1848 Discovery of Gold in California. 243 co to American citizens, to the amount of three millions of dollars, should be assumed.1 Five years later, the United States, desiring a more southern boundary for a portion of their new territory, secured what is known as the "Gadsden Purchase," by paying the additional sum of ten millions of dollars. 66 10. Peace was no sooner concluded than it was discovered that the soil of California was richly endowed with gold.' On one of the tributaries of the Sacramento river an old settler was peacefully digging a trench,-caring little, Discovery it may be supposed, about the change in citizen- of gold in ship which he had undergone, nor dreaming that California. the next stroke of his spade was to influence the history not merely of California but of the world. Among the sand which he lifted were certain shining particles. His wondering eye considered them with attention. They were The treaty was made by commissioners who met at Guadalupe Hidalgo, a small town about four miles from the city of Mexico; but the boundary between the two countries soon became a subject of dispute, which was not settled till 1853, when the United States purchased the Mesilla Valley, or, as it was called, the Gadsden Purchase, General Gadsden having been the agent employed by the United States in transacting the affair. The map on the opposite page shows the extent, not only of the territory acquired from Mexico, but of the territory possessed by the United States at the close of the Revolutionary war, as well as of all the tracts since acquired. So much of it as relates to Louisi ana and Oregon is based upon the conclusions stated in Greenhow's History of Oregon and California," an official work published under the direction of the United States Senate. The map inserted in Vol. 1 of the Ninth Census Report, is not in accord with Greenhow's con clusions, as it extends Louisiana to the Pacific ocean. 2 Before 1779, eight establishments, missionary and military, were formed by the Spaniards on the Pacific coast of North America, the most southern being San Diego, the most northern, San Francisco; and during the five years preceding that date, three exploring voyages were made by order of the Spanish Government, in which the coast was examined as far north as the sixtieth parallel. (See page 37, note.) By the year 1800, as many as sixteen Spanish missions had been established in various parts of Upper California. Here the Indians were gathered, and the Catholic missionaries taught them the arts of civilized life, and imparted to them the truths of Christianity. After Mexico had become independent, the mission lands, comprising several million acres, were occupied by the Mexican government, and the missions were gradually abandoned. gold! Gold was everywhere—in the soil, in the river-sand, in the mountain-rock; gold in dust, gold in pellets, gold in lumps! It was the land of old fairy tale, where wealth could be had by him who chose to stoop down and gather! Fast as the mails could carry it the bewildering news thrilled the heart of America. 11. The journey to the land of promise was full of toil and danger. There were over two thousand miles of unexplored wilderness to traverse. There were mountain ranges to surmount, lofty and rugged as the Alps themselves. There were great desolate plains, unwatered and without vegetation, Indians, whose dispositions there was reason to question, beset the path. But danger was unconsidered. That season thirty thousand Americans crossed the plains, climbed the mountains, forded the streams, bore without shrinking all that want, exposure, and fatigue could inflict. Cholera broke out among them, and four thousand left their bones in the wilderness. The rest plodded on undismayed. Fifty thousand came by sea. From all countries they came from quiet English villages, from the crowded cities of China. Before the year was out California had gained an addition of eighty thousand to her population." 12. Florida became a State the day before the last of Tyler's term of office (1845). At a later period of the year, during Polk's administration, Texas became a State, as previously stated. Iowa, the twenty-ninth State, was admitted in 1846. It originally was a part of the "Louisiana Purchase." The admission of Wisconsin took place in 1848, from what, in part, was soon after the Revolution, the Northwest Territory. New States. Taylor's Administration. 1. As slavery in Mexico had been abolished more than twenty years, the territory ceded by her to the United States "free soil." In anticipation of th acquisition, Mr. was 1849 The Wilmot Proviso. 245 Wilmot, of Pennsylvania, acting for himself and other members of Congress from the free States, had offered The an addition to the Mexican treaty, which after- 16th national ward became known as the Wilmot Proviso," ZACHARY TAYLOR. 66 election. and which may be considered as the foundation stone of the Free Soil Party. The object of the proviso was to preserve for ever as "free soil" the territory to be acquired from Mexico. It, however, did not pass both Houses of Congress; but it greatly helped to bring into existence the new political party, and consequently three parties contended for the presidency in the fall of 1848. 