The Californian gold rush

SUTTERS Creek is, I am reliably informed, a reasonably palatable Californian wine. It is named after the township of Sutters Creek in California about 150 miles east of San Francisco.
That town was started by John Sutter who moved there to harvest timber when he had to close his original timber mill at Sutters Mill. His first settlement had been at Sutters Fort which, in time, grew to become Sacramento.
Sutter arrived in the Untied States in 1834. He had been born in Germany, lived in Switzerland and travelled on a French passport. He travelled west, at one time joining a group of preachers, and on the Oregon Trail. From there he sailed to Hawaii and then back to Alaska. Here he became involved with Russian fur traders but his dream was to establish a new colony in California. By the time he reached there, he described himself as Captain Sutter of the Swiss Guard and had a uniform which he had bought in St Louis. At the time, California was part of Mexico so he took Mexican citizenship and the local Governor gave him a grant of 48,000 acres where he began harvesting timber.
He needed to set up a sawmill to process his timber and he enlisted the help of
James Marshall. Marshall was a fellow pioneer and carpenter who had travelled west from New Jersey. Sutter and Marshall formed a partnership to build a sawmill. Sutter was to provide the materials and labourers – mostly native Americans and others he had brought from Hawaii and Marshall was to supervise the building and run the mill. They settled on a site which had plenty of tall trees and a river for transport and power. It came to be called Sutters Mill.
One day, Marshall noticed some flakes of gold in the tailrace of the mill. He sent for Sutter and they swore the rest of the workers to secrecy. That, of course, did not happen. Some children of one of his workers spent a small amount of gold in a store. Word spread and when a local merchant, Samual Brannan, travelled to San Francisco, that ended any hope of secrecy. News of the gold find started one of the greatest gold rushes in history and soon Sutters Mill was overrun.
Sutter’s business collapsed as a result of the rush. His workers simply walked away and went searching for gold. It was then that he moved to Sutters Creek but that too became surrounded by prospectors and hangers-on. Eventually, he retired east to Pennsylvania with what was left of his fortune and a small pension. Marshall was not as lucky. He never struck it rich from gold. When a dispute arose between local native Americans and prospectors, he went against the prospectors and had to flee for his life. Years later when things settled down, he returned and began growing grapes and making wine. He died in 1885 and was buried on the hillside behind his cabin. Speaking of the gold find, he is reported to have said that “some day they will make a fuss over me”.
James Marshall was responsible for starting the Californian Gold Rush when he found traces of gold at Sutters Mill on January 24, 1848, 163 years ago this week.