A history of California and an extended history of its southern coast counties, also containing biographies of well-known citizens of the past and present, Volume I, Part 31

Author: Guinn, James Miller, 1834-1918
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company
Number of Pages: 1184

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The vigorous measures adopted by the com- mittee purified the city of the vicious class that had preyed upon it. Several of the smaller towns and some of the mining camps organized vigilance committees and a number of the knaves who had fled from San Francisco met a deserved fate in other places.

In the early '50s the better elements of San Francisco's population were so engrossed in business that they had no time to spare to look after its political affairs; and its government gradually drifted into the hands of vicious and corrupt men. Many of the city authorities had obtained their offices by fraud and ballot stuf- fing and "instead of protecting the community against scoundrels they protected the scoundrels against the community." James King of Will-

iam, an ex-banker and a man of great courage and persistence, started a small paper called the Daily Evening Bulletin. He vigorously as- sailed the criminal elements and the city and county officials. His denunciations aroused pub- lic sentiment. The murder of United States Marshal Richardson by a gambler named Cora still further inflamed the public mind. It was feared that by the connivance of some of the corrupt county officials Cora would escape pun- ishment. His trial resulted in a hung jury. There was a suspicion that some of the jury- men were bribed. King continued through the Bulletin to hurl his most bitter invectives against the corrupt officials. They determined to silence him. He published the fact that James Casey, a supervisor from the twelfth ward, was an ex- convict of Sing Sing prison. Casey waylaid King at the corner of Montgomery and Wash- ington streets and in a cowardly manner shot him down. The shooting occurred on the 14th of May, 1856. Casey immediately surrendered himself to a deputy sheriff, Lafayete M. Byrne, who was near. King was not killed, but an ex- amination of the wound by the physicians de- cided that there was no hopes of his recovery. Casey was conducted to the city prison and as a mob began to gather, for greater safety he was taken to the county jail. A crowd pursued him crying, "Hang him," "kill him." At the jail the mob was stopped by an array of deputy sheriffs, police officers and a number of Casey's friends, all armed. The excitement spread throughout the city. The old vigilance com- mittee of 1851, or rather a new organization out of the remnant of the old, was formed. Five thousand men were enrolled in a few days. Arms were procured and headquarters estab- lished on Sacramento street between Davis and Front. The men were divided into companies. Willian T. Coleman, chairman of the vigilance committee of 1851, was made president or No. I, and Isaac Bluxome, Jr., the secretary, was No. 33. Each man was known by number. Charles Doane was elected chief marshal of the military division.

The San Francisco Herald (edited by John Nugent), then the leading paper of the city, came out with a scathing editorial denouncing the

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vigilance committee. The merchants at once withdrew their advertising patronage. Next morning the paper appeared reduced from forty columns to a single page, but still hostile to the committee. It finally died for want of patron- age.

On Sunday, May 18, 1856, the military di- vision was ready to storm the jail if necessary to obtain possession of the prisoners, Casey and Cora. The different companies, marching from their headquarters by certain prescribed routes, all reached the jail at the same time and com- pletely invested it. They had with them two pieces of artillery. One of these guns was planted so as to command the door of the jail. There were fifteen hundred vigilantes under arms. A demand was made on Sheriff Scannell for the prisoners, Cora and Casey. The prison guard made no resistance, the prisoners were surrendered and taken at once to the vigilantes' headquarters.

On the 20th of May the murderers were put on trial; while the trial was in progress the death of King was announced. Both men were convicted and sentenced to be hanged. King's funeral, the largest and most imposing ever seen in San Francisco, took place on the 23d. While the funeral cortege was passing through the streets Casey and Cora were hanged in front of the windows of the vigilance headquarters. About an hour before his execution Cora was married to a notorious courtesan, Arabella Ryan, but commonly called Belle Cora. Catholic priest, Father Accolti, performed the ceremony.

Governor J. Neely Johnson, who at first seemed inclined not to interfere with the vig- ilantes, afterwards acting under the advice of David S. Terry, Volney E. Howard and others of "the law and order faction," issued a proc- lamation commanding the committee to disband, to which no attention was paid. The governor then appointed William T. Sherman major-gen- eral. Sherman called for recruits to suppress the uprising. Seventy-five or a hundred, mostly gamblers, responded to his call. General Wool, in command of the troops in the department of the Pacific, refused to loan Governor Johnson arms to equip his "law and order" recruits and

General Sherman resigned. Volney E. Howard was then appointed major-general. His princi- pal military service consisted in proclaiming what he would do to the "pork merchants" who constituted the committee. He did nothing ex- cept to bluster. A squad of the vigilance po- lice attempted to arrest a man named Maloney. Maloney was at the time in the company of David S. Terry (then chief justice of the state) and several other members of the "law and or- der" party. They resisted the police and in the melee Terry stabbed the sergeant of the squad, Sterling A. Hopkins, and then he and his as- sociates made their escape to the armory of the San Francisco Blues, one of their strongholds.

