Foreword; Preface; Introduction; Chapter 1: White American Perceptions of California Indians; Chapter 2: Native American Reaction to the Invasion; Chapter 3: Other Native Resistance; Chapter 4: The Gold Rush and Native Americans of Southern California; Chapter 5: Anglo Depredations Against California Indians; Chapter 6: Indian Relations with the State and Federal Governments; Suggested Reading; Index
Summary
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 n