Would the Gold Rush still happen if the US was still at war?

[DocJamore]

Self explanatory question. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the war with Mexico at an opportunistic time. Any later and the United States might have pushed for greater concessions, which would effectively extended the war into 1848 and beyond.

Would the settlers be deterred by going into a war zone? Would there still be a gold rush at all?

 

[Arkenfolm]

At worst, you'd probably just delay the gold rush until peace is signed. But even then, you'd be more at risk of American Indian attacks than Mexican soldiers in the California goldfields which were away from the main fighting in California. And the Indians couldn't deter people.

 

[Crunch Buttsteak]

The Treaty of Cahuenga had ended hostilities in California a good year before the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the war.

In fact there had already been a minor gold rush in 1842 in the San Gabriel Mountains near Santa Clarita.

Plus the Californio settlement was mostly centered around Los Angeles and Monterey.

So to make this idea work, you could have one of the Californio ranchers get a land grant for the Sierra Nevada foothill areas around Coloma and containing the more accessible placer gold deposits, which leads to an earlier gold discovery and news of which spreads to Mexico City.

With that, the Mexican Government would actually give two shits about Alta California, with more people coming north from Baja California and such, thus would be more heavily defended.