[Printed Circular Letter from the Anglo-Californian Gold Mining Company Regarding Company Stock]

London: May 19, 1855. About very good.. [2]pp., on a bifolium. Previously folded. Light wear along top edge; short closed tear at right margin. Scattered faint foxing. With original mailing envelope. This two-page printed circular, dated May 19th, 1855, from the Anglo-California Gold Mining Company in London, offers to convert "unissued shares" of company stock into "preference shares." The first page of the circular reads, in part:

"You will observe from the enclosed report [not present] of the adjourned General Meeting, that circumstances have arisen in California rendering it imperative that the Director should immediately have at his command a further sum of £6,600. You will also observe that the Board have power to convert the unissued shares into preference shares, at par, to be offered in the first instance to the present holders of shares. The advantage offered to persons taking those Shares is that they are guaranteed a dividend of 25 per cent per annum before any dividend is paid on the other Shares."

The second leaf of the bifolium prints a blank form for recipients to purchase said preferred shares. During the first years of the California gold rush, approximately 120 companies formed in Great Britain to offer mining shares in the booming goldfields to the public. Many saw these companies as an opportunity to invest in the boom without facing the expense or the danger of traveling to California. Most, however, ended in failure, and investors collectively lost almost £2 million at the time.

The Anglo-California Gold Mining Company, formed by Luke Williams in March 1849, was one of the first and largest of these British ventures, and it sold thousands of ten shilling shares to the public. Williams sent a former Royal Navy Captain, Henry Vere Huntley to the Calaveras River in early 1850 to start the operation. When he failed, Williams arranged a deal with Fremont's Quartz Rock Mariposa Gold Company to crush and refine their ore and the ore of smaller ventures. To that end, the company sent two steam-powered crushing mills to California, and when those proved useless to the task, the company failed.