When the report of the stabbing reached headquarters the great bell sounded the alarm and the vigilantes in a very brief space of time surrounded the armory building and had their cannon planted to batter it down. Terry, Ma- loney, and the others of their party in the build- ing, considering discretion the better part of valor, surrendered and were at once taken to Fort Gunnybags," the vigilantes' headquarters. The arms of the "law and order" party at their various rendezvous were surrendered to the vig- ilantes and the companies disbanded.

Terry was closely confined in a cell at the headquarters of the committee; Hopkins, after lingering some time between life and death, finally recovered. Terry was tried for assault on Hopkins and upon several other persons, was found guilty, but, after being held as a prisoner for some time, was finally released. He at once joined Johnson and Howard at Sacramento, where he felt much safer than in San Francisco. He gave the vigilantes no more trouble.

On the 29th of July, Hethrington and Brace were hanged from a gallows erected on Davis street, between Sacramento and Commercial. Both of these men had committed murder. These were the last executions by the commit- tee. The committee transported from the state thirty disreputable characters and a number de- ported themselves. A few, and among them the

*The vigilantes built around the building which they used for headquarters a breastwork made of gunny- sacks filled with sand. Cannon were planted at the corners of the redout.

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notorious Ned McGowan, managed to keep con- cealed until the storm was over. A few of the expatriated returned after the committee dis- solved and brought suit for damages, but failed to recover anything. The committee had paid the fare of the exiles. It was only the high toned rascals who were given a cabin passage that brought the suits. The committee finished its labors and dissolved with a grand parade on the 18th of August (1856). It did a good work. For several years after, San Francisco from be- ing one of the worst, became one of the best governed cities in the United States. The com- mittee was made up of men from the northern and western states. The so-called "law and order" party was mostly composed of the pro- slavery office-holding faction that ruled the state at that time.

When the vigilance committees between 1851 and 1856 drove disreputable characters from San Francisco and the northern mines, many of them drifted southward and found a lodgment for a time in the southern cities and towns. Los Angeles was not far from the Mexican line, and any one who desired to escape from justice, fleet mounted, could speedily put himself be- yond the reach of his pursuers. All these causes and influences combined' to produce a saturnalia of crime that disgraced that city in the early '50s.

Gen. J. H. Bean, a prominent citizen of Southern California, while returning to Los An- geles from his place of business at San Gabriel late one evening in November, 1852, was at- tacked by two men, who had been lying in wait for him. One seized the bridle of his horse and jerked the animal back on his haunches; the other seized the general and pulled him from the saddle. Bean made a desperate resistance, but was overpowered and stabbed to death. The assassination of General Bean resulted in the organization of a vigilance committee and an . effort was made to rid the country of desper- adoes. A number of arrests were made. Three suspeets were tried by the committee for various crimes. One, Cipiano Sandoval, a poor cob- bler of San Gabriel, was charged with complicity in the murder of General Bean. He strenuously maintained that he was innocent. He, with the

other two, were sentenced to be hanged. On the following Sunday morning the doomed men were conducted to the top of Fort Hill, where the gallows stood. Sandoval made a brief speech, again declaring his innocence. The others awaited their doom in silence. The trap fell and all were launched into eternity. Years afterward one of the real murderers on his deathbed revealed the truth and confessed his part in the crime. The poor cobbler was inno- cent.

In 1854 drunkenness, gambling, murder and all forms of immorality and crime were ram- pant in Los Angeles. The violent deaths, it is said, averaged one for every day in the year. It was a common question at the breakfast table, "Well, how many were killed last night?" Little or no attention was paid to the killing of an Indian or a half breed; it was only when a gente de razon was the victim that the community was aroused to action.

The Kern river gold rush, in the winter of 1854-55, brought from the northern mines fresh relays of gamblers and desperadoes and crime increased. The Southern Californian of March 7, 1855, commenting on the general lawlessness prevailing, says: "Last Sunday night was a brisk night for killing. Four men were shot and killed and several wounded in shooting af- frays."

