Historic Nantucket, Summer 1999, Vol. 48, No. 3

NANTUCKEr

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THE NANTUCKET HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION Dorothy Slover President

Peter W. Nash

David H. Wood First Vice President

Second Vice President

Alan F. Atwood

Virginia S. Heard Clerk

Treasurer

Jean M. Weber Executive Director

BOARD OF TRUSTEES William A. Hance Julius Jensen m Arie L. Kopelman L. Dennis Kozlowski Jane Lamb Carolyn MacKenzie Albert L. Manning, Jr.

Sarah Baker Patricia M. Bridier Laurie Champion Prudence S. Crozier John H. Davis Alice F. Emerson Thomas C. Gosnell Barbara Hajim

Bruce D. Miller Aileen M. Newquist Steven M. Rales Arthur I. Reade, Jr. Alfred Sanford Richard F. Tucker Marcia Welch Robert A. Young

ADVISORY BOARD Nina Hellman Elizabeth Husted Elizabeth Jacobsen Francis D. Lethbridge Reginald Levine Katherine S. Lodge Sharon Lorenzo Patricia Loring

Walter Beinecke,Jr. Joan Brecker Patricia Buder Helen Winslow Chase Michael deLeo Lyndon Dupuis Martha Groetzinger Dorrit D. P. Gutterson

William B. Macomber Paul Madden Robert F. Mooney Jane C. Richmond Nancy J. Sevrens Scott M. Stearns, Jr. John S. Winter Mary-Elizabeth Young

RESEARCH FELLOWS Dr. Elizabeth Little

Renny A. Stackpole

Nathaniel Philbrick EDITORIAL COMMITTEE

Mary H. Beman Susan F. Beegel Richard L. Brecker

Thomas B. Congdon, Jr. Charlotte Louisa Maison Robert F. Mooney Elizabeth Oldham

Nathaniel Philbrick Sally Seidman David H. Wood

PROPERTIES OF THE NHA Oldest House Hadwen House Macy-Christian House Robert Wyer House Thomas Macy House 1800 House Greater Light Old Mill Old Gaol

Old Town Building Thomas Macy Warehouse Fire Hose Cart House Quaker Meeting House Nantucket Whaling Museum Fair Street Museum Peter Foulger Museum Museum Shop

Cecil Barron Jensen

Bartholomew Gosnold Center Folger-Franklin Memorial Fountain, Boulder, and Bench Settlers Burial Ground Tristram Coffin Homestead Monument Little Gallery Eleanor Ham Pony Field Mill Hill Elizabeth Oldham

EDITOR

COPY EDITOR

Helen Winslow Chase

Claire O'Keeffe

HISTORIAN

ART DIRECTOR

Historic Nantucket welcomes articles on any aspect of Nantucket history. Original research, first-hand accounts, reminiscences of island experiences, historic logs, letters, and photographs are examples of materials of interest to our readers. ©1999 by Nantucket Historical Association Historic Nantucket (ISSN 0439-2248) is published quarterly by the Nantucket Historical Association, 2 Whaler's Lane, Nantucket, MA 02554.

Second-class postage paid at South Yarmouth, MA and additional entry offices.

Postmaster: Send address changes to Historic Nantucket Box 1016 • Nantucket, MA 02554-1016 • (508) 228-1894; fax:(508) 228-5618 • infonha@capecod.net For a map of our walking tour and historic sites: http://www.pointinfinity.com/mapandlegend

ANTUCKEI' VOLUME 48, NO.3

Summer 1999

24

ord

by Jean M. Weber

The Nantucket Coffee Connection

by Robert F. Mooney

AI About It!

25

by Kate Stout

They Now?

Consequences of California Mania Nantucket and the \'(/baling Industry

by Mary E. Woodruff

by J uclith Downey

mnding the Horn and •s"ing the Isthmus to a C- lifornia

27

Recording the Voyage of the Henry Astor to San Francisco

by Cecil Barron Jensen

by Cecil Barron Jensen

28 lt'y"opolis )' (~!!)'

by Cecil Barron Jensen Excerpt by J. S. Holliday

rl c:rJ!d

byJ. S.llolliday

29

mcs S. Russell

Historic Nantucket Book Section

by Malcolm Rohrbough

\',,tn•c. Ca!i(omia Miller

by Linda McBeath-Van Gundy

Seeing the Elephant

31

NHANews

Anonymous. San Francisco from Rincon Point. Watercolor, ca. 1849-50 Print Collectio n, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Arts, Prints and Photographs The New York Public Librmy Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations

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NAN TUCK E T

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A Foreword

by Jean M. Weber

A

SA PUBLICATION FOR MEMBERS OF TllE

Nantucket Historical Association, Historic Nantucket serves a number of purposes.

Primarily a journal to encourage research and feature original articles on the history of the island, the magazine also creates a network of communication among members and friends, rather like a family newsletter. This special issue, commemorating the hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Gold Rush, which drew so many Nantucketers to California in the waning years of the whaling industry, is the result of a direct appeal to our family of readers. When editor Cecil Barron Jensen asked for "photographs, letters, or journals sent 'home' to Nantucket from the goldfields of California" in the fall 1998 issue, she could not have envisioned the many complex and entwined pathways for research that would be opened up. Inevitably, the trails of history led over land or ocean to California, and often back again to Nantucket. Those who did not return to the island when they failed to make their fortunes in gold remained, in the minds of their fan1ilies, Nantucketers.

Coincidentally, just one passenger listthat of the ship Fanny, which sailed from Holmes Hole (Oak Bluffs) on August 22, 1849- contains the names of two ancestors of current NHA members who contributed to this Gold Rush issue. Author Linda McBeath-VanGundy's great-great grandfather, James S. Russell, and James Dunlap's great-great-great grandfather, Christopher Capen, left together on the Fanny as members of the Hope Mining Company. Their correspondence with

Cecil revealed their common history. It also revealed the patience and rugged ability to adapt to difficult circumstances and, all too frequently, the sadness and failure of expectations that tinged the California experience.

Many, like Christopher Capen, returned to Nantucket.

Thomas Macy, now living in Beverly, Massachusetts, called us on another matter entirely. In settling a family estate, he wanted us to know about a number of Macy family papers, photographs, artifacts, and furniture he had inherited. Some he said he would be glad to loan, should we ever need them for an exhibition. Others he most generously agreed to give to the NHA. Happy to accept such a well-documented collection, I traveled to Beverly and, as Tom shared stories and showed me his collection, spied a curious small glass jar capped with string and dark brown paper sitting on his mantelpiece.

It contained rich, dark California dirt, speckled with gold dust- a souvenir brought back to Nantucket by his great-great grandfather, Charles W. Macy.

The Gold Rush ties to Nantucket are just one of the many facets of the long reach of island history.

Incredible stories of daring and endurance connect us to the realities of whaling in the South Seas, trade and warfare in England and Europe, manufacturing competition with the mainland, and the settlement patterns of the American frontier. With one difference: even for Nantucketers who emigrated to other states and to distant parts of the world, it seems the island was always home.

Charles W. Macy brought this jar of California dirt and gold dust back to Nantucket as a souvenir.

It remains in the Macy /armly today. Courtesy a/Thomas Macy. Photograph by jeffrey S. Allen

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ANTUCKET

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1999

Read All About It! ((Editorial restraint crumbled before the rush of exuberance.))

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FI.I 'ER IISD TilE MAK/\(, 01 Cti.IFOR.\Itlll\

OLD FI:VER SPREAD LIKE A PLAGUE, A D

There would be six more editions of the biweekly

on Nantucket, as elsewhere across the country, one of the predominant "carriers" was the local newspaper. Writes J. S. Holliday in his Rusb /or Ricbes, "From the Atlantic to the Missouri fron tier, from the Great Lakes to the gulf ports, newspaper editors played up California's unfolding gold story with florid phrases and excited rhetoric."

On Nantucket, two newspapers existed at the time of President James Polk's explosive State of the Union address in which he announced - and thereby made credible - reports of the discovery of go ld in California.

Polk's speech was delivered to the nation on December 5, 1848.

The Weekly Mirror and the weekly Inquirer both ran the stories as soon as the news reached them, on D ece mber 9 and December 11, respectively. Right beside the story of Polk 's announcement of gold at Sutter's Mill in the Inquirer ran a companion piece by Governor Mason, written from Monterey, in which he claims tha t "California is a perfect El Dorado, portions of which are reported to be almost paved with gold. " The W eekly Mirror ran the same article on December 16.

What followed amounted to an editorial feeding frenzy - with th e two editors, E . W. Cobb of the Inquirer and John Morrissey of the \ÂĽleekly Mirror, competing in equal fervor for the latest, hottest, most exciting news from tl1e fields- and regularly duplicating stories. Nantucketers got dosed with Gold Fever three times a week, from 1848 well into the 1850s.

Inquirer before the new year, 1849, and in each was news of, or about, gold. In the very next edition after

HI STOR I C

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.J . S. H OLLIDAY

by Kate Stout

Polk's address , on December 15 , two side-by-side headlines ran on page two - the page given over to national news - "Description of the Gold Region" and "Le tter from a Golddigger to his Uncle, T ranscribed Accurately." The former extolled the virtues of Suttersville: "The location is one of the best in tl1e country ... being the depot for the extensive gold, silver, platinum, quicksilver and iron mines."

The author goes on to clain1: As near as I can ascertain , there are now about 2,000 personages engaged, and the roads leading to the mines are thronged with people and wagons.

From one to nine ounces of pure virg in gold per day is gathered by every man who performs the requisite labor. . . . A gentleman informed me that he had spent some time in exploring the country, and that he had dug fifty-two holes with his butcher's knife in different places , and found gold in every one.

The Golddigger's letter, too, is compelling. In it, Ezekiel Barnes, Company B, NY Vol unteers "for Californey" writes in a letter sent to the New York Commercial and picked up by the Inquirer.

Dear Uncle- I write this to go hom to you by a vessel that sails when the folks on board are willin to go; but at present all are gone gold diggin . .. Evety body quits work now and goes for gold. The wbaleman drops his harpoon-the soldier drops the gw1 and bayonet, and the missionary drops the Bible. ... I've heard much about 'a golden age'-well, I think we have got it now.

]obn Morrisssey, o/tbe Weekly Mirror

SUM J'v!ER

1999

5

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l:tfAY~ WEDNESDAY AND FRIDAY :ED 1\'ARD w. coun.

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The mastheads and assorted advertisements from the Inquirer and the Weekly Mirror.

In fact , the term "Age of Gold " was coined by a newspaper man , one of the most famous of his day, Horace Greeley, in the New York Tribune. Clearly, news was spreading like wildfire of streets paved with gold, of ore that could be mined so easily a knife would do, and of quantities so vast that every man who merely made the effort could become rich beyond his most fanciful imaginings.

And on Nantucket, with whaling in decline by the e nd of 1848 and the island , overall , increasin gly depressed because of it, the gold of California seemed a ce rtain- and irresistible- p anacea . Furth er , Nantucketers were seafarers. Even though they were half a world away, they, better than virtually any East Coast landlubber, knew well how to get to the Pacific by sea. No arduous overland routes nor timely and uncertain trekking across the isthmus fo r them . No, they had the ships, which could be and were easily reoutfitted from whalers to passenger and cargo vessels bound for San Francisco.

In the Weekly Mirror of December 30, 1848- just three editions after the news broke - Morrissey printed the first advertisements that were Rush-related.

