California gold rush of the mid 1800s. He describes how people travel to california, the physical geography of the area and the evolving Technology Used to mind goal. Good morning everyone. Were going to talk about the history of the gold rush, im going to talk mainly about california and the years following 1948. But they have played a very important golds, think all the way back to conquistadores. One of the things they are fascinated by was the quest for gold. The history of their conquest first with the as tex and then of the incas, is of an quintuple desire for Precious Metals, gold and silver. When the first english settlers came to jamestown in 1607, while they are hoping to find some kind of supplies of gold that have been found by the spaniards. It was a source of bitter disappointment to not find gold in what is now virginia. They brought with him jewelrys, and goldsmith. Americas first gold rush took place close to us in georgia in 1829, this was the georgia gold rush in north georgia. If youve been about hundred miles north of here you can see that the old lump can county courthouse has been converted into mining museum. It is about 100 miles up the road. What happened was, the first gold was discovered, then suddenly people start pouring into the area, huge numbers. Because of the intoxicating possibility that gold would make them wealthy quickly. And tell them, this had been an area behind the line of settlement. But suddenly, the White Settlement catches up very quickly. Here is the governor, describing what it was like meeting the georgia minors in 1829. Many thousands of idle profit people flocked into georgia from every point of the compass. Whos pentup vicious propensity swim lucid from law an opinion, make them like the evil one, in other words the devil. In his worst mood. After waiting all day in the chat who she rivers, picking up articles of gold, they collected around fires at night and played on the ground and on their hats, cards, dice, push pin and other games of chance for their days findings. Whiskey cards serve them to. Hundreds of combatants sometimes seem swearing, striking and gouging eyes. As frontier men can only do these things. Frontiersman in the south used to fight, and tell one of them when it gouge out the eye of his combat. That was victory. The army was sent interest or some kind of order in this chaotic scene where people of poured in from every direction. The here on the sheet, the army majors reported this, upwards of 200 persons who presented whites, indians, halfbreeds and blacks, boys a 14 and old men, and either occupations were as various is there complexions. Comprising diggers, thieves, gamblers, shopkeepers. There is also two colonels of the georgia militia, two candidates for the congress, two of the gospel. All attracted by the love of gold. He is making the most of it there. But this was a very rich sight of gold. A large quantity of gold was drawn out of them, out of the minds there, between 1829 and into the 18 seventies and eighties. For a while it was minted into federal currency. You see the coin on the left is a u. S. Coin and on the right is after the confederate succession, the Confederate Bank also used gorgeous georgia gold. Fermenting just by living here, youve all seen an example of this cold on the State Capitol building. Five or six miles from here. The gold is thinly coated with gold. This is a very important source. The people who already lived there, in the area were georgia gold rush took place where the cherokees, one of the native american society. This ever since the american revolution, the federal government had been trying very hard to integrate the native american nations into the United States. Saying, learn to become christians, learn literacy, learn to become farmers instead of hunters and gatherers. Become integrated into our society. That was the federal policy in the first three or four decades of the republic. Now comes a test case, now suddenly turns out that the chair keys are living on land for which the whites are very hungry indeed. What principle was going to unveil, the principle of racial exclusion was going to prevail. The whites just wanted to get rid of the indians one way or another. In the election of 1888, in a successful candidate andrew jackson, they found someone who also wanted to get rid of the native americans anyway he could. This is john ross one of the cherokee chiefs. If any communities had lived up to the federal government, it was obviously cherokee, they learned how to read. One created a syllable bowl the bible had been translated into the cherokee language. Many of them had become christians, many of them now war american dress. This was a highly integrated community. But nevertheless, the principal prevailed, we have to get rid of them. Congress passed the indian removal act in 1830 which was signed by president jackson, saying that the five civilized tribes, this is president jackson he said, the five civilized tribe should move from their current lands and out onto a place that was then called indian territory. The five groups they had where the seminals, chicken saws and the idea was that it would be a forcible resettlement of population on the other side of the Mississippi River out here. This is now oklahoma, it was then called indian territory. The Georgia State government passed a law specifying that these lands in these Northern Area of georgia should be reallocated by a land lottery to white settlers. To forcibly dispossess the former inhabitants and handed over to the weights. This is the prelude to a movement, the trail of tears, by which the cherokee were shifted and forced to migrate several hundred miles under adverse conditions with large numbers of them dying along the way. It is one of the great Human Rights Violations of the u. S. History, particular in georgia itself. And talk about the spread of american settlers and political power, we talked about the mexican more. This was the war fought between mexico and the u. S. In 1846 to 48. As i said then, although the american armies were not particularly well