Gold: the marvellous history of General John Augustus Sutter

by Blaise Cendrars

  He kept in constant touch with the United States, and it was precisely from that direction, from the government in Washington, that he had most to fear.

  As early as 1841, Captain Graham, at the head of forty-six English and American adventurers, had hoped, by a bold stroke, to seize power and proclaim the independence of California. But Alvarado had got wind of the affair; he surprised the conspirators, massacred more than half of them and threw the rest into prison. Immediately, London and Washington seized on the incident to claim compensation for the murder of their subjects. London demanded 20,000 dollars and the United States 129,200 dollars for fifteen riflemen. A British corvette lay in wait off Vera Cruz. The Mexicans were forced to submit.

  In the spring of 1842, the revolt led by the Dominican monk, Gabriel, was put down in a blood-bath.

  In October 1843, a band of more than a hundred Americans arrived from Santa Fe and Governor Alvarado, unpopular because of his despotic rule and in fear of new disturbances, asked Mexico for aid. Santa Anna, the President and dictator, sent three hundred galley-slaves by sea. He had promised them land, tools, cattle and the restoration of their civil rights if they could succeed in kicking out the Americans. At the same time, he appointed a new Governor of California, General Manuel Micheltorena. This general was an honest man, full of good intentions, but he could do nothing to uphold the Mexican domination, which was rapidly disintegrating. He chose to set up his quarters in the old Mission buildings of Santa Clara, Los Angeles. He frequently visited New Helvetia to take counsel, but Sutter, for his part, was preoccupied with the unyielding attacks of the savages, which were causing terrible slaughter.

  Five more years pass, years of struggles, uprisings, riots and revolutions fomented primarily by the Cabinet in Washington, then comes the war with Mexico and the cession of Texas and California to the United States.

  Sutter has obtained a further grant of twenty-two square leagues of land from the last Mexican Governor.

  He owns the largest domain in the States.

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  Peace at last.

  A new era commences.

  John Augustus Sutter will at last be able to enjoy, and rejoice in, his wealth and good fortune.

  New seeds arrive from Europe and saplings of every kind of fruit-tree. He acclimatizes olive and fig-trees on the lower, more sheltered ground; apple and pear-trees on the hills. He starts the first cotton plantations and, on the banks of the Sacramento, experiments with rice and indigo.

  And finally he realizes a desire that has long lain close to his heart: he plants vines. At great expense, he has vine-stock brought over from the Rhine and from Burgundy. In the northern part of his estates, on the banks of the Feather River, he has had built a sort of country seat or manor house. It is his retreat. The Hermitage. Clumps of tall trees shade the house. All around, there are gardens with huge beds of carnation and heliotrope. There his finest fruits grow, cherries, apricots, peaches and quinces. His choicest pedigree cattle graze in the meadows.

  Now, every step leads him towards his vineyards. When he goes for a walk, it is to see his vines, his Hochheimer, his Chambertin, his Château-Chinon.

  As he caresses his favourite dog in the shade of a pergola, he dreams of bringing his family over from Europe, of lavishly repaying his creditors, of regaining his civic rights and redeeming the honour of his name; also, of endowing his little birthplace, so far away . . . Sweet dreams.

  My three sons will come, they will have work, they must be men by now. And my daughter, how is she? I know! I'll order a grand piano for her, from Pleyel in Paris. It will be brought along the route I travelled long ago, on the backs of bearers if need be . . . Maria . . . All my old friends . . .

  Reverie.

  His pipe has gone out. He gazes into the far distance. The first stars are coming out. His dog lies motionless.

  Reverie. Calm. Repose.

  It is Peace.

  * * *

  SEVENTH CHAPTER

  * * *

  27

  Reverie. Calm. Repose.

  It is Peace.

  No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No: it is GOLD!

  It is gold.

  The gold rush.

  The world is infected with gold fever.

  The great gold rush of 1848, 1849, 1850 and 1851. It will last for fifteen years.

  SAN FRANCISCO!

  * * *

  EIGHTH CHAPTER

  * * *

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  And all this is triggered off by the simple blow of a pickaxe.

  These stampeding mobs of people. First, they come from New York and all the ports on the Atlantic coast, and then, immediately afterwards, from the hinterland and the Middle West. It is a veritable flood. Men pack themselves into the holds of steamers going to Chagres. Then they cross the isthmus, on foot, wading through the swamps. Ninety per cent of them die of yellow fever. The survivors who reach the Pacific coast charter sailing-ships.

  San Francisco! San Francisco!

  The Golden Gate.

  Goat Island.

  The wooden wharves, the muddy streets of the nascent town, which are paved with sacks full of flour.

