What is now Northern Georgia remained largely unsettled by White Americans in the early nineteenth century. It was mostly Cherokee land. And even though they still felt it was their future destiny to have it, Georgians didn’t focus heavily on obtaining it yet. But one faithful day, when someone happened to stumble upon a small shiny rock, it became the place to be. It also gave the state a reason to remove the Cherokee. This shiny rock was gold. Its discovery and the ensuing rush, which started around 1828, molded the future of Northern Georgia and changed society in the mountains.
The Cherokee lived a simple life in the mountains. Most were hunters and farmers. They lived in small villages and had log homes. The lower classes wore the traditional clothing like buckskin shirts and trousers. They had the traditional moccasins and many men wore a type of turban made of calico on their heads. The higher classes like those who would later be involved in the new government wore the clothing of their white neighbors. Their capital was New Echota. It had six buildings at its center with a few more in the surrounding area. It had a mission station and a post office. Most of the year it was a small crossroads, but at important times of the year had around 300 people living in it.1
Where as many Native Americans tried to fight the change, the Cherokee began to try to adapt to European life styles. In 1817 they started molding their government to be more like the United States’ structure. They had a council made up of four representatives from the eight new districts of the Cherokee Nation. They also created a higher house, the National Committee, made of members elected from the council. There were district judges and circuit judges, which traveled between two of the districts. The Principal Chief was the chief executive along with the Assistant Principal Chief under him, much like the President and Vice President. In 1827 they created the Supreme Court of the Cherokee Nation. This new court began to change existing Cherokee law such as outlawing polygamy as well as prohibiting the retribution for a a murder of a family member. It was their custom to kill a member of a murderer’s family in retaliation of a murder. 2
Many claimed to be the first to find gold in the North Georgia Mountains, but most of those stories were hoaxes. One of the most widely accepted, the story of Benjamin Parks, has a lot of parts that don’t fit historically. Parks claimed that in 1827 he found gold on his preacher, Robert O’Barr’s, land. He bought the land from O’Barr, who originally did not believe him. Later O’Barr tried to get the land back, but Parks would not sell it back. He then was reported to have sold the land to John C. Calhoun a few years later. The dates he gives don’t match up with when O’Barr started preaching in the area. Parks also describes a gold rush immediately after he found the gold, but it did not really begin for another year or two. 3
The gold brought entrepreneurs of all kinds of folk with one goal. There were whites, Native Americans, and free blacks of all ages. People from all professions came including a few preachers. The most popular spot was on the Yahoola Creek near present day Dahlonoga. Many heard reports of miners finding thirty dollars worth a day, but in actuality it was more like five dollars a day. Besides the actual diggers there were sawers, peddlers, shop keepers, gamblers and, not surprisingly thieves. Shantytowns sprang up near camps. Often these towns had a reputation for being hives of crime and rowdiness, which was not far from the truth. The gold fever caused people to act in ways they would not normally act, putting the pursuit of wealth above all else. Not only were they using Cherokee land, but also many would often pillage Cherokee villages. The Cherokee appealed to the federal government to stop the mining and crime. The government complied and sent army regulars to run off the miners. They were not very successful. 4
Governor George Gilmer in his letters to the General Assembly described his views on the Cherokee question. Gilmer believed that Georgia had a responsibility to protect the Cherokee lands from intruders. He also thought it better for the Cherokees and the citizens of the state if the Cherokees moved west. It seems they were just an excuse to get control of the land. He thought profits from the gold could be used to lower taxes. He saw the mines as vast revenue for the state. However he did not like the idea of a lottery to distribute the gold land. He foresaw land rapidly changing hands with major speculation and a lot of people cheating each other. 5 This turned out to be an accurate prediction.