There were three in this edition alone, two of which were generated off-island and all stacked in a row JIAT I SA \V IN CAJ,IFORXI .\ ,

by Edwin Bryant, late ..<\lcaldc of S an to be sure to grab Franci.<;Co; and 1\Ia(.'aulay'!' HiRtory of Englnnd, the eye - one fcor 11nle by H. MACY. f7 boast e d " Important to those going to CALU<'ORNIA. SUPPLIES. Ca l ifornia ," OBACCO, G1gnr;r, Pipe!!, Pl)wd"r.• Shot . anno uncing the Cnp>~, &..c~ &r., on h 1111d 1 anti fur sule low, invention in New ''Y T. \V. CAI...I>f.H.. f l9 Jersey of a goldwashing machine available for pur·CAWJi"OilPIIA..f CALrFO .tNI:\f chase; "For San Tra-vttf in Californin, eompri!ling Francisco," news 1, . l.he p.roini~enent G~ogrophtcO\I, Agrirulturul that the Cristobal 11rte1_ Mu.a_.,ntl••~i(.~UI Fe11turell of lite country; ul~o.

Colon o ut of .~ouca ArkAMnil, Del Norte llfld Gilu New York was Rive, •• from tbe official rP.pnrt• or Col. FrP-JIIClnt, taking passenM·-.le Jt No. I Centr~ St. Blot·k. fl -1 gers; and mos t

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NANTUCKE T

important of all for the island, "For California," in which the first Nantucket ship, the Aurora, solicited "A few passengers [who] will be taken at a low rate" to San Francisco. The local rush for California was on.

Two days later, January 1, 1849, the Inquirer ran the same ad for the A urora. A mere eight days later, all available passages had been booked and the ship had been outfitted for the trip to San Francisco. On January 9, the Aurora cleared the bar and was off to the goldfields , not even a month after the first stories reached Nantucket readers. By the end of that month, eleven other Nantucket ships were ready to sail.

The barrage of gold reports in both papers was continuous from that point on, and was driven both by competitive as well as personal zeal.

For a while, in the early 1840s, John Morrissey had printed the Inquirer before taking over as its editor in 1843. In 1845, Edward W. Cobb bought the paper and took over as editor, forcing Morrissey out of a job .

Morrissey responded by starting a rival rag, the Weekly Mirror. The Great Fire of 1846, however, burned them both out of their respective offices. Cobb was forced to the point of bankruptcy by the fire and bad to borrow a substantial amount of money in order to get the paper up and rolling again, whereas the Mirror was not as badly compromised.

Any thoughts Cobb, who would be thirty-five in 1849, may have had of heading for California himself most likely were held in check by two things - the vast debt he had incurred only two and a half years before and his yow1g fanlliy. Cobb had married Susan Burdett in January 1837. Nine months later she was dead. He did not remany again until1844, and by the time of the Gold Rush not only had a relatively new wife but was in the middle of building a family. His daughters Emily I and Susan were born in 1846 and 1847 respectively, and two sons would be born as the Rush continued Charles in 1852 and Everett in 1854. Whatever his I desire might have been, Cobb's only outlet was to channel it into the vicarious participation his newspaper allowed him.

John Morrissey, however, had no such reservations and was, by nature, highly competitive and adventuresome; rather th an be done out of a job by Cobb , remember, he had responded by starting his own newsSUMM E R

1999

WEEKLY MIRROR.

A Family Ne'.Vsplper----Heutral in Politics----Devoted to Sound Morals, Ljterature, Instruction, Amusemen~ Foreign, Domestic and Marine News.

S A T U R 0 1\ Y

paper. Further, when news of gold reached him, he wasted no time in making his own plans to go West.

The June 30, 1849, Mirror- an issue that also ran a piece under the column head "California Items" and said "the frequent discovery of new deposits of this precious metalled to the apprehension it would become a 'drug' . _ _" - would be his last.

He joined forces with a group of islanders in a golddriven business venture called the Hope Mining Company. They bought a former whaler, the Fanny, and outfitted it for California. Then they drew up an agreement in which they would work together in pursuit of gold for two years, at which time each man would be given his share and be on his own. By mid-August, the Fanny had crossed the bar. The rival Inquirer of August 14 would gush that the Hope Mining Company, of which Morrissey had been made president, represented "among the most worthy, intelligent and energetic citizens of Nantucket, and if there is money to be made in California, either by gold-digging or in any other honest way, they will have their share of it. " Morrissey, who was thirty-two when he headed West, left behind his wife of eleven years and four children, ages nine, six, three, and one. Harclly uncommon, the lust for gold often broke up families. As Holliday says in Rush /or Riches, for every romantic - or greedy - reason for going to California, there were also reasons of pure escape: from bad marriages, lost love, debt, the drudgery of ordinary day-to-day life, to name a few.

What drove Morrissey remains a mystery, but his successors at the Mirror, Samuel S. Hussey and Henry D. Robinson, wrote either ironically or with tongue-incheek in the August 11 edition: Among the number who are soon to leave is included our friend Morrissey __ .. We a little wonder that brother Morrissey did not take the Mirror with him , as his subscribers must have already gone, or will soon go to the gold regions ... . We do not see how a man who has been so accustomed to looking in the Mirror, can be satisfied with nothing to see himself in . . ."

Although Morrissey had a ready outlet on Nantucket for his observations in California, he appears only to have availed himself of it once. In the April 13, 1850, edition of the Mirror, his successors wrote: "We have received the following letter from our friend Morrissey IIISTORIC

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M 0 R N I N G,

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NO. 2:1.

I 8 ~ 9-

written soon after his arrival in San Francisco .... " Dated February 28, Morrissey wrote of their arrival, the ships they had spoken en route, and his first in1pressions. "It certainly is an aston ishing, novel and wonderful place," he enthuses. "The mines yield as richly as ever." He goes on to say, "I believe that an industrious man can do well here; he may not become a millionaire, or even get rich in a year, but still ... scrape together more money in a year, than he could possibly obtain with the same exertion elsewhere." And , the letter goes on Three of our antucker men returned from the Southern mines a few days ago, who had worked in company, and after paying all expenses, they divided $1800 apiece. Others of your townsmen have done well at the mines. Indeed, so far as I have been able to learn, those from Nantucket, whether as miners, mechanics, laborers, or traders, have met with a full average of prosperity.

Morrissey closes his letter with a final thought: "One thing I will say in closing, tl1at I do not regret being here to try my luck .... " He would not return to Nantucket for another five years, when he would rejoin his wife, and in 1855 buy out Cobb, who was by then in failing health, thereby reclain1ing his first newspaper, the Inquirer, as his own.

The two newspapers would continue printing side-byside for another decade, merging into the Inquirer and Mirror on April Fools Day 1865.

W ith every word printed in the newspapers -from letters like Morrissey's to every heaclline, every exclan1ation mark that foll owed the wo rd "California" or "gold," to every advertisement tl1at offered maps of the goldfields or equipment for mining or ships soliciting passengers bound for San Francisco - Nantucketers were tempted again and again. Readers were bombarded with the likes of "Our Prospectors"; "The California Gold"; "Anoth er California Let ter"; "From the

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7

Six ads referring to gold all appeared on the same page of the Inquirer on February 19, 1849.

Four are shown in the excerpt above.

Below right: Dysentery claims a Nantucket gold miner's lzfe.

Isthmus"; "An Artful Dod ger for California"; "Inexhaustible Gold Discoveries!" et al.

Some stories renewed the fervor in a most direct and provocative way. When the Sarah Parker returned to the island, for instance, she brought with her forty ounces - twenty-three nuggets - of gold. A piece in the Inquirer issue of May 11, 1849, states: The Nantucket adventurers at the mines, were, last season, very successful ... Mr. (Jethro] Hussey was at the mines less than a month, yet he collected with his own hands about two thousand dollars; and Mr. [Francis] Swain had only provisions enough to enable him to stay a week, yet he brought away some seven hundred dollars.

It was Hussey's and Swain's gold that was sent back to Nantucket aboard the Sarah Parker. "Captain Russell, of the Sarah Parker," the article says, paid fourteen dollars an ounce for it, four or five dollars an ounce less than it is worth at the mint . ... Presuming that the people would be curious to see the first important fruits of Nantucket diggings in the mines, Capt.

Russell kindly left his gold with a friend who had a store on Main Street, that all who wished to, might go and take a look at the stuff.

The display on Main Street caused quite a commotion, and whipped up renewed urgency to head for California.

8

HISTORIC

NANTUCKET

Advertisements, too, stirred up getrich-quick dreams , as they screamed: "California! California!"; "Boots for Gold Digging"; "California Supplies"; "California-Emigrant's Guide to the Gold Mines"; "For California " (announcing another Nantucket ship, Henry Astor's, intention to sail); and "Gold! Gold! Gold!" All six of these ads, in fact, appeared on the same page of the Inquirer on February 19, 1849. By as ea rly as September 1849, another kind of ad began to appear - brokers looking to buy gold dust.

The papers were also full of speculation secondary to the Gold Rush about building a railroad across the Isthmus of Panama to hasten the journey; reports of ships returning from the mines carried headlines like "$3,000,000 in Gold Dust!"; even reports that gold had been found in Indiana. The Mirror of May 11, 1850, ran a piece called "Gold in Indiana," picked up from the New York Tribune, which reported getting the story from "a gentlen1an of high character."

Inevitably, the papers eventually began reporting news of deaths: Nantucketers lost in, or en route to, the mines. Disease was me major killer, bom in me tropical, disease-infested isthmus area and in the dusty and cholera-ridden minefields. Some, however, died of ship-board tragedies, omers of simple exhaustion, perhaps even disappointment. The first two deaths of Nantucketers appeared in me February 19, 1849, edition of me Inquirer. that of Joseph W. Hussey, "formerly of this town," and Capt. Elijah Grimes, "for many years a merchant in Honolulu. " By me 1850s, however, most editions carried news of California deaths .

Gorham Worm, for instance, died of drowning in me Feather River; Jacob Baker died "of a shock of the palsy"; Edward A. Swain "In California, at me mines, DEATHS. In c .. lif.,rnia, at the mine•, of •lyoenre•y. lllr. Edward A. Swain, nfthia town, aged 21 y~aro . · AI tloooluk1, Dec. 2cl., acri•lentnlly kille<l l>y the dioch.~rre o( a l(nn, Mr. A11hnr Cooper. ofthi• luwu , late frUIII California.

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of dysentery"; and so on and so on. In the end, more than a hundred Nantucket men died, but even the deaths of friends and neighbors failed to discourage islanders from throwing up everything to try their luck at gold-digging. After all, the deaths were relegated to the newspapers' very smallest print.

Enthralled by the promise of gold at their fingertips-and that's what the newspapers told them week after week, that a good man, particularly a man of Nantucket caliber, could not fail, so long as he wasn't bone lazy-island men continued to head West even when the real gold, the actual Rush, was essentially over.

By September 1849, the Inquirer printed a list of 464 Nantucket men who bad already sailed for California, the "largest number, in proportion to the population, than from any other place in the Union." T his claim would be backed up 150 years later when Malcolm Rohrbough would write in his Days of Gold that Nantucketers made up "the largest and closest knit group" of any in the goldfields.

As Morrissey was wont to remind his readers, better to "try my luck" than just stay home and read all about it.

Kate Stout is publisher and editor of the

Sources: Brock, Jethro C., "A Correct List of Persons Belonging to Nantucket Now in California or On Their Way There," MS. 335, NHA. Holliday,J.S., Rush for Riches: Gold Fever and the Making of California (1999).

Mooney, Robert F., "Gold!" Nantucket Magazine, summer 1997.

Rohrbough, Malcolm J., Days of Gold: The California Gold Rush and the American Nation (1997).

