UPDATED, May 13, 2023, with a few minor text edits and additions for clarity.

If you’re just joining us, you might want to read the first two parts of this series: Farewell to California! The Bonniwell party returns (part 1) and Farewell to California! The Bonniwell party returns (part 2), before continuing with today’s Part 3.

Since its beginnings in 1848, news of the California Gold Rush was highly sought after across the nation. U. S. newspapers published all the latest doings, and raced to print the latest updates before competing papers could do so. Readers were breathlessly informed of the amounts of gold and cash (usually in the form of specie, or money as coins) that regularly arrived at eastern ports. Lists of passengers departing to and arriving from the gold fields occupied inch after inch of column space. Ships arriving from the west fed America’s appetite for the latest developments by carrying eastward the U.S. Mail and the latest California newspapers. Ship captains prided themselves on delivering the news more quickly than their competitors.

December, 1850: Henry Bonniwell and P. M. Johnson

The result of this insatiable need for California news—available to 21st-century readers via digitized and searchable historic newspaper collections—is that I have been able to identify the names of several of our returning Bonniwell expedition members, along with their date of return and means of travel. From what I’ve learned so far, the first two of our Wisconsin adventurers to return were Henry V. Bonniwell and Phineas M. Johnson, who arrived in New York City harbor on the morning of Friday, December 20, 1850, as passengers on the steamer Cherokee.

Today’s Clark House Historian post uses just one of these gold rush articles as its source. The original article occupied the complete first column (and a bit of the second) of page 2 of the Friday evening, December 20, 1850, New York Evening Post. There’s a lot of news packed into the original article; to make that news easier to digest, I have divided the unbroken column of type into several smaller parts. Let’s take a closer look…

The Bonniwell party’s prospectors had gone to the California gold fields via two very different routes. The 1849 party went west using a combination of land and water transportation to get from Milwaukee to El Dorado via steamship from New Orleans, then across the Isthmus of Panama by foot, mule and canoe, and then another steamer to San Francisco. Compared to the overland route, it was quicker, more reliable, and safer, but more expensive.

The larger Bonniwell party of 1850, led by “Captain” William T. Bonniwell, took the shorter but more strenuous—and risky—overland route. After fitting out their wagon train at Independence, Missouri, they headed west, across the vast plains and the great western desert, and then struggled up and across the Sierra Nevada. This route was much less expensive, and much less secure. They faced constant dangers, including lack of adequate food and water, unpredictable weather, equipment failure, the threat of bandits, and the possibility of Indian attack.

Both Bonniwell parties survived their journeys and made it to the gold region. They appear to have had some success, mixed with much tedium and many futile efforts. Eventually, our Wisconsin prospectors—like many, if not most, California gold seekers—decided to return home. And then the question became: how to get home safely, economically, and reasonably quickly? For most adventurers, especially those with even a modest amount of gold dust or specie in their baggage, it was clear that the overland route was too long, impractical and dangerous. So some kind of (mostly) ocean voyage seemed like the best bet, and the San Francisco newspapers were full of enticing deals for homeward travelers.

San Francisco to Panama, and beyond

San Francisco newspapers regularly featured advertisements for competing steamship lines. Here’s one from the Daily Pacific News of January 21, 1850, for the Empire City line, promoting the trip from San Francisco to Panama [City] on their newest ship, the Sarah Sands.

This 1850 lithograph, like the ad above, suggests the iron ship Sarah Sands was new, modern and cut a sleek line through the sea. Just the thing for a returning miner’s comfortable trip homeward: