Elmer D. McInnes - Nevada Gunsmoke: Frontier Fighters of the Boom Years, 1850-1890

The mining rush to Nevada, ca. 18591878, though on a somewhat smaller scale than the mammoth California gold rush of ten years before, nonetheless witnessed a prodigious influx of ebullient humanity into the formerly barren, sunbaked landscape. The discovery of valuable silver deposits in the rock of the region proved to be the impetus for the human development of the nations 36th state. In imitation of California, however, who set the North American precedent, the Nevada rush also saw that unique development called the mining camp gunman or Chief of the camp. That violent, domineering individual, armed with a brace of huge so-called horse pistols and a wicked looking, long bladed Bowie knife, strode the plank sidewalks and dirt streets of many of the regions bustling communities. They would be a fixture for most of Nevadas boom years and would add their own brand of excitement to the days of auriferous wealth accumulation.

The first known white man to set foot in what would later become the State of Nevada proved to be a group of fur trappers led by the legendary mountain man Jedediah S. Smith out of St. Louis, Missouri, in 1825. Although only passing through on their way to California, Smith and his party were the first to describe various features of the landscape of the area. Smith was subsequently followed by various other exploring parties, including those of Peter S. Ogden, Milton Sublette and the great Pathfinder, John C. Frmont. These expeditions, plus the parties of gold seekers who crossed the Great Basin in the late 1840s on their way to California, helped to familiarize the rest of the country with the seemingly uninhabitable region.

With the establishment of Utah territory on September 9, 1850, the area now encompassing the present-day State of Nevada became part of the Territory of Utah. That same year a party of Salt Lake pioneers set out for California. Reaching the base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in the Carson Valley, the group tarried long enough to discover slight traces of gold in the feeder streams of the Carson River. Although this created some interest it was not deemed of great importance and the area continued to be ignored as a place for settlement.

Though prospecting had been sporadic and largely unpromising, by 1851 the Carson Valley of the West portion of the territory began to attract settlement, principally at the camp of Mormon Station, later renamed Genoa. Slowly, more and more settlers and gold seekers began to arrive and other camps began to spring up throughout the Valley. Eventually, the officials of Utah Territory at Salt Lake City split the region of present-day Nevada into various counties, including the organization of Carson County in 1855. By this time the discovery which would cause this sparsely settled wilderness to explode in a paroxysm of greed, violence and heady adventure had already come to pass.

Despite the fact of the search for gold having been, to a great extent, disappointing, the quest for silver still had some promise. In 1853 the Grosh brothers of Pennsylvania, E. Allen and Hosea, discovered important silver deposits in the Carson Valley near the future site of the town of Silver City. At length the discoveries began to be announced at a steady pace, including possibly the biggest of all, the so-called Comstock Lode, on June 12, 1859. This would be the genesis of perhaps Nevadas greatest boomtown, Virginia City, as well as numerous others in the area. With the first influx of humanity from the California gold fields, the Nevada rush began in earnest.