He Said That His Parents Did
Not Live Together, And He Seemed To Have Been Ill Treated By His
Father.
Though he had been delicately brought up, and indulged
in every way, (and he had then with him trinkets which had been
given him at home,) yet his education had been sadly neglected;
and when only twelve years old, he was sent as midshipman in the
Company's service.
His own story was, that he afterwards ran
away from home, upon a difficulty which he had with his father,
and went to Liverpool, whence he sailed in the ship Rialto,
Captain Holmes, for Boston. Captain Holmes endeavored to get
him a passage back, but there being no vessel to sail for some
time, the boy left him, and went to board at a common sailor's
boarding-house, in Ann street, where he supported himself for a
few weeks by selling some of his valuables. At length, according
to his own account, being desirous of returning home, he went to
a shipping-office, where the shipping articles of the California
were open. Upon asking where the ship was going, he was told by
the shipping-master that she was bound to California. Not knowing
where that was, he told him that he wanted to go to Europe, and
asked if California was in Europe. The shipping-master answered
him in a way which the boy did not understand, and advised him to
ship. The boy signed the articles, received his advance, laid out
a little of it in clothes, and spent the rest, and was ready to
go on board, when, upon the morning of sailing, he heard that the
ship was bound upon the North-west Coast, on a two or three years'
voyage, and was not going to Europe.
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