gold rush and abandoned ships

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 07 May 10 - 07:08 PM

tHERE IS A great song I heard recently called the Burning of the Bruce I believe..oystermen took oysters to San Francisco and brought back gold. There was some sort of personel problem and an angry crew member burned the boat as I recall. I think Willapa Hills sings it. mg

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: Joe Offer
Date: 07 May 10 - 05:16 PM

Well, I have to say that one of the strangest tributes to the California Gold Rush is the rockabilly work of Jimmi Acardi, who lives in Penn Valley, an area that was a center for miners in the Days of 49.

Jimmi has at least two rockabilly albums of Gold Rush songs, "Songs of the Gold Rush" (2000) and "On the Gold rush Trail" (2007).

He doesn't live far from me, but I've never met him. His interpretation of music and mine are on two different planets. But hey, I wish him well.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: Joe Offer
Date: 28 Jun 07 - 03:55 PM

This Google Image Search will bring up some interesting pictures. The page I liked best was http://www.sfgenealogy.com/sf/history/hgshp1.htm.
There are a number of sunken ships in the waters off Old Sacramento, but the water is murky and the Sacramento River current is treacherous, and the wrecks are buried in mud - so it isn't a good site for divers to explore.

Here on the American River in the foothills, there were gold dredgers that sifted the river bottom and banks, leaving endless piles of lifeless rock along the river and silt and dangerous heavy metals downstream.

A couple of weeks ago, Debby McClatchy took me hiking in the diggins that surround her home town of Dutch Flat, California. High-pressure water blasted mountains away, to get down to the bottom of an ancient river, the Blue Lead that was believed to be full of gold.

All this was an interesting history, but it caused an unbelievable amount of ecological damage that still hasn't healed after over a hundred years. Still, this is a wonderful place to live. If you fly over my house, all you'll see is trees - as long as they don't catch fire, this is wonderful.


-Joe-

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: JennieG
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 08:01 PM

I have read that the same thing happened in Melbourne in the 1850s - the gold discoveries were only 120kms away, a relatively easy journey. Apparently Hobsons Bay was choked with ships whose crews had deserted and headed off the the goldfields, and as no other crews could be found the ships just sat there. But I don't know if any of them ended up as the San Francisco ships you describe did. Perhaps some of the Victorians on the list may be more familiar with their state's history than I am?

Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: Megan L
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 05:44 PM

This has been interesting thank you for brining the subject to my attention.

meg

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: GUEST,Dave M
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 05:09 PM

Thank you to all contributors

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: EBarnacle
Date: 27 Jun 07 - 02:09 PM

Frequently, the issue was simply that the ships could not be crewed. In these cases, the crew would desert to seek their fortunes in the gold fields. When you cannot operate the ship, what do you do with it?

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: yrlancslad
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 09:14 PM

The most famous of the beached ships was the Niantic, pieces of which are still preserved at the S.F. Maritime Museum. Another such ship was the Arkansas beached next the PacificStreet wharf near the corner of what would be Battery Street. She became the Old Ship Saloon, the bar tended by one James Laflin who had come around the Horn in her on her last voyage.The U.S. Hotel was built over the ship but when she was sold for scrap in 1857 the Old Ship continued in another building and is still operating today.
Laflin became a boatman,runner, crimp (shangaier) and shipping master (who acted as middleman between shangaiers and ships captains needing crews) as well as owning other saloons and sailors boarding houses which were ideal places to shangai sailors from. In the latter half of his life he specialized in crews for whalers and died in 1905, 73 years old.
Good books on this subject include Herbert Asbury, The Barbary Coast and Bill Pickelhaupt, Shangaied in San Francisco. Hugills' book, Sailor Town is worth a read too though he relies heavily on the Asbury book.

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: Susan of DT
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 07:50 PM

Beth-El house of God in Hebrew. Several sailor's chapels are referred to as Bethels.

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: MartinRyan
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 07:47 PM

The story is HERE

Regards

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: MartinRyan
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 07:45 PM

Hugill's description is in his "Sailortown" book - which I'm reading at the moment. Apparently, another interesting end-use of abandoned ships was as a "bethel" - a temporary church or mission hall. I'd never heard the word before.

He specifically mentions the "Niantic Hotel" as an example.

Regards

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 04:23 PM

Here is a website to check out - I Googled Herbert Asbury's book on the Barbary Coast and came up with this:

San Francisco History - The Barbary Coast, ContentsText of Herbert Asbury's 1933 informal history of the San Francisco underworld.
www.sfgenealogy.com/sf/history/hbtbcidx.htm

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 04:15 PM

Being a native of San Francisco, I did a lot of historical reading on the gold rush era and the ensuing years. I don't know how this might relate to music, but the ship to which you refer was probably the Niantic. Abandoned where it was anchored, it was later used as a hotel. Many others simply rotted away in place. Much of today's Montgomery Street financial district is sitting on landfill which covers the old "graveyard of ships."

Incidentally, the term "Shanghaiing," meaning the abduction of men (sailors or not)who were then impressed into involuntary service on ships bound for the orient, was said to have originated in the infamous "Barbary Coast" saloons, cribs and hotels. The "Mickey Finn" was the name appended to the sleep-inducing concoction slipped into drinks, which then allowed the unconscious victim to be spirited away onto a waiting ship.

San Francisco was a wild and wooley place. A great old book, "The Barbary Coast," by Herbert Asbury, gives a great overview of this time and this singular "Sodom and Gomorrah" of the west coast.

Subject: RE: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 04:10 PM

This is mentioned on several websites. One of the best was http://www.nps.gov/jeff/historyculture/upload/gpld_rush1.pdf, but it is blocking my computer. I will have to close as a result, but I will be back with others.

Some of the ships were hardly fit to sail, and abandonment was by the owners.

Subject: gold rush and abandoned ships
From: GUEST,Dave M
Date: 26 Jun 07 - 03:49 PM

I seem to remember a story told by Stan Hugil about sailors beaching their boats and heading off to the gold rush. Apparently these boats became hotels and brothels etc. Apparently one of the main hotels in Frisco is called after one of these boats which became a hotel.. More information please.