sam fired on Van Sickles, the hotel owner went after him with a shotbun. He was later tried and a jury passed a verdict of 'self-defense'.

The eastern side of the Sierra Nevada mountains come straight down and stop dramatically at the flat plain of the Carson Valley. One minute you're on the flat, the next you're climbing the Kingsbury Grade. This wagon road was built by two men named Kingsbury and MacDonald in 1860, it shortened the distance between Virginia City and Sacramento by 15 miles. The road cost $585,000 to build and the builders charged a toll to pay for the road. A wagon and four horses had to pay $17.50 for a round trip from Shingle Springs to Van Sickles Station. The Pony Express used this road, too, for the short period of its existence between 1860 and 1861.

The four-horse team strains as it pulls our stagecoach and up over sparsely wooded eastern slopes with dizzy views down to the flat Carson Valley. Once over Dagget Pass, tall pines and smooth grey granite boulders take over. The summit is over 7400 feet, then down to Lake Tahoe, blue and peaceful in the warm September sun. When we were in Virginia City, we took a ten minute stagecoach ride with Gary. What you don't realise until you try riding as a passenger in one is how claustrophobic it can be. You can't see what's coming and the scenery whizzes by. If you were sitting facing backwards it might have been quite disconcerting. Not good for people who are easily travel-sick. The idea of taking a bone-rattling stagecoach all this way is almost inconceivable. Especially knowing that they sometimes travelled at night around the precipitous bends. Eeek!


After the pass, Richard and I stop at South Lake Tahoe for lunch. In the 1860's people were often malnourished because fresh fruit and veg were almost impossible to find apart from the autumn. We know from J. Ross Browne and others that staple foods were corn-meal, lard, bacon, eggs, potatoes, cabbage, cheese, sugar and coffee, When Sam Clemens arrived in Virginia City in 1862, a man called Rollin M. Daggett remarked that he 'had been living on alkali water and whang leather...' This is an exaggeration, of course, but gives you an idea of the monotony of food back then.

Strawberry was one of the most famous stopping places on the western Sierra Nevada Mountains. There were no strawberries there, but according to some reports, a man called Berry owned the inn and he had straw for the horses. Another article by J. Ross Browne, first published in Harper's Monthly Magazine, December 1860 documents the first wave of prospectors coming over the Sierra Nevadas to mine gold and silver on the Comstock. Some of his most hilarious anecdotes take place at Strawberry.

The illustration above right shows 'Dinner at Strawberry', an illustration from 'A Peep at Washoe'. A light at length glimmered through the pines, first faint and flickering, then a full blaze, then half a dozen brilliant lights, which proved to be camp fires under the tree, and soon we stood in front of a large and substantial log-house. This was the famous Strawberry', known throughout the length and breadth of the land as the best stopping-place on the route to Washoe...

Soon the road shows glimpses of the American River on the left. Further down in Coloma gold was discovered for the first time in 1848 with the cry: 'Gold. Gold in the American River!' The road down the western Sierra Nevadas is a much gentler grade. It takes us into the hot valley and Placerville, which was once known as Hangtown. Placerville was named after 'placer' mining, the method where you pan for gold in an open stream or creek. Placerville's Main Street still has buildings dating back to the 1850's and you can see Stage Coach Alley. You can also get a hot dog at Hangville Hot Dogs. This was another staging place for horses. After Placerville it is on to Shingle Springs.

We tried to find the old train station at Shingle Springs but only founded traces of the old track in a cutting of earth red with iron. The train arrived here in 1865, but until then you would carry on in your stagecoach to Sacramento, another 30 miles on. At last you could emerge and take a different method of transport: boats plied daily from here to San Francisco. I'll bet plenty of travellers vowed never to sit in a stage coach again!

TIPS FOR STAGECOACH TRAVELERS

The best seat inside a stage is the one next to the driver. Even if you have a tendency to sea-sickness when riding backwards - you'll get over it and will get less jolts and jostling. Don't let "sly elph" trade you his mid-seat>

In cold weather, don't ride with tight-fitting boots, shoes or gloves. When the driver asks you to get off and walk, do so without grumbling, he won't request it unless absolutely necessary. If the team runs away - sit still and take your chances. If you jump, nine out of ten times you will get hurt.

