French Gulch, a mining town founded by French-Canadian miners, was a major stop on the stage coach route from Sacramento to Portland between 1859 and 1868. The present main street was at one time the Shasta and Yreka Turnpike Road.

French Gulch was the center of vast mining activities. Among the more famous were the Franklin and Milkmaid Mines, the Washington Mine, and the Niagara Mine, which in 1880 was sold to a local miner for $10 and a gallon of whiskey. The miner worked the claim and took out over $2 million worth of gold. The Brown Bear Mine was discovered in the late 1850s by a bear hunter and it produced $11 million.

The first white child in Shasta County, C. F. Montgomery, was born here April 24, 1851.

French Gulch is located in a narrow canyon between a hill and Clear Creek. Almost all the buildings face a single main street. The population in 2010 was 346.

When the town was nominated for the National Register in 1972, the buildings included a hotel, a post office, a public school, St. Rose Catholic Church, two cemeteries, two stores, an IOOF Hall, a legitimate theater in the former school building, and several dozen dwellings mostly of considerable age.

The church and the IOOF Hall were destroyed by separate fires.

French Gulch has large yards, numerous trees, white picket fences, an irrigation ditch of fresh water alongside the main street for part of its length, and a pleasant trout stream in a rocky bed behind the town. Above and below the town are the scars of placer gold mining operations.

Source: NRHP Nomination Form dated 24 March 1972.