Georgia began to make its move toward getting full control of the Cherokee nation. Governor Gilmer, with the support of the General Assembly, issued a proclamation that all Cherokee lands were now a part of Georgia, and that intruders and Cherokees alike were prohibited from mining on the land. Gilmer then wrote to President Jackson about what he had done and requested that he withdraw the federal troops. Jackson, who had just push the Indian Removal Act through congress, agreed and withdrew them. After passing state laws that did little to stop the mining, Gilmer asked for the troops to return to police the mines. Major Phillip Wager led three hundred troops back to North Georgia to help. They broke up into groups of twelve who were assigned certain areas. They patrolled during the day, which forced many miners to give up and leave. Others went at night to gather stones and return to a safe place to search them for gold. Still others kept mining in the day with lookouts. The Cherokees continued to dig on their land as well which caused white outrage. A group called the Pony Club began to attack Indian villages. They became much like the Ku Klux Klan by harassing and killing many influential Cherokee leaders. Men believed to be involved in the club made an attempt to kill Cherokee Chief John Ross. In 1830 Georgia’s General Assembly passed an act that gave Gilmer power to take possession of the mines and another that created a guard of 60 men to enforce it. 6
The Cherokee seemed to have won with the decision of the Worcester vs. Georgia trial. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Worcester, a white missionary, and the Cherokee nation. Worcester had been arrested for being on the Cherokee land by the state of Georgia. The Supreme Court ruled that the state of Georgia had no control of the Cherokee nation. However, President Jackson had no intention of enforcing the ruling.7So the property evaluations began. They divided the land into four sections and those sections into districts. Those districts were divided into 160-acre lots, or 40-acre lots in the case of the gold lots. Surveyors combed the Cherokee lands estimating the value of the lands, and gave estimates to the Cherokees of what they would be paid for their property. They were given more money for improvements like homes, stables, and sheds. They were also given money for apple, peach, and other assorted fruit trees. 8
Georgia’s new governor, Wilson Lumpkin, felt it was necessary to take control of the Cherokees’ land. He said that if Georgia weren’t in control of the land that the Cherokee would be unable to keep the dregs of society from taking over. He thought the gold was just too much temptation for the lawless masses. Lumpkin described Georgia as a benevolent caretaker of the Cherokee land. He supported his view by saying that it was the job of all Christian nations to take care of the lesser peoples of the world. He did support the lottery unlike his opponent in the governor’s race, George Gilmer. 9
The land would now be distributed in a lottery, under the control of Governor Wilson Lumpkin. People that wanted a chance had to go to Millidgeville to get tickets. To be eligible to get a ticket for the 160-acre lot one had to be a white male over eighteen who had lived in Georgia for four years, a widow, or a family of an orphan. Heads of families, veterans, widows and orphans of veterans, and families with more than one orphan could get more chances. The only difference in the 40-acre lots was that one would only have had to have lived in the state for three years. Some people were specifically barred from the lottery including illegal miners since June 1, 1830, members of the Pony Club, people who had received land in previous lotteries, and of course the Cherokees. There were about 85,000 people competing for 18,309 160-acre lots, and about 133,000 competing for 35, 000 40-acre lots. 10
There were a number of businesses that after a known valuable gold lot was drawn would hunt down the winner and try to buy it from them. A number of the winners were poor farmers, who didn’t know what they had, and sold the lots for less than they were worth. Rival businesses that were late finding the winner would help them take the swindlers to court. Others were treated well and given reasonable amounts for their lots. The Jefferson Mining Company immediately tracked down a poor farmer who had won a lot called the Pigeon Roost lot. A silent auction was held for the plot in order to be fair to the man. The poor man asked a representative of the company if he could expect to get a thousand dollars for his lot. The representative, with a grin on his face, told him it was a possibility. The Jefferson Company won with a bid of ten thousand dollars, much to the delight of the farmer. One winner was a poor old widow who lived near Athens. After hearing of her luck she rode a mule to her lot near Ball Ground. Once there she found someone to help her run the miners on her land off. The land turned out to be good and she became very successful. Often the land proved of little value anyway, giving the farmer the better deal in the end. One man rushed to buy a lot off of a poor farmer named Alford Allison. The man finally convinced Allison to sell, but after much labor he almost went bankrupt. He sold it to the original owner, Allison, who later found a rich spot on the land. 11
