The Silverado Squatters (1883) is
Robert Louis StevensonRobert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. Stevenson was greatly admired by many authors, including Jorge Luis Borges, Ernest Hemingway, Rudyard Kipling, Marcel Schwob, Vladimir Nabokov, J. M. Barrie, and G. K...
's
travel memoirTravel literature is travel writing of literary value. Travel literature typically records the experiences of an author touring a place for the pleasure of travel. An individual work is sometimes called a travelogue or itinerary. Travel literature may be cross-cultural or transnational in focus, or...
of his two-month honeymoon trip with
Fanny Vandegriftalign="right"|Fanny Vandergrift Osbourne Stevenson was the wife of Robert Louis Stevenson and mother of Isobel and Lloyd Osbourne.-Early life:...
(and her son
Lloyd OsbourneSamuel Lloyd Osbourne was an American author and the stepson of Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson with whom he would co-author three books and provide input and ideas on others.-Early Life:...
) to Napa Valley,
CaliforniaCalifornia is the most populous state in the United States, and the third largest by area. California is the second most populous sub-national entity in the Americas, behind only São Paulo, Brazil...
in the late spring and early summer of 1880.
In July 1879, Stevenson received word that his future American wife's divorce was almost complete, but that she was seriously ill. He left Scotland right away and traveled to meet her in
Monterey, CaliforniaThe City of Monterey in Monterey County is located on Monterey Bay along the Pacific coast in Central California. Variants of the city's name are recorded as Monte Rey and Montery. Monterey lies at an elevation of 26 feet above sea level. As of 2005, the city population was 30,641...
(his trip detailed in
The Amateur EmigrantThe Amateur Emigrant is Robert Louis Stevenson's travel memoir of his journey from Scotland to California in 1879-1880. It is not a complete account, covering the first third, by ship from Europe to New York City...
(1894) and
Across the Plains (1892)).
The Silverado Squatters (1883) is
Robert Louis StevensonRobert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. Stevenson was greatly admired by many authors, including Jorge Luis Borges, Ernest Hemingway, Rudyard Kipling, Marcel Schwob, Vladimir Nabokov, J. M. Barrie, and G. K...
's
travel memoirTravel literature is travel writing of literary value. Travel literature typically records the experiences of an author touring a place for the pleasure of travel. An individual work is sometimes called a travelogue or itinerary. Travel literature may be cross-cultural or transnational in focus, or...
of his two-month honeymoon trip with
Fanny Vandegriftalign="right"|Fanny Vandergrift Osbourne Stevenson was the wife of Robert Louis Stevenson and mother of Isobel and Lloyd Osbourne.-Early life:...
(and her son
Lloyd OsbourneSamuel Lloyd Osbourne was an American author and the stepson of Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson with whom he would co-author three books and provide input and ideas on others.-Early Life:...
) to Napa Valley,
CaliforniaCalifornia is the most populous state in the United States, and the third largest by area. California is the second most populous sub-national entity in the Americas, behind only São Paulo, Brazil...
in the late spring and early summer of 1880.
In July 1879, Stevenson received word that his future American wife's divorce was almost complete, but that she was seriously ill. He left Scotland right away and traveled to meet her in
Monterey, CaliforniaThe City of Monterey in Monterey County is located on Monterey Bay along the Pacific coast in Central California. Variants of the city's name are recorded as Monte Rey and Montery. Monterey lies at an elevation of 26 feet above sea level. As of 2005, the city population was 30,641...
(his trip detailed in
The Amateur EmigrantThe Amateur Emigrant is Robert Louis Stevenson's travel memoir of his journey from Scotland to California in 1879-1880. It is not a complete account, covering the first third, by ship from Europe to New York City...