2. The candidate of the Democrats was General Lewis Cass, of Michigan; of the Whigs, General Zachary Taylor, of Louisiana; and of the Free Soilers, whose party cry was "Free Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor, and Free Men," was ex-president Van Buren, of New York. General Taylor started in the canvass with a decided advantage over his competitors. In the Mexican war he had won great laurels as a soldier; and by his simplicity, directness, and indomitable daring in that contest had acquired the popular favor. His soldiers used to call him "Old Rough and Ready." His laconic expressions at Buena Vista-" General Taylor never surrenders," and "A little more grape, Captain Bragg"were often quoted during the presidential campaign, which resulted in his election. He was inaugurated on the 5th of March, 1849, the 4th being Sunday. 3. It was during the early excitement of the "gold fever" that President Polk's term of office expired and Taylor's began. "The 'fever' was raging like an epidemic in every direction. High and low, rich and poor took it. From the fall of 1849 to the fall of 1850 was the tent era of California, the strange flush times of the young State. Property was changing hands, fortunes changing favorites, with Mining life in astonishing rapidity. The poor man of yesterday California. was the rich man of to-day. The servant, running away from his master, tarried a month or two in the mines, and returned with gold enough to buy his master out. The average wages made by miners in 1849 were, perhaps, twenty or thirty dollars a day; yet in rich diggings an average of from three hundred to five hundred dollars a week was not uncommon for weeks together. 6 4. The abundance of gold in the hands of people not used to it made them lavish. There was very little sitting down and calculating how to economize; and there was no Poor Richard' pleading frugality and pointing out the penury that must follow thriftlessness. If there was any shrewd Yankee still following the precepts of his early education, and in an open-handed generation trying to remember that it is not what a man makes, but what he saves, that determines him rich or poor, his daily memorandum of expenses must have seemed very shocking. If he took breakfast at a restaurant in San Francisco, he had a dollar to pay for a beef steak and a cup of coffee. For fresh eggs he must pay from seventy-five cents to a dollar each. His dinner would cost him from a dollar and a half to five dollars, according to his appetite. Washing was eight dollars for a dozen pieces: it even happened, they say, that some sent their dirty clothes to China to be washed. 5. On landing at San Francisco, which early became the principal port of debarkation, or on arriving over the moun tains, almost all dashed first into the mines. Placer mining could be learned in a day: any one who could shovel dirt, stand up to his knees in running water, and shake a pan, knew the art. The currency was gold-dust, that is, small scales, globules, or nuggets of gold. At first they rudely measured it; then as rudely weighed it—a silver dollar's weight, the weight of a jackknife, or the weight of an ounce avoirdupois. Then they began to smelt the dust into The Compromise of 1850. 247 bars, ingots, or slugs, stamping the initials of the assayer to give credit to its designated weight where scales were not ac cessible. Not till 1854, when the United States gave them a Branch Mint at San Francisco, was the currency regulated with any satisfaction." 66 revived. 6. In September, 1849, there was a sufficient number of settlers in California to form a State; and "the youthful queen of the Pacific, in her robes of freedom inlaid with gold," made application to Congress for admission Slavery to the Union. As the constitution which Cali- agitation fornia had adopted excluded slavery from her territory, another violent agitation of the slave question" followed, "Calhoun, the great leader and champion of the cause of slavery," and the other friends of the slave power, opposing the admission of California as a free State. Before the question was decided, Taylor died (July 9th, 1850), and was quietly succeeded without show or parade" by the vicepresident, Millard Fillmore, of New York. 66 Fillmore's Administration. 1. Other subjects, besides the admission of California, but all growing out of the slavery question, had been introduced into Congress at this time; and so violent was the controversy be- The tween the opposing Compromise parties that the safe of 1850. ty of the Union was menaced. The great orator and statesman, Henry Clay, by his fervid eloquence, did much to allay this strife, and finally a compromise was effected by which California was admitted as a free State (1850). At the same time, New Mexico and Utah were organized as territories; the slave trade was abolished in the District Columbia; and the "Fugi MILLARD FILLMORE. |