The Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, (also Fraser Gold Rush and Fraser River Gold Rush) began in 1858 after

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

was discovered on the

Thompson River The Thompson River is the largest tributary of the Fraser River, flowing through the south-central portion of British Columbia, Canada. The Thompson River has two main branches, the South Thompson River and the North Thompson River. The river ...

British Columbia British Columbia is the westernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Situated in the Pacific Northwest between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains, the province has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that ...

at its confluence with the Nicoamen River a few miles upstream from the Thompson's confluence with the

Fraser River The Fraser River () is the longest river within British Columbia, Canada, rising at Fraser Pass near Blackrock Mountain (Canada), Blackrock Mountain in the Rocky Mountains and flowing for , into the Strait of Georgia just south of the City of V ...

at present-day Lytton. The rush overtook the region around the discovery and was centred on the

Fraser Canyon The Fraser Canyon is a major landform of the Fraser River where it descends rapidly through narrow rock gorges in the Coast Mountains en route from the Interior Plateau of British Columbia to the Fraser Valley. Colloquially, the term "Fraser Ca ...

from around

Hope Hope is an optimistic state of mind that is based on an expectation of positive outcomes with respect to events and circumstances in one's own life, or the world at large. As a verb, Merriam-Webster defines ''hope'' as "to expect with confid ...

and

Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...

Pavilion In architecture, ''pavilion'' has several meanings; * It may be a subsidiary building that is either positioned separately or as an attachment to a main building. Often it is associated with pleasure. In palaces and traditional mansions of Asia ...

and

Fountain A fountain, from the Latin "fons" ( genitive "fontis"), meaning source or spring, is a decorative reservoir used for discharging water. It is also a structure that jets water into the air for a decorative or dramatic effect. Fountains were o ...

, just north of

Lillooet Lillooet () is a district municipality in the Squamish-Lillooet region of southwestern British Columbia. The town is on the west shore of the Fraser River immediately north of the Seton River mouth. On BC Highway 99, the locality is by road abo ...

. Though the rush was largely over by 1927, miners from the rush spread out and found a sequence of other gold fields throughout the British Columbia Interior and North, most famously that in the

Cariboo The Cariboo is an intermontane region of British Columbia, Canada, centered on a plateau stretching from Fraser Canyon to the Cariboo Mountains. The name is a reference to the Caribou (North America), caribou that were once abundant in the reg ...

. The rush is credited with instigating European-Canadian settlement on the mainland of British Columbia. It was the catalyst for the founding of the

Colony of British Columbia The Colony of British Columbia refers to one of two colonies of British North America, located on the Pacific coast of modern-day Canada: * Colony of British Columbia (1858–1866) * Colony of British Columbia (1866–1871) See also * History of ...

, the building of early road infrastructure, and the founding of many towns.

Gold rush

Although the area had been mined for a few years, news of the strike spread to

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

when the governor of the

Colony of Vancouver Island The Colony of Vancouver Island, officially known as the Island of Vancouver and its Dependencies, was a Crown colony of British North America from 1849 to 1866, after which it was united with the mainland to form the Colony of British Columbia. ...

, James Douglas, sent a shipment of ore to that city's mint. People in San Francisco and the California gold fields greeted the news with excitement. Within a month 30,000 men had descended upon Victoria. 4,000 of these

Gold Rush A gold rush or gold fever is a discovery of gold—sometimes accompanied by other precious metals and rare-earth minerals—that brings an onrush of miners seeking their fortune. Major gold rushes took place in the 19th century in Australia, ...

pioneers settlers were Chinese. Until that time, the village had had a population of only about 500. This was a record for mass movement of mining populations on the North American frontier, even though more men in total were involved in the gold rushes of California and Colorado. By the fall, however, tens of thousands of men who had failed to stake claims or were unable to because of the summer's high water on the river, pronounced the Fraser to be "humbug." Many returned to San Francisco, but a continuing influx of newcomers replaced the disenchanted, with even more men storming the route of the

