Robert Plumridge

Robert Plumridge, 1845-1906
Gambler and Bookmaker
 
Buried in Rosedale, Section: R-N

Grave marker photo courtesy of Pioneers’ Cemetery Association

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Robert Plumridge was born in December 1844 in New Zealand. This would have been barely three years after the local Maori chieftains signed a treaty and New Zealand was made a British colony. 
 
It is possible that Robert was the son of George Plumridge, born in England, and Catherine Norris, born in Ireland. The 1852 state census of California lists a boy by that name, living in the household of R. Watson and his wife Catherine. Watson, a hotel steward, might have been Robert’s stepfather.
 
Plumridge was working as a waiter in California when the Civil War began in 1861. On September 20, 1861, he enlisted at Coloma, El Dorado County, California, for a term of three years. He mustered in at Auburn, Placer County, on October 16 and was assigned to Company F, 4th California Infantry. The regiment never saw battle; instead, its soldiers were assigned as support personnel to posts along the west coast of the United States. By September of 1862, Plumridge was working in the bake house of a military hospital. At the expiration of his term of enlistment, he was discharged at Fort Yuma on September 20, 1864.
 
Fort Yuma was on the California side of the Colorado River, across from the Arizona Territory. Plumridge seems to have chosen Arizona over California, for he was recorded as voting in Prescott in 1876. In 1880, he was listed as managing a hotel in Tombstone.
 
On November 10, 1883, Plumridge wed Isabel Acedo in Tucson, Arizona (she also appears in several records as ‘Elizabeth’). Isabel was twenty years his junior. They settled in Phoenix, where they had five children.
 
Instead of employing his skills as a baker, Plumridge made his living in Phoenix as a gambler and bookmaker. According to his obituary, he was an ardent ‘sporting man’ and an authority on card games, horse races and boxing. Nevertheless, he had such a reputation for honesty and fair play that even those who lost their bets could not complain. He was employed for several years by the Capitol Saloon as a faro dealer, although he sometimes took time off to attend sporting events where money was likely to change hands.
 
On September 7, 1895, Plumridge applied for an invalid pension due to respiratory problems contracted during his service. He was awarded Pension #938,379.  
 
Plumridge died on June 19, 1906, of carcinoma of the bowels. Following an Episcopal funeral service, he was buried in Rosedale, Section: R-N.
 
Plumridge’s wife Elizabeth received widow’s pension #852,345, based on his military service. She died August 1, 1927, in Los Angeles, California.
 
© 2025 by Donna L. Carr. Last revised 30 June 2025.

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