Henry Hancock

Henry Hancock (April 11, 1822 – January 9, 1883) was a Harvard trained lawyer and a land surveyor working in California in the 1850s. He was the owner of Rancho La Brea, which included the La Brea Tar Pits.

Henry Hancock was born in Bath, New Hampshire, a son of Thomas Hancock and his wife Lucy (Smith) Hancock, and grandson of Henry Hancock and Abigail (Cotton) Hancock. He was of English ancestry, his grandfather having emigrated from Somerset in the 18th century.

Hancock entered the Norwich Military Academy, then studied law at Harvard University. Graduating in 1846, he went St. Louis, Missouri, where he became a surveyor. During the Mexican–American War, he was quartermaster of the 1st Regiment Missouri Mounted Volunteers under Colonel Alexander William Doniphan. At the war's end, he returned home to New Hampshire but soon decided to go west.

Hancock sailed from Chicago to San Francisco. He arrived in California in September, 1849 and opened a law office. He then tried his hand at gold mining on American River, but in 1850 moved to Los Angeles.

Hancock engaged extensively in government surveying. In the early 1850s, the rancheros who had received their land grants during the Mexican and Spanish occupation of California were required to prove their claims to the new American government. They filed claims with the United States Land Commission and had to have their property surveyed and mapped by government surveyors. Henry Hancock surveyed Rancho San Pedro for the Dominguez family, Rancho San Francisco for the Del Valles, Rancho San Jose owned by the Palomares and Vejar families; and Henry Dalton's Rancho Azusa de Dalton. He also served as the city surveyor for Los Angeles.

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