Stout, Kate, "Nantucket's '49er Miners," Map & Legend, winter 1999.

Eliza Starbuck Barney GeneaLogicaL Record, NHA. George Cobb Papers, 183-l-c.1951, MS. 392, NHA.

The Inquirer, December 18-18-1852.

"Nantucketers in the Gold Rush," Stackpole Papers, MS. 335, NHA.

VitaL Records to ... 7850, vols. 1 and 5.

Proceedings of the NHA, 1902, 15-17; Historic Nantucket, October 1955, 12-15 and October, 1985, 9-15.

Weekly Mirror, December 1848-December 1850.

Map and Legend and a frequent contributor to Historic Nantucket.

Where Are They Now? N DECEMBER 24, 1849, THE INQUIRER PUBLISHED A LIST of persons who traveled to California to participate in the Gold Rush. As Malcolm J. Rohrbough noted in Days of Gold, by the end of the year thirty-five Coffins, twenty-eight Folgers, and twenty-five Swains had left Nantucket for California. What happened to these Nantucketers? Did they return home? How many chose to stay in San Francisco and stilt have descendants living there today?

As we mark the hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Gold Rush it is interesting to see the number of Nantucket names that at¡e still commonly found in San Francisco. Using several of the Web's Best People Finders, as recommended, Jesse Berst's Anchor Desk (www.anywho.com, www.infopace.com, and people.yahoo.com.), we 6nd many names frequently associated with Nantucket.

N ANTUCKET

SAN FRANOSCO

Coffin Folger Gardner Macy Starbuck

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15

10

10

13 7

Swain Worth

10

123 4 2 20 33

2 4

By comparison, there were four Folgers in New York City, two Starbucks in Los Angeles, and seven Coffins in Chicago.

-Mary E. Woodruff HISTORIC

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9

e

Rounding the Horn and Crossi

Isthmus to a Life in Califor by Cecil Barron Jensen

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IIJSTORI C

N 1894 THERE WERE THREE WAYS FOR PEOPLE from the East Coast of America to travel to California - around the Horn, across the Isthmus of Panama, or cross-country by land.

Nantucketers ruled out the overland route immediately.

They went by sea, of course! With a fleet of whaling ships, captains and crews looking for opportunities to get back out on the water, and a population that understood, and even delighted in, long sailing voyages they were well prepared to join the Gold Rush. They were in fact among the first on the East Coast to leave for San Francisco.

The first whaleship to leave Nantucket was the Aurora- pulling out from the bar on January 9, 1849.

One of its passengers was William C. Pease, the twentyone-year-old son of a whaling captain. Throughout his journey around the Horn, Pease documented his experiences by writing to his parents and siblings letters that are now held in the manuscript collection of the Nantucket Historical Association. Pease, however, traveled to San Francisco again in 1854, that time with his wife, Harriett Cartwright, via the isthmus. The voyage is also well docwnented by a long letter sent upon their arrival in California. So by tracking Pease's t\vo trips West, readers can get a sense of how Nantucketers journeyed for gold. We get a feel for the fun of the adventure but also its hardships. Each route, around the Horn or across the isthmus, had its challenges.

Pease's experiences were in many ways typical of the experiences shared by men and women from all over the country in the years 1849-54.

On his first voyage he represents the young prospector seeking his fortune, caught up in the excitement and thrills of the adventure, but also disappointed by the realities he encounters. With his wife, whom he calls Hattie, we see a more mature settler. He is leading a group of companions westward. They are leaving Nantucket to seek a new life in California.

I

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But let 's start at the beginning - on board the Aurora. For many men, not used to life on a whaling ship, there were many adjustments to be made. The first was to the rolling, rocking vessel. In his book To California by Sea: A Maritime History of the California Gold Rush , James P. Delgado writes that "The vast majority of Gold Rush passengers had never been upon the waters of a lake or a river, let alone the ocean, so often the first week at sea was a tim e o f sickness, despair, soul-searching, and gradual accommodation as reality began to clash with expectations." For Pease, seasickness was his first battle. Not wanting his family to miss anything about his adventure, he writes on February 16 "I will give you a little account of my seasickness. We left the bar Tuesday morning at 3 oclock when I came on deck before breakfast Sancaty head was just in sight tl1at morning. I took breakfast with all hands and I did not eat another regular meal for a week." He continues with a description of the gales, storms, and headwinds that they encountered by way of explanation for his illness. Eventually he recovered, was back up on deck, and eating again.

Pease spends much of his time in his letters describing the food -one of his great sources of disappointment on board the ship. On February 25 , he writes "I have been barefooted for tl1ree weeks. I am growing fat and lazy. Nothing to do and plenty to eat such as it is.

Our pork is so poor that I do not eat it. We have apple pies every Sunday. It takes about 14 to go around tl1e table." By June 23 his comments about the state of their provisions reaches a pitch and he writes to his family "a little histOLy of this voyage which if it could be printed in full form would be more interesting to read than Miriam Coffin." [Miriam Coffin, or th e WhaleFishermen by Joseph C. Hatt, and published in 1834, is a great historical novel set in Nantucket and standard reading for all Nantucketers of Pease 's day.] He explains that at the beginning of the voyage the passenSUMMER

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gers were happy with the crew and captain and "our victuals then was very good." But after the first barrel or two of pork was eaten, the quality din1inished and the men could no longer eat it. "They would take a barrel on deck and it would be as yellow as gold it would be so musty, and they would throw about half of it overboard, and the rest of it would frighten a statving man. " The flour and biscuits also went "musty and sour." It seems as if water from the deck above had leaked on top of the barrels of food. "When about 3 months out it got so poor that nobody could eat it but the Captain, and he called it good."

The passengers "growled and talked" amongst themselves and to the captain. But it was no use.

Nothing was going to be done about the condition and terrible smell of rotting food. Eventually, two of the passengers took it upon themselves to clear out the food. They threw about "two cart loads" overboard, including so many potatoes that the sea "was a soLd body of rotting potatoes."

"1 wish the owners had to live on the fare, we have for six months.

It would learn them how to fit a ship, if the owners got as badly shaved as we have, l will be satisfied, if we had some captains we would have been in San Francisco the 10th ofT unc, we have seen the chance to do it, most all hands on board has been sick. I expect I should have been as sick as any, if I had not been tough as a shark and eat enough to keep me fat."

Throughout the journey, Pease writes about sighting other "sails." Not only does it represent an opportunity to broaden their circle of human contact, it is also a chance to pass mail and share news. "Wednesday there was a large ship in sight. We came up within three mile of her and then six of us passengers got the Captain to let us have a boat and we boarded her." (It was in the whaleboat, incidentally, that Pease crossed the equator.)

"When we lowered the ship was 2 Jh mile ahead of us and it was a stern chase .... The Captain advized us not to go he said we could not get to her but we was bound to go. We pulled over an hour and I bLstered my hand some, but I would have pulled all day before we would come back and had them to laughed at us." The men's efforts were well worth it. As they came up to the Edward Everett of Boston the 150 passengers were "all up in the stern of the ship most of them with red shirts on it was quite a sight." When the six men announced that they were heading for California "they gave 3 cheers that made the old ship ring. " They were treated

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Fro111tbc log o/tbe Aurora, kept by }a111e.r M. Bunker.

Map photographed by JeffreyS. Allen

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As readers can see, Pease's expectations certainly clashed with the reality. However, he did have some amusing times. In one letter he writes "We muster two accordions one fiddle a flute and a flagaelet [flageolet] on board.

So in the evening we have singing and dancing ." They fished for sharks, caught porpoises, and watched for other ships. One of his most enthusiastic passages is a description of a trip he and some of his fellow passengers made to another ship bound for California.

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11

One of William C. Pease's tellers home to Nantucket

to lemonade, sung to, and given a copy of the crew list before they returned to their own ship. It was definitely a highlight of the voyage.

On the first ofJuly 1849, the Aurora sailed into San Francisco. "We are all well and fine spirits. We arrive in here today at 11 oclock and it was a sight to behold to see the vessels. I should think there was near 200 here. " So Pease's first journey to California came to a close.

"Father and Mother I do not think there has a day passed but what I have thought of you and whenever I open my trw1k the top things are your miniatures and that Bible. I have read that Bible all through on the voyage but the last 7 chapters in it. " Pease continued to write to his family while he was in San Francisco. It appears that he was a skilled carpenter, and instead of seeking his fortune in the mines, he stayed in the growing port to build houses and shops. He earned enough money to hire a crew, lease land , build a house (with space for shop rentals and lodgers), and send money home to his family.

On November 11, 1849, he writes "California is a world of itself. 4 months ago when I got here there was

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1

hardly any wooden buildings and now it is a place almost as large as Nantucket and growing beyond all account. I should think now that there was from 50 to 75 buildings now under way and it has been the same way ever since I have been here. No man can say here but what he can make money, no matter whether he has got a trade or not. " He firmly believes that anyone with initiative can make money in San Francisco.

He reports that the wages are high, but so are the expenses, and it is not a good place for families. And anyone who does not want to be there, who does not want to work hard , should just pack up their kit and head home!

It's not obvious in his letters why William Pease went home himself. Early on in his letters he repeats to his family his intentions of returning to Nantucket eventually. Perhaps he went home sooner than he expected because of two deaths in the family. A search in the Eliza Starbuck Barney Genealogical Record reveals that Pease's eldest brother Edward died December 4, 1849, and his father,John H. Pease, died November 15, 1851. It is possible that one of those deaths was the reaSUMMER

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son for return. His last letter from his first visit to San Francisco is dated November 11, 1949.

The final letter in the William C. Pease collection is dated July 22, 1854. Forty-four-pages, it runs as a narrative of his experiences from the time he left Nantucket until his arrival in San Francisco. It covers his travels to New York to stay with his in-laws in Brooklyn; the trip on the North Star steamer to Aspinwall; their lodgings at the Summit- a small waystation along the isthmus; their trip to Panama on the backs of mules; tours of Panama; and finally, boarding the steamer Golden Gate. Pease truly enjoys writing this account of his journey and, newly married, he is a very happy man. His words sing with enthusiasm . His love of his adventures and life are apparent - even if he docs still complain about the food!

The Peases and friends left Nantucket on board the Nebraska bound for Hyannis - "the old boat is good but slow." A cart picked them up at the boat and drove them across the Cape. "We rode along through one village after another. All looking very pleasant but not much business stirring. It seemed as though there was plenty of room on the Cape for men of energy and capital to build up the place." The cart delivered them to Fairhaven, where they boarded a ferry for New Bedford. Pease writes that on this leg of the journey he had the company of Mr. and Mrs. Hadwen and Mr. and Mrs. Barney. They journeyed from New Bedford to Fall River where they took a ship to New York. After a pleasant stay with his in-laws, Hattie and William boarded their steamer bound for Panan1a. What started out with a great deal of optin1ism turned out to be a trying passage for the newlyweds.

At the start of the journey, all 500 passengers climbed up on to the deck to say farewell to ew York.

Pease describes his view of the city where "the steeples of the numerous churches towered up majestically above all other buildings and whose wharves were crowded with shipping from all parts of the world.

So numerous that their masts looked like a forest of trees." Shivering in their "silks & all the jewelry on that they owned ," the passengers went down for their first meal. According to Pease the beefsteak was passable, the bread was very good, the butter was @thy, and the ham ... "we would put our fork in it to keep it from walking off on its own account."

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Hattie did not venture to the dining saloon again until the last day.

Many of the passengers, including Hattie, were sick throughout most of the journey, but not Pease. He was fit and attended every meal the ship's stewards setved.