Douglas Road The Douglas Road, a.k.a. the Lillooet Trail, Harrison Trail or Lakes Route, was a goldrush-era transportation route from the British Columbia Coast to the Interior Plateau, Interior (NB another route known as the Lillooet Trail was the Lillooet Cat ...

to the upper part of

around

; others got to the upper canyon via the

Okanagan Trail The Okanagan Trail was an inland route to the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush from the Lower Columbia region of the Washington and Oregon Territories in 1858–1859. The route was essentially the same as that used by the Hudson's Bay Company fur brig ...

and

Similkameen Trail Similkameen may refer to: * Similkameen, a former community in British Columbia, Canada * Similkameen City, British Columbia, a former community in British Columbia, Canada * Similkameen Country or Similkameen District, or "the Similkameen", a ...

, and to the lower Canyon via the

Whatcom Trail The Whatcom Trail was an overland trail from the Puget Sound area of Washington Territory during the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush of 1858. The trail began on Bellingham Bay, at Fairhaven (now a Bellingham neighbourhood), the route used went via a ...

and the Skagit Trail. All these routes were technically illegal since the Governor required that entry to the colony to be made via Victoria, but thousands came overland anyway. Accurate numbers of miners, especially on the upper Fraser, are therefore difficult to reckon. During the gold rush tens of thousands of prospectors from

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

flooded into the newly declared

and disrupted the established balance between the

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), originally the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading Into Hudson’s Bay, is a Canadian holding company of department stores, and the oldest corporation in North America. It was the owner of the ...

fur trade The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal ecosystem, boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals h ...

rs and

indigenous peoples There is no generally accepted definition of Indigenous peoples, although in the 21st century the focus has been on self-identification, cultural difference from other groups in a state, a special relationship with their traditional territ ...

. The influx of prospectors included numerous European Americans and African Americans,

Britons British people or Britons, also known colloquially as Brits, are the citizens of the United Kingdom, the British Overseas Territories, and the Crown dependencies.: British nationality law governs modern British citizenship and nationality, w ...

Germans Germans (, ) are the natives or inhabitants of Germany, or sometimes more broadly any people who are of German descent or native speakers of the German language. The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany, constitution of Germany, imple ...

English Canadians English Canadians (), or Anglo-Canadians (), refers to either Canadians of English people, English ethnic origin and heritage or to English-speaking or Anglophone Canadians of any ethnic origin; it is used primarily in contrast with French C ...

, Maritimers,

French Canadians French Canadians, referred to as Canadiens mainly before the nineteenth century, are an ethnic group descended from French colonists first arriving in France's colony of Canada in 1608. The vast majority of French Canadians live in the provi ...

Scandinavia Scandinavia is a subregion#Europe, subregion of northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. It can sometimes also ...

ns,

Italians Italians (, ) are a European peoples, European ethnic group native to the Italian geographical region. Italians share a common Italian culture, culture, History of Italy, history, Cultural heritage, ancestry and Italian language, language. ...

Belgians Belgians ( ; ; ) are people identified with the Kingdom of Belgium, a federal state in Western Europe. As Belgium is a multinational state, this connection may be residential, legal, historical, or cultural rather than ethnic. The majority ...

and French, and other European ethnicities,

Hawaiians Native Hawaiians (also known as Indigenous Hawaiians, Kānaka Maoli, Aboriginal Hawaiians, or simply Hawaiians; , , , and ) are the Indigenous Polynesian people of the Hawaiian Islands. Hawaiʻi was settled at least 800 years ago by Polynesians ...

, Chinese,

Mexicans Mexicans () are the citizens and nationals of the Mexico, United Mexican States. The Mexican people have varied origins with the most spoken language being Spanish language, Spanish, but many also speak languages from 68 different Languages o ...

