Samuel S. “Red Devil” Jobe
Samuel S. “Sam” Jobe was Ernie Morris’ great-grandfather.
Samuel S. “Sam” Jobe was born February 22, 1841 in Anderson County, Missouri. His wife, Eliza E. (Blackburn) Jobe, was born July 14, 1851 in Wayne County, Missouri. Sam and Eliza were married in Walla Walla, Washington in August, 1883.
The Pony Express began delivering mail across the western U.S. starting in 1860. Sam was a Pony Express rider for Ben Holladay on a route from St. Joseph, Missouri to Sacramento, California. As a young man of 19 Sam and Ben Holladay staked the Overland Trail from Missouri to Oregon. Sam’s first non-stop Pony Express ride was a stretch of 125 miles from Horseshoe Bend on the Laramie River to Julesburg, Colorado on the South Platte River. The Pony Express lost the mail contract after about 18 months and was replaced by stagecoaches.
After the Pony Express shut down Sam became a stagecoach driver for the Overland Stage Company, delivering mail, passengers and cargo across the western countryside. Sam was excellent at driving a stagecoach with a six-horse hitch.
Abbot and Downing began manufacturing the Overland stagecoach in Concord, New Hampshire in 1825. As the business grew coaches were sold to several locations of the world. Overland Stage Co. was eventually taken over by Wells Fargo Co. reportedly based on a debt Overland was unable to repay.
Stagecoaches traveled about five miles an hour, about 60 to 70 miles per day for most days. It was a wild and dangerous undertaking for the owners, drivers, passengers, and cargo. Stage stops were often located in lonely places and had their share of dangers. Travel often included rough roads, hot and dusty conditions, long hours of hard work, and risks of robbery by highwaymen or attacks by hostile Indians.
Sam had bright red hair and a blazing red beard. Indians were afraid of Sam because they thought anyone with red hair and a red beard must be the Devil. The sight of him turned the Indians’ blood cold. Indians who crossed Sam’s path called him the “Red Devil.”
Sam occasionally had encounters with hostile Indians, although they usually left him alone. Several times hostile Indians would attack stagecoaches, kill all passengers and stole the horses and cargo from stagecoaches ahead of or behind Sam. Sam would then need to cover additional routes that had been decimated by Indians attacks.
One of Sam’s very memorable lifetime moments occurred during a wagon train journey from the Midwest to the West Coast when he was a young man. During the long hard trek, the wagon train ran into trouble. Surrounded by hostile Cheyanne and Sioux warriors, Sam and his companions were compelled to fight for their lives within a circle made by their covered wagons. According to events recalled by Sam’s relatives, during the battle Sam secured a Sioux war bonnet. The bonnet was full length of beautifully colored fathers, bound with disks of pure silver which graduated from approximately three inches in diameter to tiny pieces no larger than a dime. Sam later presented this ornate headdress to his personal friend, Buffalo Bill Cody, who exhibited the headdress during for several of his circus performances. At the age of 15 Buffalo Bill had been one of the youngest Pony Express riders. Before his death, Buffalo Bill presented the headdress to a New York museum where it is believed to be located to this day.
The stagecoach business was eventually replaced by telegraph, railroads and automobiles, and the contract to deliver the mail and other services by stagecoach was lost. The stagecoaches were then parked and ole dad time took care of the rest of them.
Sam and Elize eventually retreated to their livestock ranch in the lower Carrizo Plains area of San Luis Obispo County, an area that was a wilderness at the time.
Sam and Eliza raised their family and lived out the rest of their pioneer lives near the town of Maricopa where they were blessed with the birth of their child, Nora (later Mrs. Jesse Wilkinson). Nora was reportedly the first white (non-Indian) child born in the Carrizo Plains area.
Eliza Jobe died January 13, 1928 at the age of 76 after living in the Carrizo Plains area for 41 years. Sam Jobe died on December 30, 1933 at age 92.
Sam Jobe Jr. and Sam Jobe Sr.
Sam Jobe was a great grandfather of Ernest Morris. As a tribute to Sam and his life, Ernest made a miniature woodcarving of the Concord Stagecoach with a six-horse hitch and passengers. Although it took several months to carve, it was a labor of love.
