Daniel C. Fletcher

Daniel C. Fletcher was lucky to make it to the prospecting fields of California at all. Although the gold fever had struck both him and his older brother Theodore in 1849, their father had objected to them going to California because of the many newspaper accounts reporting deaths of travelers from diseases contracted while crossing Panama.

To the consternation of his father, Theodore eventually booked passage aboard a steamer bound for Panama in early 1852. Discovering that Theodore had purchased a ticket only for himself, the father forced him to acquire another one for Daniel. If Theodore were going to go, the father reasoned, he would be safer traveling with a companion. Luckily for young Daniel, that companion turned out to be him.

The boys made it to California and settled at Grass Valley, an encampment situated about four miles outside of...