SAN FRANCISCO IMPORTS DURING THE GOLD RUSH

A group of 13 Gold Rush-era shipping documents recording the import of international goods to the port of San Francisco between 1849 and 1857. The news of gold at Sutter’s Mill in 1847 lured more than 300,000 people from the rest of the United States and abroad to San Francisco, which then had a population of just 459 residents. These new emigrants brought only small amounts of goods with them, and there was little farming in California to support the '49ers. Most American merchants who sold provisions and amenities during the California Gold Rush dealt in imported goods such as dried fish and beef jerky, canvas and clothing, tools, lumber, candles, coffee and livestock from points abroad. One invoice, dated May 3, 1850, is for 100 tons of coal shipped from Duffryn Steam Coal in Liverpool to G.W. Aspinwall, a prominent businessman and co-founder of both the Pacific Mail Steamship Company and Panama Canal Railway companies, which revolutionized the migration of goods and people to the West Coast. Another four-page handwritten invoice in this group, dated September 15, 1849, lists sundries shipped on the Steamer Clyde from Jamaica to the merchants Jewett and Melhado in San Francisco. It includes cases of jams, jellies, pickles, Brandy, seasoning salt, and more. In addition to supplying miners, Jewett and Melhado provided monthly reports in the Alta California newspaper on the price and flow of goods in Northern California. Other receipts record everything from the import of cigars to bales of twine and canvas cloth.…