“Murder for Gold”

Raneen Zubeideh

HIST 300GW

Spring 2020

        In the span of 64 years, less than the average life expectancy for a human being- the Maidu population decreased by 7,900 people, more than 88% of the population was eradicated through violence, expoliation, starvation, and murder. The Gold Rush in 1948 brought thousands of ambitious European travelers with the exclamation of three words, “gold boys, gold” by James Marshall bringing indulgence in California’s promise of new wealth. The new group introduced into the region of gold consisted of primarily white European men coming for a chance to hit the gold jackpot. However, the land was not empty as the new settlers had expected as Euro-centric preconceived notions painted the land to be empty The Maidu tribe inhabited an abundant amount of land from the Sacramento river to the Sierra Nevadas. The introduction of the new Europeans during the Gold Rush brought extreme diseases, destruction of indigenous property, exploitation, and the murder of thousands of Native Maidu people. By settling in land filled with the Maidu indigenous people, the aims of the Europeans were to colonize the land in order to exploit the natural gold resources and utilize the Native peoples in order to further their agenda. Malaria, Measles, Influenza, along with many foreign diseases penterated land of the Maidus, who had previously not known any of these strains of European disease. The story starts with the Maidu people, and their existence before the Gold Rush, and in order to examine the toll that the colonization of Northern California took on the indigenous Maidus, it is essential to juxtapose Maidu life before the Gold Rush with Maidu life during and after.

        Before the Gold Rush, the Native Maidu people inhabited over three million acres of land from the Sacramento River to the Sierra Nevadas and from the modern day Chico area to the Stanislaus Forest. The Maidu people are made up of three primary linguistic groups: the Konkox, the Nisenan, and the Mountain Maidu. In their indigenous land, the Maidu people had the ability to practice their spirituality, religion, and way of life as they desired through utilizing the natural resources around their tribe in order to live. The Maidus are characterized as notably hunters and fishers, as their settlement had easy access to many rivers and lakes. The land provided the indegionous people with the basic necessities to live, as they had been for thousands of years prior. Although many parts of California and the United States were already inhabited by European settlers and Africans exported for slave labor, the Maidu land was practically untouched as “for the most part outsiders did not explore the Maidu lands until the mid-1800s because it was mountainous and difficult to travel.”^[1] The Maidu people utilized Oak trees scattered throughout Northern California in order to provide them with wood for housing, fruit and seed for consumption, and shady areas for the hot Northern California summers. Not only were these natural resources stripped from the Maidus, the Europeans would thereby interrupt the way of living for the Maidus from the beginning of the Gold Rush and on.
        The Maidu people utilized the earth for their needs, using the aforementioned oak trees for resources along with supplying their own food. The Maidu became experts in this lifestyle and continued to be able to recognize when the land was ready for them to eat and extract goods from the soil “As a primitive man the Indian is dependent upon the products of the soil, and thus the wild Savage can get along nicely we're a civilized European would die of hunger if left to himself.”^[2] When the Europeans came to colonize Sutter’s Mill, they destroyed the geography and the physical attributes of the land. This is extremely evident when analyzing the salmon runs in the Sacramento River after mills were installed alongside the stream. The calendar year embraced by the Maidus allowed them to source the materials needed for their dishes- as they had a stable diet only relying on the natural resources accessible and close in proximity. “The principal goods of the Indian are acorns and grass seeds” which they had the ability to source during the months of May and June, “the various species of Oaks produce acorns which vary in size and taste. Of these they select the best. After the acorns are shelled and pound it into flour, they make wholesome and palatable bread without any special dishes, at the banks of the River.”^[3] Being that the Maidus relied on the river for most to all food sources, when the Europeans came in- the natural indigenous land of the Maidus was not able to be utilized as it had been in the past. By occupying where the Maidus would normally source and make their food- the normal life of the Maidus would be interrupted, however, this was not the end of the interruption.