"I made up my mind to get as near my moneys worth as possible." He also enjoyed "music on the family organ," playing cards with Hattie in their cabin, being served ice water, and visiting with the other passengers.

He records passing Cuba and seeing Santo Domingo from the deck. After more than a week they arrived at Aspinwall, now known as Colon, in north central Panama at the entrance of the canal.

Early on in the letter, it is clear to see that Pease and Hattie had fun and lots of laughs together , but never more than in an amusing discussion following their arrival in the muddy port of Aspinwall.

After scouting out the route across the isthmus, Pease returned to the North Star to tell his group that the terrible conditions of the road made it impossible for the women to ride a mule sidesaddle. It is easy to in1agine the following conversation: "I told Hattie that she would have to put on the pants and ride across the Isthmus on a man 's saddle. No she said I shall not.

But you must. No I must not was still the answer.

She thought I was gassing her. " In the end, Hattie and the other women wore trousers.

And a good

1

The Golden Gate steam clipper.

San Francisco Maritime National Hirtoric Park

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thing, too, from the sound of it; the conditions were dreadful.

The first leg of their journey across the isthmus was by train. After six hours , partially in the rain, they arrived in a small village called the Summit. From the train depot it was a half-mile walk in mud up to the American Hotel. Even though she was wearing pants, Hattie was also wearing a dress that kept dragging in the mud. To help her out, Pease tied up her skirts around her knees. He didn't realize that this inhibited the movement of her legs, and she did not tell hin1. As a result, she couldn't take big steps and he had to "jimmy" her over puddles or rocks. Finally, they "hopped along" to the hotel, where they were served meat so tough they assumed it was an old mule that had just retired from carrying people back and forth from Panan1a, cooked in molasses! They had quite a laugh over that meal!

In the morning, the party set off on the mules down the muddy road leading to the Pacific. "Some places you would have to hold on to the mule's neck to keep from going off behind and next it would be to brace back and keep from going over his head." The mule was "sometimes knee deep in mud and other times deeper." All along the road the "natives" were selling things like eggs, coffee, lemonade, and cakes. Pease described the natives' homes as buts made with poles dug into the ground with thatched roofs. "One corner partitioned off from poles and bushes made the bedroom." The children were naked. The Peases estimated that there were a thousand mules on the road from the Summit to Panama. When the Pacific port came in sight they all "gave a cheer." The road improved and things started to look a little more "civilized." That night they ate dinner in a French restaurant. It was also an opportunity to stay in a nice hotel and wash off the layers of dirt.

Pease's description of the difficult journey across the isthmus rings with joy. It is especially clear in the following passages: "Hattie now declared she was satisfied with wearing the pants. The old dress that she took off she threw down in disgust as she had no more need of that. ... She was tickled as a dog with two tails all the way along as she enjoyed it and could have a good time in laughing at the rest of the crowd. She said she would not go to California if she could not have the chance to ride a mule across the Isthmus."

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The next morning they boarded the stean1er Golden Gate. According to Delgado, the Golden Gate in New York in 1851 was considered to be the "queen steamer of the Pacific. "Large and spacious, the 3,000-ton steamer's 269-foot-long wooden hull accommodated 800 passengers." She was also the fastest steamer of the day, setting a new record in April 1853 for the journey from Panama to San Francisco of eleven days, fourteen hours.

Pease writes vety little about their time on the ship other than to describe her as "beautiful " and a "floating palace. " We can assume the food was good, too!

Pease concludes a letter to his mother from their house in San Francisco. It is pleasant to picture domestic peace and a comfortable life for the two settlers: "Hattie and myself are in fine health both fat and hearty. The climate agrees with us as well as we could wish. Hattie is setting by my side making me an undershirt. She is Jack at all trades and good at all. I have never been away from her but one eve since we married and then I had business to attend down the street. We get along as nice as a fire. I think we are just suited for each other."

In his letter Pease mentions his two brothers, also living in San Francisco- John H. Pease, Jr., and George H. Pease. The Barney Record reveals that the brothers married and settled in California. Their mother, Mary (Bunker) Pease, eventually moved to California where she died in 1865. William and Harriet had three children: Edward C., George William, and Lester W. The Peases truly were a Nantucket family who settled a continent away. To think it all started aboard the Aurora in 1849-one hundred and fifty years ago-with a dream of making a fortune in the gold mines.

Sources: Delgado, James P., To Calz/ornia by Sea: A Maritime History of the Calz/ornla Gold Rush (1990).

William C. Pease Letters, Reed Collection, MS. 254,

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Chrysopolis San Francisco: City of Gold The following is an excerpt /rom Rush for Riches: Gold fever and the Making of California, by ]. S Hollzday, published in 1999. It is reprinted with permiuion /rom the author and the University of California Press. This passage is /rom the chapter entztled "Careless Freedmm~" subtitled "Chrysopolis."

Historic Nantucket chose it because it seems to capture the atmosphere ofSan Francisco in 1849-the boomtown that embraced so many Nantucketers. It 's easy to see how the energetic (and entrepreneurial) men got caught up in the ... Rush /or Riches-' OR THE 1110USANDS WHO CAME BY SEA, UKE

the Frenchma n , the strange world of California enveloped them at the wharves of San Francisco, a city so frantic, so profligate, that the passengers' letters were filled with astonishment. First they were surprised by the number of ships deserted by officers and crews: abandoned at anchor in Yerba Buena Cove, facing the town , crowded together, creaking and swaying, an estin1ated 150 in May 1849.

By October the ghostly fleet numbered 308-a forest of masts. In June 1850 th e newspapers reported an astounding number: 635 brigs, barks, schooners, and other vessels, many with their cargoes undisturbed and worthless in rl1e glutted market. If not left to rot and sink, scores of these hulks were pulled ashore to be used for storage or for saloons and lodgings. The brig Euphemia served as San Francisco's first prison . Most were cannibalized for planking, canvas, cordage, and spars to supply the hurry-up construction of San Francisco.'''

Even before they could get ashore, passengers encountered the competitiveness and raw economic force of life in California. Small boats hooked onto me

sides of arriving ships and business agents climbed on board, eager to learn if the cargo contained merchandise in short supply in the volatile San Francisco market. A captain in luck, wim, say, mousands of boots or a cargo of bricks, might receive competing bids beyond his wildest fancies. Pushing on board as well, employment agents tried to hire from among the passengers mechanics and tradesmen with sorely needed skills-carpenters, clerks, draymen , masons , black smiths, printers. TI1e captain of tl1e schooner Alhambra, arriving from New Orleans, reported in October 1849 mat on dropping anchor off San Francisco "there was a great rush of hotel keepers and 'restaurateurs' [looking] for cooks and waiters. They bid as high as three hundred a month for my black cook. " Most of the joint-stock companies, so efficiently organized in the optimism and innocence of hometown planning, disbanded on arrival in San Francisco or within a few days of reaching the diggings. They succumbed to me inevitable antagonisms of meir trying journeys, or because members quickly learned mat mining in 1849 could not be conducted by an unwieldy

by

J. S. Holliday

Anonymous.

San Francisco from Rincon Point.

Wlatercolm; ca. 1849-50.

Pni1t Collection, Miriam and Ira D. \'(/a/loch Division ofArt.r, Print.r <illd Photographs The New York Public L1brary Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundatiom

,., During 1850, 1,521 ships entered an Francisco Baybut one of many statistics supporting the judgment that San Francisco's sudden rise from an almost unknown village to a center of worldwide maritime trade "stands unprecedented in the annals of navigation ."

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In Februmy 1850, the brig Euphemia anchored amid the wharves in San Francisco and took in its first prironers.

Like the ApoUo in the background (prospering as a saloon and warehouse), the prison ship was soon surrounded by wharves and buildings and later buried in landfill.

Illustration from Annals of San Francisco, 1855.

Courtesy of james Henley Collection, City ofSacramento, History and Science DiL'Ision, Sacramento !lnhive and Museum Collection Center.

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group working under directions from a president or field officer. More disappointing, companies that came by sea had to sell their cargoes into the ebb and flow of the fast-changing market. With members anxious to get to the diggings, no one wanted to wait for advantageous prices; so they sold, hoping for the best. As with cargoes, so with their ships, once expected to serve as headquarters for mining operations. Sold into the glutted market, even the finest brigs and schooners brought only a fraction of their value in any other port.

In all, a bewildering introduction to a wild world that seemed to defy all their expectations.

Eager as the passengers were to get ashore, San Francisco seemed even more eager to receive them.

Across tidal mudflats the wharves of 1848 were extended in the swruner of 1849 and through 1850 to reach deep water, so ships could unload passengers and cargoes without the need for small craft between ships and shore. In the race to gain profits by providing these landings, competing wharf companies used steam piledrivers to sink timbers of Oregon fir deep into the mud.

Over these supports they laid down planking thirty to sixty feet wide. Of the twelve whatves eventually built, the most prominent and successful-the Central (or NA

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Long) \Vharf-gained a length of eight hundred feet by December 18-19 and reached out over two thousand feet a year later.

To provide storage-at high rental fees-for the millions of dollars of imports stacked on these wharves and along the muddy shore, some comp;mies moored storeships (taken from the ghost fleet) along their wooden avenues, while others erected warehouses on pilings. Their competition grew so fierce that sabotage crews sometimes worked at night to pull up a competitor's newly driven pilings or to cut mooring cables. 1' As aggressive waterfront construction pushed out to deeper water, San Francisco seemed to a worldly Chilean goldseeker to be "a Venice built of pine instead of marble. It is a city of ships, piers, and tides. Large ships a good distance from the beach serve as lodgings, '' In the frenzy of waterfront businesses and schemes, companies and individuals could make great forwnes. Among the many ships pulled ashore and held in place with pilings to serve as storehouses, saloons, and lodgings, the 400-ron Niantic earned for her owners in 18-19 and 1850 a monthly rental in come of $20,000. A carpenter from Connecticut who specialized in driving pilings headed home in the fall of 1850 with $65,000 (a millionaire in today's doUars).

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stores, and restaurants .... The whole central part of the city sways noticeably because it is built on pilings the size of ships' masts, driven down into the mud."

Once ashore, the passengers entered the even more bizarre life of a boomtown given over entirely to business, speculation, and entertainment, a place hurriedly improvised to profit from its unique and powerful location as the portal to the gold regions. During July 1849 the number of men landing from ships totaled 3,565and women, 49. They all needed shelter and food, sought in boardinghou ses and hotels , eateries and saloons, recently opened in whatever structures could be quickly put togeth er. But these businesses were alread y overcrowded , so most newcomers slept in temporary shelte rs: tents , wood -framed dormitories covered with sail canvas, wooden shanties, here and there deck cabins lifted whole from ships, and a few sheet-iron "houses" impo rted from the States. Using lumber from Oregon at a cost of $600 per thousand feet, business men intent on fast profits pushed their high-priced workers to complete frame buildings, while ot!1ers, more confident of San Francisco's future, invested in two- and th ree-story brick buildings, all to be rented at prices fa r beyond the most brazen avarice of landlords back east.

At th e Parker H ouse on th e Plaza, a small room rented for $1,800 per month; two other rooms went for $2,400 per month. The building's annual income exceeded $150,000. For a nearby canvas tent, fifteen by twenty-five feet, called Eldorado, tenants paid $40,000 annually. Some landlords took in $50,000 montb!y.

"One's mind cannot immediately push aside its old instincts for values and ideas of business," wrote Bayard Taylor for the New York Tribune when he spent a few days in S<m Francisco in August 1849. "Men dart hither and thither, as if possessed with a never-resting spirit.

You speak witl1 an acquaintance, a merchant perhaps.