(1894) and
Across the Plains (1892)). Broken financially, suffering from a life-long
fibronous bronchitisAcute bronchitis is an inflammation of the large bronchi in the lungs that is usually caused by viruses or bacteria and may last several days or weeks. Characteristic symptoms include cough, sputum production, and shortness of breath and wheezing related to the obstruction of the inflamed airways...
condition, and with his writing career at a dead end, he was nursed back to health by his doctor, his nurse, and his future wife, while living briefly in Monterey,
San FranciscoSan Francisco is the fourth most populous city in California and the 12th most populous city in the United States, with a 2008 estimated population of 808,976. It is the eighth most densely populated city in the U.S. and is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the larger San...
and
OaklandOakland is the eighth-largest city in the U.S. state of California and a major West Coast port city, located on San Francisco Bay about eight miles east of the City of San Francisco. Oakland is a major hub city for the Bay Area subregion collectively called the East Bay, and it is the county seat...
. His father having provided money to help, on May 19 1880 he married the San Francisco native, whom he had first met in France in 1875, soon after the events of
An Inland VoyageAn Inland Voyage is a travelogue by Robert Louis Stevenson about a canoeing trip through France and Belgium in 1876. It is Stevenson's earliest book and a pioneering work of outdoor literature....
. Still too weak to undertake the journey back to Scotland, friends suggested
CalistogaCalistoga is a city in Napa County, California, United States. The population was 5,190 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Calistoga is located at ....
in the upper Napa Valley with its healthy mountain air.
They first went to the Hot Springs Hotel in Calistoga, but unable to afford the 10
dollarsThe United States dollar is the unit of currency of the United States. The U.S. dollar is normally abbreviated as the dollar sign, $, or as USD or US$ to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies and from others that use the $ symbol. It is divided into 100 cents .The U.S...
a week, they spent an unconventional
honeymoonA honeymoon is the traditional holiday taken by newlyweds to celebrate their marriage in intimacy and seclusion...
in an abandoned three-story bunkhouse at a derelict mining camp called "Silverado" on the shoulder of
Mount Saint HelenaMount Saint Helena is a peak in the Mayacmas Mountains with flanks in Napa, Sonoma, and Lake counties of California. Composed of uplifted 2.4-million-year-old volcanic rocks from the Clear Lake Volcanic Field, it is one of the few mountains in the San Francisco Bay Area to receive any snowfall...
in the Mayacamas Mountains. There they managed to "
squatSquatting is the act of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied space or building, usually residential, that the squatter does not own, rent or otherwise have permission to use. Squatting is significantly more common in urban areas than rural areas, especially when urban decay occurs...
" for two months during a pleasant California summer, putting up makeshift cloth windows and hauling water in by hand from a nearby stream while dodging
rattlesnakeRattlesnakes are a group of venomous snakes, genera Crotalus and Sistrurus. They belong to the subfamily of venomous snakes known commonly as pit vipers.-Overview:...
s and the occasional fog banks so detrimental to Stevenson's health.
The Silverado Squatters provides some interesting views of California during the late 19th century. Stevenson uses the first
telephoneThe telephone is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sound, most commonly the human voice. It is one of the most common household appliances in the developed world, and has long been considered indispensable to business, industry and government...
of his life. He meets a number of
wineWine is an alcoholic beverage typically made of fermented grape juice. The natural chemical balance of grapes is such that they can ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes or other nutrients. Wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast consumes...
growers in Napa Valley, an enterprise he deemed "experimental", with growers sometimes even mis-labeling the bottles as originating from
SpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula.
[The Spanish constitution does not establish any official denomination of the country, even though España , Estado español and Nación española are used interchangeably...]
in order to sell their product to skeptical Americans. He visits the oldest wine grower in the valley, Jacob Schram, who had been experimenting for 18 years at his Schramsberg Winery, and had recently expanded the wine cellar in his backyard. Stevenson also visits a
petrified forestPetrified wood is a type of fossil: it consists of fossil wood where all the organic materials have been replaced with minerals , while retaining the original structure of the wood...
owned by an old Swedish ex-sailor who had stumbled upon it while clearing farmland — the precise nature of the petrified forest remained for everyone a source of curiosity. Stevenson also details his encounters with a local Jewish merchant, whom he compares to a character in a
Charles DickensCharles John Huffam Dickens FRSA , pen-name "Boz", was the most popular English novelist of the Victorian era and one of the most popular of all time. He created some of literature's most memorable characters. His novels and short stories have never gone out of print...
novel (probably
FaginFagin is a fictional character who appears in the Charles Dickens novel Oliver Twist, referred to in the preface of the novel as a "receiver of stolen goods", but referred to more frequently within the actual story as the "merry old gentleman" or simply the "Jew".-Character:Born in London, Fagin...
from
Oliver TwistOliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy's Progress is Charles Dickens' second novel. It is about a boy named Oliver Twist, who escapes from an workhouse and meets a gang of pickpocketers in London...
