List of people associated with the California Gold Rush

The California gold rush occurred in Northern California, during the period from 1848 to 1855.

{| class="wikitable sortable"

|+List of people associated with the California Gold Rush

!scope="col" style="width: 100px;"| Name

!scope="col" style="width: 100px;"| Image

!scope="col" style="width: 50px;"|Birth, death

!scope="col" style="width: 50px;"| Birthplace

!scope="col" style="width: 300px;"| Profession

!scope="col" style="width: 150px;"| Notes

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|1812–1860

|Medway, Massachusetts, U.S.

|mountain man, trainer of grizzly bears

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|1818–1905

|Greenfield, New York, U.S.

|alcalde, blacksmith, industrialist, abolitionist, postmaster, Methodist minister

|one of the founding fathers of the city of Santa Cruz, California

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|1832–1901

|Stockbridge, New York, U.S.

|meatpacking industrialist

|started his meat packing business with funds from success in the Gold Fields

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|1815–1892

|Connecticut, U.S.

|politician, rancho grantee

|first mayor of San Jose, California

|1811–1855

|Walla Walla, Washington, U.S.

|soldier, hotelier

|present at the first discovery of gold

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|1819–1900

|Chautauqua County, New York, U.S.

|politician, soldier

|founder of the city of Chico, California

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|1819–1889

|Saco, Massachusetts (now Maine), U.S.

|politician, businessman, journalist

|first to publicize the California Gold Rush, and California's first millionaire

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|c. 1802 – 1889

|Villa de Branciforte (modern day Santa Cruz), California

|Californio ranchera, medical practitioner, merchant

|founding mother of San Francisco, California, and Mayfield, California (now Palo Alto, California)

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|1832–1901

|Lexington, Ohio, U.S.

|businessman, politician, minerals miner, banker

|1805–1866

|Fort Mandan, North Dakota, U.S.

|Shoshone–French explorer, guide, fur trapper, and military scout

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|1822–1902

|Mason County, Kentucky, U.S.

|African American pioneer, homesteader, miner, and farmer in California; formerly enslaved

|c. 1827–1862

|Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.

|madam of the Barbary Coast of San Francisco

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|1847–1924

|New York City, New York, U.S.

|actress, entertainer, comedian, philanthropist

|1826–1864

|Buncombe County, North Carolina, U.S

|prospector, explorer

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|1822–1888

|Troy, New York, U.S.

|railroad executive, businessman

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|1806–1874

|Aurora, Erie County, New York, U.S.

|writer, forty-niner

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|c. 1825–1916

|Mobile County, Alabama, U.S.

|African American businessperson, real estate developer, abolitionist

|one of San Francisco's wealthiest Black men in the late 19th-century

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|1829–1869

|Vaucluse Plantation, Virginia, U.S.

|politician

|from nobility

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|1825–1885

|Ireland

|Irish-born politician

|10th Mayor of San Jose, California

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|1817–1855

|Meredith, New Hampshire, U.S.

|real estate investor, military personnel

|founder of Folsom, California

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|1813–1890

|Savannah, Georgia, U.S.

|explorer, military officer, politician

|namesake of Fremont, California

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|1819–1873

|Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, U.S.

|lawyer, politician, military leader

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|1817–1894

|Rapallo, Kingdom of Sardinia (now Italy)

|Italian-born chocolatier

|founder of the Ghirardelli Chocolate Company in San Francisco, California.

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|1823–1915

|Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.

|African American politician, businessman, publisher, abolitionist

|During the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, he led a migration of African Americans from San Francisco to Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

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|1830–1911

|Tennessee, U.S.

|African American freedman, miner, farmer

|was an enslaved African American who self–purchase freedom during the mid-19th-century

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|1818–1869

|London, England

|developer, entrepreneur

|transported emigrants to San Francisco, developed the South Park neghborhood, started San Francisco's first sugar refinery

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|1829–1911

|Northampton County, North Carolina, U.S.

|miner, planter, soldier

|served as a Confederate general during the American Civil War

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|1822–1885

|Point Pleasant, Ohio, U.S.

|18th president, soldier

|served in the Mexican–American War; led the Union Army to victory in the American Civil War

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|1821–1904

|Vermont, U.S.

|mine-owner, capitalist, businessman, financier

|made his fortune during the California Gold Rush, as a gold miner

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|1820–1891

|Sullivan, Missouri Territory (now Missouri), U.S.

|businessperson, politician

|used slight mining knowledge from Missouri to succeed in 1850s gold rush investment

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|c. 1820–1860

|Foster, Rhode Island, U.S.

|thief, murderer, mutineer, pirate

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|1829–1913

|Duchy of Brunswick (now Germany)

|politician, industrialist, real estate investor

|leading land developer in Santa Cruz County, California

|1832–1915

|Albany, New York, U.S.

|prospector, explorer

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|1828–1914

|New York City, New York, U.S.

|politician, miner

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|1796–1852

|Rutland, Massachusetts, U.S.

|politician

|commander of the California Republic

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|1843–1915

|Kearney, Missouri, U.S.

|soldier, thief

|part of the James–Younger Gang, former Confederate soldier

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|1815–1888

|Union County, Pennsylvania, U.S.

|mountain man, hunter, chair maker, entertainer

|early settler of Humboldt County, California

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|1810–1848

|St. Croix, Danish West Indies (now United States Virgin Islands)

|Afro-Caribbean businessman, politician

|founder of the city of San Francisco, thought to have been the first black millionaire in the United States