As gold mining became increasingly popular, many farmers switched to it and slaves began to be used in it. Many farmers traveled north and mined after harvest. Others who lived in North Georgia had their own farms there. Like all other work in the Antebellum south, slavery found its way into mining as well. Mining companies rented slaves from planters or bought their own, although many planters were cautious about letting their slaves work in the mines because of the dangerous work. Miners cared little for their own health and they were less likely to treat a slave with care. Many were indeed worked to death. It did give slaves an opportunity to earn money for themselves though. Some miners let them keep some of what they found if they would sell it back to them, or let them have what they could find after dark. Others would hide gold dust in their hair to get away with. If they obtained it illegally it would be hard to find someone to buy it from them. Both parties could get in big trouble for such a deal. 12
As the gold mining continued, bigger towns began grow up around the mining camps and shantytowns. One such town that was named after Nathaniel Nockolls, a man who had built many of the town’s first buildings, was Nuckollsville. It also was Knuclesville because of the fighting that went on in the town. Later at the suggestion of John C. Calhoun the town was renamed Auraria. Auraria’s chief competitor was Dahlonega, which got its name from the Cherokee word for yellow metal. When county lines were drawn Dahlonega edged out Auraria for the county seat. Other gold towns included Clarksville of Habersham County, Villa Rica of Carroll County, and the small border village of Gainesville in Hall County. 13
Gold fever caused problems for everyone. Many people, including a good deal of immigrants, flocked towards the North Georgia Mountains. The roads to the mines were treacherous, especially during snow or rain. When they got to the mining operations they found less than luxurious hotels. There was a lot of fighting over mines, some of which included Cherokee attacks. In one case a Native American woman attacked a group of miners and almost killed them, prompting the site to be known as Amazon Branch. There was also a problem of shortages of all kinds. There just weren’t enough farms to support the great influx of people. Live stock had to be brought in from places like Tennessee. Sometimes meat was even bought from the Cherokees. The shortages created a great opportunity to anyone who would open a store. With the high local price norms, there was a lot of money to be made off the miners. The most popular places of entertainment were saloons, where the favorite pastimes of drinking, gambling, and fighting were frequent. 14
Auraria, the major gold town of the region, despite its reputation did not have a great deal of crime. The only murder reported during the time of the rush there was when one citizen struck another on the head with a rifle. The murderer was sent to jail in Gainesville. One problem was runaway slaves hiding out in the gold region. Often the rewards for captures of runaways were not enough to entice the miners to waste time tracking them down. There were also slaves that ran away from the town to get away from the hard mining work. Another problem the town had was horse theft. Horses weren’t as valuable as harder working animals and usually not much was made of the thefts. In fact many, like John C. Calhoun, simply believed their horses had wondered off. Calhoun remarked that his horse probably liked South Carolina better than Georgia, and simply went home. 15
Life was not totally comprised of gold digging in Auraria. Entertainment made its way into the mountains in many forms. Like other parts of the region, gambling was a favored pastime in Auraria. Christmas and the Fourth of July were popular holidays. There were many traveling shows that came to the town such as one man who had many tricks involving fire and one involving the apparent resurrection of a cat. Something went wrong with the cat trick and despite all the performer’s efforts the cat could not be brought back. The showman, William D. Houghton, claimed the cause of the death stemmed from weak ammonia used in the trick. Another popular form of entertainment were dances known as frolics. There were even natural spectacles such as a meteor shower in 1833. 16
