WILLIAM A. COATS

 

Twenty-one years ago William A. Coats purchased the home place of ten acres where he and his family reside, five and a half miles southwest of Yuba City; and he and his wife also own a part of the old Carpenter place, two and a half miles west of Tudor, and five miles south of their home place.  He raises French prunes and cling peaches on the home place, and recently has set out a fifteen-acre orchard of cling peaches on their 150 acres of the Carpenter place, the balance being devoted to the raising of grain.  Mr. Coats was born near Columbia, Boone County, Mo., August 4, 1878, the second of twelve children born to Henry Clay and Mary Ann (Corneliuson) Coats, both natives of Missouri.  In 1874 Henry Clay Coats made a trip to California, but the following year returned to Missouri.  He passed away at Sturgeon at the age of forty-nine, on August 26, 1899; the mother is living at Columbia, Mo., aged sixty-seven years.

William A. Coats was reared in Boone County, Mo., and attended the district school during the winter months, and during the summer he worked on the homestead farm twelve miles from Columbia.  Allen Coats, great-grandfather of William Coats, was the original settler on the farm, and he built the house in 1840, which is still standing and in good condition.  William A. Coats came to California in the fall of 1897 with his cousin W. K. Coats; and for seven years he worked for his uncle William A. Coats on his ranch in Sutter County.  By economy and thrift he was able to save enough money to buy his present home place in 1902, where he has since resided.

Mr. Coats’ marriage, at Sacramento, united him with Miss Frankie Carpenter, a native of Sutter County, the fifth of seven children born to James W. and Eliza (Bailey) Carpenter.  Mr. and Mrs. Coats are the parents of two sons, Elmer and Merle.  In politics, Mr. Coats is a Democrat; and fraternally he is a member of Shamrock Camp No. 360, W.O.W., Yuba City.  Mrs. Coats has served on the board of trustees and the building committee of the Barry Union School.

 

History of Yuba and Sutter Counties, Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, 1924

p 1084

 

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ROBERT C. KELLS

 

Now retired from the active cares of life, Robert C. Kells is enjoying the evening of his days as a resident of Chico, Cal., where he has made his home for the past fifteen years.  He was born in Defiance County, Ohio, February 16, 1852, and is a son of Robert and Mary Kells, natives respectively of Pennsylvania and Vermont.  During an early period in the settlement of Canada, members of the Kells family had emigrated there from Ireland and Port Kells was named in their honor.  Later generations removed to Pennsylvania, and from there Robert Kells, Sr., migrated to Ohio, becoming a pioneer of Defiance County, where he followed the millwright’s trade.  When sixty-two years of age he was engaged in building a mill for himself, and during the course of construction he injured his foot, causing blood-poisoning to set in, which resulted in his death.  At the time of his death his son, Robert C., was only two years old.  The death of the mother had occurred when he was only ten months old; and he was thus left an orphan very early in life.  After she died he was taken into the home of Gideon Ensign; and at the age of two years he was bound to Samuel and Mary Hilbert, who treated him with the greatest kindness and carefully trained him for a life of usefulness.

While Mr. Kells was the only child born to his father and mother, both of his parents had large families by former marriage.  When Robert C. was thirteen, one of his half-sisters, formerly Mary J. Kells, now Mrs. Trowbridge, persuaded him to accompany her to Lucas County, Iowa.  After about three years he went with a half-brother, E. C. Kells, to Kansas and for four years worked on a ranch, also having the privilege of attending school.  In October, 1869, he enlisted in the 19^th Regiment of Kansas Volunteers and was mustered in at Topeka, Kans., thence going west to Fort Wichita, and thence to Forts Supply and Cobb.  Later his regiment established the military post at Fort Sill, next proceeding to New Mexico and returning through Forts Dodge and Hays, Kans., and at the latter point he was mustered out after a service of more than a year.  During a part of this time he had been with General Custer and under Colonel Crawford.  Among his engagements with the Indians was one in which sixteen of the regulars were killed.  On another occasion they came in contact with the Kiawas, who surrendered without a struggle.  Later, after a forced march to overtake one of the tribes, sixty miles west of Fort Sill, they finally captured the red men and secured their surrender, returning with them to Fort Hays, and also bringing back two white women whom the Indians had carried off from their homes on Solomon River.  During his service in the army, Mr. Kells endured many severe hardships, exposure to cold and storm proving the greatest, perhaps, although in addition to this he was often obliged to subsist entirely on buffalo meat.  After his honorable discharge from the army, he returned to the ranch in Kansas where his half-brother lived, and there secured work as a cowboy.