Tierra del Fuego gold rush

1883–1906 gold rush in Argentina

Tierra del Fuego Gold Rush

An 1889 5-gram gold coin from Tierra del Fuego by Julius Popper

Date| 1883–1906
Location| Tierra del Fuego, Argentina and Chile
Cause| Gold rush began after the French steamship Arctique ran aground on the northern coast of Cape Virgenes and a rescue expedition for the stranded crew discovered gold in Zanja a Pique
Participants| Chilean miners
Argentine miners
Dalmatian miners
Other European miners

Outcome| Influx of miners led to the formation of the first towns in the archipelago and fueled the economic growth of Punta Arenas and rapidly destroyed Indigenous Selkʼnam population

Punta Arenas

Zanja a Pique

El Páramo

Sloggett Bay

Lennox Island

Wollaston Islands

class=notpageimage|

Location of Punta Arenas and some of the principal gold findings.

Part of a series on the

History of Chile
Timeline • Years in Chile

Early history

* Monte Verde
* Origin of the Mapuche
* Early Mapuches
* Incas in Chile

Colonial times

* Spanish conquest
* Colonial Chile
* Captaincy General
* Arauco War
* Destruction of the Seven Cities

Nation-building

* Patria Vieja
* War of Independence
* Reconquest
* Patria Nueva
* Civil war (1829–1830)
* War of the Confederation

Republican period

* Conservative Republic
* Colonization of the Strait of Magellan
* Liberal Republic
* Occupation of Araucanía
* War of the Pacific

Parliamentary period

* 1891 Chilean Civil War
* Parliamentary Republic
* 1924 coup d'état

Presidential period

* 1925 coup d'état
* Presidential Republic
* Radical governments
* Allende and UP era

Military dictatorship

* 1973 coup d'état
* Military dictatorship

Contemporary

* Transition to democracy
* Student protests
* Mapuche conflict
* Social Outburst
* Politics of Chile

Related topics

* Agriculture history
* Economic history
* LGBT history
* Maritime history
* Mining history
* Chilean wars
* Chilean coups d'état
* Political scandals

* Chile portal
* History portal

* v
* t
* e

Between 1883 and 1906 Tierra del Fuego experienced a gold rush attracting many Chileans, Argentines and Europeans to the archipelago, including many Dalmatians. The gold rush led to the formation of the first towns in the archipelago and fueled economic growth in Punta Arenas. After the gold rush was over, most gold miners left the archipelago, while the remaining settlers engaged in sheep farming and fishing. The rush made a major contribution to the genocide of the indigenous Selkʼnam people.

## Early discoveries

[edit]

Early attempts to find gold centered in the rivers next to Punta Arenas which drain Brunswick Peninsula to the Strait of Magellan. Small finds occurred in 1869, and in 1870 the governor of Magallanes Óscar Viel sent a 35-gram gold nugget to Chilean president José Joaquín Pérez as a gift.[1] From April 1870 to April 1871 at least 15 kg of gold were mined near Punta Arenas.[1] Most gold ended up in Valparaíso and the ships that engaged in commerce in the increasingly busy port of Punta Arenas.[1] In the 1870s a few settlers of the Falkland Islands moved to Punta Arenas to search for gold, as did John G. Hamilton and Federico Shanklin, two well-known English veteran miners of California and Australia.[1] Their efforts did however appear to have failed.[1] In 1879 an expedition led by Chilean Navy officer Ramón Serrano Montaner discovered gold in some watercourses of western Tierra del Fuego.[2][3] In 1880–1881 enterprises and mining camps at the gold fields discovered by Montaner's expedition were established.[1]

## The rush begins

[edit]

The gold rush was triggered in 1884. On the night of 23 to 24 September that year the French steamship Arctique ran aground on the northern coast of Cape Virgenes, in Argentina near the border with Chile.[2][1] An expedition sent for its rescue discovered gold in a place called Zanja a Pique.[2] When news reached Punta Arenas many inhabitants left for Zanja a Pique.[2] There were various reports of extraordinary gold findings in Zanja a Pique, where individual Frenchmen, Germans and Chileans extracted more than ten kilograms in less than one month.[1] From Punta Arenas the news then reached Buenos Aires.[2] When the miners who acquired the Argentine mining rights for the location arrived to Zanja a Pique, almost no gold was left, with miners based in Chile having already abandoned the place.[1]

