The Rivals: William Gwin, David Broderick, and the Birth of California [Paperback]

Arthur Quinn (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 28, 1997

“This is the story of two men—of how they achieved great power and how through their implacable rivalry they destroyed each other,” writes Arthur Quinn. Anticipating California’s admission to the union, both came to the state in 1849 seeking a seat in the U.S. Senate. William McKendree Gwin, an aristocratic Southerner, and David Broderick, a veteran of the bare-knuckle politics of New York, struggled for control of California’s Democratic Party during the 1850s. Their feud, personal as well as political, ended in violent death for one and disgrace for the other.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Unlike most political histories of the antebellum period, this work does not focus on events in the eastern United States. Instead, it examines the slave-free soil struggle in California through the eyes of two of the young state's prominent public figures and rivals, who each went west to seek his political and financial fortunes. William Gwin was an aristocratic Mississippi planter with a dubious past, and David Broderick was a veteran of the bareknuckle politics of New York City. Each sought and obtained a seat in the U.S. Senate, but their conflicting views spilled over into personal animosity that led to Broderick's death in an illegal duel and Gwin's subsequent dishonor. Quinn (Broken Shore, Redwood Pr., 1987) presents more than a well-crafted tale of two rivals; he works in the dual contexts of a state in the making and a nation breaking apart as the Civil War looms closer. A balanced work for history collections.
Daniel Liestman, Seattle Pacific Univ. Lib.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Quinn painstakingly reconstructs the legendary personal and political rivalry that motivated and eventually destroyed two of the principal architects of California's successful bid for statehood. In 1849, both William Gwin, a privileged southern aristocrat, and David Broderick, a one-time New York working-class politico, arrived in California determined to shape destiny in their favor and become major power-brokers. Though they both belonged to the Democratic Party, they represented opposing factions and continually vied for influence and control in both California and Washington. Eventually, this bitter feud escalated beyond professional jealousy, erupting in violence as Broderick was slain in a well-publicized duel with one of Gwin's faithful supporters. Set against the colorful backdrop of the gold rush, the battle for statehood, and the onset of the Civil War, this dramatic chronicle moves outside the realm of biography into the arena of social history. Margaret Flanagan --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Bison Books (September 28, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0803288514
• ISBN-13: 978-0803288515
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,242,197 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Personification of the American Struggle, March 9, 2011

By 

R. P. Cotta Jr. (Modoc County, California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Rivals: William Gwin, David Broderick, and the Birth of California (Paperback)

Most contemporary Californians are probably not conversant with the tumultuous and bawdy beginnings of the Golden State, or how the 1849 Gold Rush brought into the state representatives from nearly every corner of the world, and all manner of agents of fortune. Among the Argonauts were William Gwin and David Broderick, two men who came not to seek their fortunes in the mines, but to achieve greatness in the halls of political power.

Arthur Quinn has not exactly written a biography of Gwin and Broderick, although one can hardly read "The Rivals" without learning a great deal about their respective lives. (In fact, Quinn's narrative is so rife with historical fascination that many a reader, like myself, will be tempted to put the book down in order to research and read fuller accounts of characters and events only alluded to in the main text.) Rather, Quinn's focus is on the decade of the Eighteen-fifties, and how Gwin and Broderick -- both Democrats -- came to lead opposing wings of that political party in California, a populist wing (Broderick) and the Southern wing (Gwin).

In fact, Quinn splendidly shows how the struggles of Gwin and Broderick epitomized the struggles of the nation as it groped its way toward the Civil War. But Quinn's perspective, if considered as retrospective, casts Gwin and Broderick as personifications of America's working classes and its aristocracy. Although both Gwin and Broderick are both long in their graves, the struggle they waged, in this sense, goes on apace today.

(As a side note, it may be difficult to find the grave of David Broderick. Even though his death caused a statewide sensation, he was apparently removed from his original resting place in San Francisco's old Laurel Hill Cemetery in the first half of the 20th Century, when San Francisco removed almost all cemeteries from the city limits. It would appear his remains were deposited in a mass grave in a cemetery in Colma, California, and his grave monument unceremoniously dumped into the San Francisco Bay along with other gravestones. If so, this would be a rather pedestrian and unceremonious end to one of California's first United States Senators -- although one that might please William Gwin.)

The reader of history will indulge in Quinn's descriptions of old California, particularly of San Francisco (of which little from the 1850s remains) and Monterey. One may still visit old Colton Hall in Monterey, where California's constitutional convention was held in 1850, where William Gwin played a major role. The story also recounts the California experiences of other historic figures, such as William Tecumseh Sherman, John Fremont, Bayard Taylor, and others, as well as the ugly rise of vigilantism in San Francisco and other California cities.

But the story centers on Gwin and Broderick, and their antagonism toward one another. In fact, these men could never have gotten along because each was what the other so vehemently resented. Gwin was from the landed aristocracy, the ruling elite, a plantation owner from the South, to the manor born and groomed to wear the mantles of power. Gwin considered the common man, the laborer, the mechanic and craftsman, as merely the flotsam and jetsam of Humanity, to be ruled by men such as himself, lest they drag all civilization itself back to a state of anarchical barbarism. Broderick, on the other hand, was one of those common men, the son of a stone cutter, a former New York saloon owner who was no stranger to a barroom brawl. To Broderick, it was the gentry, as represented by Gwin, which was the sworn enemy of the working classes everywhere.

In the end, both Broderick and Gwin come to political ruin as the times engulf them. Broderick was killed in a duel by a former California Supreme Court justice in 1859, and although Gwin lived until 1885, it is not hard to imagine that he considered his departed rival, as between them, the more fortunate.

This is a great book for history buffs, especially California history. It would have benefited the reader to include photographs of Broderick and Gwin, other important personages of the times, perhaps a few period photos of California, and certainly a map or two. But, despite this lack, by the time you have finished it, you will have a sense of actually knowing the two protagonists, and even of having lived through the events which transpired so long ago.