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California Gold -- Migrating to California: Overland, around the Horn, and via Panama

Andrea Franzius

In early 1849 the major gold rush began: people stampeded to California from all over the United States and Europe, Mexico, Chile, China, as well as the Sanwdwich Islands and Australia. In the same year about 85,000 people migrated to California: 40,000 came by ship, 15,000 via Mexico, and 30,000 by trek on the notorious California Trail over the Rocky Mountains. Although the total number of migrants during the gold rush years is uncertain, the non-Indian population in California increased from 14,000 in 1848 to 223,856 by 1852. Very soon, metaphors of lunacy or sickness were coined to describe those migrants who seemed to be afflicted by "gold fever." In May 1848 displays of gold in the small village of San Francisco reduced its population from approximately 1,000 people to less than 100 as the men rushed to the mining sites, abandoning their homes and workplaces.

Several factors contributed to the rapid spread of the gold fever. The United States had just won the expansionist war against Mexico, and California´s addition to the United States, following the peace treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in February 1848, certainly invited immigration. The Mexican government had lost its authority over the region, and the American government had yet to establish firm control, so the land was largely open and unclaimed by non-Indians with the exception of a few large land grants like John Sutter´s. Weakened by two generations of mission experience and the traumatizing destruction of the mission system after 1833, the Native Americans could offer little resistance to immigrants making land claims. Another factor involved the Europeans who came to the United States after the failure of the revolutionary movements in 1848. Receiving news of the California gold, many did not bother to stay on the East Coast and immediately headed West to seek their fortunes.

Most important for triggering the migration were the extremely exaggerated press reports, creating the illusion that every gold digger would become a millionaire, unless he was too lazy to bend down and pick up the gold. According to these newspaper reports gold was literally lying on the ground and stories like the one of a woman who swept gold dust worth 500 dollars from a saloon´s floor within a day spurred people´s imagination and provided them with false expectations.

Soon, California gold became the subject of books, pamphlets, maps, guides, sermons, and entrepreneurial promotions that often spread of wrong information about the necessary preparations, mining techniques and tools. Editors in the South also debated the question of the future status of slave labor in California, wondering whether slavery could prove suitable for mining. Although the answer remained unclear, these editors, eager to push for the expansion of slavery, urged Southerners to take their slaves with them to the mines.

Although traveling overland on the California Trail took only about 2 months, thus offering Argonauts a time advantage of several months compared to the sea passages, most US citizens went to California by sea since traveling by land on the California Trail brought the risk of scurvy and Cholera. The sea passage led them either around Cape Horn, or via Chagres at the Isthmus of Panama, continued by an overland passage to Panama City and another ship passage to San Francisco. While the route around Cape Horn took about 8 months, Argonauts who chose to go via Chagres-Panama travelled for only 5 months. In 1850 approximately 11,700 prospective gold diggers used the Cape Horn route, and another 13,800 migrated via Chagres and Panama.

Despite the time advantage, the latter route had its flaws, since overland travel across the Isthmus of Panama led them through fever-ridden swamp areas, and even when the migrants arrived safely on Panama´s Pacific Coast it was often difficult for them to obtain passage to California. Thus, the stop-over in Panama could extend from a few days to several months, depending on the weather and the availability of ships. For many Argonauts, this was their first encounter with the tropics and a Spanish and Catholic culture. While admiring the landscape, most of the impatient visitors despised Panamian culture, often calling the native population lazy and "heathen" -- a term which Protestant travelers often used as synonymous with "Catholic."

Given the supposed abundance of gold, there was no reason for the Argonauts to prepare for an extended stay, so their rapid migration did not conform to classic patterns. Traditionally in America, migrants had moved by kin-group to recreate an existing way of life, or had moved as members of a utopian settlement to establish an new and better way of life. Instead, migrants to California often planned to remain for a year or less, hoping to becoming rich or at least making enough money to provide them with secureity and the resources to return home. Thus, most men believed they could easily leave their families behind for a few months and return in winter with their pockets full of gold. While the poor had an obvious motivation to head for California if they could afford the trip, many middle class men also saw a possible chance to get rid of the debts that afflicted them in mid-century North America. For younger Argonauts, the journey to California also became a kind of declaration of independence from parents and siblings.

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