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|<abbr>c.</abbr> 1814–<abbr>c.</abbr> 1897

|South Carolina, U.S.

|African American businessman, abolitionist

|early Black settler in San Francisco

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|1796–1876

|Stumpstown (now Fredericksburg), Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, U.S.

|businessman, piano builder

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|1822–1903

|Bilten, Canton of Glarus, Switzerland

|Swiss–born memoirist

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|1810–1885

|Hopewell Township, New Jersey, U.S.

|carpenter, sawmill operator

|discoverer of the first gold

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|1797–1850

|Lexington Plantation, Fairfax County, Virginia, U.S.

|military officer

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|1821–1861

|Grange, County Sligo, Connacht, Ireland

|Irish-born dancer and courtesan

|famous as a "Spanish" dancer, and mistress of King Ludwig I of Bavaria

|1824–1883

|Ireland

|Irish-born newspaper editor

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|1811–1862

|Rutherford County, Tennessee, U.S.

|politician

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|1837–1913

|Union County, Indiana, U.S.

|poet, frontiersman

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|1829–1853

|Álamos, Sonora, Mexico

|Mexican outlaw, gold miner, vaquero

|"Robin Hood of the West"

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|c. 1799–1882

|Pennsylvania, U.S.

|teacher, lawyer, politician, failed miner

|8th Governor of Arkansas

|John Marion Murphy

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|1824–1892

|Frampton, Quebec, Lower Canada

|rancher, miner, businessperson, politician, and an early settler in California

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|1818–1880

|Deptford, England

|English-born commodities trader and real estate investor

|also known as Emperor Norton

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|1829–1908

|Vermilion, Ohio, U.S.

|inventor, mechanical engineer

|inventor of the "Pelton Runner," considered to be the "Father of Hydroelectric Power"

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|1807–1886

|Santiago, Chile.

|miner, merchant, politician, writer, forty-eighter

|wrote an influential text about the gold rush, led later the German colonization of southern Chile

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|1801–1894

|Mission San Gabriel Arcángel, San Gabriel, Alta California, New Spain

|Californio politician, ranchero, entrepreneur

|last governor of Alta California under Mexican rule from 1845 to 1846.

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|c. 1814–1904

|U.S.

|African American entrepreneur, real estate investor, abolitionist, financier

|first self-made millionaire of African-American heritage

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|1802–1872

|Winchester, New Hampshire, U.S.

|missionary, farmer, whaler

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|1804–1877

|Santiago, Chile.

| miner, vine and watermelon farmer, painter

| introduced Chilean grapes to California

|James F. Reed

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|1800–1874

|County Armagh, Kingdom of Ireland

|miner, businessman, soldier, settler

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|1824–1882

|Yarmouth, Colony of Nova Scotia (now Nova Scotia, Canada)

|British North America-born politician

|Mayor of Sacramento, secretary of the State of California

|c. 1835–1900

|Missouri, U.S.

|African American mining engineer, metallurgist

|1823–1907

|Sullivan County, New York, U.S.

|prospector

|early pioneer of Searsville and La Honda

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|1820–1891

|Lancaster, Ohio, U.S.

|soldier, businessman, educator, author

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|1824–1893

|Watervliet, New York, U.S.

|politician, railroad tycoon

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|1817–1883

|New York, U.S.

|politician, attorney, jurist

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|1829–1902

|Buttenheim, Kingdom of Bavaria, German Confederation (now Germany)

|German Confederation-born entrepreneur

|founder of Levi Strauss & Co. of San Francisco, California

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|1833–1917

|Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, U.S.

|businessman

|built wheelbarrows in Placerville in the early 1850s and contributed his earnings to the family Studebaker Wagon Corporation

|1824–1892

|Savoy, France

|French-born gold miner and businesswoman

|known for wearing pants, and arrested several times for it.

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|1803–1880

|Kandern, Margraviate of Baden, Holy Roman Empire (now Germany)

|German-born Swiss businessman, explorer

|established Sutter's Fort

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|1810–1888

|Sussex County, New Jersey, U.S.

|miner, prospector, politician

|1829–1928

|Canton, Guangdong, Qing China

|sex worker, madam

|the first Chinese sex worker in San Francisco

|1819–1907

|Frankfort, Maine, U.S.

|businessman, abolitionist

|pioneer in the Mission District, San Francisco

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|1825–1909

|Geneva, Ohio, U.S.

|shipbuilder

|considered "the 'grandaddy' of big time wooden shipbuilding on the Pacific Coast"

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|1835–1910

|Florida, Missouri, U.S.

|writer, humorist, and essayist

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|1807–1890

|Monterey, Alta California, Viceroyalty of New Spain (now California, U.S.)

|Californio politician, military leader

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|1812–1881

|politician

|Carl David Maria Weber

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|1814–1881

|Steinwenden, Palatinate, Kingdom of Bavaria (now Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany)

|entrepreneur, miner, land owner

|founder of the city of Stockton, California

|1819–1887

|entrepreneur

|founder of Wellman, Peck and Company

|<abbr>c.</abbr> 1820–1902

|entrepreneur

|founder of the El Dorado hotel in Nevada City

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|1826–1894

|politician

List of people associated with the California Gold Rush

See also

References