Dame Shirley was a woman from the Gold Rush. Her real name was Louise Clapp. Louise Clapp arrived in Rich Bar, California, in September 1851. Only four women and about a thousand men were there! She met
a man who hadn’t spoken to a women in two years!
During the Gold Rush, Louise Clapp wrote a series of letters to her sister Molly. Molly lived in New England. The letters where published in 1854 under the name Dame Shirley. In her letters Dame Shirley usually complained that the miners drank liquor, fought, and gambled and she once wrote that “similar (accidents) happened very often.”
by Rosie, Steven
Read more Women’s Gold Rush Stories.
