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Wallace (née Greenell)?, Mary Ann? in addressee 
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Text Online
From:
John Wallace
To:
Mary Ann? Wallace (née Greenell)?
Date:
August 1851
Source of text:
  • Natural History Museum, London: NHM WP1/3/98
  • Natural History Museum, London: NHM WP1/3/96/1
  • Wallace Family Collection (private collection)
Summary:

Has left nearest town “to be a sojourner in the wilderness.” Speculating on an immense construction project; joined 160 miners to build a canal or flume made of wood 20 miles long in steep rocky mountainous wilderness inhabited only by grisley [sic] bears, deer, and coyotes. It will convey water from Stanislaus River to Columbia region, which is rich in gold but requires water to extract it. Labor is furnished by unpaid miners, who also pay for equipment in exchange for shares in the Company; when system is operating, they will pay for use of the water to work their claims. As the only Surveyor here, it fell to me to engineer, design, and lay out the whole project. “There is no place like California for freedom of action and scope for enterprise.” Longs to hear more of the Great Exhibition and the Chrysal [sic] Palace in England “as every American paper is full of it.”

Contributor:
Alfred Russel Wallace Correspondence Project