In very cold weather abstain entirely from liquor when on the road, because you will freeze twice as quickly when under its influence.

Don't growl at the food received at the station - stage companies generally provide the best they can get.

Don't keep the stage waiting. Don't smoke a strong pipe inside the coach. Spit on the leeward side... Don't lean or lop over neighbours when sleeping. Take small change to pay expenses. Never shoot on the road as the noise might frighten the horses. Don't discuss politics or religion.

Don't point out where murders have been committed, especially if there are women passengers.

Don't lag at the wash basin. Don't grease your hair, because travel is dusty. Don't imagine for a moment that you are going on a picnic. Expect annoyances, discomfort and some hardships. (Omaha Herald 1877)

P.S. Listen to a fun audio account of a young Englishman's stage journey across America in 1859 on the Wells Fargo History site.

Slippery Gulch

In September 2009, I spent four days in Virginia City, Nevada, researching a new series of books.

Virginia City was a wealthy and rowdy mining town in the 1860's and 1870's. On the famous Comstock Lode, it produced billions of dollars of gold and especially silver ore. Mark Twain was a reporter there from Sept 1862 until May 1864. The town had gunmen, prostitutes, native Americans, miners, con-artists, saloon-keepers as well as bankers, lawyers, mine managers, journalists and speculators. There were even a few respectable women and children. Mark Twain once remarked that his days there 'were full to the brim of the wine of life.'

By the early 20th century, however, Virginia City was in danger of becoming a ghost town. Then in the late 1950's, something happened to revive interest in it. A hugely successful television show called Bonanza made Virginia City popular again. However, the show got several things wrong about Virginia City. Because it was filmed in Los Angeles, Virginia is shown as a flat town. But one of the most distinctive things about Virginia City is that it is built on a steep hillside. This is something you have to experience to believe.

No photo really shows you how radical the steep streets are. Imagine a city built on the slope of a pitched roof. Or a city built on stairs. The stairs are the north-south running streets, named after the letters of the alphabet. 'A' street is high up Mount Davidson, 'B' Street is further down, then the famous 'C' Street, with all the saloons and shops. In the olden days 'D' street was where the 'soiled doves' had their 'cribs' and 'F' Street was Chinatown, etc. But the east west running streets are ramps on almost a 45º angle! Now they are paved, but in the olden days they were just dirt. Imagine trying to walk on a muddy, icy street, or worse yet, trying to drive a carriage!

My great-grandmother grew up near Virginia City and remembers how a man and his wife were riding in a carriage when the horses lost their grip. Down they went, down and down and right over a cliff. The horses and the husband died. The wife was in a coma for several days and when she came out of it she discovered her broken and reset left arm was two inches shorter than her right. Apparently runaway carriages were almost daily occurrences in the 1860's. One of the many nicknames for Virginia City is 'Slippery Gulch'...

Another thing they never tell you about Virginia City is the physical effect it has on you. It is over 6000 feet high and the air is thin and dry. The first time I went I felt slightly sick and dizzy and had heart palpitations. This time I noticed the extreme dryness. My eyes felt scratchy and my nose prickled. You get used to it after a while but it really has an effect on you physically.

From the time of the late 1950's, Virginia City has attracted bikers. They love the scenic roads up to Virginia City and the saloons once they get there. Sometimes the streets throb with the sound of Harley Davidson motorcycles. In one bar you get leather-clad patrons and heavy metal music, in the saloon next door cowboys and Country Western music. Mostly everyone gets on with everyone else.

It was fun that Labor Day Weekend to see equal parts bikers and Civil War re-enactors. And sometimes both combined.

There really is nowhere in the world like Virginia City.

The Western Mysteries

I've been visiting Nevada and California to research a series of history mystery stories I hope to write. They will be set in the Comstock region of Nevada in the autumn of 1862, the beginning of the big silver boom there and the time of Mark Twain's arrival at the Territorial Enterprise Newspaper.

left: Sam Clemens - not yet Mark Twain - when he arrived in Virginia City in 1862 aged 27

I don't want to say too much because it is a fantastic idea - and nobody else has done it - but here are a few clues.

