!information received from Betty Lawrence on 28 Oct 1997.
Charles Henry Hurt was only three years old when his parents crossed the plains from Missouri in the summer of 1853 with their household necessities carefully packed in a covered wagon drawn by oxen. His family settled in Lakeport, Lake County. At age 23, he left home and went to work in a saw-mill. He soon, however, returned to farming. He arrived in Round Valley, Mendocino County in 1884 where he secured 80 acres of land. This land was purchased from him in 1891 for the Covelo Indian Reservation and he subsequently bought another farm and added acreage to it finally reaching 963 acres in all. He served for nearly 7 years as deputy United States Marshal for the Northern District of California. - "History of Mendocino & Lake Counties" by Aurelius O. Carpenter and Percy H. Millberry. Published by Historic Record Co. 1914

!From Lolita Long Lowry's notes:
Mendocino County to which the Hurts moved was part of the territory ceded to the United States by Mexico in settlement of the Mexican War. boundaries were defined and the State of California was proposed. As part of the constitution of the State the boundaries of the counties were determined and Mendocino was an original county. Supervisorial districts were set up in 1860 and Round Valley Township was part of the Second District. It is so named because of the shape of the Valley approximately 6 x 7 miles. It is a very fertile valley nestled in the Coast Range with surrounding peaks up to 7000 feet. Settlers who were interested in farming and cattle raising came in the 1850s and by 1867 there were "unmistakable signs of permanency".

!However there was a lack of a fixed land title and a need for a road to connect with other settlements according to an article in the Mendocino Herald in Ukiah dated 1/3/1868. By this time there was a school, a church, a sawmill and grist mill and the Indian Reservation had been established. Covelo, named by an early settler after a Swiss village, was the only town in the township. It had been started by the building of a home in the central part of the valley and businesses followed. Covelo and Round Valley are used interchangeably to refer to the area as the small town represents the center of activities and business of the Valley. There were many skirmishes with the Indians which are referred to in an unfinished article in Sacramento (author not identified) in LLL's files.. . .

!information received from Betty Lawrence on 28 Oct 1997.
From Lolita Long Lowry's notes:
"Sarah was the second of four girls. Her mother died when she was a child and Godwin remarried. He brought his family to California by train in October 1869. Sarah not only raised her own thirteen children but assisted in the upbringing of three grandchildren (daughter Melissa's children) and two nieces and a nephew (children of Sarah's sister and Charles' brother James and Alice Hurt). She lost one child at five weeks from whooping cough, Charles Henry Jr., and in her family bible was a lock of his hair and a small piece of blue velvet which was the covering of his casket. An attached note written by daughter, Alice Hurt Long, stated that the family then lived in what was called "Swamp Land" - their first home in Round Valley where three of the children were born. This area was later drained by control of the creek and the road that runs by it is still called the Charley Hurt Highway.

!The family Bible was given to her the year she was married. The births of their first twelve children were entered probably about 1893 after the twelfth child was born as the ink is faded and the writing is the same. Their marrige record and births and birth and death of Charles their son were also written at the same time.

!Sarah was a member of Eastern Star as were many of her daughters and was also a charter member of the Presbyterian Church in Lakeport. Sarah's death certificate indicate she died from diabetes.

!While Charles Henry Hurt was a tall man, Sarah was short and could stand under the outstretched arm of her husband"