lead, they were much more effective to bend the mexican armies. They could win a spectacular series of battlefield victories. By late 1847, the leader of one of the american armies landed on the coast of the eastern coast of mexico, let his army inland and they were able to overrun mexico city. Itself on the right there, you can see a picture of general scotts Army Fighting and marching triumphantly into mexico city where they were in effect were able to dictate the terms of the peace treaty that followed. This was the peace treaty of guadeloupe hidalgo. Whos geographical significance was, a vast area of mexico was now handed over to the u. S. Nearly all the land was currently was california, nevada, utah, arizona and then parts of new mexico and colorado. But that today was the southwestern quarter of the u. S. Certain things about this are important to remind you of. This is now an area with high population. But then its population was extremely low. Only a few thousand spaniards had ever lived there, or a few thousand mexicans. There is a low density of a native american settled. It was mainly unoccupied territory. The reason it was unoccupied was because it was so dry, all this land has very low rainfall with a few exceptions like the Northern California coast. Most of it is too dry for ordinary agriculture, so not many people could live there. To give you an idea of how low its population was, how many of you bid to San Francisco . It is a fantastic natural harbor. You sail into the golden switches of narrow entrance. It has enormous deep water enclosed harbor. Now its one of the great cities of the world. This is what it looked like an 1846 to 1847. Just a handful of huts and a few streets. It was a very, very quiet and sleepy little place. Its future significance was unimaginable that time. This is a settler, he lived in a place called sutters forte which is on the site of the current city of sacramento. Which is now the state capital of california. I mentioned in a previous lecture, americans have been moving into texas even when texas was still a mexican territory. In the same way that american settlers have been moving into california, even when it was still mexican territory, one of them was yo handset or. He came from switzerland and he set up a trading fort, and there it is in the upper picture. The fact that he had to have a forte is a sign that he was politically volatile the area was. He was expecting to be attack so he took precautions. He was in sacramento. One of the things he wanted to sell was lumber. And that was going to come from the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains, east of sacramento. So he sent one of his assistants, james marshall, up the river. Up to a place card colonia and asked them to design and build a sawmill. This is a place where the American River is flowing fast enough that it can turn the water will, and it was attached to circular saw blade so the lumber could be brought down and san and sent down the river. One of the things that you have to do to make an effective saw is diverts the river down the i designed flew met terms the water rapidly. In the middle there, he found little flakes of gold. Little metal flakes. He reported back to sutter, his boss, and said i found gold. His boss said, dont tell anybody. We will keep it secret. You could foresee this. You know how bad everyone is keeping secrets. Dont you know from your own experience . The only way to have a secret is to never tell anyone. As soon as you tell someone, the secret gets out and thats exactly what happened in this case. It wasnt long before the news got back east. Its spread very rapidly over the world. The result was a massive move of people into california. This is the area where the gold was discovered. This is sacramento, sutter sport was right there. And he sent his assistant up here and that is where the gold had been discovered. We now know from subscribes geological work, the gold field is about the area that a show marin yellow. The richest area, where the most of gold was found, was about here. This is called the mother lode. Those little red boxes, those are places where the mining cant camp spread up. They correspond very closely as you would expect to the load itself. Imagine a simplified version of the coast of california. Im just going to do this for reasons of simplicity. Here San Francisco bay, one river is flowing south, the sacramento river, and eventually it flows into the San Francisco bay. It is parallel to the coast. Theres a Coastal Range here. And then a big central valley. Theres another river flowing north and it flows into San Francisco bay. This is the central valley, over here is much higher mountains. What are they called . I dont know. This makes the snowy mountains. Nevada, yeah. And you can tell from the map that there are lots of rivers that flow out of this and join the northern ones and the southern ones flow into the san juan keen river. That is the kind of schematic of california. It is very important that you get a sense of what that looks like. And the gold is here, sort of in the foothills of the valleys. Lets hear about how the news got back east. Allen, can you come up in reeves . William sherman was a famous unit general. But at this point whos lieutenant in the u. S. Army witnessing what was happening when the gold was discovered. Here is lieutenant. German as the spring and summer of 1840 advance, the reports came faster from the gold mines. Stories reached us of fabulous discovery and spread throughout the land. Everyone was talking gold, gold, which soon adopted the character of a fever. Some of our soldiers began to desert. We heard of men earning 50, 500, and thousands of dollars per day. And for a time, it seems as though someone would reach solid golds. So the news gets out, heres an army officer reporting to seniors. Not long after that the president himself made a big speech. We have the president here with us. If you just look at the back sheet of the hand out, you can see what the president said. This is just a few months after that initial discoveries. It was