Biographical Sketch by Belle W. Lobenstine Printed Privately 1920 Copyright 1920 by Belle W. Lobenstine In Loving Memory of My Father William C. Lobenstine That those of us who follow after may honor and love his memory and live worthy of his name...

This book does not in any sense purport to be a biography. Often during Father's lifetime, on our long walks together or during long quiet evenings at home, he would tell of his early life, repeating over and over certain incidents which had impressed him deeply and so—when after he had gone we found among his papers two closely written diaries bound in calf, telling of his trip to California and the return from there—it seemed most natural to work over these diaries, to try to make out their cl

Christian Lobenstine or William C. Lobenstine, as he called himself later on in this country, was born in Eisfeld, Dukedom of Meiningen, on November eighth, eighteen hundred and thirty-one. He was the youngest in his family. The others were Theodore, Caroline, Frederic, Bernard, Dorothea, Georgia, and Henry. They were the children of Johanne Andreas and of Elizabeth Lobenstein. His father and older brothers were tanners and also farmers. Of the brothers, Theodore, the eldest, seems to have been

EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY Among the great many opinions expressed regarding usurpation of the government or despotism, one attracted my attention and agreed so much with my own sentiment that I could not but pay due merit to the moral truth of it. Despotism is despicable in its perpetrator and at all times a disgrace to human beings, depriving them perforce of their inalienable rights and their moral esteem for themselves and bringing them down on common ground with slaves. Although as just mentio

VOYAGE TO CALIFORNIA December thirty-first, eighteen hundred and fifty-one. Left Wheeling on Steamer Messenger for Pittsburgh, April twentieth. Exodus to California. The tide of emigration for California swept me along in its progress for the same reason as thousands of others—to appropriate money enough by a few years' hard toil, to secure a future independency. When first the idea of a movement to the West took possession of me, I was wavering in the choice between California and Oregon and ga

LAST YEARS IN CALIFORNIA—RETURN TO THE EAST April twenty-ninth, eighteen hundred and fifty-four. Several weeks have elapsed since closing my last journal to the present date of this entry, and longer still this interval might have been but for sickness, which keeps me from my daily task and compels me to pass the hours of ennui and solitude by such means as circumstances afford. Among these means, reading is my favorite occupation if the subject of it is attractive and pleasing and one main reas