He utters a few hurried words of greeting, while his eyes send keen glances on all sides of you. Suddenly ... he is off, and in ilie next five minutes has bought up half a cargo, sold a town lot at treble the sum it cost, and taken a share in some new and imposing speculation." A boardinghouse-keeper in a letter home complained, "This place is not fit for anytl1ing but business.

No one spends a minute for anyiliing else."

Through ilie fall of 1849 the rush increased. During September nearly six thousand passengers landed at San Francisco, described iliree monilis later by a goldHI S TORI C

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seeker from Boston as a place "the world never produced before. Crowded with ... Yankees & the Chinaman jostling each other in the streets, while French, Germans, Sandwich Islanders , Chilians , Malays , Mexicans , &c &c in all their varieties of costwne and language go to fonn a congrommoration of hw11anity. " As intrigued as they were by the exotic costumes and peoples thronging San Francisco's muddy lanes, many Americans felt an instinctive resentment toward so many foreigners who had arrived with the intent of taking gold that rightfully belonged to U. S. citizens.

Of all the businesses that mined the pockets of Americans and foreigners alike, from bathhouses and billiard rooms to saloons and "dens of lewd women, " none reached the prominence and profitability of gambling, offered under simple canvas tents no less than under the gilt chandeliers of elaborate "palaces."

When iliey left home, most goldseekers had vowed to resist California's infamous temptations. Once in San Francisco, however, very few could turn away from a visit to ilie Parker House, the Bella Union, the Aquila d'Or, or many oilier gaming halls where success could be properly celebrated with ilie best liquor and cigars, or disappointment assuaged witl1 friendly, understanding talk. And as everyone knew, the walls displayed life-sized paintings of naked women, while at the faro and monte tables live women-their bosoms partially, thrillingly exposed-laughed , smoked, and drank among the male patrons. In these invigorating surroundings, a few bets seemed justified-to anticipate success in the mines, to add to winnings from bard-worked clain1s, or, wiili just a little luck, to gain at last what the diggings had capriciously withheld.

IS. Hollzday is the author a/The World Rushed In: The California Gold Rush Experience (1981).

Hollzday is Director Emeritus of the California Historical Society and former Director of the Oakland Museum of California; Associate Professor ofAmerican History at California State University, San Francisco; and Assistant Director of the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.

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James S. Russell Nantucket Native) California M By Linda McBeath-

c

OUNTLESS TIMES I LISTE NE D TO MY

grandfather tell how he came to possess the journals of Nantucket native and California VanGundy miner James S. Russell. Grandpa vividly recalled visiting his aged cousin, Frank Starbuck, and being told to take a shovel and start digging near an oak tree not far from the Starbuck home. Little did Grandpa know what treasure he would uncover! His shovel struck metal, and continued digging revealed a sealed metal can containing sixty-nine daily journals diligently recorded by his Grandpa Russell. In tl1e ensuALL photographs ing years, in conversation with Grandpa, we marveled courtesy of at the triumphs, tragedies, and trials encountered by Linda McBeathRussell during his search for gold. Russell's spirit lives VanGundy m the small journ als du g from the soil where he pann ed , sluiced , and held on to gold-laced dreams. The legacy written upon the journal pages is a record of Russell 's life in his own words.

Russell 's accounts and recollections are of a truly adventurous period in history. It is a personal story beginning in Nantucket, with reports of gold being easily found along the banks of the American River in Coloma, in El Dorado County, California.

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James Sanderson Russell was born May 13, 1830, to one of Nantucket's adventurous whaling fanUlies. The only son of Anm1ial and Eliza (Hussey) Russell, he came of age in the aftermarn of Nantucket's devastating fire of 1846 and the whale-dependent economy's decline.

Realizing employment opportunities on the island to be few, the rumors of gold in California sparked the young man 's imagination! Looking for an adventure and a promising future, Russell listened intently to rumors about the gold.

The December 13, 1848, edition of the Inquirer confinned reports of gold by publishing Colonel Mason's "California Gold-lnlportant Official Report." In the report Mason wrote, I struck this stream (now known as Weber's Creek) at the washings of Sunol & Co. They had about thirty Indians employed, whom they pay in merchandise. They were getting gold of a character sim ilar to that found in the main fo rk and doubtless in sufficient quantities to satisfy them.

I send you a small specimen, presented by this company of their gold.

Gold fever spread rapidly and the people of Nantucket Island would never be the same. Russell joined people from around the world in dreaming of tl1eir fortune and future to be found in California gold.

He joined men in Nantucket racing to gather supplies and reserve space on a ship. In preparing for the trip Russell applied and was granted a Seaman's Protection Certificate in which he is described as being nineteen years old with blue eyes, dark complexion, dark hair, and being five feet, 8 inches tali.

On August 22 , 1849, Russell bid farewell to his widowed mother and two sisters and boarded the Fanny and sailed East. The first entries of the ship's log records: August 22, First part light wind from the S West imployed in geting the ship ready for sea at 1 S UMMER

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P.M. August 23, First part light winds from the SW at 1 P.M. came to anchor and furled the sails at daylight made sail and stood up the South at 9 A.M let go the anchor at noon took the anchor and stood out to sea at noon gayhead bore SSE. The ship moving into the Atlantic Ocean found the sea calm, the wind moderate, and the weather clear. The ship's log reveals the passengers busying themselves "sail making and various jobs" to ready the ship for the long voyage. On September 9, the ship approached the Azores, where authorities tried to quarantine the ship due to a cholera outbreak in New York City. The Argonauts, not to be deterred, continued to sail. At the end of September, light to strong winds blew the ship to the Cape Verde Islands: "Sent the boat on shore for water but soon returned and found but little." At Santa Cruz the schooner U.S.A. boarded the Fanny and "informed us that no water was to be got at Port Grand. " Sailing into Port Pavarn the crew successfully brought aboard water, fruit, and vegetables. earing Cape Horn the crew prepared for what all knew to be a treacherous crossing in heavy swells, strong erratic winds, and rough seas. The Fanny fared well passing around the Horn, reporting, "Split to fore top ships gallant sail." On December 22, the ship's log notes the passengers spent the day mending sails. The ship sailed to "Valparaiso Harbor 20 fathoms of water furled the sails and set the watch." December 28 through January 3 the ship remained in port. The crew and passengers went ashore to enjoy the picturesque landscape and other offerings of the port city. Leaving Valparaiso, the sailors found the weather fine and all hands well. To alleviate boredom during the final leg of the trip, "All hands imployed in various jobs. " The men took advantage of the time to sharpen picks and axes, mend clothes, check and recheck supplies, and examine maps of the gold areas. At 1 P.M. on February 21, 1850, the Fanny, "Came to anchor at San Francisco 182 days from home."

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Russell headed where he knew there to be Nantucket acquaintances. umerous seafaring captains and their families, having relocated from antucket and Martha's Vineyard, resided on Rincon Hill. Russell settied into a comfortable home for the next four months, while operating a scow shipping freight to shore in the rough, crowded waters of San Francisco Bay. Leaving San Francisco Russell tried his luck mining on the Yuba River at Downieville, until the drought of 1850 forced him to abandon his claim. In August he relocated to Sacramento. On October 15, word arrived of California's admittance to the Union and Russell participated in the city's jubilant statehood celebration, which ended quickly as celebrants fell ill with cholera.

Russell witnessed hasty mass burials and bonfires of victims' personal belongings before fleeing the epidemic.

Russell and his Nantucket friend Benjamin Gardner traveled to Coloma in El Dorado County, where they saw miners working shoulder to shoulder in the American River shoveling and panning for gold.

Determining Coloma to be overcrowded, Russell and Gardner followed Weber Creek prospecting for a claim. Where Weber and Sweetwater creeks merged, they found Nantucket natives James and Annie Chase, struck a claim, and began to experience life in the diggings.

Russell spent his days prospecting, wheeling, throw-

Russell, left, with son Frank, top, son-ziz-law MarcusStarbuck, and Peter Calyer.

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The Russells' Nantucket marriagecerti/icate

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ing, washing, and sluicing dirt for gold. He fow1d the days long, the work hard , and the earnings meager.

"Washed some this morning and night got about 25cents-BULLY," and on another occasion, "Towing some this morning and evening, rocking between, got nothing as usual. " Russell's entries also make note of good times as well, "Rocking some on the hill got $18.25." After one heavy rainstorm flushed the soil Russell joyfully wrote, "Rocking all day up the ravine got 3 pieces of 6 oz."

The miners with clain1s on Sweetwater Creek grew into a tightly knit community. Together they and the few women in the area enjoyed singing socials, dances, and picnics. They planted and harvested vegetables from their ga rdens, grapes from the vineyards, and fruit from the orchards. Hunting deer and geese in ilie surroW1ding foothills and fishing in the American River provided the main course for the miners ' shared suppers. "Took dinner with Mr. and Mrs. Chase," is a frequent journal entry.

Illness sometimes interrupted the celebrations.

Russell recorded, "Down to Edwards he very sick."

In the East it would be family members who attended the sick, but out West fellow miners furnished support and medical attention to their comrades. For the following fourteen days Russell fulfillled his obligation to Edwards by providing meals, preparing medications, N A NT U C K E T

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and watching by his bedside to make the sick man comfortable. At last he recorded, "Watched wiili Edwards last night probably the last I will have to as he is very low."

Nicholas Edwards died the next evening at 9:30. Th e miners gathered and Russell observed, "We buried our friend this afternoon at 4 o'clock in the Jay Hawk Burying Ground. A large attendance, a very good service at the grave. Peace to his soul."

Under the direction of Russell, Edwards's tools were brought from his claim to his cabin. Russell sold "Edwards claim and so on." He wrote a letter and sent the proceeds of the sale to Edwards's family.

Amongst the excitement and sorrow of life in the diggings Russell determined one thing to be missing from his life. As women appeared in the mining communities, marriages were celebrated and babies born and Russell wanted tl1e companionship of a wife.

During a four-month visit to Nantucket in 1860, Russell assessed the island's economy, visited witl1 family and friends, and met twenty-two-year-old Ellen Brooks. Russell returned to California witl1 new-found determination and the hope of Ellen joining hin1 in the West. He filled his journals with notes of writing to and receiving letters from her. One entry reads, "Out of bed to get letter from Ellen." For eight years th e two exchanged letters and pictures. Their correspondence developed into a long-distance romance.

On August 17 , 1868, Russell traveled to San Francisco and " bou ght a ticket " on the stea mer Oregonian for a trip home. In Nantucket, Russell visited relatives, friends, and the woman he now called "Dear Ellen." His entry on November 21 states, "Ellen and myself were married this morning by Rev. Mr. Davis.

Left soon after on the island steamer." After two days in New York City the newlyweds boarded the ship Henry Chacon for San Francisco. The Russells enjoyed pleasant days at sea, passin g the time writing letters to friends and promenading on deck. They arrived in ilie City by the Bay on December 17 and left in1mediately for Sacramento and El Dorado County. Arriving in Sweetwater, Russell dropped Ellen off at James and Annie Chase's. Ellen spent ilie night sharing Nantucket gossip wiili her friend Annie, while Russell went home to prepare his shanty for his bride.

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Ellen dedicated her first months in the diggings to papering and painting the shanty, stuffing the mattresses with bay, and mailing a rag rug for the dirt floor. She sketched pictures to hang on the walls and send home to relatives. She engaged her husband to build a bookcase, sink, and table. Ellen's womanly touches transformed the small shanty into a comfortable residence.