known that minds of the Precious Metals consisted of a considerable extent in california. Recent discoveries found that these lines are more extensive and valuable than anticipated. They count for the abundance of gold in that territory and they are such an extraordinary character, corroborated by that centigrade ports of officers and Authentic Service who have visited and drive facts from personal observation. The explosions already made warrant believe that the supply is very large. And that gold is founded varies places. It appears also from these reports, minds of quick silver are found in the gold region. One of them is now being worked and believed to be one of the most productive in the world. The effects produced by this discovery of these Mineral Deposits have produced a surprising change in the state of affairs in california. Labor commands the most exorbitant price, and all other pursuits is that of searching,. Nearly all of the male population is gone to the district. Ships are deserted by their crews and their voyages suspended for want of sailors. Our Commanding Officer has apprehensions that soldiers cannot be kept in the Public Service with a large increase in pay. Desertions have become frequent. He recommends those that shell withstand the strong temptation shall be rewarded. This abundance of gold, and pursuit of it, have already caused california and unprecedented rise in life. Thank you. That is president poke. He is making this declaration about the way in which there economy is being transformed. People are pouring in and nobody wants to do any work except for digging for gold. Ships arrive, the crews dessert because they want to go up to the gold diggings. Psychologists are very interested in us, gold fever takes people. Over the curious thing about it is that it is not particularly useful. I dont know if youve ever thought about this, today it is possible to do 70 conductors, heat shields on spaceships. But then it was mainly for decoration. And also sometimes as a unit of currency. It doesnt rust. You can make coins out of it. It is not really useful, nevertheless it was incredibly valuable. Its one of the many things that have been so important to our history, like gold and tobacco, which great fortunes were made on. Though they werent essential. Were thinking about. People start pouring into california, even around the world, england, france, germany, south america, even china. There is a huge amount of enthusiasm about finding ways to get to california. Lots of handbooks like this began to be published. This was published in boston. And account of california and the wonderful gold regions with descriptions two different routes to california. Information about the ancient and modern discoveries of gold. It was help for travelers on how they are going to get there. Now one of the there were essentially three ways of getting there. What they had in common is that they were all incredibly difficult. Unbelievably difficult. This is 1849, still another 20 years before you could get their boy railroad. The first ones were invented but they were very short lines. One of the ways was by going in a clipper ship. This is a new type of ship with a lot of sale, capable of sailing fast. One possibility was to sail from the east coast all the way down through the south atlantic, then around cape horn. What is that like . Horrible. It is the storminess waters in the entire world, you are coming into the teeth and it could come in two weeks that is one way of doing it. Lots of people tried that. And this is an ad for it, the ship called the california. And you can see the artist has implied that you can see the coast, which is not true. They rearrange the topography. That is one possibility. A second possibility was to go by steam ship. Instead of going all the way around the tip of south america, sail into the east coast, into the caribbean where the crossing is narrowest. Then either at the place from panama or nicaragua, go across by land, then take a second ship which would take you to San Francisco. The advantage of doing it that way was that the journey was a great deal shorter. The disadvantage was that just about the best place in the world to die of malaria and yellow fever was there. This is an incredibly difficult place just to live. A few years for decades later people had successfully built the suez canal, they tried to build the panama canal, they failed because they all died of horrible tropical diseases. That was a risky business. The incentive was so great. For california direct, the extraordinary inducements. The quickest and cheapest and safe, it is what they claim. The third way was to go on the trails. Of the three routes taken, this was the one and most frequently. As you know, the oregon trail really opened up in about 1843 or 44. Five or six years previous to this. They worked out that the best way to do it was to start at independence, missouri, go off the river then across to the sweet water river, across the rockies of the lowest point, then pick up the headwaters of the snake river where meets the Columbia River, then down as far as portland where the Columbia River reaches another river. It was at this point that various cut offs were established. Particularly the california trail with a cut off down here near sacramento. This is approaching it overland rather than by sea. The oregon trail is very difficult itself. If you take the california trail, its even worse. You would have to go into northern nevada to a place called the humbled sink. Which is usually a dry riverbed, it only has water there it for a few days. It is usually just bonedry. They had to cross is incredibly hot, arid desert. And all along the way people died from various. Things but make matters worse, you then had to cross this year at nevada mountains themselves. It was harder crossing those rather than the rockies. Great skiing country today, but we lived in softer times and they did. Already by then, when most famous incidents in american cannibalism had taken place there. The dawn are party was a group that set off from missouri, to