Suddenly there were vast sums of money in the South. Of course the federal government wanted to keep this money at home, but the road to Philadelphia was treacherous. This caused much of the wealth to be exported overseas. One solution proposed was to build branches of the mint in the South. With the support of John C. Calhoun, Thomas Hart Benton, and the director of the mint a bill was passed creating three branches in the South. One was built at New Orleans, one at Charlotte, and the third at Dahlonega. Many of those who supported the United States Bank were against them, but their attempts to get rid of it failed. In the end the branch at Dahlonega was seized by the state of Georgia. Its death coincided with the drop in mining in the South. 17
Many things contributed to the decline in mining in North Georgia. It was becoming harder to mine in many places. New techniques were incorporated to mine ridges away from the riverbeds, where most of the mining had taken place. Mines were dug deeper in attempts to milk areas for all they were worth, which made mining a lot more dangerous. Also copper was found in Ducktown and what is now known as Copperhill. Many gave up gold mining to try their luck in copper. 18
Perhaps the biggest reason for the decline in mining in Georgia and the rest of the South was the discovery of gold in California and the following 1849 rush. The twenty-niners became the forty-niners as many miners who had experience in vein mining on the ridges went west to try their luck in the California mines. So many went that it was said that California miners were raised in the cradle of the Southern mines. One man named Dr. Matthew Stephenson tried to persuade Dahlonega miners that there was plenty of gold still left in the area. His speech did little to stop their flight west. James Boisclair was a Georgia miner who gathered a group of workers together and set off for California. He paid for their traveling cost in exchange for half of their first year’s findings. Some became successful out west while others were forced to return to the South. One man found enough in Georgia to take his family west, while he was there he never found much. He later returned to try to find the mine that had paid for his trip, but never found it. Many miners brought back some of the new techniques they had learned back to try to get more out of the southern mines. 19
In the 1850’s a few miners lingered trying to find something left of the original rush. Hydraulic systems powered by canals, dams, and aqueducts were used to try to wash off the lop layers of soil on the hills. Another method was blast mining. Tunnels would be blasted out and the hydraulic hoses would be used to wash them out. Mining in the South would ultimately come to an end with the start of the Civil War. 20
Before gold was discovered in the North Georgia Mountains it was Cherokee land with few white settlers in it. As the white world moved closer the Cherokee began to adapt their ways to the European-American culture. They formed a government modeled after the United States and drafted a constitution. Even with the support of the Supreme Court they could not hold on to their land. Georgia had caught the gold fever for witch there is no cure. It became the excuse the government needed to push them off to the west. But it was an opportunity for others. Poor farmers who won the land lottery could either try their luck in mining or make a great deal of money by selling the land. Slaves could earn extra money to buy their freedom. Many of present day North Georgia’s important towns like Dahlonega and Clarkesville were started around mining camps. No longer was Georgia dominated totally by plantation life. In fact a new society very different from the plantation culture grew up in the North Georgia Mountains. The upcountry is even to this day a very place different from the rest of Georgia. Gold fever created a new part of the Southern culture, and practically over night the North Georgia Mountains became the society of gold.
1. Henry Thompson Malone, Cherokees of the Old South (Athens: University of Georgia Press 1956) 123-127.
2. Malone, 77-90, 128.
3. David Williams, The Georgia Gold Rush: Twenty-Niners, Cherokees, and Gold Fever (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1993) 22-25.
4. Williams, 25-31.
5. George Gilmer, Sketches of the First Settlers of Upper Georgia, of the Cherokees, and the Author (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1855), 362-366.
6. Williams, 31-35.
7. Williams, 43-44.
8. William L. Anderson, ed. Cherokee Removal: Before and After (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1991), 9-24.
9. Wilson Lumpkin, Removal of the Cherokee Indians from Georgia (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1907), 95-102.
10. Williams, 51-52.
11. Williams, 53-57.
12. Williams, 83-86.
13. Fletcher M. Green, ”Georgia’s Forgotten Industry: Gold Mining,” The Georgia Historical Quarterly XIX (1935): 108-111.
14. Williams, 88-95.
15. E. Merton Coulter, Auraria: The Story of A Georgia Gold-Mining Town (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1956), 47-56.
16. Coulter, 57-72.
17. Green, 220-222.
18. Green, 217-223.
19. Williams, 118-120.
20. Green, 224-226.