, West Indians, and others. Many of those first-arrived of European and

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

origin were

n by culture, and this included Maritimers such as Amor De Cosmos and others. The numbers of "Americans" associated with the gold rush must be understood to be inherently European-ethnic to start with. Anglo-American Southerners (from states such as Missouri and Kentucky), Midwesterners, and New Englanders were well represented. Alfred Waddington, an entrepreneur and pamphleteer of the gold rush later infamous for the disastrous road-building expedition which led to the Chilcotin War of 1864, estimated there were 10,500 miners on the Fraser at the peak of the gold rush. This estimate was based on the

area and did not include the non-mining "hangers-on" population. (The Fraser River Gold Rush started in 1858)

Richard Clement Moody and the Birth of British Columbia

When news of the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush reached London,

Richard Clement Moody Major-General Richard Clement Moody (13 February 1813 – 31 March 1887) was a British Governor and Commander of the Royal Engineers. He was the founder and the first Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia; and was Commanding Executive ...

was hand-picked by the

Colonial Office The Colonial Office was a government department of the Kingdom of Great Britain and later of the United Kingdom, first created in 1768 from the Southern Department to deal with colonial affairs in North America (particularly the Thirteen Colo ...

, under Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton, to establish British order and to transform British Columbia into the British Empire's "bulwark in the farthest west" and "found a second England on the shores of the Pacific." Barman, Jean. ''The West Beyond the West: A History of British Columbia''. Toronto: University of Toronto. p. 71. Moody arrived in

in December 1858, commanding the Royal Engineers, Columbia Detachment. Moody had hoped to begin immediately the foundation of a capital city, but upon his arrival at Fort Langley he learned of an outbreak of violence at the settlement of Hill's Bar. This led to an incident popularly known as " Ned McGowan's War", where Moody successfully quashed a group of rebellious American miners. Governor Douglas placed restrictions on immigration to the new

British colony A Crown colony or royal colony was a colony governed by England, and then Great Britain or the United Kingdom within the English and later British Empire. There was usually a governor to represent the Crown, appointed by the British monarch on ...

, including the proviso that entry to the territory must be made via Victoria and not overland, but thousands of men still arrived via the

Okanagan The Okanagan ( ), also called the Okanagan Valley and sometimes the Okanagan Country, is a region in the Canadian province of British Columbia defined by the basin of Okanagan Lake and the Canadian portion of the Okanagan River. It is part of ...

and

s. Douglas also sought to limit the importation of weapons, one of the reasons for the Victoria-disembarkation requirement, but his lack of resources for oversight meant that overland routes to the goldfields could not be controlled.

Related conflicts

During the fall of 1858, tensions increased between miners and the

Nlaka'pamux The Nlakaʼpamux or Nlakapamuk ( ; ), also previously known as the ''Thompson'', '' Thompson River Salish'', ''Thompson Salish'', ''Thompson River Indians'' or ''Thompson River people'', and historically as the ''Klackarpun'', ''Haukamaugh'', ''K ...

, the

First Nations First nations are indigenous settlers or bands. First Nations, first nations, or first peoples may also refer to: Indigenous groups *List of Indigenous peoples *First Nations in Canada, Indigenous peoples of Canada who are neither Inuit nor Mé ...

people of the Canyon. This led to the

Fraser Canyon War The Fraser Canyon War, also known as the Canyon War or the Fraser River War, was an incident between white miners and the indigenous Nlaka'pamux people in the newly declared Colony of British Columbia, which later became part of Canada, in 1858 ...