  Sugar costs five dollars, coffee ten, an egg twenty, an onion two hundred, a glass of water a thousand. Shots ring out and the 45 revolver does duty for a sheriff. And behind this first human wave come more, and still more, hurling themselves in a great tide, and coming now from much further away - from the shores of Europe, Asia, Africa, from North and South.

  In 1856, more than six hundred ships enter the Bay; they disgorge an endless stream of people who instantly throw themselves into the search for gold.

  San Francisco! San Francisco!

  And another magic name: SUTTER.

  The name of the workman who struck that famous blow with the pickaxe is not widely known.

  It was James W. Marshall, a carpenter by trade and a native of New Jersey.

  29

  John Augustus Sutter, not merely the first American millionaire, but the first multimillionaire in the United States, is ruined by that blow of the pickaxe.

  He is forty-five years old.

  And after having ventured all, risked all, dared all and created for himself a way of life, he is ruined by the discovery of gold-mines on his lands.

  The richest mines in the world.

  The fattest nuggets.

  The end of the rainbow.

  30

  But let us hear from John Augustus Sutter himself.

  The following chapter is copied from a thick book whose parchment covers bear traces of fire. The ink has faded, the paper has yellowed, the spelling is shaky, the handwriting full of flourishes and curlicues; it is difficult to decipher, the language is full of idioms, phrases of Basle dialect and Amerenglish. While the hand that wrote it is touchingly awkward and full of hesitations, the narrative itself is told directly, simply, even stupidly. The writer has not one word of complaint, he confines himself to narrating the events, enumerating the facts just as they happened. He does not exaggerate in the slightest degree.

  I humbly translate:

  31

  'Towards the middle of January 1848, Mr Marshall, the carpenter from New Jersey who is building my mills, was working on the new sawmill at Coloma, high up in the mountains, fifty miles distant from the fort. Once the framework had been erected, I sent Mr Wimmer and his family up there, together with a number of workmen; Mr Bennett, from Oregon, accompanied them to oversee the installation and setting-up of the machinery. Mrs Wimmer did the cooking for the whole party. I still required a sawmill as I was short of planks for my large steam-mill, which was also under construction, at Brighton. The boiler and machinery for this had just arrived after a journey of eighteen months. God be praised, I had never expected to see a successful outcome to this enterprise, and all the oxen survived, thank the Lord. I also needed planks for the construction of other buildings and especially for a stockade around the village of Yerba Buena, at the far end of the bay, for
there are now many vessels in the harbour and the crews are wild and unruly, given to looting, so that much of the livestock and provisions disappear, one knows not how.

  'It was on a rainy afternoon. I was sitting in my room at the fort writing a long letter to an old friend in Lucerne. Suddenly Mr Marshall burst into the room. He was drenched to the skin. I was very surprised to see him back already, for I had just sent a wagon loaded with foodstuffs and scrap iron up to Coloma. He said he had something very important to tell me and that he wanted to communicate it to me in the utmost secrecy; he begged me to conduct him to some isolated place, far from any possibility of being overheard or surprised by some indiscreet person. We climbed to the top storey, as he kept insisting that we must shut ourselves away in a remote chamber, even though there was nobody else at the ranch except my bookkeeper, who was downstairs in his office. Marshall asked me for something, I believe it was a glass of water, and I went down to fetch it for him. When I came up again, I forgot to lock the door behind me. Marshall had just that moment taken a rag out of his pocket, and was in the process of showing me a lump of some yellowish metal that he had wrapped up in it, when my bookkeeper came into the room to ask me for some information. Marshall quickly hid the metal in his pocket. The bookkeeper apologized for disturbing us and left the room. "For God's sake, didn't I tell you to lock the door?" cried Marshall. He was beside himself and I had a hard time calming him down and convincing him that the bookkeeper had merely come in on business and not with the object of surprising us. This time, we bolted the door and even pushed a cupboard against it. And Marshall again took out the metal. He had several little grains of it, each weighing about four ounces.He told me he had said to the workmen that it might be gold, but they had all laughed at him and taken him for an idiot. I tested the metal in aqua regia, then I read the entire article on GOLD in the Encyclopaedia Americana. Thereupon, I announced to Marshall that his metal was gold, virgin gold.

  'The poor boy almost went crazy. He wanted to jump on his horse at once and rush back to Coloma. He begged me to accompany him, post-haste. I pointed out that it was already dusk and that it would be better to spend the night at the fort. I promised to go with him the following morning, but he would not listen to reason and set off hell-for-leather shouting: "Come tomorrow, come early!" The rain was falling in torrents and he hadn't even stopped for a bite to eat.

