Voyage of the Brooklyn Saints information

The ship Brooklyn Saints were pioneers who sailed from New York City to San Francisco in Alta California (February 4 – July 31, 1846)^[1] to establish the first Mormon colony in the West.^[2][3] Due to religious persecution,^[4][5] leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) planned to relocate the Mormon^A populace outside the United States.^[6] Two hundred thirty eight pioneers were recruited^[7][8] to sail around Cape Horn with heavy equipment for a large colony.^[9] They would plant crops and build infrastructure to receive the larger migration coming west by wagon the following year. Brooklyn took six months to sail 24,000 miles around Cape Horn to Alta California, surviving two terrible storms.^[10] Upon landing, the Brooklyn Saints were instrumental in building San Francisco^[11][12] and helped to kick off the California Gold Rush.^[13]

The Brooklyn arrived at the San Francisco Bay shortly after the Mexican–American War commenced in California, just as U.S. forces were gaining control of the area.^[14] Brooklyn's seventy male passengers were immediately pressed into service. Building the settlement had to wait while assigned military duties were performed.^[15][16] With food and shelter scarce,^[17] the colonists experienced initial hardships. Nonetheless, within three months, many acres of land in the San Joaquin Valley were fenced, planted with wheat, and a grain mill was erected.^[18] When military conflict moved south, the passengers worked communally to construct one hundred buildings during the first year. Soon eight nearby towns were founded, connected by ferries, roads and bridges.^[19][20] As other American settlers arrived, San Francisco grew into "the great emporium of the Pacific"^[21] and farm produce yielded one of California's first millionaires, John Horner.^[22]

The Brooklyn colonists invested their time and resources into building up the Bay area, expecting the main body of Latter-day Saints to settle near them. However, Brigham Young chose the Great Salt Lake Valley as the center place for the Mormon population and as the site for a holy temple to be built.^[23] When official word of the new gathering place was issued, Samuel Brannan informed the disappointed Brooklyn settlers that their communal endeavors in San Francisco were at an end.^[24] Their joint property was sold. Although uniting with the rest of the Mormon populace was still much desired,^[25] the Brooklyn settlers lacked resources to undertake an 800-mile overland journey and start their lives over.

Within three months, funding for a second migration became possible when gold was discovered at Coloma (January 24, 1848).^[26] Samuel Brannan publicized the rich finds locally in his newspaper^[27] and sent riders with a special edition back east, spurring the Gold Rush. Operating lucrative trading posts for miners^[28] soon made Brannan another of California's early millionaires. Most of the Brooklyn pioneers worked placer mines along the American River^[29] and were amply rewarded. With the gold they unearthed, by July 1849, about half of the Brooklyn pioneers outfitted wagons and headed over the Sierras to Salt Lake City^[30] on a new route built by veterans of the Mormon Battalion. Their Mormon Emigrant Trail through Carson Pass^[31] became the main route west for gold seekers to reach the mining regions.^[32] In 1851, church leaders from Utah recruited about half of the remaining Brooklyn pioneers to build another Mormon colony at San Bernardino.^[33] Two Brooklyn Saints went to the Sandwich Islands, while most of the rest returned to their lives in the eastern states.^[34]