The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1935-03-15
Suffers FORT NEW HELvETlA.
By ELMO SCOTT WATSON


@HE recent gold decision" of the Su-
!: !. !: !. !: !. !. !.
l@AII preme Court of the United States,
III awaited so long and SO anxiously
Ii by the whole world, has added an
II III other chapter to the history Of
Ii money, and especially to that
III much-discussed and frequently per-
III picking angle of it, commonly
I'LL known as the gold standard" 1t
is a far cry from the event which
took place in Washington the other day to an
event which took place in little European vii
lage one February night 132 years agO-a far
cry indeed, from the stately hall where sit the
black-robed justices of a nations highest trib-
uEal to small room in the cottage of Swiss
paper-maker. Yet there is a distinct connec-
ton between the two.
Just before midnight on February g, 1903, a
son was born to Johann Jakob Suter and his
wife, Christine Wilhelmine Stoberin Suffer- but
if, the next morning, anyone had told the SIM
pie burghers of Kandern in the Grand Duchy
Of Baden that this little boys career would
change the destiny of a nation across the
Atlantic and vitality affect the economic history
of the whole world, they would have stared at
such prophet with unbeieying eyes. But he
would have spoken the truth. For the world.
half a century later, was to know this little
boy, whom his parents named Johann Angus
tus Suter, as Gen. John Sutter-Sutter of Cal
ifornia. the man whose name has become al
most synonymous with the name Of a yellow
metal so highly priced by mankind-gold!
The story of John Suffer has been told many
times, but perhaps never more completely and
more Interestingly than in a new biography is
sued recently by the Press of the Pioneers, Inc.
o. New York. II is "Sutter of California by
Julian Dana and in IL Is recorded young SUIT
.er's career a cadet in a military academy
at Neufchatel, his apprenticeship "a book
nubliShpr'S ShO1, in RaSlp his oarly mi
to Anna Dubelt, his struggles to support his
wife and four children on the meager pay of
a captain of artillery in the Swiss Guards.
The result was his decision to seek his for
tune in the New world and 100 years ago this
spring the Odyssey of John Suffer Che had
changed his name upon his arrival here) in
America began. First trader the Santa
Fe Trail he went to the Oregon country in
1888, made trip to the Sandwich islands and
To Alaska and finally July 1, 1885, arrived
in San Francisco, then called Yerba Buena by
the MeXicans, and started on the career in the
country which to make his name forever
famous.
AT that time most of the settlements in Cali
forna along the coast but Suffer pro-
posed TO go inland and colombo Obtaining a
land grant from the Mexican officials he set out
TO select a site for his proposed colony. In
August he arrived at a point where the Amer
lean river joins the Sacramento. the site Of the
present capital of California. There he estab-
lished his colony to which he gave the name
of New Helvetia, after his homeland of Swtzer-
land, and erected the fort which was to be the
focal point in the empire he was to build.
The story of that empire is familiar one
how he won the friendship of the Indians by
using just the right mixture of kindness and
frmness; how they formed part of the hun
dreds of retainers who titled the fields and
tended the herds and focks of this feudal lord
IN the American wilderness; how he extended
his holdings of land until he ruled over nearly
100000 acres; and how he became the most
important figure in all that region, both under
the Mexican rulers and later when California
passed from their hands into the possession of
the United States.
To Suffers Fort came many a notable traveller
Col. John G. Fremont, Kit Carson Gen Steph-
en- Kearney. young lieutenant named William
Tecumseh Sherman and another named W. ].
Revere, the latter a grandson of Paul Revere
who inherited some of his ancestors talent for
drawing and who made the sketch of the fort
which is reproduced above From Suffers Fort
went out the rescue party which saved the rem
nants of the Inflated Bonner party marooned
in the snowy Sierras in 1s47 and many another
stirring chapter in California history was en-
acted in and around the capital of New Hell
vetia.
Many of these are recorded in the extracts
from Suffers diary with which Mr. Dana en-
beIlishes his biography. John Suffer could not
have realized what history he recording
when he took his pen in hand one day to write
this:
August 27th 1S47 host of Mormons here
&c buy provisions and have blacksmith work
done. Made a contract with James Wilson
Marshall for a sawmin to be erected on the
American Fork
Even more fateful is the entry for the fol-
lowing day:
August 18th. Horses shod Of many more
Mormons. Employed nearly all them TO work
here since they seem to be uniformly honest
honorable and Woodworking. James Wilson
Marshall and Peter WINNER departed early for
the Mts. TO determine a proper sawmill
ste.
When Suffer wrote that, he was writing the
doom of New Helvetia. For the proper saw
mill site" which Marshall and WINNER select
ed happened to De where some golden flakes lay
near the surface of the ground and it was
Mormon. with booming voice. shouting the
news of the discovery in San Francisco, who