## The rush and Julius Popper expedition

[edit]

In Buenos Aires the press compared the gold findings to the rushes of Australia and California.[2] In that city many companies were formed for the purpose of extracting gold.[2] Julio Popper, a mining engineer, was contracted by one of these companies in Buenos Aires. Popper then proceeded to recruit a number of Dalmatians from the many immigrants that lived in Buenos Aires those years.[2] With these workers Popper set out to exploit the findings of El Páramo in San Sebastián Bay.[2] Another camp was established in Sloggett Bay at the southern coast of Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego.[2]

The gold rush reached the Chilean islands south of Beagle Channel so that by 1893 over one thousand men, most of them Dalmatians, lived there. However, by 1894 gold extraction begun to decline in these islands and deposits became gradually depleted.[2][4] A number of enterprises formed in the 1900s to extract gold from the islands south of Beagle Channel ended with meager results.[4]

## Legacy

[edit]

See also: Selkʼnam genocide

Economic history
of Chile

Colonial era

* Colonial mining
* Real Situado
* Hacienda
* Encomienda
* Alerce logging
* Century of wheat
* Bourbon reforms

Early republic

* Independence debt
* Silver rush
* Wheat cycle
* First copper boom
* Early coal mining
* Long Depression

Saltpetre Republic

* Saltpetre War
* "Oreros" and "Papeleros"
* Sheep-farming boom
* Tierra del Fuego gold rush
* Meat riots
* Great Depression

Internal growth

* Copper mining during World War II
* CORFO
(Production Development Corporation)

* UN Economic Commission
* Land reform
* Copper nationalization
* Vuskovic plan

Return of liberalism

* Chicago Boys
* El ladrillo
* Decreto Ley 600
* 1982 crisis
* "Miracle of Chile"
* Copper Stabilization Fund
* Asian crisis
* 2004 energy crisis
* 2000s copper boom

* v
* t
* e

During his work in Tierra del Fuego, Popper was involved in the killings of native Selkʼnam, which came later to be known as the Selkʼnam genocide.[5][6]

Around the island, gold diggers, sheep herders and even police are reported to have assaulted Indian camps to acquire their women.[3] This created a shortage of women among Fuegian tribes.[3] The capture and control of women in the main island worsened conflicts between rival groups.[3] There are also reports of trade of women during deals between men.[3] By 1894 Porvenir consisted of five houses, two of them liquor stores and a third one a brothel.[3]

The Dalmatians involved in the gold rush gradually left mining activities either to return to Dalmatia or Buenos Aires or establish themselves in Punta Arenas.[2] The gold rush caused an improvement in the geographical knowledge of the poorly known islands south of Beagle Channel and linked them to Punta Arenas.[4] Gold extracted in Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego generally left the zone without improving much the economy of southernmost South America, but in the case of the gold extracted from the islands south of Beagle Channel much of it ended up in Punta Arenas where it fueled economic growth.[4]

The devastating consequences of the Great Depression in Chile in the labour market led to a revival of gold ming in Cordón Baquedano by Chilote and Croatian pirquineros in the 1930s.[7]

## See also

[edit]

* Chilean silver rush
* Boundary treaty of 1881 between Chile and Argentina
* German colonization of Valdivia, Osorno and Llanquihue
* Gold mining in Chile

