A Short History of Sonoma

7. More Famous Names and Faces

128 Chapter Seven More Famous Names and Faces Ever since the first adobe brick was set into the foundation of Mission San Francisco Solano, the town of Sonoma has been a lure for a great cross section of global society. Beyond missionaries, tourists, and entrepreneurs, Sonoma has hosted visitors and residents who hailed from the worlds of the military, business, food and wine, literature, and Hollywood. Some only passed through town; others visited frequently. A few made Sonoma their home, and one was even hauled off to jail. Although Sonoma’s first residents were men who toiled in spiritual fields, it was the military that really put the place on the map. From the day in 1833 when General Vallejo and his family arrived until the Pacific Squadron relocated across the bay to Benicia nearly twenty years later, Sonoma was a military post. After the Bear Flag Revolt, American soldiers of all stripes lived in town and left their mark on the city’s history. Some of them went on to brilliant military careers in the Civil War. Among these were Philip Kearny, George Stoneman, and Charles Stone. But two achieved fame that still resonates in town today. One was Joseph Hooker, born in Massachusetts in 1814. He graduated from West Point in 1837, and in 1849 he was named assistant adjutant general of the Pacific Division, joining General Persifer Smith in Sonoma. While in town he found a way to add to his army pay by acting as an unofficial middleman to the quartermaster. That is, he charged m o r e f a m o u s n a m e s a n d f a c e s 129 the military large fees for supplies like hay and firewood that he bought from local residents for a pittance. He was brought up on charges and was eventually acquitted, but he was forced to take a leave of absence from the army. Hooker decided to stay in town despite his local reputation and managed to distinguish himself over the next few years. He served as the foreman of a coroner’s jury in the case of a man accused of mule stealing who was subsequently lynched. He also ran for State Assembly, though he didn’t win, and he owned a 550-acre ranch at Agua Caliente, where the Agua Caliente Springs Hotel was later built. He also built a house on First Street West in town, later selling the property and its acreage to the Vasquez family. By the time the Civil War broke out, Hooker was back in the army, and in 1862 he was commissioned a brigadier general. He was denied promotion in 1863 and left the field service, spending the rest of the war as a departmental commander. He retired in 1868 with the rank of major general. Before returning to the military he tried to sell his Agua Caliente property, but his land title was a little fuzzy. After the war he had to petition the Andrew Johnson administration to confirm his title, which was eventually granted. The people of Sonoma remembered him for decades, referring to him by a nickname he never liked: Fighting Joe. A wagon allegedly belonging to Hooker was used in a San Francisco parade celebrating the seventy-fifth anniversary of California’s statehood in 1925. And a trunk that he left behind at his Agua Caliente property was given by a later owner of the site to the “Golden Gate Park museum” in San Francisco. Its whereabouts today are unknown. The Vasquez House, once owned by Hooker at its First Street West site was moved to its present location in the El Paseo shopping complex on First Street East. It is now the headquarters of the Sonoma League for Historic Preservation. One of the most famous of the Civil War generals also played an important role in Sonoma history, in an episode that veers close to farce. It involved future General “Marching Through Georgia” William Tecumseh Sherman. After the Bear Flaggers took over Sonoma in 1846 and Commodore 130 a s h o r t h i s t o r y o f s o n o m a Sloat had seized California for the United States, the Bears elected immigrant John Nash to act as alcalde. They felt they had the right to install an official of their own choosing because they were...