She took an active interest in Russell's mining activities and made frequent trips to his claim, on one occasion recording, "This afternoon down on the claim a few moments then came up to Mr. Gardner's to see them fix some gold to sell." Ellen cherished the time with the other women along the creek. "Down to Mrs. Toby's today to a quilting. Mrs. Robbins , Mrs. White, Mrs. Chase, Coates, Rolling and myself there. Men down in eve." It was a welcome break from the chores of washing clothes, ironing, cooking, and cleaning.

On November 29, 1869, "Ellen quite unwell, nothing new yet," wrote a worried Russell. The next day he joyfully proclaimed, "Baby bom this morning at half past 3. After a bard night of it." They named the child Nettie. Two more children were born to James and Ellen-Frank, born May 24, 1871, and Aggie, born April 2, 1876. Russell actively participated in the upbringing of his children. He stayed with the children when Ellen took trips to town, enjoyed reading to the girls, and taking Frank with him to his claim. Russell proudly recorded walking each of his children to their first day of school. He served four three-year terms as a trustee to the Green Valley School. Russell 's responsibilities included hiring and paying the schoolmistress, ordering books, and maintaining the one-room schoolhouse by repairing and moving the furnishings, painting the blackboard, and chopping wood for the stove. He was paid $2.00 per day â&#x20AC;˘ for his work.

The Russells enjoyed the local social life.

The families along the creek hosted parties, dances, candy pulls, sing-alongs, and, as weather permitted, picnics and fairs. While the miners searched for the elusive gold, tragedy struck in the form of cholera, diphtheria, and other fatal diseases. Russell's journals record many adult deaths as well as the children's struggle to survive illness with only remedial medical supplies. As the Russells helped their neighbors along the HlSTORIC

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creek cope with illnesses and mourn their losses, the Russell children also became ill. Russell spent his days helping his neighbors and his nights watching over his own sick children. Day after day he sorrowfillly recorded, "My children no better." Finally, Russell recorded, "Thank God the babies seem better tonight." The Russell children recovered and Russell returned to mine on his claim.

Receiving word of his sister being seriously ill, Peter Calyer, Russell's partner, quickly departed California for New York. His effort to see her proved to be in vain: "Rec'd. a letter from Peter in NY reported his sister dead two weeks before he arrived." After settling his sister's affairs, Calyer traveled to Nantucket as he told Russell he would. Russell's mother welcomed him and the chance to hear first-hand accounts of her son. An opportLmity was provided for Calyer to meet Sue Tuck.

The two enjoyed each other's company, and Russell received letters reporting "Pete having a good tin1e."

Calyer and Tuck married at the home of Tuck's father, Uriah, and beaded for Sweetwater. On December 23, 1874, the Calyers joined the others in El Dorado County.

Marcus Starbuck arrived on Sweetwater Creek May 31, 1877 , bringing news of home to the Nantucket natives. Starbuck immediately went to work alongside Russell sluicing for gold. The sixteen-year-old Starbuck proved to be a reliable, hardworking young man, who grew to be a confidant of Russell's: "Marcus and myself

Russell Familv: (top row) Ellen, James, Frank, and Mara1s Starbuck (oil the ground) Aggie, Can/a Starbuck, and Nellie.

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dear little creatures how they must suffer to take at work in the creek all day." As the years passed, such long walks in such warm weather. I can Starbuck bestowed attention on Russell's daughter. hardly be reconciled when I think how far away On December 31, 1890, twenty-one-year-old Nettie they are and I shall never see the dear little ones. and Starbuck married in a quiet ceremony at the 0 how we would like to have you all in our Russell home. mongst to spend the winter with us. I think the During the 1870s mining continued to be challengtin1e would go some quicker, don't you?" ing, frustrating, and dangerous. Russell met with only moderate success, "Trying to ground sluice, not enough James and Ellen evaluated their life and goals and decidwater." His journal reflects his frustration, "I left alone ed to stay in California. In December 1889, Russell felt to consider how things have gone this year past. God overwhelming grief, "'Rec. a letter tonight from Will grant I may do better the coming one." As a result of giving an account of Mother's death on Thanksgiving homesickness, disappointment, and restlessness Day." He continued to work with high hopes, buoyed Russell's neighbors abandoned their claims, changed by "Picked up a piece of gold weighed 3 oz." occupations, moved to other locations, or returned to By the turn of the century hydraulic mining compatheir former homes. On January 10, 1871, alarmed by a nies dotted the countryside. These technological sense of urgency and concern, Russell reported that advances in mining promised a quicker and more profMrs. Chase had received, "a letter warning Mrs. C. and itable method to extract the gold. Russell's only son, babies to leave for home." Ellen traveled to the Chase Frank, hired on with the aromas Hydraulic Company. home to help Annie prepare for a quick departure. The On April 15, 1912, Frank Russell invited his father to Russells sadly bid Annie and her children goodbye. see the dredger on which he worked. "Quite an invenAccompanied by her husband she headed for San tion or way to mine," marveled the older Russell. Five Francisco to board a ship for the trip home. James months later the father mourned the loss of his son Chase returned to Nantucket in September 1871. The when Frank was sucked into the dredger, killing him Chases were followed in 1875 by Benjamin Gardner, instantly. "Our dear boy Frank killed last night by when on July 5 Russell recorded, "Mr. Gardner left for being caught in the machinery," sorrowfully wrote the Nantucket today. Awful lonesome." Russell dearly senior Russell. missed his mining partner of twenty-five years.

Russell's journal entry of January 22, 1916, reads, Russell continued to look for a good prospect. "Still "Ellen taken sick this eve about 9:30 P.M. Sent for the prospecting all day for quartz pockets succeeding in doctor at Folsom." Throughout the year Ellen finding one late in the afternoon. Bids to be a good remained sick. Russell struggled with the fact his wife one." A good one it was! Three days later he recorded, would never again be the woman with whom he shared "Got 4 t/2 ounces!" But all too often the entries reflect many years of his life. Journal entries painstakingly disappointment, "Washing this morn got about nothrecord Ellen's deteriorating health, "Ellen vety sick, out ing." The gold dust and nuggets became ever more eluof her head at tin1es. We only hope for the best." As the sive during the '80s and '90s. Russell spent long days hopelessness of her condition became apparent he working hard on the claim. Letters from Russell's aging wrote, "Ellen is no better. I fear she never will be." On mother marked the passage of tin1e as she wrote of her January 27, 1917, Russell in referring to Ellen wrote, wishes to see hin1 and his family: "God only knows how it will end." The next day he sadly penned, "Our Dear Ellen passed away today at I can neither read or write in the evening 12:30 noon. Passed to a better home we trust and is which makes me feel lonesome as the long now with her loved boy Frank." winter evenings are approaching not meaning to Russell mourned the loss of his son and wife but murmur for I have a pleasant home and good continued to hold to his hope of finding a good children to care for me and that is more than prospect: "Began my new project this morning on the many can say. You say the children were claim." Well into his nineties Russell continued to read calculating to write with you I should have been his newspapers, visit with family and friends, and search delighted to had them done so but did not blame for gold. He became a newsworthy personality as one them with the thermometer at 100 in the shade,

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of the last surviving 49ers. Interviews in newspapers throughout California offered the aged miner a chance to recall his early-day experiences. A 1924 newspaper article written by Michael Irving reported : His home is there at the foot of Pine Hill, a quiet ranch hidden in the trees and brush. The place runs half a mile up Sweetwater Creek. More than one hw1dred men worked that gulch at one time for the elusive gold he will tell you. ow he alone remains. Ask Russell about the reservoir up the river, near the broad heel of Pine Hill. With rwenty one men he helped build that reservoir in the old days, storing up water against the dry season when there were no rains for the running of the sluices. Of those rwenty one men he alone is alive. Of those he knew in the early fifties there is not one left.

When reporting about Russell's long life Itvi.ng wrote, "never been drunk and does not use tobacco but he will not attempt to draw a moral. He has just lived and worked and intends to continue to live and work."

As the days spent on his clain1 became less frequent, Russell sought the solitude and peaceful retreat of his home. His small journals became his companion as he passed the time reading and reminiscing. "Looking over my diaries this evening." Reflecting on his long life he wrote to his grandchildren, "I suppose you think ninety years is a long time to look ahead but it don 't seem long to me to look back." As the 1920s drew to a close Russell suffered the pains and stiffness of rhewnatism.

At the age of ninety-nine he limited himself to staying close to home, "My rheumatism not much better consequently at home" and "Put in a very bad night last night. God grant it be better tonight."

During the early days of 1930 it became increasingly evident that Russell was entering the final stage of life.

In May, relatives and friends called on Russell to offer congratulations on the occasion of his one hundredtl1 birthday. There was a dinner, a cake with one hundred candles, musical entertainment, and a chance for Ru ssell to recall some of the outstanding events in local history.

It is difficult to determine if Russell ever recovered from the exhaustion of his birthday celebration, for it was not long before the doctor began to make house calls to the Starbuck Ranch to see Russell. As word HISTORI C

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spread of Russell's declining health visitors sat around his table, listening one last time to his Gold Rush tales.

On June 29, Russell died while taking his afternoon nap.

Nettie Starbuck wrote in her father's journal, "Grandpa passed away today aged 100 years, 2 months and 16 days." Russell is buried in the family plot at Jay Hawk Pioneer Cemetery, El Dorado County, California.

James Russell never realized his youthful dream of finding a fortune in gold. He did leave for future generations daily journal entries that are a testament to his patience, dedication , and perseverance as a participant in California's Gold Rush.

Source List California Gold-Official Report, Nantucket Inquirer, December 13, 1848.

Journal a/Ellen B. Russell, 1869;}ournals ofjames S Russell, 1861-1930; Letter to Russell Family, 1888,

by Eliza Russell; 49-er Still Pans His Gold at 94, by Michael Irving, Newspaper Unknown, 1924.

Collection of Linda McBeath-Van Gundy, Sacran1ento, California

Letter to Russell Grandchildren, 1920,

by James S. Russell, Collection oflrma Paulsen, Walnut Creek, California

Log of the Ship Fanny 1849-1850, NHA Seaman's Protection Certificate, Dirtrict a/Nantucket, Massachusetts, Quarter Ending 30th a/September, 1849, ational Archives and Record Setvice, Washington, D.C.

Lzi1da McBeath- Van Gundy has been researching the Russell famzly for the past twenty years and has given numerous oral presentations on her ancestors. She is the preszdent of the ElDorado Historical Society and a member of the Calzfornia State Sesquicentennial Committee /or Sutter's Fort in Sacramento.

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The Nantucket Coffee Connect by Robet¡t F. Mooney

james A. Folger

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GEST OF THE FORTYPioneer Coffee in tin cans, which kept the flavor and niners was James A. Folger, who sailed aroma the miners expected. from Nantucket bound for the goldfields For a time, Jim Folger left the business to try his of California at the age of fourteen in hand at mining. He made one gold strike, and he used 1849. He was accompanied by his brothers- Henry, the proceeds to set up a country store at an approprisixteen, and Edward, twenty. Their father, Samuel B. ately named camp called Yankee Jim's. As the 1850s Folger, had nine children and welcomed the opportuni- drew to a close, he sold the store at a good profit and ty for his sons to seek their fortune in California, using returned to San Francisco. He was only eighteen years his savings to help finance their journey. The trio agreed old when he showed up on Willian1 Bovee's doorstep that if the fan1ily fw1ds could not support all three boys, and resumed his role as a partner in the Pioneer Mills. the older boys wmud have the first chance at the goldBovee sold his interest in the coffee company to Jim fields. Traveling via the Panama route, the three arrived Folger in 1859, and after buying out other partners,Ji.nl renamed the firm the James A. Folger Company. He in San Francisco on May 5, 1850.

