Letter from Blanshard to Earl Grey

Letter from Blanshard to Earl Grey

British Columbia
Gold Rush
Anglo-American Competition
Gold
Commerce
Business

This letter from Richard Blanshard to Earl Grey discusses the lack of any new discoveries of gold or coal, and the competition that could soon arise from Oregon. Within the letter, Blanshard states that despite no coal has been discovered, the miners are still searching. He also mentions that he has heard news of rich gold mines on the Spokane River in Washington, and is concerned this will lead to the haemorrhaging of miners from British Columbia. This area of land was not only contested by settlers and natives, but also nation states themselves. Only 4 years prior to the writing of this letter, Britain and the U.S signed the Oregon treaty, creating a border between the two states along the 49th Parallel. The gold rush not only created competition between people from around the world, but also between nation states themselves too, particularly the US and Britain.

Richard Blanshard

Colonial Despatches, Despatch to London: Blanshard to Earl Grey. 7378, CO 305/2, p.57.

http://bcgenesis.uvic.ca/getDoc.htm?id=V50003.scx&search=gold#searchHit1

15 June 1850

Roberto Catarinicchia

The National Archives, London

English

Textual - handwritten letter

19th century British Columbia