History of Sacramento, California
The history of Sacramento, California, began with its founding by Samuel Brannan and John Augustus Sutter, Jr. in 1848 around an embarcadero that his father, John Sutter, Sr. constructed at the confluence of the American and Sacramento Rivers a few years prior.
Sacramento was named after the Sacramento River, which forms its western border. The river was named by Spanish cavalry officer Gabriel Moraga for the Santisimo Sacramento, referring to the Catholic Eucharist.
Before the arrival of Europeans, the Nisenan Native American tribe inhabited the Sacramento Valley area. The Spanish were the first Europeans to explore the area, and Sacramento fell into the Alta California province of New Spain when the conquistadors claimed Central America and the American Southwest for the Spanish Empire. The area was deemed unfit for colonization by a number of explorers and as a result remained relatively untouched by the Europeans who claimed the region, excepting early 19th Century coastal settlements north of San Francisco Bay which constituted the southernmost Russian colony in North America and were spread over an area stretching from Point Arena to Tomales Bay. When John Sutter arrived in the provincial colonial capital of Monterey in 1839, governor Juan Bautista Alvarado provided Sutter with the land he asked for, and Sutter established New Helvetia, which he controlled absolutely with a private army and relative autonomy from the newly independent Mexican government.
The California Gold Rush started when gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill, one of Sutter, Sr.'s assets in the city of Coloma in 1848; the arrival of prospectors in droves ruined Sutter's New Helvetia and trade began to develop around a wharf he had established where the American and Sacramento Rivers joined. In the region where Sutter had planned to establish the city of Sutterville, Sacramento City was founded; Sutter, Sr. put his son in charge in frustration, and Sutter, Jr. worked to organize the city in its growth. However, its location caused the city to periodically fill with water. Fires would also sweep through the city. To resolve the problems, the city worked to raise the sidewalks and buildings and began to replace wooden structures with more resilient materials, like brick and stone. The city was selected as the state capital in 1854 after Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo failed to convince the state government to remain in the city of his namesake.
Prior to Sutter's arrival – through 1838
such as the Miwok and Maidu Indians were the original inhabitants of the north Californian Central Valley. Of the Maidu, the Nisenan Maidu group were the principal inhabitants of pre-Columbian Sacramento; the peoples of this tribe were hunter-gatherers, relying on foraged nuts and berries and fish from local rivers instead of food generated by agricultural means.The first European in the state of California was conquistador Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, a Portuguese explorer sailing on behalf of the Spanish Empire, in 1542; later explorers included Sir Francis Drake and Sebastián Vizcaíno. However, no explorer had yet discovered the Sacramento Valley region nor the Golden Gate strait, which would remain undiscovered until, respectively, 1808 and 1623. A number of conquistadors had completed cursory examinations of the region by the mid-18th century, including Juan Bautista de Anza and Pedro Fages, but none viewed the region as a potentially valuable region to colonize. Neither did Gabriel Moraga, who was the first European to enter the Sierra in 1808 and was responsible for naming the Sacramento River, although he incorrectly placed the rivers in the region. However, Padres Abella and Fortuni arrived in the region in 1811 and returned positive feedback to the Roman Catholic Church, although the church disregarded their finds as they were in conflict with all previous views of the area. The Mexicans, who had declared independence in 1821, shared Spanish sentiments, and the area remained uncolonized until the arrival of John Sutter in 1839.
The area that would become the city of Sacramento was initially observed by many European and American mapmakers as home to Great Plains-based rivers that stretched across the Rocky Mountains and emptied into the Pacific Ocean. Speculation at the time placed the fabled St. Bonaventura River where the American-Sacramento River complex was; mountain man Jedediah Smith mistook the American and Sacramento Rivers for the St. Bonaventura in his 1827 venture into the region, and named the Sacramento Valley the "Valley of the Bonadventure" before trekking southwards along the Stanislaus River.
Mexican Territory: Sutter's Colony – 1839 to 1848
arrived in the city of Yerba Buena, which would become the city of San Francisco, after encountering a massive storm en route from the city of Sitka, Russian Alaska; he was later redirected by Mexican officials to the colonial capital of Monterey, where he appealed to governor Juan Bautista Alvarado of Alta California his ambitions to establish an "empire of civilization" on "new land". Alvarado noted that he needed to establish a presence in the Sacramento Valley, and realized that Sutter's ambitions allowed him an opportunity to secure the valley without committing extra troops to the region. As a result, he granted Sutter's request on the condition that Sutter would become a Mexican citizen. Sutter commenced to build a fort of his namesake, Sutter's Fort, in 1840; the fort became his base of operations. New Helvetia was roughly in size until he negotiated an 1841 deal with the Russians to purchase Ft. Ross, which lay in present-day Sonoma County, and consolidated all of Ft. Ross' holdings with those at Fort Sutter.Sutter's New Helvetia existed within Mexican borders, sporting a large degree of autonomy; John Sutter ruled over New Helvetia with absolute power, and named himself general over a privately developed army composed of Native Americans. John Sutter employed both white people and Native Americans for many mundane and military tasks regarding New Helvetia. After New Helvetia grew to encompass Fort Ross, Sutter's military presence in the region began to garner suspicion from the government of Mexican Alta California; Sutter, who often bragged of his military strength, aggravated the Mexican government with his claims of power. As New Helvetia continued to develop economically, Sutter constructed a ranch at the Nisenan village of Hok and named it "Hock Farm", designating it his official retreat. New Helvetia was considered a stable colony by 1844, and was the only foreigner-friendly locale in Alta California at the time. Among other foreigners, the Donner Party had designated Sutter's Fort their destination during an overland journey that placed them across the Sierra mountains in the wintertime.
