John Sutter

 

Original name: JOHANN AUGUST SUTER (b. Feb. 15, 1803, Kandern, Baden--d. June 18, 1880, Washington, D.C.), German-bornpioneer settler and colonizer in California; discovery of gold on his land (1848) precipitated the California GoldRush.

Fleeing from bankruptcy and financial failures and leaving his wife and children in Switzerland, he reached California in 1839 and persuaded the Mexican governor to grant him lands on the Sacramento River. There, at its junction with the American River, he established the colony of Nueva Helvetia (New Switzerland), later to become Sacramento. He built "Sutter's Fort" (1841), set up frontier industries, and, in spite of his enormous debts, provided lavish hospitality, and often employment, to traders, trappers, immigrants, and natives who came to his fort.

Discovery of gold on his land brought disaster to Sutter. In theprocess of building a sawmill, a carpenter named John Marshall found flakes of gold (Jan. 24, 1848). The two men tried tokeep the find a secret, but the news leaked out. Workers deserted the colony; gold seekers and squatters overranSutter's land, stealing and destroying his goods and livestock. When the U.S. courts denied title to his Mexican grants, his ruin was complete. By 1852 he was bankrupt.

In 1851 Sutter and his wife moved to the East, where he spent the remainder of his life in a futile attempt to gain redress through Congress. Sutter Street, in San Francisco, and Sutter County commemorate his name.