The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1889-04-24
THE RUSH FOR GOLD.
A WILD RACE FOR CALIFORNIA
IN FORTY-NINE.
The Adventurous From All Parts Of
the World Participated in the
Scramble - High Prices
Queer Use for Tobacco.

Old Forty-niners laugh at the attempt
to compare high prices at the Lower
California placer mines with those which
prevailed in the first flush of gold dis
covery in the Caloma mill-race, and they
are right, for there is no parallel between
the cases. The California gold discovery
of forty years ago was literally q world
disturbing event. 1t occurred at time
when no great wars or enterprises OF any
kind serving as outlets to surplus energy
were in progress, and the announcement
stirred up the adventurous in every part
of the globe. 1t acted with equally
electric effect upon the spirit of COM
merce. A race began for San Francisco.
Hundreds of vessels were put on the route
with every imaginable kind of cargo.
Immense losses were incurred by mer-
chants and shippers, first, because they
had to guess at the market and often dis
patched unstable goods; secondly, be-
cause the arrival of all ships at Yerba
Buena was the signal for indiscriminate
and hclter-skelter desertions. Often
every soul on board, from the loblolly-
boy to the Captain, set off for the mines.
1t was scarcely possible to find ship
keepers, no matter what wages were
offered Ten dollars day was refused
for stcvcdoring, ,and 'longshorcmen would
hardly accept the cargo for the labor
of unloading it. Ten dollars for an hours
work was frequently demanded in those
times, and as promptly paid.
Scores Of ships rotted at their anchors.
Some broke adrift, went ashore, and
being left where they stranded, were in
time buried under the constantly grow
ing city. Some which lay at wharyes
were served in the same way. They
were not always completely unloaded.
Several years ago, for example, while
some street repairs were being made in
the "made ground" the lower part of
San Fancisco) the hull of one of these
buried vessels was uncovered, and in it
were found several cases of champagne
which had been lying there since '49 or
so. It is curious fact that even when
prices generally were highest liquors and
wines remained comparatively cheap.
The books kept at Suffers Fort show
that in '49, when pair of gum boots
cost SIS, a pound of tallow candles 81. so,
box of German matches 81, nails 81 a
pound, pickles from So to S. bottle,
and so on in like proportion, there was
plenty of champagne to be had at S25 the
basket. The explanation of this is that
all the shippers naturally dispatched
wines and liquors as miners staples sure
of q market. The result was to glut the
market with "wet goods" But many
other things which were needed at the
mines never got there because of the lack
Of transportation, and the famine in the San
Francisco labor market caused the loss OF
incalculable quantities of valuable mer-
chandise. At one time the greater part
of cargo of plug tobacco was used to
mend the streets, hundreds of boxes
being dumped into mud-holes and en-
ployed to build crossings with.
The waste in these ways must have
been enormous from first to last, but
nobody has ever so much as tried to COM
pute it, and any such attempt would be
idle in the circumstances. In that
mighty convulsion for it was nothing
less) men never stopped to estimate losses
of any kind. The four great fires of San
Francisco swept away scores OF millions,
but the heaviest losers knew that recovery
was only question of pluck and persist
ence, and they did not wait for the EN-.
bers to cool before they began to build
again. All that this country could
furnish of energy, grit, enterprise and
staying qualities gathered in California
then, and presently all the world sent OF
its best and its worst to the great new
Tom Tiddler's ground. Nothing is i'm
possible, and so it will not do to say that
such scenes will ever be seen again; but
at least it is improbable that the over
whclming excitement, the fierce fever Of
that time, will rccur.-NeW York. Tribune.