File:California Gold Rush relief map 2.jpg|left|thumb|A map of northern California gold fields, in relation to Sacramento and Coloma
Sutter's empire began to disintegrate when he decided to back the unpopular Alta Californian governor Manuel Micheltorena, who was soon overthrown by Alvarado and José Castro in an 1841 coup d'état. Sutter was jailed as a result, but not before Micheltorena issued the Sobrante Grant, which added of land to New Helvetian territory. In 1845, Castro arrived at Sutter's Fort and offered a deal to purchase New Helvetia; Sutter declined, although he later expressed regret for not accepting Castro's terms. In 1846, the Bear Flag Revolt was initiated by Americans in Sonoma who were frightened by growing Mexican hostility towards foreign presences in the region; taking the city by surprise, general Mariano Vallejo was captured at his headquarters in the city, and the irregular force demanded use of Sutter's prison facilities to host captured Mexican officials. Agreeing reluctantly, Sutter raised the Bear Flag over his fortification. However, he treated the Vallejos, whom he considered friends, as guests and not as prisoners. While the "Bear Flaggers" under William B. Ide and John C. Frémont continued to wage war against the Mexican government, Sutter attempted to resume a state of normalcy in New Helvetia, although the lack of manpower as a result of the revolt left productivity lagging.
The United States initiated the Mexican–American War in 1846 against Mexico in the wake of the U.S. annexation of the Republic of Texas, whose independence Mexico had not recognized. California, along with Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, most of Arizona and Colorado, and parts of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Wyoming, were annexed by the United States in the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Thus, Sutter's New Helvetia fell under U.S. control.
Continuing business as normal, John Sutter dispatched associate James W. Marshall, who was to construct a sawmill in the foothills of the Sierra at the city of Coloma, in 1847. In January 1848, Marshall detected a flake of gold on the ground at the site of Sutter's new mill, and after conducting tests, determined the mineral's authenticity. Word leaked about the discovery nearly immediately. When news reached San Francisco, a rush of hopeful prospectors began to move northwards to the Sacramento Valley, and by the middle of the year, so-called "Argonauts" flooded Sutter's holdings in search of gold. The arrival of Argonauts in the region decimated the economical integrity of Sutter's New Helvetia, as the prospectors slaughtered his herds of livestock, drove out local Native Americans loyal to Sutter, and divided New Helvetia amongst each other without Sutter's consent. Disappointed with what had become of his holdings, Sutter placed his son as head of fort business operations and retired to Hock Farm.
Foundation – 1848 to 1850
The real city of Sacramento was developed around a wharf, called the Embarcadero, on the confluence of the American River and Sacramento River that Sutter had developed prior to his retirement in 1849 as a result of the gold discoveries which began at Sutter's Mill at Coloma. John Sutter, Sr. had replaced himself with his son, John Sutter, Jr., who noticed growth of trade at the Embarcadero and considered it a viable economic opportunity; the port was used increasingly as a point of debarkation for prospecting Argonauts heading eastwards. Sutter, Jr. had military officials William H. Warner and his assistant, William Tecumseh Sherman, survey his father's holdings for a location where he could establish a new city and create the city over a grid of numbered and lettered streets for organizational purposes. A number of businessmen, including millionaire-to-be Samuel Brannan, future California governor Peter Burnett, and George McDougall, brother of future California governor John McDougall, were attracted to the waterfront location. However, Sutter, Jr. and George McDougall disagreed over the terms of the lease of the location, and a trade war erupted between Sutter's Sacramento City and McDougall's new base of operations at Sutterville. Sutter, Sr., who had opposed many of his son's decisions, resumed control of his business affairs after Sutter, Jr. ended the competition between the two cities; trade in the area was biased toward Sacramento City as a result of Sutter, Jr.'s efforts.Unlike other settlements of its time and type, Sacramento City did not have gambling houses and saloons until the summer of 1849; the city was free of those businesses for the first few months of its existence. Churches also appeared early on when the Methodist Episcopalian pastor W. Grove Deal established the first church with regular services in May 1849. Catholic reverend Augustine Anderson arrived in 1850 and constructed a church in 1854, while Jews founded a synagogue called Congregation B'Nai Israel in 1852. In 1849, Edward C. Kemble moved north from San Francisco and established the city's first newspaper, The Placer Times. Kemble's newspaper disassembled three months later when Kemble was stricken with sickness. The first Sacramento theatrical stage, located in the Eagle Theatre, was founded in October 1849.
Sacramento City did not have a formal government during early and mid-1849, and gambling institutions in the region sought to keep only the loose alcalde government. However, many city residents were swayed in favor of the gambling houses; by the fall of that year, the entire legal structure of Sacramento City was established by a large 296-vote margin on a second proposal. The government of California had only just reorganized itself into county units; days after the overhaul, the California State Legislature verified that Sacramento was officially recognized by means of charter in February 1850. Sacramento City later petitioned the Legislature to drop the "City" from the settlement's name, which was also granted. Sacramento City was serviced by organized public transportation via the rivers and upheld regular street maintenance by 1850; the settlement had reached a "home-and-garden" stage in development by the same time.