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Martinic Beros, Mateo (2003). "La minería aurífera en la región austral americana (1869-1950)". Historia (in Spanish). 36. doi:10.4067/S0717-71942003003600009 (inactive 12 July 2025).`{{cite journal}}`: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of July 2025 (link)
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Beros 1973, pp. 55–65
3. ^ a b c d e f Bascopé Julio, Joaquín (November 2010). "Sentidos coloniales I. El oro y la vida salvaje en Tierra del Fuego, 1880-1914" (PDF). Magallania. 38 (2): 5–26\. doi:10.4067/S0718-22442010000200001. ISSN 0718-2244.
4. ^ a b c d Beros 1973, pp. 65–75
5. ^ Mason, Peter (2001). "La muerte exhibida fotografias de Julius Popper en Tierra del Fuego". In Odone, C.; Palma, M. (eds.). The lives of images. Picturing history. London: Reaktion. p. 153\. ISBN 978-1-86189-114-3.
6. ^ Ray, Leslie (2007). Language of the land: the Mapuche in Argentina and Chile. Document. Copenhagen: IWGIA, International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs. p. 80\. ISBN 978-87-91563-37-9. OCLC 159958365.
7. ^ Saldívar, Juan M. (2020). "Etnografía histórica de la migración croata y chilota en la fiebre del oro en Porvenir, Tierra del Fuego, Chile 1930-1990" [Historical Ethnography of the croatian and chilotes migration in the gold rush of Porvenir, Tierra del Fuego, Chile 1930-1990]. Estudios Atacameños (in Spanish). 66 (66): 347–366\. doi:10.22199/issn.0718-1043-2020-0054.

## Further reading

[edit]

* Beros, Mateo Martinic (1973). Crónica de las tierras del sur del Canal Beagle (in Spanish). Editorial Francisco de Aguirre.

## External links

[edit]

* "SS Arctique", Wrecksite. Information on the vessel.

* v
* t
* e

Gold rushes of the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries

United States|

* Carolina (1800s)
* Georgia (1829)
* California (1848)
* Pike's Peak (1858)
* Black Hills (1876)
* Nome (1899)
* Fairbanks (1902)

Canada|

* Queen Charlottes (1851)
* Fraser Canyon (1858–1860)
* Rock Creek (1860)
* Similkameen (1860)
* Stikine (1861–1862)
* Cariboo (1861–1866)
* Nova Scotia (1861–1874, 1896–1903, 1932–1942)
* Wild Horse Creek (1863–1865)
* Leechtown (1864–1865)
* Big Bend (1865)
* Omineca (1869)
* Cassiar (1871–?)
* Cayoosh (1884)
* Klondike (1897–1903)
* Porcupine (1911)

Australia|

* Victorian (1851)
* New South Wales (1851)
* Western Australian (1880s–1890s)

New Zealand|

* Otago (1861–1863)
* West Coast (1864–1867)
* Coromandel (1860s–1870s)

Latin America|

* Brazilian gold rush (began 1690s)
* Ouro Preto, Brazil (1750)
* Tierra del Fuego (Chile-Argentina) (1883)
* Andacollo, Chile (1930)
* Serra Pelada, Brazil (1980)

Europe|

* Wicklow, Ireland (1795)
* Kildonan, Scotland (1869)
* Lapland, Finland (1870)

Africa|

* Witwatersrand, South Africa (1886)
* Kakamega, Kenya (1930s)

Part of a series on Gold mining

* v
* t
* e

Financial bubbles

* Market trend
* Credit cycle
* Irrational exuberance
* Social contagion
* Real-estate bubble
* Stock market bubble

Commercial revolution
(1000–1760)|

* Tulip mania (1634–1637)
* Mississippi bubble (1684–1720)
* South Sea bubble (1711–1720)
* Bengal Bubble of 1769 (1757–1769)

1st Industrial Revolution
(1760–1840)|

* Canal Mania (c. 1790–c. 1810)
* Carolina gold rush (1802–1825)
* 1810s Alabama real estate bubble
* Georgia Gold Rush (1828–c. 1840)
* 1830s Chicago real estate bubble
* Chilean silver rush (1830–1850)