A worthless fellow by the name of David Brown, who had, without provocation, killed a companion named Clifford, was tried and sen- tenced to be hanged with one Felipe Alvitre, a Mexican, who had murdered an American named Ellington, at El Monte. There was a feeling among the people that Brown, through quibbles of law, would escape the death penalty, and there was talk of lynching. Stephen C. Foster, the mayor, promised that if justice was not legally meted out to Brown by the law. then he would resign his office and head the lynching party. January 10, 1855, an order was received from Judge Murray, of the supreme court, stay- ing the execution of Brown, but leaving Alvitre to his fate. January 12 Alvitre was hanged by the sheriff in the jail yard in the presence of an immense crowd. The gallows were taken down and the guards dismissed. The crowd gathered

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outside the jail yard. Speeches were made. The mayor resigned his office and headed the mob. The doors of the jail were broken down; Brown was taken across Spring street to a large gateway opening into a corral and hanged from the crossbeam. Foster was re-elected by an almost unanimous vote at a special election. The city marshal, who had opposed the action of the vigilantes, was compelled to resign.

During 1855 and 1856 lawlessness increased. There was an organized band of about one hun- dred Mexicans, who patroled the highways, robbing and murdering. They threatened the extermination of the Americans and there were fears of a race war, for many who were not members of the gang sympathized with them. In 1856 a vigilance committee was organized with Myron Norton as president and H. N. Alexander as secretary. A number of dis- reputable characters were forced to leave town. The banditti, under their leaders, Pancho Dan- iel and Juan Flores, were plundering and com- mitting outrages in the neighborhood of San Juan Capistrano.

On the night of January 22, 1857, Sheriff James R. Barton left Los Angeles with a posse, consisting of William H. Little, Charles K. Baker, Charles F. Daley, Alfred Hardy and Frank Alexander with the intention of captur- ing some of the robbers. At Sepulveda's ranch next morning the sheriff's party was warned that the robbers were some fifty strong, well armed and mounted, and would probably attack them. Twelve miles further the sheriff and his men en- countered a detachment of the banditti. A. short, sharp engagement took place. Barton, Baker, Little and Daley were killed. Hardy and Alexander made their escape by the fleetness of their horses. When the news reached Los Angeles the excitement became intense. A public meeting was held to devise plans to rid the community not only of the roving gang of murderers, but also of the criminal classes in the city, who were known to be in sympathy with the banditti. All suspicious houses were searched and some fifty persons arrested. Sev- eral companies were organized; the infantry to guard the city and the mounted men to scour the country. Companies were also formed at

San Bernardino and El Monte, while the mil- itary authorities at Fort Tejon and San Diego despatched soldiers to aid in the good work of exterminating crime and criminals.

The robbers were pursued into the mountains and nearly all captured. Gen. Andres Pico, with a company of native Californians, was most efficient in the pursuit. He captured Silvas and Ardillero, two of the most noted of the gang, and hanged them where they were cap- tured. Fifty-two were lodged in the city jail. Of these, eleven were hanged for various crimes and the remainder set free. Juan Flores, one of the leaders, was condemned by popular vote and on February 14, 1857, was hanged near the top of Fort Hill in the presence of nearly the entire population of the town. He was only twenty-one years of age. Pancho Daniel, an- other of the leaders, was captured on the 19th of January, 1858, near San José. He was found by the sheriff, concealed in a haystack. After his arrest he was part of the time in jail and part of the time out on bail. He had been tried three times, but through law quibbles had escaped conviction. A change of venue to Santa Bar- bara had been granted. The people determined to take the law in their own hands. On the morning of November 30, 1858, the body of Pancho was hanging from a beam across the gateway of the jail yard. Four of the banditti were executed by the people of San Gabriel, and Leonardo Lopez, under sentence of the court, was hanged by the sheriff. The gang was broken up and the moral atmosphere of Los Angeles somewhat purified.

November 17, 1862, John Rains of Cuca- monga ranch was murdered near Azusa. De- cember 9, 1863, the sheriff was taking Manuel Cerradel to San Quentin to serve a ten years' sentence. When the sheriff went aboard the tug boat Cricket at Wilmington, to proceed to the Senator, quite a number of other persons took passage. On the way down the harbor, the prisoner was seized by the passengers, who were vigilantes, and hanged to the rigging ; after hanging twenty minutes the body was taken down, stones tied to the feet and it was thrown overboard. Cerradel was implicated in the mur- der of Rains.

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In the fall of 1863 lawlessness had again be- come rampant in Los Angeles; one of the chiefs of the criminal class was a desperado by the name of Boston Daimwood. He was suspected of the murder of a miner on the desert and was loud in his threats against the lives of various citizens. He and four other well- known criminals, Wood, Chase, Ybarra and Olivas, all of whom were either murder- ers or horse thieves, were lodged in jail. On the 2Ist of November two hundred armed citizens battered down the doors of the jail, took the five wretches out and hanged them to the portico of the old court house on Spring street, which stood on the present site of the Phillips block.