1. The series will be for children aged 8 - 14+
2. The detective will be a loner: the western hero is always a loner.
3. The detective will be a kid.
4. The detective will own a Smith & Wesson seven-shooter.
5. Real historical figures will appear in the books.
6. The bad-guys will be gunfighters, tricksters & newspapermen.
7. The mysteries will be based around real historical events.
8. The books will be told in the first person.
9. My detective will love black coffee and layer cake.
10. I am going to have a lot of fun writing these books.

So watch this space!

A Roman Christmas

[This is a version of a lecture I gave at the British Museum in December of 2009]

Q. What do Christmas crackers, mulled wine, Santa hats, office parties, mistletoe, greenery, presents and candles have to do with ancient Rome?
A. Everything!

English "Christmas crackers"

The Saturnalia was one of the most popular festivals in Roman times, possibly going back to Etruscan times. A sacrifice of piglets was made to the god Saturn along with other rites, and there followed several days of feasting and fun. It was the custom to greet one another with the phrase YO SATURNALIA! One of my books takes place in Ostia, Rome's port, during the festival of Saturnalia. It is called The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina.

Here are 12 THINGS about the SATURNALIA which might seem familiar:

I. WINTER SOLSTICE - The Saturnalia began on December 17, a few days before the WINTER SOLSTICE. That’s when the days are shortest. It was essentially a pagan festival to bring back the sun. And some Romans celebrated the birth of a god at this time, a god of light called…

Mithras in the British Museum

II. BIRTH OF A GOD - Some scholars believe that the Persian god Mithras and/or the Roman god Sol Invictus had birthday celebrations on the winter solstice, which fell on 25 December in the Roman calendar. It wasn’t until about AD 400 that church leaders decided to celebrate the birth of Jesus on this day, possibly in an attempt to overlay and obliterate these ‘pagan’ holidays. We don’t really know when Jesus was born. It may have been in December. Or it may have been in the spring or autumn. That doesn’t mean we still can’t celebrate it.

III. GREENERY - Romans decorated their houses with greenery. One of my favourite TV shows is Big Bang Theory. Sheldon says ‘In the pre-Christian era, as the winter solstice approached and the plants died, pagans brought evergreen boughs into their homes as an act of sympathetic magic, intended to guard the life essences of the plants until spring. This custom was later appropriated by Northern Europeans and eventually it becomes the so-called Christmas tree.’ That’s certainly where the custom of Christmas wreaths and mistletoe come from.

Flavia & Nubia by lamplight

IV. HOUSE DECORATED WITH LIGHTS - Romans also decorated their houses with extra lights at this darkest time of the year. Again, this was a pagan attempt to bring back the sun. Torches, tapers, candleabra and oil-lamps flickered throughout the houses of the rich. Because of this Rome was a particular fire hazard in the winter. One historian estimates that a hundred fires broke out daily in the Eternal City, which had its own entire corps of firemen – they were called Vigiles and we get the word ‘vigilent’ from them. Ostia, the port of Rome, had its own vigiles.

V. FEASTING! In mid-winter instinct tells us to build up a nice layer of fat, to feast in preparation for lean times ahead. A bit like a bear before hibernation. But we must take a moment to pity the Romans. Sadly, they did not have chocolate.

Flavia Gemina with a wreath

VI. DRINKING! It has been medically proven that a small amount of wine added to water will kill off most known bacteria. For most of the year Romans drank diluted wine, but during the Saturnalia they often drank neat wine, heated and spiced. Go easy this year or you might need the VOMITORIUM! (NB a 'vomitorium' is an exit, NOT a room where you go to be sick!) When your mum has her Bailey’s Irish Cream after Christmas dinner, just think, that custom goes back to the Saturnalia.