It was soon decided that James would stay in the soon had his salesmen covering the West with such succity, alone at age fourteen, while his brothers went to cess that the name Folger became synonymous with the mines. Fortunately, he had worked as a carpenter coffee. In later years, the company expanded from since age eleven when he had helped rebuild Nantucket California to became a national product.

Jim Folger married at twenty-four and built a home after tbe Great Fire of 1846. He accepted a job offer from William H. Bovee, who bad come from New in the new suburb of Oakland, where he became a leadYork at the age of 27 with a novel idea. Bovee had ing citizen, active in both business and civic affairs. He arrived in San Francisco to find there was no coffee fit continued to keep up his interest in his native island to drink in California. He had run a coffee-roasting and visited Nantucket in the summertime to keep in business in New York, but roasted coffee was then a touch with his family. He died unexpectedly of a heart city luxury. Most consumers had to buy green coffee attack at the age of fifty-four, leaving the business to be beans, roast them, grind them in portable mills, and carried on by his sons and grandsons. Both J runes A. spend half a day to produce a cup of coffee. In the min- Folger II and James A. Folger III have been president ing country, where men were desperate for hot coffee, of the coffee company, which now carries the famous Bovee found a ready market. He decided to build a Nantucket family name to millions of loyal conswners.

After Folger's business was well established, the oldspice and coffee mill on Powell Street, six blocks from the waterfront, and hired young Ji.nl Folger timers who had taken part in the Gold Rush spoke of to help him. The original hand-operated mill him with admiration and amazement: "How about proved insufficient for the business, so Jim yow1g Jim Folger, only fourteen, that came all the way Folger helped build the first wind-powered out from Nantucket to make his own way," commented mill in San Francisco, rigged with sails from one. "Now look at him- in business for hin1self down abandoned whaleships in the harbor. The in Frisco ru1d selling coffee to every damn diggings in two men went into partnership as the Pioneer California!"

Steam Coffee and Spice Mills.

Brother Henry returned to Nantucket, but This article is an excerpt /rom an article that appeared zi1 Edward set up a whale oil business next to the the Early Summer 1997 issue a/Nantucket Magazine.

Pioneer Mills. As the mining business was It is reprinted here with permission. Bob Mooney spreading through the sierras of California, Jan1es is an attorney, historian, and member of the became a traveling salesman, carrying samples of Nantucket Historical Association's editorial committee.

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sequences of California Mania Nantucket and the Whaling Industry

T

HE NEWS OF GOLD BEING DISCOVERED IN

California reached Nantucket's shores in late 1848. There, as in the rest of the country, the lure of riches took a strong hold. By the end of 1849, more than five hundred Nantucket men had ventured West to seek their fortunes. The toll on the whaling industry, both for the island and on the whole, was marked. More than forty-two whaleships were withdrawn from the industry for the specific purpose of being refitted to carry goods and passengers to the goldfields. In addition, numerous whaleships in pursuit of oil were lured away by gold and many men deserted their vessels midway through the voyage to seek gold.

Several companies based on shares were organized on antucket for the purpose of purchasing a vessel, making the passage around the Horn to San Francisco, and then on to the minefields to find gold. For the most part, the company n ames adopted reflected either where they were from, such as the Nantucket Mining & Trading Co., or the name of the vessel purchased, such as Sarah Parker Mining Co. No. 1. antucketers also joined companies that were formed in other ports such as New Bedford. Others elected to go on the commercial routes from New York to Chagres, Panama, cross the isthmus and then aboard another steamer to San Francisco.

The companies formed were business ventures not only to move people but also goods to California.

In reviewing the account books for the companies, there are frames for houses and buildings, windows and doors coded to the buildings , and even the pots and pans to be used for these structures. In some cases vessels also had small steamers aboard to be used to move the goods up the river to the mines. The companies established constitutions and bylaws setting out their business structures.

One of the companies formed on Nantucket was the Astor Mining Co. The shareholders purchased the ship Henry Astor of Nantucket, which had just returned HISTORIC

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from a whaling voyage in October of 1848. Within their by constitution is stated the duties of the captain as well as Judith Downey the director and sub-directors. It also mandated that no liquor would be allowed and that a proper Sabbath would be kept. The Henry Astor took on board the cap- ~ tain, three mates, forty-four seamen, a cook, a steward, and a physician. In addition, she carried fifteen passengers. During the voyage, according to the constitution, "It is agreed the company shall occupy their time on the passage from here to California, in preparing tents, boats, houses, implements, and other fixtures, which may be required for their comfort and operations in California." She sailed in March 1849 and was among the first to depart from Nantucket.

At the same time that the companies were being formed and whaleships were being converted, there was growing concern within the whaling industry. Whaling agents feared that as news of the discovery reached their vessels in the Pacific they would lose men. Frederick The Henry Astor

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Frederick Coleman Sanford.

Below right: An advertisement /or the Henry Astor

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Coleman Sanford wa South Pacific by Frances Coffin aboard the ship one such agent, in Cristobal Colon and dated December 12, 1849, was the partnership of issued as a printed circular with a notice at the bottom: Field & Sanford. "N .B. copy of original for the perusal of Master of Sanford wrote to Whalers in the Pacific." In his letter to George David Bunker, master Starbuck of Nantucket, Coffin wrote, "Firstly I see so of the ship Lexington many of our townsmen going headlong to the devil, I of Nantucket while on would willingly stop them if I could. The ship Rose of a whaling voyage, and Nantucket was in Valparaiso December the 6th and to apprised him of the all appearances is going up the spout. I saw captain gold situation and how it Miller, and asked him what he intended to do, he said was affecting the whaling he should sell his oil, and casks, and all other traps and industry. In a letter dated take freight for California . . ." Coffin strongly advised January 16, 1849, Sanford Miller against this- to no avail. He reported on several wrote: "Every ship's taken from other whaleships that had also abandoned whaling. the business of whaling as fast as they The Gold Rush was such an event for Nantucket come in, to go to California, the Aurora and made such an inlpact on the community that it was sailed last week with passengers from here, Seth Swain well documented. Jethro C. Brock compiled a list of master and 100 ships from other potts, provisions we individuals who went to California. This list appeared hear are very high at San Francisco ... " Later in the in two formats. First as a broadside entitled A Correct month, Sanford instructed Bunker, "I write to say the List of Persons Belonging to Nantucket, Now in fever for California 'Gold digging' is all the rage now, California, or on Their Way There. This was published and thinking it would derange you people in the same on September 3, 1849, by Hussey & Robinson of the way. I think it would be well to keep clear of the coast, Mirror. One caveat Brock notes was "It will be seen recruit at the Marquesas till the rage is over." that this list comprises the names of many persons who T he following month, Sanford again warned are natives of Nantucket, that have not resided Bunker "if there be danger of the men's running away upon the island for a number of years." The second foron the coast in mat was printed consequence of as a booklet that California mania, was expanded to ~- -- they are mad here ~ ·· ~ --~ ) TilE ln!tt ~11rliu!! ~l.ip lii:~H Y ASTOR. include the list of and I don't see ~~;~· (;,.n. F. J""• nHt:o~tt:r, will have immerl i- persons who had why they will not returned. This ate di~pRtc~h. 1100 "'llil from tlllto~ fJOrt. Hl.nut thf• be there." In the booklet was pubFor fn•tght lished by Brock san1e letter he also 21hh I't>b., fnr ~nn f'ra11eisco dare ct. wrote "Nothing or pa!it~Hge Mpply tn in January 1850 11Jlo23 CHAHLtS B. S\VAl~. very remarkable in and survives in town affairs, most several versions, of the boys are including a copy bound for California to seek fortunes, Henry Astor sails 111 the collections of the Nantucket Historical soon with George F. Joy as master & 40 are on shares Association. It is interesting to note in reviewing the list the company are on their own hook. Aurora went from that few women left antucket to go to the goldfields. here sometime ago with 20 passengers. Frances B. The women listed appear to be the wives of captains or Folger is to take 50 from here in Ship Russell on shares mates while evidence from other ports indicates that to dig etc. in California, but depend on it you will make numerous women went to be with fanlliies or even to more clear money if you get a voyage of sperm oil." set up their own businesses with services such as washThe concern was so great in the whaling industry ing or cooking. th at a letter with news of the events, written in the The shared experiences created a lasting bond for A

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the men who went to the goldfields. Once they returned home, organizations made up of the California pioneers were formed . In the collections of many historical societies, including the Nantucket Historical Association, are membership certificates and badges from reunions and conventions.

The "California mania," as Sanford called it, was a pivotal event in the nation's history. The whaling industry was changed forever. It also proved to be an impor-

tant event in the lives of the men who participated in it as recorded in their obituaries and in the papers they left behind.

Judith Downey is the librarian at the Old Dartmouth Historical Society- New Bedford Whaling Museum.

She is also curator ofthe New Bedford Whaling Museum's exhibition Whalers Go West: The Lure of Gold.

ording the Voyage of the Henry Astor to San Francisco The Nantucket Historical Association is fortunate to have a number of journals or logs kept by seamen and passengers on their journeys to Calz/ornia. The Henry Astor voyage, for example, was well documented. The NHA research library has two journals, one kept by Timothy Hinckley, a passenger, and another one kept by Captain George F Joy, recording the journey of sixty-seven men that began March 12, 1849, arriving in San Francisco on September 16, 1849. In Hinckley's journal we hear the voice of an adventurer, keeping track of all of his memories. Joy's journal faithfully records the weather, wind, and latitudes of the ship, but also allows us a more businesslzke perspective on the voyage. Following are some quotations /rom both journals.

March 12 When a boat was prepared to transfer some friends to the steamer who after bestowing upon us there best wishes and kind farewells departed for home, I cast one longing lingering look on the home of my youth and bid it adieu.

I feel inadequate to express the emotions of those onboard, the first night from home. Suffice it to say, there were husbands separated from wifes, parents from children, children from parents, brothers from brothers and sisters, lovers from their sweethearts, and friends from friends.

And for what, is all this. Oh! heavens; forgive the word, for a shining oer called Gold.

- TH March 17 What a heterogeneous mess of opinions! and professions! in a company of ship Captains, and mates (all of our officers by the bye are experienced captains), sailors and landsmen, machanicks of ... nearly all kinds, men and youths without trades or professions, and all on terms of equality from the cook to the captain, with the exception of the ships discipline.

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July9 [A description of the scene on the ship] The carpenters making window sashes, coopers making buckets, the blacksmiths building a forge, the sailmakers making tents, the spar makers making ... ensail booms, passengers making baskets, the sailors to work on the rigging, the dogs fighting &c &c.

--GFJ August4 The cooks by some strange fatality, have taken it into their heads to give us mince pies for dinner on Saturdays, for myself, I would like it very much if Saturday came twice or three times a week.

- TH September 16 At 9 am saw the land at 11 am come to anchor in San Francisco harbour found some 200 sail of vessels lying at anchor. 188 days from Nantucket

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Seeing the Elephant tV a

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This "seeing the elephant" stationery /rom the NHA collections led to a key phrase in Gold Rush parlance.

Photographed by Jeffrey S. Allen

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HEN RESEARCI-UNG THIS ISSUE OF HISTORIC

Nantucket, we came across a curious entry in our database-"Gold Rush Stationery. " There is no explanation of how this single page came to N antucket, only a small note attached explaining th at it was a front page.

It is a remarkable piece because it captures the full story of the Gold Rush-from start to somber finish.

