Historical Marker · No. 143
Marshall Monument
Coloma, El Dorado County · California
Erected by The State of California; monument unveiled May 3, 1890, 1890
Marshall is buried under this. He died at Kelsey in 1885, broke, having outlived a state pension that ran from 1872 and was allowed to lapse in 1878; by the end he was selling his autograph for fifty cents a card. Five years later the legislature appropriated nine thousand dollars for a monument and tomb on an acre of his old vineyard, advocated by the Placerville parlor of the Native Sons of the Golden West. It was the first monument the state erected. The bronze figure on top points at the tailrace.
What the plaque says
Erected by the State of California in memory of James W. Marshall 1810 - 1885 whose discovery of gold January 24, 1848 in the tailrace of Sutter's mill at Coloma, started the great rush of argonauts Monument unveiled May 3, 1890
Where it stands
38.79673, -120.89418 · Directions
Worth the stop nearby
- Marshall Gold Discovery State Historic Park — 1.1 miThe tailrace at Coloma where a carpenter found gold in January 1848 and the world came running.
More markers nearby
- Coloma Road-Coloma — 0.4 mi
- Gold Discovery Site — 0.5 mi
- Wakamatsu Tea and Silk Farm Colony — 1.7 mi
- Marshall's Blacksmith Shop — 4.1 mi