        The European settlers trickled into the Maidu land after the first Gold discovery by James Marshall. The ambitious Europeans came with one goal: to get rich; and willing to do whatever it took in order to get there. The Gold Rush was declared on January 24, 1848 when John Marshall found a Gold Nugget at Sutter’s mill. Sutter’s Mill was located on the Sacramento River, right on the Maidu Nisenan tribes land, where they sourced fish and utilized the River for food and water. The original find of gold caused California’s non-indigenous population growing at 15,000 in 1848 to 100,000 in 1850 and 380,000 by 1860^[4] The new Europeans came from all over the United States, coming from cities such as New York City and states from the south like Alabama to establish their new lives in hopes of finding great success in the new opportunity of gold mining in what they had perceived to be as empty land. The notion of “unsettled land” became popularized as the Native Americans living on the land are heavily portrayed as savage throughout European Gold Rush literature and writing, as Europeans “fell prey to hostile arrows”^[5]. The first find is documented in “California Gold, an Authentic History of the First Find” through the White European viewpoint, as written by James Stephens Brown- a gold miner present at the nugget find. Throughout the journal, Native Maidu people are referenced only as ‘civilized’ or ‘uncivilized’. The European settlers exploited their natural resources and utilized slave labor in order to further their agenda. The exploitation of Native American Maidu people was not only occurring in large numbers, yet was encouraged by the California government as settlers were “rewarded by the California state treasury for bringing in Indian scalps and heads”^[6] The settlers continued to kill Native Americans not only for game, but reward.

The labor system of the gold rush was not only exploiting young Maidu men, but also exploiting children as “the adoption of Indigenous children as unpaid laborers through California’s apprentice system”^[7] was prevalent. There was a heavily desire for Native children as they were viewed as subhuman and weak compared to caucasion children and they could perform tasks we have seen all throughout history due to their small hands. The indigenous children were stripped away from their families and used to work on the mills as unpaid laborers. The small children were easily stripped from their parents, as the population decrease in the Maidu population allowed for the new Europeans to take the children as they pleased after whole villages and families were killed. Orphans were then taken under the white man's wing and used as a slave in order to mine the gold that the miner desired. The utilization of children in machinery due to their small figure is not a new concept and would not end after the Gold Rush of 1849, as the practice of child labor continued on in America and still continues on. However, what makes this extremely vital to the understanding of the treatment of Maidus is that the new European settlers could have brought their own children to perform the tasks or even the new offspring they produced during the Gold Rush era- but the Maidu children were viewed as small enemies- eventually capable of rebellion.

        The exploitation of the Maidu people started with the settlement on their indigenous land without any consent from the Maidu tribes. The settlement on essential rivers and lakes created extreme issues and resource shortage for the indigenous people, the mills on Sacramento River created a blockage for salmon runs along with increased chemicals and machinery operating in the river. The Maidu people had been living simultaneously around other Native American people, and “Although the California Indians perhaps lived as peacefully together as any tribes on the continent, they were careful to place their camps or Villages as prevent surprise.” They lived “near a stream or a spring, so in the mountains they generally selected a sheltered open, where an enemy could not easily approached within bow-shot without being covered.”^[8] The Maidu people took precautionary measures to make sure they were not only protected through means of nature by invasion, but could also sustain themselves with the natural fruit of the land. Through the introduction of European settlers into the indigenous land, natural resources were drained out and removed. The aforementioned Oak trees that provided shelter, food, and a much needed shade were removed by the colonizers in order to create more room. By dismantling the Maidu people through draining out their natural resources via destruction and interruption- the Native people struggled to feed their families, hunt on land that proved to be sufficient for thousands of years prior to Gold settlements. By settling on the exact location in which the Maidu relied on natural resources to eat and live, when the “Settlers arrived, and their cattle ate local plants and their hogs foraged for the acorns so important to the Native diet. Unable to feed themselves, some Maidu were forced to leave their villages to work in the cities or on nearby ranches and farms.”^[9] By draining the natural resources of the Maidu the colonizers were tactful in starting an epidemic of hunger and despirity in order to exploit the Natives to work for them. Forced labor was abundant amongst the Maidus due to worries about feeding their families and surviving, as the invasion of their land was practically non-existent before the Gold Rush.

        The absolute destruction of the land was caused by ‘tailings’ and in the land that Native Americans utilized as a dancing ground “is built on a reclaimed mine-tailings site. Tailings are crushed rock, sand, and gravel that were leached with mercury and cyanide to remove gold.”^[10] The destruction of Maidu land not only caused the rivers to lack vital food sources, but the very ground that the Maidu people perform their inigenous dances has been poisoned through means of utilizing chemicals to extract gold. The act of extracting gold by the European settlers already destroyed the land. By mining in the rivers, the natural cycle of the salmons was interrupted- thereby changing when the Native Americans were able to eat and fish. The European settlers continued to tear down to oak trees to make place for their new settlements.