But we wondered about the significance of the elephant in the center of the page. Knowing that there were no elephants in California, we searched for an explanation. Judith Downey, author of the article on page 25 , found one. J. S. Holliday, in his first book on the Gold Rush, The World Rushed In: The California Gold Rush Experience, explains the significance: Life on the trail discouraged some goldseekers. If they gave up and headed for home, they were said to have "seen the elephant. " This special phrase, used by almost every Gold Rush diarist, had been a part of the American language before 1849; but it took on poignant meaning for th e tens of thousands who experienced getting to California and then life in the mining camps. As the goldseekers' moods and expectations changed, so they used "the elephant" in different ways. but the essential idea remained dominant as revealed in the story from which the expression is preswned to have originated. By 1837 circus parades commonly included one or two elephants. The story goes that "a farmer who had heard of elephants, but had never seen one, longed to do so. When a circus complete with elephant came to a nearby town, he loaded his wagon with eggs and vegetables and started for the market there.

En route he met the circus parade led by the elephant. The farmer was enchanted but his horses were terrified. They bucked, pitched, overturned the wagon, and ran away, scattering broken eggs and bruised vegetables over the countryside.

'I don't give a hang,' said the farmer.'I have seen the elephant."'

As a universal expression of the Gold Rush, "seeing the elephant" symbolized the great adventure of going to California to dig a golden fortune. On the way "the elephant" revealed itself in many unexpected difficulties and dangers that beset the goldseekers, and "to see the elephant" became the expression for suffering a severe ordeal, facing one's worst expectations, overcoming the meanest realities; in a word, knowing the Truth.

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Historic Nantucket Book Section Days of (,ol : he California Gold Rush

years-embraced every class-from the wealthy to those in marginal circumstances, from every state and territory, including slaves brought by their owners. In nwnbers it represented the greatest mass migration in the history of the Republic, some eighty thousand in 1849 alone and probably three In 1997 the University a/California hw1dred thousand by 1854. ~ DAYS Of. ~ Press published Malcolm ].

The news of the discovery of Rohrbough's book, Days of Gold. gold in California fell upon an American nation in the throes of a It is a concise introduction to the Gold Rush and its impact on the transition from the countryside to United States. He takes his readers the city and from the field to the factory. /rom the early days of the gold minThe California Gold Rush ing to the breaking up of families now seemed to recapture the and the founding of California. He American dream of riches tackles such subjects as the scarcity deservedly won through hard of women in California, life in the work. And in the search for gold, anyone with a pick , a pan, or a mines, and lz/e in San Francisco.

The harsh realities of the experience shovel could participate, at least in the first years, regardless of wealth, are revealed. He also shines light on social standing, education, or famithose left behind, the women and families left at home to cope. ly name.

Histori c Nantucket asked Mr. The rush for California gold Rohrbough to write a brief descripraised troubling questions in tion to the Gold Rush and its conseAmerica at mid-century. Was it quences by way of introducing his acceptable to leave a family and book. community in search of wealth?

What were the arrangements in those families left HE DISCOVERY OF GOLD 1 }OHN SUITER'S behind, especially the enhanced roles of women who millrace at about ten o'clock in the morning now had to assw11e responsibilities for family, farm, or of January 24, 1848, set in motion the peo- shop? And in California, what were the rights of nonple and events that we know as the Anlericans- an especially non-English speakers California Gold Rush. The discovery and the spread of with the mines and within California itself? The flood the news across the continent caused hundreds of ships of immigration to California soon transformed the to be launched and a tl10usand prairie schooners to be Golden State. California joined the Union in 1850. hitched up. The vessels departed from Boston, New The wealth conjured up by the images of gold in York, and Philadelphia; from Nantucket and farther to California's streams turned out to be real. While farm the south from Wilmington , Charleston, and New workers earned a dollar a day for twelve hours of work Orleans. The overland schooners embarked from towns in the fields and skilled artisans perhaps a dollar and a and villages across the nation, from the subsistence half for the same hours, men who were recently fanners farms of the Ohio Valley to the great plantations of the and mechanics made sixteen dollars a day washing lower Mississippi Valley. Those who joined the proces- gravel in California streambeds. In the six years from sion-in 1849 and annually thereafter for a dozen 1849 to 1855, the forty-niners harvested some three and tl t

by Malcolm J. Rohrbough University of Califomia Press, New York; hardcover, $18.00.

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hundred million dollars in gold from California.

As the goldfields were depleted, it became difficult for the forty-niners to realize they had missed their golden chases. The prospects for individuals to make great fortunes declined and all but disappeared over time, and the Argonauts became reluctant to admit their declining prospects and even more reluctant to go home with little or nothing to show for their efforts. The decision to return became entwined with a sense of personal failure that would be evident to their families and communities.

The spectres of failures and unful1illed dreams became as much a part of the California Gold Rush as the great strikes reported in local newspapers.

By the close of the 1850s, most of the forty-niners had gone home. Families and communities reformed, although often with many adjustments. Some families remained permanently divided, \vith a new branch on the West Coast. A few simply vanished and were never heard from again. The ties that spread across the continent in response to the discovery of gold turned out to be lasting ones. The Civil War was about joining the North and South; the California Gold Rush had been about joining East and West.

Malcolm ]. Rohrbough is professor ofhistory at the University of Iowa and the author of Aspen: The History of a Silver-Mining Town, 1879-1893 and The Trans-Appalachian Frontier: People, Societies, and Institutions, 1775-1850.

Living History for Children Have you ever wondered what it was like to live on ·Nantucket in the past? The Nantucket Historical Association is pleased to offer hands-on activities based on island life during the ~>ioht••~>nl~h and nineteenth centuries.

PROGRAMS OFFERED IN JULY AND AUGUST:

Tuesday: THE WHALE FISHERY Learn the skills necessary to sign on for a whaling voyage, create a facsimile of scrimshaw, and see how whales were captured and processed.

Wednesday: COLONIAL LIFE Help the miller grind corn at the Old Mill, then bake bread on the open hearth at the Oldest House, and explore colonial life.

Friday: WHALING LORE Follow the voyages of the Nantucket whalemen as they travel around the world, and create a Two-hour sessions, twice each day at 10 A.M. and 2 P.M. Space for each session limited to ten children, aged 6-10.

Reservations are required. Cost: $25 per program; $20 for NHA members.

For reservations or more information, call (508) 228-1894.

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The Tupancy-Harris Fount1 The Nantucket Historical Association is enormously grateful to the Tupancy-Harris Foundation for its ongoing annual support. In 1987, when the Thomas Macy House was given to the association by Sallie Gail Harris Tupancy and Oswald A. Tupancy, they also provided that their gift would come with a commitment to ensure that the annual expenses of the historic mansion would not be a burden on the NHA. Each year, in addition to other philanthropic efforts on Nantucket, the Tupancy-Harris Foundation underwrites the care and maintenance of the house at 99 Main Street. Each year a grant is made to ensure that the house and grounds are always ready to receive visiting lecturers , researchers, and other guests of the HA. In addition, the house is a resource for other nonprofit community groups that occasionallly hold meetings in the house.

More recently the Tupancy-Harris Foundation has made a gift to fund the archival storage area for tl1e NHA's new research library. Currently, plans are under way to move the research library from its current location in the Peter Foulger Museum to the Fair Street Museum.

New Titles in the Lib Bronner, Simon J. Grasping Things: Folk Material Culture and Mass Society in Amenca. (1986) D' Alleva, Anne. Art and Artifacts of Polynesia. (1990) Elliot, Sir Gerald. Whalzi1g 1937-1967:

The International Control a/Whale Stocks. (1997) Forster, Honore. More South Sea Whaling. (1991) Hayden, Robert C. A/rzcan-Amerzcans & Cape Verdeans in New Bedford: A History of Community and Achievement. (1993) The Vineyard Oral History Center of the Martha's Vineyard Historical Society. Vineyard Vozces: Words, Faces, and Vozces of Island People. (1998) Wright, Conrad Edick and Katheryn P. Viens, editors.

Entrepreneurs: The Boston Business Community, 1700-1850. (1997).

Wright, Conrad Edick, editor. Amerzcan Unitarianism, 1805-1865. (1989)

Memorial Gifts to the Libra ..

Thank you to Jean Weber for the donation of The

Victorian Home/ront: American Thought and Culture, 1860-1880 and A Directory of Massachuesetts Photographers. Thanks also to Yvonne Pimental who purchased Quilts in America and Twenty Families of SUMMER

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Color in Early Massachusetts, 1742-1998. All books

Business Member Event

have been donated in memory of Cindy Lou Pimental.

Those interested in purchasing books from the Nantucket Historical Association's wish list, please contact the library director Betsy Lowenstein at (508) 228-1894.

A wine tasting with Michael Fahey of Fahey and Fromagerie was held for Business Leaders, Sponsors, and Partners on June 10 at the Peter Foulger Museum.

The event gave business members a chance to view

Since last fall, the bones of the sperm whale found on Low Beach on December 31, 1997, have been in the NHA's new storage facility behind the Bartholomew Gosnold Support Center. Ahead lies a long cleaning process to remove the oil that seeps from deep inside the bones.

Fortunately, the NHA is lucky to have the help of Edie Ray, an active member of the Nantucket Marine Mammal Stranding Team and one of the first to arrive on the beach on the day the whale stranded. Ray has been working on cleaning the bones since spring and is looking forward to seeing the project completed.

Ne The antucket Historical Association's newest exhibition, Seafaring: The Maritime Arts of Nantucket, opened to the public on May 28 at the Peter Foulger Museum.

Curated by Aimee E. Newell, curator of collections, the show highlights some of the finest artifacts in the NHA's collection. Members at the exhibition preview on May 27 were pleased to see the variety and depth of the objects on display. The exhibition includes scrimshaw, textiles, furniture, ceramics, and paintings that Nantucketers made or bought as they traveled to foreign shores. Readers of Historic Nantucket will also enjoy seeing the late eighteenth-century Captain James Chase Liverpool pitcher - the subject of the Annual Report covers.

Seafaring: The Maritime Arts of Nantucket early in the season and meet and greet each other. It also gave the NHA trustees and staff a wonderful opportunity to thank the business members for their important support.

Membership chair Robert Young said it was a terrific reception, and looks forward to an equally successful party next year.

Congratulations Public programs coordinator Jeremy Slavitz has been accepted in The Seminar /or Historical Administration at Colonial Williamsburg. For three weeks in October and November, he will be one of eighteen participants from historical organizations and museums in the program.

He will learn about the most recent trends in the profession and strengthen his leadership skills with experts in the field.

Exhibition Schedule for Summer and Fall Peter Foulget¡ Museum -Seafaring: The Maritime

Arts a/Nantucket Fair Street Museum- Shoals and Shipwrecks:

antucket's Treacherous Shores

Above/eft: Sperm whalebones waiting to be cleaned.

Below: Jean Weber, Dorothy Slover, and Aimee Newell at the

Whaling Museum - Creatures of the Bank

members preview party for Seafaring:

Hadwen House -Lightship Baskets of Nantucket

The Maritime Arts

of antucket

Wal i The Nantucket Historical Association is pleased to announce that beginning in June members and visitors will be able to join a ninety-minute walking tour of historic downtown Nantucket led by HA staff. For the summer, tours are offered on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at 10:30 A.M. and 2:30 P.M. Space is limited to twenty-five people. Admission is $20 adults, $10 children, and $10 for members. Reservations are required and may be made by calling (508) 228-1894.

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SUMMER 1999

VOL. 48, NO. 3

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Published quarterly by the Nantucket Historical Association

2 Whaler's Lane I P.O. Box 1016 Nantucket, Massachusetts 02554 © NHA 1999 ISSN 0439-2248 USPS246460