), and portrays as happy-go-lucky but always scheming to earn a dollar. Like Dickens in
American NotesAmerican Notes for General Circulation is a travelogue by Charles Dickens detailing his trip to North America from January to June, 1842. While there he acted as a critical observer of these societies almost as if returning a status report on their progress...
(1842), Stevenson found the American habit of spitting on the floor hard to get used to.
His experiences at Silverado were kept in a journal he called "Silverado Sketches", parts of which were incorporated into
Silverado Squatters in 1883 while living in
BournemouthBournemouth is a large coastal resort town in the Borough of Bournemouth, England. The town has a population of 163,444 according to the 2001 Census, making it the largest settlement in Dorset. It is the largest town on the south coast and the largest settlement between Southampton and Plymouth...
,
EnglandEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the North Sea to the east, with the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, with other tales appearing in "Essays of Travel" and "Across the Plains". Many of his notes of the scenery around him later provided much of the descriptive detail for
Treasure IslandTreasure Island is an adventure novel by Robert Louis Stevenson, narrating a tale of "pirates and buried gold". First published as a book in 1883, it was originally serialised in the children's magazine Young Folks between 1881-82 under the title The Sea Cook, or Treasure Island.Traditionally...
(1883).
The
Robert Louis Stevenson State ParkRobert Louis Stevenson State Park is a California state park, located in Sonoma and Napa Counties. The park offers a hike to the summit of Mount Saint Helena from which one can see much of the Bay Area. On clear days it is possible to see the peak of Mount Shasta, distant.The park is named after...
now encompasses the area where they stayed. The entrance to the park is at the summit of
State Route 29State Route 29 is a state highway in the U.S. state of California that travels in a north-south direction from CA 20 in Upper Lake to Interstate 80 in Vallejo....
. A new trail has been constructed in recent years. The "Silverado Museum" in
St. Helena, CaliforniaSt. Helena is a city in Napa County, California, United States. It is part of the Napa, California Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its area code 707. Its zip code is 94574. It is in the Pacific time zone. The population was 5,950 at the 2000 census.Ellen White, co-founder of the Seventh-day...
is dedicated to Robert Louis Stevenson.
Resources and editions
Editions
- The Silverado Squatters at Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg, abbreviated as PG, is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks." Founded in 1971 by Michael S. Hart, it is the oldest digital library. Most of the items in its collection are the full texts of public domain...
- The Silverado Squatters, HTML version from the University of Virginia
The University of Virginia is a public research university located in Charlottesville, Virginia, founded by Thomas Jefferson...
.
- The Silverado Squatters, HTML version with scanned images, from the Library of Congress
The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress and is the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and holds the largest number of books. The head...
- The Silverado Squatters, from William Ernest Henley
William Ernest Henley was an English poet, critic and editor.-Biography:Henley was born in Gloucester and was the eldest of a family of six children, five sons and a daughter. His father, William, was a bookseller and stationer who died in 1868 and was survived by his young children and creditors...
's The Novels and Tales of Robert Louis Stevenson, volume 15. Published by Scriber's and Sons in 1905. Scanned online via Google Books.
- The Silverado Squatters, published by Scribner's and Sons in 1905 with a preface by Fanny Van de Grift Stevenson. Scanned online via Google Books.
- The Silverado Squatters, audiobook, Blue Pylon Creative (2005). ISBN 0-9765765-0-3
Resources
- Silverado Museum in St. Helena, California
St. Helena is a city in Napa County, California, United States. It is part of the Napa, California Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its area code 707. Its zip code is 94574. It is in the Pacific time zone. The population was 5,950 at the 2000 census.Ellen White, co-founder of the Seventh-day...
, devoted to Robert Louis Stevenson.