My Story

By Rebecca Humphreys Turner

This is a wonderful memoir by an immigrant to southern California.  Rebecca Turner was nineteen years old when her family left Arkansas as the Civil War was starting.  The journey across the nation, with a detour through Mexico, was difficult, perilous and tragic.

The family settled in the San Gabriel Valley, while the Civil War ravaged the rest of the country.  She recounts that there was a great deal of Southern sympathy in southern California.  The family first lived in El Monte, which was a major community in the Valley.  They moved into larger quarters when a fellow Southerner allowed them to live in the Old Mill, El Molino Viejo, in what is now San Marino.

Rebecca recounts the horrible rains in 1861, which flooded the Valley.  This was followed by a terrible drought, which killed many horses and cattle.  The family knew Benjamin Wilson, who had traveled to California with William Workman and whom they describe as a kind gentleman.  Tragedy followed Rebecca to California when her brother-in-law was murdered in Los Angels.  The accused was arrested, but acquitted.

After she and William Turner wed, William Workman offered him a job as miller at the Workman Mill.  The pay was $30 per month, the use of the miller’s house plus fees for milling the crops of neighboring farmers.  Mr. Workman stopped paying the salary; so Mr. Turner, with the help of Workman’s ranch foreman, opened a general store on the premises.

One day, Mr. Turner was attacked by a customer with a knife.  During the melee, Rebecca, who was pregnant, was shot and, ultimately, lost her unborn baby boy.  The culprit was captured and lynched by, among others, the foreman of Workman’s Rancho La Puente.  This crime confirmed Rebecca’s unfavorable view of Mexicans, although she was more favorably disposed toward Native Americans.