United States

  Don Andres Pico 
  A Californian returning from the wars 
  Domestic life at a rancho 
  Women in favour of peace 
  Hospitable treatment 
  Fandango 

  Capt. Dupont 
  Gen. Kearny 
  The presidio 
  Appointed Alcalde 
  Gen. Kearny's proclamation 
  Arrival of Col. Stevenson's regiment 

  First settlement of the missionaries 
  Population 
  Characteristics of white population 
  Employments 
  Pleasures and amusements 
  Position of women 

The following is an official account of a visit paid to the gold region in July by Colonel Mason, who had been appointed to the military command in California, and made his report to the authorities at Washington. It is dated from head-quarters at Monterey, August 17, 1848.

A Description of Its Soil, Climate, Productions, and Gold Mines; with the Best Routes and Latest Information for Intending Emigrants. To which is annexed, an Appendix Containing official documents and letters authenticating the accounts of the quantities of gold found, with its actual value ascertained by chemical assay. Also late communications containing accounts of the highest interest and importance from the gold districts.

by Edwin Bryan

1849

THURSDAY morning, October the 26th, found Emery feeling very poorly, but insisting on going ahead with our day's work, so Camp No. 34 was soon behind us. We were embarked on a new stream, flowing west-southwest, with a body of water ten times the size of that which we had found in the upper canyons of the Green. Our sixteen-foot boats looked quite small when compared with the united currents of the Green and the Grand rivers.

by E.L. Kolb

An hour or so after making our camp, we began to doubt the wisdom of our choice of a location, for a downpour of rain threatened to send a stream of water under the tent. The stream was easily turned aside, while a door and numerous boards found in the drift pile, made a very good floor for the tent and lifted our sleeping bags off the wet sand. We had little trouble in this section to find sufficient driftwood for fires. The pile at this camp was enormous, and had evidently been gathering for years.

It is a dogged courage of which the author of this book is the serene possessor - shared equally by his daring brother; and evidence of this bravery is made plain throughout the following pages. Every youth who has in him a spark of adventure will kindle with desire to battle his way also from Green River to the foot of Bright Angel Trail; while every man whose bones have been stiffened and his breath made short by the years, will remember wistfully such wild tastes of risk and conquest that he, too, rejoiced in when he was young.

We passed Loper's claim after resuming our journey the next day. His workings were a one-man proposition and very ingenious. We found a tunnel in the gravel a hundred feet above the river, and some distance back from the river bank. A track of light rails ran from the river bank to these workings; the gravel and sand was loaded into a car, and hauled or pushed to the bank, then dumped into a chute, which sent it down to the river's edge.