The (Once) Great Republic of Rough and Ready

by Jennifer Gunner

Clouds of dust and profanity hung in the town hall of Rough and Ready as the gold miners shuffled inside. Scorching sunshine streamed into the room between the wooden slats in the walls, sizzling every man at his bench. Above their heads hung haphazard streamers of red, white and blue; in their denim pockets bulged clumps of pay dirt they’d been sifting when the whistle had blown.

“Town meeting!” continued the cries outside. “Emergency town meeting!”

Inside, a few of the newly arrived wives hunkered together, their disappointed eyes sliding over the men. Once well-groomed husbands were now unrecognizable under long, wild beards and leathered skin. Many of the wives found themselves longing for the jostling journey of the covered wagons and their husband-free lives in Wisconsin. They wrinkled their noses against the stink of stale sweat.

The last miner entered the hall, whooping and waving a lemon-sized gold nugget above his head. Shouts of course approval and grumblings of sour grapes filled the hall.

“All rise for the president of the Great Republic of Rough and Ready, Colonel E.F. Brundage!” called a drawling voice. President Brundage strode to the front of the room. 

“Thank you, gentleman,” Brundage said, and when his eyes swept the room he quickly added, “and ladies. Lord knows Rough and Ready needs a woman’s touch.”

The bachelors cackled. The husbands shifted in their seats.

“But welcoming you isn’t the reason for our meeting.” Brundage cleared the nervousness from his throat. “As you all know, we voted to leave the tyrannical United States only three short months ago. I think we’d all agree that our secession has been a resounding success.”

A man belched from the back of the room.

“But I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news,” Brundage continued.

“Better not be about our Fourth of July party today!” another man hollered.

“I’m afraid that's just what it’s about.” Brundage gestured to a sullen man at the door. “Mr. Howard, perhaps it’s best coming from you.”

Howard slunk to the front of the room, his worn hat in hand. “We can’t get no liquor,” he reported. 

An alarmed hush swept the room.

“Nobody’ll sell us anything.” Howard’s eyes were sunken. “Saloons are closed to Rough and Ready, they say. Grass Valley, Nevada City—everywhere.”

“On account of what?” a man demanded. 

“On account of Rough and Ready being another country,” Howard said. “And us being foreigners.”

The chatter gave way to howls of rage.

“I’m a damn American!” cried a miner. “Born in America!”

“My daddy and granddaddy fought the British!”

“I’ve never even been to no other country!”

“Nevada City ain’t nothing but foreigners!”

“Now, men,” stated Brundage, “I told you this might happen. The federal government has turned our sister cities against us. They’re jealous that we’ve escaped the mining taxes that took our gold from our pockets.”

“So now we gotta have a dry Fourth of July?” a miner asked. “No whiskey? No nothing?”

“Maybe we can make do,” said another miner. “What about Miller’s moonshine?” 

The crowd turned toward the window, where an aged rain barrel sat in the searing sunlight, and then at Miller. Miller glanced at his stern wife. “Just rain in that barrel,” he said, twisting his hat in his hands. “Never heard of no moonshine.”

“How much, er—rain—you got left, Miller?” Howard’s voice was hopeful.

“None,” Miller said quickly. “Dry as a bone.”

The men moaned.

Brundage held up an authoritative hand. “Given this unfortunate news, I propose that we put off the party until we can get the requisitions we need.”

“But today’s the goddamn Fourth of goddamn July!” cried a miner in the front, and the wives in the seats around him shot their husbands accusing looks. “We can’t very well wait for the twenty-ninth of July!”

“Sure we can.” Brundage spread his arms wide as if to harness the shouting. “We’re not Americans anymore, so why should we celebrate their day of independence?”

His words cut into the crowd like a sharp spade though wet clay.

“We don’t kneel to the federal government anymore,” he continued. “We don’t obey their laws, and we don’t need their holiday.”

“But I’ve always celebrated the Fourth.” The once-enraged miner now sounded like a lost child. “Me and my folks used to watch the parade in Milwaukee.”

“Me too,” said another. “And we’d drink whiskey all night.”

A man sniffled in the back.

“I say we go back to America,” said the miner in the front. “Maybe then we can get some whiskey.”

“I know some sporting women who can be here by suppertime!” shouted another miner. The bachelors cheered; the husbands blanched.

“Now, fellas!” Brundage waved frantically. “Forget America! We’re Rough and Readyans—named after the great President Zachary Taylor!”

“The great American president Zachary Taylor,” quipped a miner. 

Brundage ignored him. “This is what we wanted! We voted months ago!”

“Then let’s vote again!”

“Yes! Another vote!”

“You’re voting for a damn party, not a country!” shouted Brundage. 

“Can you get us whiskey any other way, Brundage?” 

The question hung in the air. Brundage’s mouth opened and shut like a dying trout. 

“Then it’s settled.” The loud miner stood and faced the crowd. “Everyone for rejoining the United States and the state of California?”

Every hand in the room shot up, pickaxe-calloused and lace-gloved alike. “Aye!”

When Brundage’s hand slowly joined them, the rickety hall’s floorboards vibrated with hoots and hollers.

Later, after the men and the earth alike were saturated in liquor and the last sporting woman had hitched a ride out of town, the citizens of Rough and Ready, California—including Mr. Miller, who’d finished scrubbing out his rancid rain barrel just in time—would remember 1850 as the greatest Fourth of July in history. Even Colonel Brundage would forever recount the indelible night to his grandchildren, his whiskey-brown eyes sparkling with flints of gold, his voice still hoarse from patriotic song. 

About the author

Jennifer Gunner is a freelance writer who regularly publishes articles on grammar, writing, literature, and pretty much everything else. She is a fellow of the South Coast Writing Project and an active participant in writing contests of all shapes and sizes. 

About the illustration

The illustration is "A forty-niner peers into the silt of California's American River." Photograph by L.C. McClure, 1850. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.