  'Darkness came down abruptly. I went back into my room. I was certainly not indifferent to this discovery of gold in the stream, in the foundations of my sawmill, no, indeed, but, like all the ups and downs of fortune in my life, I took it with a certain amount of detachment; nevertheless, I could not sleep that night, I was picturing to myself all the dire consequences and fatal repercussions that this discovery might have for me, but never for one moment did I imagine it would bring my New Helvetia to ruin! Next morning, I gave detailed instructions to my various work-crews and left at 7 a.m., accompanied by several soldiers and a cowboy.

  'We were half-way up the winding track that leads to Coloma when we came across a riderless horse. A little higher up, Marshall emerged from the undergrowth. He had been halted by the storm and hadn't been able to go any further during the night. He was perished with cold and half dead from hunger. However, his exaltation of the previous evening had not subsided.

  'We went on up the track and arrived at this famous El Dorado. The weather had cleared up a little. That evening, we made a tour along the banks of the canal; the rain had swollen the waters and both sides were awash. I operated the sluices, the canal emptied instantly and we went down into the bed to search for gold. We found plenty of small particles and several workmen even handed me small nuggets. I told them I would have a ring made from this gold as soon as it became possible to have this done in California and, in fact, I did have this ring made, much later, in the form of a signet-ring; in default of a family crest, I had my father's printer's mark engraved on it, a phoenix being consumed in the fire, and inside the ring was the following inscription:

  THE FIRST GOLD DISCOVERED IN JANUARY 1848

  Then three bishops' croziers, the Basle cross, and my name: SUTTER.

  'The following day, I rode round the whole extent of Coloma, taking careful note of its situation and the lie of the land, with particular reference to the water-courses, then I called all my people together. I explained to them that it was necessary to keep this discovery a secret for a further five or six weeks, to give me time to complete the construction of my sawmill, on which I had already spent 24,000 dollars. When they had given me their word of honour, I returned to the ranch-house. I was unhappy and had no idea how to extricate myself from this ill-fated discovery of gold. I was certain that such a business could not be kept secret.

  'And I was right. Barely two weeks later, I sent a white man up to Coloma with a load of tools and provisions; some young Indian boys escorted him. Mrs Wimmer told him the whole story and her children gave him some grains of gold. On returning to the fort, this man immediately went to the stores, which were situated outside my enclosure, and asked Smith for a bottle of brandy. He wanted to pay for it with the grains of gold he had brought down from Coloma. Smith asked him if he took him for a dingo dog. The carter told Smith to come and ask me, if he didn't believe him. What could I do? I told Smith the whole story. His partner, Mr Brannan, sought me out at once and asked me a whole heap of questions, which I answered truthfully. He ran out without even bothering to shut the door. During the night, he and Smith loaded all their merchandise into wagons, stole some of my horses and left in haste for Coloma.

  'After that, my workmen began running away.

  'Soon, I was left alone at the fort with a few faithful engineers and eight sick men.

  'My Mormon employees were more reluctant to leave me, but when gold fever infected them too, they threw their scruples to the wind.

  'Now, beneath my windows, there was an unending procession. Every man who could walk came up from San Francisco and the other shanty-towns on the coast. Everyone closed up his hut, his cabin, his farm or his business and made his way to Fort Sutter, then up to Coloma. In Monterey and the other towns in the South, they believed at first that the whole thing was an invention on my part to attract new settlers. The procession on the road stopped for a few days, then it began again, worse than before, as these towns also joined the march. Whole townships were emptied; my poor estates were swamped.

  'So began my miseries.

  'My mills were at a standstill. The very millstones had been stolen from me. My tanneries were deserted. Large numbers of leather hides, in the process of preparation, were going mouldy in the cellars. Raw hides rotted away. My Indians and my Kanakas ran away with their families. They all went prospecting for gold, which they exchanged for brandy. My shepherds abandoned their flocks, my planters the plantations, the workers their many trades. My corn was rotting on the stalk; there was no one to pick the fruit in my orchards; in the byres, my finest milch-cows were mooing themselves to death. Even my loyal body of soldiers had fled. What could I do? The men came to see me, they implored me to leave with them, to go up to Coloma and search for gold. God, but it was a cruel blow to me ! I left with them. There was nothing else I could do.

  'I loaded my goods and provisions on to wagons and, accompanied by a clerk, some hundred-odd Indians and fifty Kanakas, I went up to establish my gold-prospecting camp in the mountains, on the banks of the creek that today bears my name.

  'To start with, all went very well. But soon, hordes of rough-neck profiteers swooped down on us. They set up distilleries and ingratiated themselves with my men. I struck camp and moved ever higher up the mountain, but no matter what I did, that fiendish brood of distillers followed us everywhere and I could not prevent my poor Indians and my poor, wild natives from the Islands from tasting this new delight. Soon, my men were incapable of carrying out the simplest task; they drank and gambled away their wages, or the gold they had found, and spent three-quarters of their lives dead drunk.
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