Tracing the Footsteps of Our Ancestors — Part 3

Antone Costa and his wife Anna BacigalupiThe Sacramento Daily Union of December 18th, 1865, reported the following: “Downieville, December 17th. About ten o’clock last evening, as Jack Costa, an Italian gardener above town, was putting out his candle preparatory to going to bed, he was shot through the window with a shot-gun loaded with a slug. The charge took effect in his left side, breaking three ribs. He lived about two hours. Nothing is directly known as to who committed the horrible deed.” However, not long after, newspapers reported that “suspicion attaches the crime to a brother-in-law of the murdered man.” The Mountain Messenger of December 23rd, 1865, gave more details, reporting, “Giacomo Costa was proprietor of the garden furthest from the center of the village, and last Saturday evening his house was made the theater of a terrible tragedy. At about ten o’clock on the evening mentioned the whole town was startled by the report of a gun, followed by loud cries and the barking of dogs; and many of our people were soon at Costa’s house, to find him upon the floor of his sleeping apartment, weltering in his blood and in a dying condition. He had been shot while in the act of extinguishing the light, preparatory to stepping into bed. The night was dark and cloudy, and the assassin had evidently watched his opportunity and shot through the window, lodging five balls in the body of the unfortunate man. His wife was in the room at the time, but escaped without injury. Costa was known to have been on bad terms with his Italian neighbors, and only a few weeks ago he had had trouble with a brother-in-law, in which knives were drawn, but which simply resulted in the latter cutting himself slightly. He left the house at the time, vowing vengeance upon Costa; and these facts fastened suspicion upon the brother-in-law, who was found at the house of Garibaldi, close by, and lodged in jail.” The brother-in-law, 21-year-old Angelo Sturla, was sentenced to two years at San Quentin under the charge of assault with a deadly weapon and was discharged on January 14th, 1868. It is probable the home where Jack Costa was murdered was the later home of the Ponta family (torn down in 1952) as it was the house located the furthest away from the center of town at the Italian Gardens. The home in which Sturla was found hiding is likely the present-day Swint (earlier Mull) residence, which the Garibaldi family once owned.

According to records at the Sierra County courthouse, the estate of Jack Costa was settled in May 1866, with Marie Costa (presumably his wife) receiving the property known as the Italian Gardens. Antone Garibaldi later purchased the property, and for many years, the place was known as the Garibaldi Ranch before being sold to Giovanni “John” Ponta and becoming known as the Ponta Ranch (more on the Ponta family later in this series).

Returning to Antone Costa - in 1861, his family moved to the property directly north of the present-day Downieville Cemetery, where they established a ranch. In addition to their two sons born in Italy, Antone Costa and his wife Anna had five more children born in Downieville: Louisa (1862-1954), Mary (1864-1865), August (1867-1940), Antonio “Tony” (1869-1960), and Charles (1871-1873). Regarding the Costa Ranch, James J. Sinnott wrote that the Costa family “developed it into one of the better ranches of the Downieville area, clearing more land, raising vegetables and hay, and planting fruit trees. After the death of his parents, M.A. [Nick] Costa operated the ranch and lived with his family on the ranch until his death. The ranch continued to be the home of Miss Anna Costa who in 1938 had a fine new home built upon it.” This home, which still stands today and is now a vacation rental, was built upon the stone cellar of the original ranch home by building contractor Harry A. Campbell, whose obituary in the Mountain Messenger stated, “in 1937-38 he was in charge of building the home of Miss Anna R. Costa and the post office building, where he was associated with O. S. “Mike” Strausberg and George R. Costa.” I was told that during the tearing down of the original ranch home at the Costa Ranch, numerous gold coins were found hidden in the walls. The post office building, mentioned in Campbell’s obituary, was built for Tony Costa after his previous building at the location was destroyed in the flood of December 10th, 1937. This building still stands today and is now known as the Carriage House Inn.

I will wrap up the Costa family history in Part 4, coming next week!