. Miners wary of venturing upriver beyond Yale began to use the

Lakes Route The Douglas Road, a.k.a. the Lillooet Trail, Harrison Trail or Lakes Route, was a goldrush-era transportation route from the British Columbia Coast to the Interior Plateau, Interior (NB another route known as the Lillooet Trail was the Lillooet Cat ...

to Lillooet instead, prompting Douglas to contract for the building of the

, the Mainland Colony's first public works project. The governor arrived in Yale to accept the apologies of the Americans who had waged war on the natives. Wanting to make the British military and governmental presence more visible, Douglas appointed justices of the peace and also revised the slapdash mining rules which had emerged along the river. Troops to maintain order, however, were still in short supply. Competition and interracial tensions between European Americans and non-white miners erupted on

Christmas Eve Christmas Eve is the evening or entire day before Christmas, the festival commemorating nativity of Jesus, the birth of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus. Christmas Day is observance of Christmas by country, observed around the world, and Christma ...

1858, with the beating of Isaac Dixon, a freed American black. He was the town barber and in later years was a popular journalist in the

. Dixon was beaten by two men from Hill's Bar, the other main town in the southern part of the goldfields. The complicated series of events that ensued is known as McGowan's War. Its potential to provoke United States annexation ambitions within the goldfields, prompted the governor to send newly appointed Chief Justice Begbie, the colony's chief of police Chartres Brew and a contingent of

Royal Engineers The Corps of Royal Engineers, usually called the Royal Engineers (RE), and commonly known as the ''Sappers'', is the engineering arm of the British Army. It provides military engineering and other technical support to the British Armed Forces ...

and

Royal Marines The Royal Marines provide the United Kingdom's amphibious warfare, amphibious special operations capable commando force, one of the :Fighting Arms of the Royal Navy, five fighting arms of the Royal Navy, a Company (military unit), company str ...

to intervene. They did not need to use force and were able to resolve the matter peacefully. The team also dealt with the corruption of British appointees in the area, which had contributed to the crisis.

Aftermath

The

did not affect the upper reaches of the goldfields, in the area of Lillooet, and the short-lived popularity of the Douglas Road caused the town to be designated "the largest town north of San Francisco and west of

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

", with an estimated population of 16,000. This title was also briefly held by Port Douglas, Yale, and later on by Barkerville. By 1860, however, the gold-bearing sandbars of the Fraser were depleted. Many of the miners had either drifted back to the U.S. or dispersed further into the British Columbia wilderness in search of unstaked riches. Other gold rushes proliferated around the colony, with notable gold rushes at Rock Creek, the Similkameen, Wild Horse Creek and the Big Bend of the Columbia River spinning immediately off the Fraser rush, and gold exploration soon after led to the

Omineca Gold Rush The Omineca Gold Rush was a gold rush in British Columbia, Canada, in the Omineca Country, Omineca region of the Northern Interior of the province. Gold was first discovered there in 1861, but the rush did not begin until late in 1869 with the disc ...

and the

Stikine Gold Rush The Stikine Gold Rush was a minor but important gold rush in the Stikine Country of northwestern British Columbia, Canada. The rush's discoverer was Alexander "Buck" Choquette, who staked a claim at Choquette Bar in 1861, just downstream from the ...

, which led to the creation of the

Stikine Territory The Stickeen Territories , also colloquially rendered as Stickeen Territory, Stikine Territory, and Stikeen Territory, was a territory of British North America whose brief existence began July 19, 1862, and concluded July of the following year. Th ...

to the colony's north. The Fort Colville

Washington Territory The Washington Territory was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from March 2, 1853, until November 11, 1889, when the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Washington. It was created from the ...

was also a spin-off of the Fraser Gold Rush, as many miners from the Fraser headed there once news of the strike in US territory reached the mining camps. Many others moved on to a gold rush in Colorado.

References

* ''McGowan's War'', Donald J. Hauka, New Star Books, Vancouver (2000) * ''British Columbia Chronicle,: Gold & Colonists'', Helen and G.P.V. Akrigg, Discovery Press, Vancouver (1977) * ''Claiming the Land: Indians, Goldseekers and the Rush to British Columbia'', Dan Marshall, University of British Columbia, Ph.D. Thesis, 2002 (unpublished)

Gold rush

Richard Clement Moody and the Birth of British Columbia

Related conflicts

Aftermath

See also

References

Further reading