        The Maidu tribe was commonly referred to as quote the Digger tribe ends quote this is due to the fact that Indian miners in California were viewed as nothing but hard labor resource whether they consented to the labor or not. The forced labor throughout the Gold Rush as “California Indians participated in the Gold Rush as miners. One government report estimated in 1848 that more than half of the gold diggers in California mines were Indian. At first many miners worked as laborers for white Californians.”^[11] What started off to be an expedition for white Europeans turned into the utilisation of Native American Maidu people for labor. The white men had realized their power over the Native Americans and utilized that power to take advantage of them through means of making them work on the mills. The exploitation of Native Americans was not a new concept as “for decades prior to the discovery of gold, Indian Labour had been the basis of the regional economy, then in 1848 the Hispanic system of labor exploitation was transferred from the Ranchos to the mines.”^[12] The new Europeans in the Sacramento Valley utilized old labor exploitation techniques that they had used to exploit the Hispanics in the territories into the new system of exploiting the indigenous people of the Maidu tribe.

        The Native Maidus experienced extreme negligence, as they were exploited in the process of mining for gold, as “under Spanish rule, many thousands [of Maidus] were lost to disease and forced labor^[13]” Forced labor created the category of ‘civilized’ and ‘uncivilized’ as the Maidu people who complied were viewed as ‘civilized’ and the ones who fought for their homes were viewed as ‘uncivilized’. and tend to be more violent as the work of Natives described by John Brown the “teams were oxen and were driven by two of Mr. Sutters’ tame or civilized Indians”^[14]. Through the characterization of Native Americans as sub-human, the Europeans began to exploit them into working in the mills through violence. Through painting the Maidu people as uncivilized and “those did not who did not want to work were considered as enemies”^[15] The colonizers were able to exploit them for labor and kill without feeling shameful through illustrating the Maidu as the enemy. The Maidu people were taken off of their land and rounded up in order to provide labor against their will, some consented in fear of dying while others resisted and were categorized as the savage Indian we can observe in many historical narratives by the white man. Through forced labor, the white settlers were able to see the hardworking Native Americans- leading to misconceptions about their abilities and strength. Along with the contrasting views on those who consented versus those who were forced; the categorization of Nativee Americans nationally fell into a series of calling indigenous resisters ‘savage’.

        Although forced labor and conquering land was a primary reason of murder of the Maidu Natives, the other main source of death were the new strains of disease introduced by the European colonizers. These diseases being malaria, smallpox, influenza, and measles- extremely invasive strains of diseases that the indigenous people had never seen. The disease strengthened the Europeans as they were less susceptible to dying from the viruses as evolution created barriers for these old diseases. Not only were the diseases able to kill off much of the Maidu tribe, it destabilized their power to fight back as “six years after the malaria outbreak, a smallpox epidemic raged through the tribes of Northern California. The Maidu reportedly suffered heavy losses in the second epidemic. Weakened by the one two punch of the two epidemics, the Maidu were in no position to protest the next incursion onto their lands.”^[16] The diseases wiped out much of the Maidu tribes throughout the Gold Rush era and after. Native resistance weakened as diseases got stronger and abundant- dismantling Native physical power for resistance. Previous to the disease outbreak, the Native men were able to protect their small villages and family and were able to rebel against the white colonizers- however, as many leaders started to die from disease- it was not long before the Native population was outnumbered by the white settlers. The outbreak of disease created the imbalance of populations (Maidu and white) causing the superiority complex to strengthen. As indicated through statistical evidence of population decline, it is evident that the Maidu people were outnumbered directly after the outbreak of the vicious diseases.        

        Violence through direct killing was one of the ways the European colonizers were able to seek power. “If an Indian is killed by a white man the relatives of the Indian will kill the first white man who crosses their path when Sutter established himself in 1839 in the Sacramento Valley, new misfortunes came upon peaceful natives of the country.”^[17] The warfare became one of exponential warfare, as the Europeans would strike and the Native Maidus would strike back- becoming endless until the Maidus population became dismantled and lower, eradicating the chance to fight back. The history of Maidu violence as mentioned is not only through mass killings, it is complemented with the forced labor and starvation through land sabotage. There are several cases about the raping of Native Maidu women throughout this time period by the white settlers, however none of the women are identified throughout the sources. What is present are the revenge killings and invasions going back and forth. During the gold rush era “a group of seven miners from Oregon attacked a band of Nisenan Indians who were mining for gold for James Marshall”. After “the [White] men raped several Indian women… the Indian men tried to protect their women, they were [then] shot”^[18]. To this day, the women and men victims of colonizer violence are unnamed and unidentified, however- the events of violence along with revenge killings are all recorded along with the names of the White men involved.

