Iowa County WI Archives History - Books .....Gold Rush And The Exodus From Mineral Point 1973
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Nancy Poquette npoq@hotmail.com January 1, 2007, 7:58 pm

Book Title: Mineral Point: A History

pages 94-95: “…Adventurous miners followed the…water route, down the 
Mississippi, through the Gulf of Mexico, across the Isthmus, and up the coast 
to California. The mass movement of the miners to the gold mines was by covered 
wagon, the so-called prairie schooner. The trek went on during 1848 and 1849 
and reached its climax in 1850. One particular day, sixty wagon teams left from 
Mineral Point…In all some 700 people left from the city for the lure of 
California gold…Mineral Point and its surrounding settlements were partly 
depopulated, businesses were paralyzed, stores were closed, property values 
fell, promissory notes went into default.”

	“Despite the exodus of the miners from the lead region, the 1850 census 
showed the following families in the village of Mineral Point:

							Head of families
	English (mostly Cornish)			311
	American (mostly Pennsylvania and NY)	        108
	Irish						49
	German					        28
	Canadian, Scottish and Welsh			6
	Swiss						2
	Norwegian					2
	French						2

	“The total population of the village was 2,110. The people were 
overwhelmingly English and on account of the Cornish, were staunchly Methodist. 
See appendix B for the list of those known to have left Iowa County for the 
California Gold Rush, albeit an incomplete list.”

	From page 97, Mineral Point: a History-“The plague of cholera was a 
dreaded scourge. Although there were epidemics in 1832 and 1834, the worst 
visitations came during the summers from 1849 to 1854…At Mineral Point, some 
residents hit on a temporary solution when they camped on a hillside during the 
worst days of an epidemic. In a letter dated September 17, 1849, a resident of 
Mineral Point wrote that although his own family was healthy, ‘We have had the 
cholera in this village for the last two or three months And perhaps some 
thirty or more have died with it. There were four or five deaths from it, I 
think, last week.’”

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