Bc, the Gold Rush, and the Natives SS10

The Gold Rush Begins Before 1858, British Columbia’s population white population was tiny; only about 800 living on Vancouver Island and just around 100 living on the mainland But around then, gold was discovered in the banks of the Thompson River, a branch of the Fraser River This news reached California, where many American prospectors decided to move north to try and become rich Over the next year, the mainland population of British Columbia skyrocketed by over 10,000, mostly consisting of Americans trying to find gold on the Fraser River

Fantasy Versus Reality The gold rush was based on the fantasy that anyone could get rich quick People believed that you could simply walk along rivers and find huge gold nuggets just lying in wait on the riverbanks In reality, the process was much more difficult; a prospector had to stake a claim along a river, dig a mineshaft through thick bedrock to potentially reach gold Many miners died on their journeys, most never returned to their homes, and the vast majority of them did not become wealthy Most prospectors ended up working as labourers and miners for people who staked the first claims

Boom and Bust To serve the rapidly increasing population of British Columbia, many new boomtowns would be formed near mining areas The most famous of these was Barkerville in central British Columbia, founded by named after a prospector who had struck gold in the area It was initially just a small town with a few cabins and tents, but soon had a population of about 5000 For a time, it was a largest city north of San Francisco and west of Chicago However, as soon as the gold rush began to fade, its population quickly fell, and it was a ghost town by the 1900s These kinds of cities that quickly faded away were common in gold rush regions

The Mainland Joins the EMpire Because many miners ended up staying in British Columbia, the area now had a large American population James Douglas, governor of Vancouver Island, was worried that this could lead to America annexing the region He reached out to the British, who responded by turning the region into the Colony of British Columbia, an official crown colony They also sent soldiers under the command of Richard Moody to help build roads and survey the region

The Natives of British Columbia Before to the gold rush, BC’s first nations were the largest group of people in the region They often held an advantageous position; they would trade with prospectors and acted as guides for people travelling to the goldfields But in the 1860s, BC built a road from Barkerville to Yale to make sure that gold would leave the region by the Fraser River This removed the need for natives to act as guides for people travelling north to mines Furthermore, many American and European miners would disturb their salmon weirs, disrupting the salmon harvest for natives

A modern Salmon Weir

Death Comes to Call In 1862, a smallpox epidemic struck Victoria. While everyone was affected, it was worst for BC’s First Nations Why do you think a disease like smallpox would be especially harsh for First Nations? Because they had not been exposed to it before, smallpox was almost always fatal for BC’s natives In response, authorities destroyed the homes of Natives living near Victoria and forced them to leave the area They then would travel further north, infecting other Native peoples, causing entire villages to die away Vancouver Island had an estimated population of about 60,000 natives prior to the outbreak, and over half of them died

The Epidemic The epidemic was made even worse by European traders, who would steal blankets and other goods from dead Natives and sell these to other Native communities This caused smallpox to spread to BC’s mainland, where it continued to affect the natives living there This caused even more deaths; even more Natives died of the disease on the mainland than on Vancouver Island This drove some natives to rebellion; in 1864, a group of Chilcotin smallpox survivors attacked railway workers, killing fourteen of them Five Chilcotin were arrested and executed for their role in the attack