Gold nugget

Gold nugget

Gold Rush
Mining
California

An unworked nugget of gold, .09g. This is reputed to be the piece of gold that launched the gold rush in California. It was found on 24 January 1848 by James Marshall while supervising the construction of a sawmill for Col. John Sutter on the South Fork of the American River at Coloma. Folsom, a representative of the US army, travelled to California –which was not yet a US state – to verify the gold claim for the US government. The nugget subsequently was conveyed overland to Washington for delivery in August 1848 to President Polk and for preservation at the National Institute. Within weeks the President declared that gold had been found in California. In 1861 the nugget - and its accompanying letter written by Folsom – entered the collection of the Smithsonian Institute.

Found by James Marshall, Sutter’s Mill, Coloma, California.

Smithsonian, National Museum of American History

http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_741894

1848

Margaret Minchin

Smithsonian, National Museum of American History
catalogue number: 135(1861).01

N/A

Material object

19th century California