VII. PARTYING AND HIJINKS - and Role Reversal, too. For the five days of the Saturnalia, slaves didn't have to work. They could eat, drink and be merry, and some even switched places with their masters, especially in more relaxed homes. In theory the masters could wait on reclining slaves and the slaves could tell the masters what they thought of them. Most masters probably just left the slaves to themselves, like Pliny the Younger, who retreated to an annex of his seaside Laurentum Villa.: ‘during the Saturnalia when the rest of the house is noisy with the licence of the holiday and festive cries. This way,’ he says, ‘I don't hamper the games of my people and they don't hinder my work or studies.’ (I don't think HE was the life of the party.) DID I MENTION THAT KIDS DIDN’T HAVE TO GO TO SCHOOL? During the Saturnalia, children were allowed into the amphitheatre. There was also lots of music and dancing. Today in the twenty first century, office employees find Christmas the time when they are tempted to take the most liberty. Be careful. Once the Saturnalia is over, you have to go back to being a slave again

a bone die

VIII. GAMBLING! In first century Rome, gambling was illegal... EXCEPT for the Saturnalia. For those few days in mid-winter, anyone could gamble: children and slaves included. Children usually gambled with nuts. In Italy and some other Mediterranean countries this practice lives on in the seasonal Tombola and Bingo games, only held at this time of year. When you get out the Monopoly board or the Wii, take a moment to consider that the Romans played games during the Saturnalia.

XI. KING OF THE SATURNALIA. On the first night of the festival in some families, the paterfamilias threw dice to determine who in the household would be the King of the Saturnalia. The 'King' could then command people to do things, eg prepare a banquet, sing a song, run an errand. During his reign, the depraved Emperor Nero used shaved dice to ensure that he would be chosen King of the Saturnalia, even though he was already the most powerful man in the known world. In The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina, Flavia is grounded by her father, so she uses one of Lupus’s shaved dice to make sure she becomes King of the Saturnalia. I believe the paper crown in our Christmas cracker reminds us of this charming custom. Kids, why don’t you ask your parents if you can throw dice on one day to be King of the Saturnalia? But if you are chosen use your power wisely, next year someone else might be King!

pileus

X. SANTA HATS! During the festival the toga was discarded in favour of the more comfortable synthesis, the dinner suit, and on their heads men - and sometimes women - wore the felt cap, pileum (or pileus), the mark of freedom. These hats were traditionally worn by slaves who had been set free. This showed that they were "free" from the usual restrictions and laws. "Freedom has loosed the bonds for all..." said one Roman author about the Saturnalia. These "freedmen's hats" were conical in shape and made of colourful felt, perhaps fur-trimmed in the winter. In The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina, Lupus wears a red felt pilleum, trimmed with white fur! Remind you of anything?

XI. GIFTS! Some people think the best part of Christmas are the presents. The Romans gave gifts on the Saturnalia: traditionally candles, silver objects, preserved fruit and especially sigilla, small clay or wooden figures, often with moveable joints. Action figures from Barbie to Spiderman are the modern equivalent. And all the other gifts we give. The Saturnalia was a time of great SHOPPING. The first century philosopher Seneca sounds very modern when he grumbled about the shopping season: "Decembris used to be a month; now it's a whole year."

Roman writing materials

XII. EPIGRAMS! In Roman times they didn’t stick a little elf tag on their presents. They often composed two-line poems called EPIGRAMS to accompany their Saturnalia gift. The epigrams didn’t have to rhyme; they were in meter. Sometimes they were funny, sometimes in the form of a riddle, sometimes just descriptive. In Holland, people still compose poems to go with their presents. That’s another SATURNALIA CUSTOM you might like to start in your house.

What are some of the gifts people gave and some of the epigrams Romans wrote?

Marcus Valerius Martialis, AKA Martial is one of my favourite Roman poets. He lived during Flavia’s time and he wrote hundreds of epigrams. From these we know what kinds of gifts people gave each other. For example, they gave each other

FOOD like pepper, beans, lentils, flour, barley, lettuces, asparagus, grapes, figs, pine cones, jar of figs, jar of plums, smoked cheese, onions, sausages, box of olives, eggs, sucking pig, pomegranates, sow’s udder, chickens, early peaches, mushrooms, truffles, a hoop of little birds, ducks, ham, goose liver, Rhodian hardbake and the famous dormice. Here is Martial's poem about the gift of dormice:

DORMICE - The winter is for sleeping so I feed on sleep and grow fat for you. XIII.59

silver memento mori cup

CONDIMENTS and CUTLERY People also gave each other condiments, wine, cutlery and cups: garum, (fish sauce), honey, mulsum (honeyed wine), raisin wine, retsina, Falernian wine, Surrentine wine, vinegar, antique cups, golden bowl, arretine ware, a basket, mushroom pots, a strainer for snow, a flagon for snow, jewelled cups, a drinking flask, crystal cups, murrhine cups (a semi precious stone that gives flavour to wine), small table jugs, an earthenware jug, glass cups, silver spoons, snail spoons, etc

