She struck a reef off Point Cabrillo, broke up and sank, killing six of her crew.
Captain Faucon, the mates, and three crew members reached Fort Ross in a ship's boat. Her loss of merchandise from China was estimated at $150,000.
When the sailors made it to San Francisco, local merchants listened to their tales carefully and sent an expedition to salvage the Frolic.
Would-be treasure hunters found local Indians wearing Chinese silks but never recovered any for themselves. They did, however, bring back stories of huge forests with enormous redwood trees.
San Francisco was a growing town at that time and needed timber. The sinking of the Frolic lead to the great California Timber rush and spurred the development of logging ports along every minor cove in Mendocino County.
The Voyage of the 'Frolic: New England Merchants and the Opium Trade
Thomas N. Layton
Stanford University Press
The colorful story of the clipper "Frolic" lay buried until 1984 when the author discovered Chinese porcelain at the site of a Pomo Indian village in northern California. The "Frolic" was built in 1844 by New England merchants to carry opium from India to China, and its history vividly depicts the political, financial, and logistical aspects of the opium trade. Steam vessels made the "Frolic" obsolete as an opium clipper, and it was on its way to Gold Rush San Francisco with a rich cargo when it went aground in 1850 on the Mendocino coast.