Exterminate Them: Written Accounts of the Murder, Rape, and Enslavement of Native Americans during the California Gold Rush

by Clifford E. Trafzer (Editor), Joel R. Hyer (Editor)

Popular media depict miners as a rough-and-tumble lot who diligently worked the placers along scenic rushing rivers while living in roaring mining camps in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Trafzer and Hyer destroy this mythic image by offering a collection of original newspaper articles that describe in detail the murder, rape, and enslavement perpetrated by those who participated in the infamous gold rush. "It is a mercy to the Red Devils," wrote an editor of the Chico Courier, "to exterminate them." Newspaper accounts of the era depict both the barbarity and the nobility in human nature, but while some protested the inhumane treatment of Native Americans, they were not able to end the violence. Native Americans fought back, resisting the invasion, but they could not stop the tide of white miners and settlers. They became "strangers in a stolen land."

Genres: Nonfiction, History

177 pages, Paperback

First published January 31, 1999

About the author

Cliffor Trafzer is Director of American Indian Studies at University of California, Riverside. Raised in Arizona, Clifford Trafzer was born to parents of Wyandot Indian and German-English blood. He earned a B.A. and M.A. in history at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, where he also worked as an archivist for Special Collections. He earned a Ph.D. in American History in 1973 with a specialty in American Indian History and the same year became a museum curator for the Arizona Historical Society. Before joining the faculty of the University of California, Riverside in 1991, Trafzer taught at Diné College (Navajo Community College), Washington State University and San Diego State University. Trafzer's research focuses on Native American history and culture. His Kit Carson Campaign: The Last Great Navajo War and Yuma: Frontier Crossing of the Far Southwest were published in 1981. His co-authored work, Renegade Tribe: The Palouse Indians and the Invasion of the Inland Pacific Northwest appeared in 1986, winning a Washington Governor\\\'s Award that year. In 1994 he won the Penn Oakland Award for Earth Song, Sky Spirit. His works include Grandmother, Grandfather, and Old Wolf: Tamánwit Ku Súdat and Traditional Native American Stories From the Columbia Plateau, Death Stalks the Yakama: A Social-Cultural History of Death on the Yakama Indian Reservation, 1888-1964, and Exterminate Them!

Reviews

[Harry Allagree · Rating 3 out of 5]

Suggestion: don't read this book when you feel depressed! In the Preface at the beginning of the book, the editors clearly give the statistics about the indigenous inhabitants of California, whom started coming here in 10,000 B.C. The population by 1846 was c. 120,000. By 1900 -- a little over 50 years -- Native Americans in California numbered about 17,000. That pretty much hints as to what this book is about, along with title. It's a collection of actual newspaper article/notices regarding the treatment of California Indians. It's a horrendous history, not only whites' treatment of them, but the utterly inefficient, negligent, outrageous and illegal non-action of state & federal "leaders", from the beginning of the state in 1850 on, with regard to the indigenous peoples. This is not a history which Californians can be proud of.

[Marilyn Zanetti · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a must read for those that want to understand how the natives were really treated by the newcomers. The authors include a collection of articles from the gold rush era that explains how the native Americans were exploited by the miners.

[Jan · Rating 3 out of 5]

the authors touch upon the complexities and show how Indians and new (European) immigrants arrive or are born in a situation of enduring conflict, coming to see either red or white skin as evil, not understanding the history of their moment. Indian raiders on horseback? Not the original thing, more a mirror of European culture. Yet at times this more deserving story gives way to a new myth, that of the good and ultimately victorious Indian, seemingly unscathed.

I really like the sort of study it is: low to the ground, casualties with names rather than mere numbers... more of a cultural analysis than another history saying "how it really was", although we only get the white man's view - which is the one that interests me the least