This Week in History: James Marshall’s trail of bad luck
- ANTONE PIERUCCI
- Posted On
Some people just seem to have all the luck.
James Marshall wasn’t one of them. Never had been, either.
If these things can be said to have a beginning, and aren’t just deeply imbedded in a person at birth, James Marshall’s bad luck began when his father died.
James was in his early 20s, a fragile time in a young man’s life, when the decisions he makes have ramifications for his future prosperity and happiness. When other young men were starting out on their own, with a clean slate, James suddenly found himself the proud owner of a heap of debt from his dearly departed father.
With few alternatives available to him, James did what every down-on-his-luck young man did – he set out west.
“West” at that time was Ohio and the other Midwestern states. Over the next few years, James Marshall saw a little bit of all of them. For a time, his luck appeared to have changed when he built a nice homestead on a small plot of land on the Missouri River. He planted corn, built fence posts and even had a respectable little home. To complete this picture of domestic bliss, James fell in love. His paramour was aptly named – I’m not kidding you – Missouri Green.
But, Bad Fortune was not going to let her favorite victim get away that easily. In no time at all, James contracted an illness that most doctors at the time called the “fever and ague,” but that is more commonly known today as malaria.
The illness sapped him of his strength, blurred his vision and – most painful of all – robbed him of his dearest Missouri Green. She didn’t die; she just fell in love with a doctor (probably the same one treating our poor James).
Despondent at love lost and at the recommendation from a doctor that he travel to more arid climates, James headed even farther west.
In the spring of 1845, our lovelorn hero arrived in the Willamette Valley, hoping to finally rid himself of his broken heart and the damp air of the Missouri bottomlands. We don’t know if he succeeded in getting rid of the first, but the weather in Oregon made it impossible to escape the second.
So, James headed south, where he heard the weather was more amenable to those suffering from the fever and ague. After a difficult journey over the Siskiyou Mountains, James Marshall arrived at the doorstep of Sutter’s Fort in the Sacramento Valley.
By now, James probably looked like a stray dog that hadn’t eaten a proper meal his whole life. Lucky for him, he was in Mexican California – a land almost bereft of skilled labor. Beggars can’t be choosers, as the saying goes, and so the proprietor of the fort – John Sutter himself – had no choice but to welcome the new arrival as a potential source of labor.
Having recovered some of his strength from the ague, James showed his new benefactor that he was at least skilled enough to handle most ordinary tasks required of a frontier settlement. Happy with the results, John Sutter helped James arrange a mortgage to purchase two leagues of land nearby. Settling into his new homestead, James began growing a herd of cattle to augment what income he received from Sutter. And so, James’ luck looked to be turning.
Looks can be deceiving.
In no time at all, a war broke out between the land of his birth and the country of his current residence. Struck by a surprising amount of patriotism, James joined up to fight for America against Mexico and soon found himself a private in Captain Fremont’s little army.
Over the next several months, he learned the monotony of most war: lots of walking and little fighting. In March of 1847, James was discharged in San Diego, and faced a long haul to get back to his home along the Sacramento.
When he finally got back to Sutter’s Fort, he found that in his absence, someone had stolen his cattle, which were more valuable than the land he owned. Without the cattle, he wasn’t able to make his mortgage payments and – you guessed it – James Marshall lost his land.
Finding himself back at square one, he turned once more to the only source of good luck in his life: John Sutter. As it turned out, Mr. Sutter had plans to build a sawmill somewhere along the American River in hopes of capitalizing on the potential wave of settlement following California’s entrance into the United States.
James agreed to scout out a location for such a mill and, when found, to oversee the construction of it.
On Jan. 24, 1848, James Marshall’s luck looked like it had finally turned. Early that morning, while walking out of his cabin in preparation for the day’s work, a few sparkles along the riverbed caught his eye.
Curious, this man who had for so long suffered the attentions of Bad Fortune, bent down and picked up the key to his potential future prosperity – GOLD! And so started the California Gold Rush.
If some people are just born lucky, then the opposite must also be true. James Marshall is case in point. Because even being the very person to kick off the greatest rush for gold in world history wasn’t enough to shake Bad Fortune from his trail.
After his initial discovery, James joined the rest of humanity and set up a gold mining claim, hoping to strike it rich. He did not. In fact, he dumped all his worldly possessions into the scheme. The result, as you can by now imagine, was no surprise.
James Marshall died in 1885 penniless and, but for the pension the state of California had given him in recognition of his role in the Gold Rush, nearly homeless. Some people just seem to have all the luck.
Antone Pierucci is curator of history at the Riverside County Park and Open Space District and a freelance writer whose work has been featured in such magazines as Archaeology and Wild West as well as regional California newspapers.