CASACRAM-L Archives

From: "Sandra Harris" <>
Subject: [CASACRAM] Hamilton Square-Sacramento Cemetery
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 08:33:06 -0700

I just gave a talk at the DAR in Sacramento and they had this in their
files. Thought it might be of interest ...


Hamilton Square
Restoration Plaque Dedication June 10 2000

In 1889, during the last term of Mayor John Quincy BROWN's administration, a
large, new plat of land was opened up and laid out for burial purposes in
Sacramento's City Cemetery and officials hastened to find an appropriate
name for it. Since this new section was to be a prominent area of the
cemetery, a name of some prominence had to be found. It was Mayor BROWN who
suggested that a suitable plot be set aside within the section for one of
the cemetery's more illustrious residents and that the section be named for
him. This most illustrious resident was William Stephen HAMILTON, the
seventh and youngest son of Alexander HAMILTON, first treasurer of the
United States. Hence the name, Hamilton Square.


William Stephen HAMILTON was born in New York City on August 4 1797, and was
only six years old when his famous father was mortally wounded in the duel
with Aaron BURR. The death in 1804 deprived him of a formal college
education. He did enter West Point in 1814, but left before graduating. In
the ensuing years he was appointed United States Surveyor of Public Lands,
served as a colonel in the Black Hawk War (1833) and held several offices
before removing to Wisconsin, where he engaged in lead mining. Gold lured
him to CA in 1849 and disease made him a permanent resident here in 1850.

Successful in his mining endeavors near Weaver Basin CA, he was en route to
Sacramento with $18,000 in gold dust. He arrived in a sickly condition and
died three days later on Oct 7 1850 of dysentery. The $18,000 in gold dust
was never found.

William was buried in a common grave in the public tier grounds of the City
Cemetery, his burial site marked only by a crude wooden headboard. His body
remained there until 1879, when the family authorized removal to a private
plot in the cemetery's east side with a suitable granite monument erected.
Ten years later, the remains were re-interred in the section named for him,
Hamilton Square. So came to an end the strange odyssey of Alexander
Hamilton's seventy son, William. He died once, was exhumed twice, and buried
three different times in three different locations. He is undoubtedly one of
this cemetery's most restless residents.

The Sacramento Cheaper of the DAR maintains his final resting place.

Sandra

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