After these spurts of violence, the Native Americans were held as prisoners and exploited for unfree laborers on the gold mills for years. Through The river that the Maidu people once felt as a place of resource, comfort, and blessings became a place in which violence took place as “neither old nor young was spared by the enemy and often the Sacramento River was colored red by the blood of these innocent Indians, for these Villages were usually situated at the banks of the rivers.”^[19] The blood loss of the Maidu people physically stained the water red as their lives were taken by means of murder then helplessly tossed into the river they once called a blessing. The Maidu once lived a peaceful life “in the high mountain meadows, valleys, and foothills of the Sierra Nevada range, to the floor of the Sacramento Valley and along the Sacramento River, the Maidu lived a fairly comfortable and peaceful existence of hunting, gathering, and fishing.”^[20] That same river ended up being stained with the blood of its inhabitants and poisoned by the newcomers with mercury.

        After the highest points of the Gold Rush, the American government attempted to create reservations as “Eighteen treaties were drawn up between the government and California tribes, including the Maidu, beginning in 1851.” Many treaties have been drawn up relating to Native American reservations in the past two hundred years, however- many ended up benefiting the United States government rather than the indigenous people of the land, as 7.5 million acres were promised for reservation. “The Native peoples agreed to give up most of their lands to the U.S. government... The treaty the Maidu made with the federal government gave them a large reservation on land where there was no gold. The government expected the Maidu to farm this land.”^[21] Not only did the Maidu people have to sign a treaty to take their land back, they were disproportionately given the land in relation to the land they had before, with the land that was being given drained of resources that were once theirs. “Indians in California came under U.S. sovereignty without legal claims to the land. Furthermore, the com­missioners’ appointments were irregular, and in the wake of the gold rush, white Califor­nians strongly objected to the treaties.”^[22] The Maidu people were put through a series of horrific events: first- colonization, second- labor, third- disease, fourth-death, and finally the process of reconcliment.

The process of the United States giving back the Native American Maidu’s their land was anything but any apology as it was a 200 year battle still ongoing of broken treaties and continued exploitation of Native land. The Maidu along with all other Native American tribes continue to sign treaties in hopes of acquiring their land back, but with requirements such as farming the land, or paying for the land, etc. Native Americans would never fully recover from the land strippeed from them during the Gold Rush. Clyde Prout, a young man living in the Colfax area identified as part of the Nisenan Maidu tribe proved commentary about a dam being built on the Bear River, stating “I have felt a need to continue fighting to protect our history, culture, and traditions. Currently there is a proposed dam project, the Centennial Dam, that threatens one of our last remaining cultural territories… So much of our culture was wiped away through the Gold Rush, the Indian boarding schools, historical trauma, and the loss of our elders.”^[23] The writings of the Maidu people continue to be infringed upon as there are threats of building new developments on the little land they have left for their legacy.

        Today, there are only approximately 2,000 people of the Maidu tribe, most located along the Feather River in Oroville, pushed north from the original land in Sacramento. The exploitation of Maidu’s natural resources allowed for the White colonizers to gain a strong hold on the Maidu people, by forcing them into labor in order to survive. Through the rape of the Maidu women and the murder of the Maidu men, the European gold miners were also able to eliminate much of the indigenous population. Going from three linguistic groups branching off the Maidu land, the European settlers continue to have an everlasting impact on the Maidu people with little of the population left, even after nearly 200 years since the gold rush. The Europeans continue to have an impact on the greater Sacramento area as they murdered the Maidu people for gold. In literature by the White man, the Maidu people are only referenced as ‘civilized’, ‘uncivilized’, ‘tame’, ‘untamed’, and ‘savage’. Through the victors history, there is a loss of touch with the realities of the Gold Rush on the inidgenous land. Rather than acknowledging the Maidu people on the land, the Gold Rush continues to be fetishized for the promise of wealth on ‘unsettled’ land. The Maidu people were murdered, raped, and drained for the idea of fortune during the Gold Rush era by the European settlers.

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