STATIONERY and FURNITURE were also popular gifts. Martial mentions wax tablets, ivory tablets, three leaved wax tablets, parchment tablets, small Vitellian tablets for love letters, ivory cashbox, dice, dice box, nuts (for gambling), gaming board, gaming pieces, case for writing materials, stylus case, bookcase, bundle of reed pens, oil lamp for the bedroom, candle, multi wicked lamp, wax taper, candelabrum, horn lantern, lantern made of a bladder, incense, smokeless wood, peacock-feather fly whisk, ox-tail fly-swat, place-keeper for scroll (like a bookmark), palm leaf broom, peacock couch, semicircular couch, citrus wood table, maple table, tablecloth, feather stuffing for a mattress, marsh reed stuffing for a mattress & hay for a mattress if you are really strapped for sesterces.

Roman bathing accessories

OBJECTS FOR GROOMING and BEAUTY - Martial mentions such gifts as a toothpick, an ear scoop, a hair pin of gold, combs, hair, wigs, hair dye, a parasol, a hair-cutting kit, a bath-set, a strigil, dentifrice (dentifricium) for polishing teeth, bean meal for folds in your stomach, opobalsam (a balsam type perfume for men), a breast band, a sponge, wool lined slippers, a horn oil flask, a medicine chest of ivory, an ivory back scratcher in the shape of a hand, unguent, a garland of roses, an earthenware chamberpot, rings, a ring case, a toga, a wrapper for after a workout, a broad-brimmed hat, a hooded cloak, a leather overcoat, a pilleum (freedman's hat), a girdle, an apron, a bath wrap, white wool, purple wool, amethyst wool, etc. Here's a poem about the gift of a red cloak:

SCARLET CLOAK Careful if you support the Blues or Greens at the races, this cloak might make you a traitor! XIV.131

sigillum from the BM

THINGS FOR BOYS and GIRLS - a hunting knife, hunting spears, a belt and sword, a dagger, a small shield, a small hatchet, a feather-stuffed ball, a ball for trigon, dumbbells, a leather wrestling cap, a rattle, a parrot that says ‘Ave Caesar’, a ‘talking’ crow, a nightingale, an ivory cage, a lyre, a plectrum, a hoop, jewellery and of course SIGILLA or little clay or wood figures.

SIGILLUM of a HUNCHBACK – I think Prometheus was drunk when he made hunchbacks from the earth, he was fooling around with Saturnalian clay. XIV.182

LUXURY GOODS - If you were really rich, you could give opulent gifts of silver, gold, jewels, animals and - in an age of slavery - even people! Martial composes epigrams for a gold statue of Victory, various figures in Corinthian bronze, paintings of different mythological characters, a clay theatrical mask, Minerva in silver, Homer in parchment notebooks, Virgil, Livy or Cicero on parchment, works by poets such as Propertius, Ovid, Lucan and Catullus – (books were luxury items in those days) - a hawk, dwarf mules, a Gallic lapdog, a greyhound, a monkey, a wrestler, a dancing girl, a scribe, an idiot, a cook, a confectioner, and a dwarf!

Caroline in a Saturnalia cap

DWARF - If you only saw his head, you would think he was Hector; if you saw him standing up, you’d think he was Astyanax. XIV.212

(That epigram was the inspiration for the baddie in my tenth Roman Mystery, The Colossus of Rhodes)

The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina

So as you celebrate Christmas this year, think about the ancient Romans and how many customs they passed down to us. And try this easy Saturnalia Quiz.

YO SATURNALIA!

The 17+ books in the Roman Mysteries series are perfect for children aged 9+, and book 6, The Twelve Tasks of Flavia Gemina, is even set during the Roman Saturnalia. That episode is also in the DVDs of the BBC TV series. Grown-ups might enjoy The Xenia and The Apophoreta, two commentaries on Martial's Saturnalia poems by T.J. Leary. A book for younger kids is The Thunder Omen, which features an ex-beggar-boy, a silly soothsayer and dancing Saturnalia chickens.