1840–1870|

* Railway Mania (c. 1840–c. 1850)
* California gold rush (1848–1855)
* Queen Charlottes Gold Rush (1851)
* Victorian gold rush (1851–c. 1870)
* New South Wales gold rush (1851–1880)
* Australian gold rushes (1851–1914)
* Fraser Canyon Gold Rush (1858)
* Pike's Peak gold rush (1858–1861)
* Rock Creek Gold Rush (1859)
* Pennsylvania oil rush (1859–1891)
* Similkameen Gold Rush (1860)
* Stikine Gold Rush (1861)
* Colorado River mining boom (1861–1864)
* Otago gold rush (1861–1864)
* Cariboo Gold Rush (1861–1867)
* First Nova Scotia Gold Rush (1861–1874)
* West Coast gold rush (1864–1867)
* Big Bend Gold Rush (c. 1865)
* Vermilion Lake gold rush (1865–1867)
* Kildonan Gold Rush (1869)
* Omineca Gold Rush (1869)

2nd Industrial Revolution
(1870–1914)|

* 1870s Lapland gold rush
* Coromandel Gold Rushes (c. 1870–c. 1890)
* Cassiar Gold Rush (c. 1870–c. 1890)
* Black Hills gold rush (1874–1880)
* Colorado Silver Boom (1879–1893)
* Western Australian gold rushes (c. 1880–c. 1900)
* Indiana gas boom (c. 1880–1903)
* Ohio oil rush (c. 1880–c. 1930)
* Tierra del Fuego gold rush (1883–1906)
* Cayoosh Gold Rush (1884)
* Witwatersrand Gold Rush (1886)
* Encilhamento (1886–1890)
* Cripple Creek Gold Rush (c. 1890–c. 1910)
* Klondike Gold Rush (1896–1899)
* Second Nova Scotia Gold Rush (1896–1903)
* Kobuk River Stampede (1897–1899)
* Mount Baker gold rush (1897–c. 1925)
* Nome Gold Rush (1899–1909)
* Fairbanks Gold Rush (c. 1900–1918)
* Texas oil boom (1901–1918)
* Cobalt silver rush (1903–1918)
* Porcupine Gold Rush (1909–1918)

Interwar period
(1918–1939)|

* 1920s Florida land boom (c. 1920–1925)
* Fairbanks Gold Rush (1918–c. 1930)
* Texas oil boom (1918–1945)
* Cobalt silver rush (1918–c. 1930)
* Porcupine Gold Rush (1918–1945)
* 1930s Kakamega gold rush
* Third Nova Scotia Gold Rush (1932–1942)

Post–WWII expansion
(1945–1973)|

* Texas oil boom (1945–c. 1950)
* Porcupine Gold Rush (1945–c. 1960)
* Poseidon bubble (1969–1970)

The Great Inflation
(1973–1982)|

* 1970s commodities boom
* Mexican oil boom (1977–1981)
* Silver Thursday (1980)
* New Zealand property bubble (c. 1980–1982)

Great Moderation/
Great Regression
(1982–2007)|

* 1980s oil glut
* New Zealand property bubble (1982–)
* Spanish property bubble (1985–2008)
* Japanese asset price bubble (1986–1990)
* Dot-com bubble (1995–2000)
* Baltic states housing bubble (2000–2006)
* Irish property bubble (c. 2000–2007)
* 2000s commodities boom (2000–2008)
* 2000s Danish property bubble (2001–2006)
* United States housing bubble (2002–2006)
* Romanian property bubble (2002–2007)
* Polish property bubble (2002–2008)
* Canadian property bubble (2002–)
* Chinese property bubble (2005–2011)
* Lebanese housing bubble (2005–2008)

* Chinese stock bubble of 2007
* Uranium bubble of 2007

Information Age
(2007–present)|

* 2000s commodities boom (2008–2014)
* Lebanese housing bubble (2008–)
* Corporate debt bubble (2008–)
* Australian property bubble (2010–)
* Cryptocurrency bubble (2011–)
* Everything bubble (2020–21)

* Carbon bubble
* Green bubble
* Social media stock bubble
* Unicorn bubble
* U.S. higher education bubble

*[v]: View this template
*[t]: Discuss this template
*[e]: Edit this template