On the 24th of October, 1871, occurred in Los Angeles a most disgraceful affair, known as the Chinese massacre. It grew out of one of those interminable feuds between rival tongs of highbinders, over a woman. Desul- tory firing had been kept up between the rival factions throughout the day. About 5:30 p. m. Policeman Bilderrain visited the seat of war, an old adobe house on the corner of Arcadia street and "Nigger alley," known as the Coronel build- ing. Finding himself unable to quell the dis- turbance he called for help. Robert Thompson, an old resident of the city, was among the first to reach the porch of the house in answer to the police call for help. He received a mortal wound from a bullet fired through the door of a Chi- nese store. He died an hour later in Woll- weber's drug store. The Chinese in the mean- time barricaded the doors and windows of the old adobe and prepared for battle. The news of the fight and of the killing of Thompson spread throughout the city and an immense crowd gathered in the streets around the build -. ing with the intention of wreaking vengeance on the Chinese.

The first attempt by the mob to dislodge the Chinamen was by cutting holes through the flat brea covered roof and firing pistol shots into the interior of the building. One of the besieged crawled out of the building and attempted to escape, but was shot down before half way across Negro alley. Another attempted to es- cape into Los Angeles street; he was seized,

dragged to the gate of Tomlinson's corral on New High street, and hanged.

About 9 o'clock a part of the mob had suc- ceeded in battering a hole in the eastern end of the building; through this the rioters, with demoniac howlings, rushed in, firing pistols to the right and left. Huddled in corners and hid- den beliind boxes they found eight terror- stricken Chinamen, who begged piteously for their lives. These were brutally dragged out and turned over to the fiendish mob. One was dragged to death by a rope around his neck; three, more dead than alive from kicking and beating, were hanged to a wagon on Los An- geles street; and four were hanged to the gate- way of Tomlinson's corral. Two of the victims were mere boys. While the shootings and hang- ings were going on thieves were looting the other houses in the Chinese quarters. The houses were broken into, trunks, boxes and other receptacles rifled of their contents, and any Chinamen found in the buildings were dragged forth to slaughter. Among the vic- tims was a doctor, Gene Tung, a quiet, inof- fensive old man. He pleaded for his life in good English, offering his captors all his money. some $2,000 to $3,000. He was hanged, his money stolen and one of his fingers cut off to obtain a ring he wore. The amount of money stolen by the mob from the Chinese quarters was variously estimated at from $40,000 to $50,000.

About 9:30 p. m. the law abiding citizens, under the leadership of Henry Hazard, R. M. Widney, H. C. Austin, Sheriff Burns and oth- ers, had rallied in sufficient force to make an attempt to quell the mob. Proceeding to China- town they rescued several Chinamen from the rioters. The mob finding armed opposition quickly dispersed.

The results of the mob's murderous work were ten men hanged on Los Angeles street, some to wagons and some to awnings; five hanged at Tomlinson's corral and four shot to death in Negro alley, nineteen in all. Of all the Chinamen murdered, the only one known to be implicated in the highbinder war was Ah Choy. All the other leaders escaped to the country before the attack was made by the mob. The

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grand jury, after weeks of investigation, found indictments against one hundred and fifty per- sons alleged to have been actively engaged in the massacre. The jury's report severely cen- sured "the officers of this county, as well as of this city, whose duty it is to preserve peace," and declared that they "were deplorably ineffi- cient in the performance of their duty during the scenes of confusion and bloodshed which disgraced our city, and lias cast a reproach upon the people of Los Angeles county." Of all those indicted but six were convicted. These were sentenced to from four to six years in the state's prison, but through some legal technicality they were all released after serving a part of their sentence.

The last execution in Los Angeles by a vig- ilance committee was that of Michael Lachenias, a French desperado, who had killed five or six men. The offense for which he was hanged was the murder of Jacob Bell, a little inoffensive man, who owned a small farm near that of Lachenias, south of the city. There had been a slight difference between them in regard to the use of water from a zanja. Lachenias, with- out a word of warning, rode up to Bell, where he was at work in his field, drew a revolver and shot him dead. The murderer then rode into town and boastingly informed the people of what he had done and told them where they would find Bell's body. He then surrendered himself to the officers and was locked up in jail.

Public indignation was aroused. A meeting was held in Stearns' hall on Los Angeles street. A vigilance committee was formed and the de- tails of the execution planned. On the morning of the 17th of December, 1870, a body of three hundred armed men marched to the jail, took Lachenias out and proceeded with him to Tom- linson's corral on Temple and New High streets, and hanged him. The crowd then quietly dis- persed.

A strange metamorphosis took place in the character of the lower classes of the native Cal- ifornians after the conquest. (The better classes were not changed in character by the changed conditions of the country, but throughout were true gentlemen and most worthy and honorable

citizens.) Before the conquest by the Ameri- cans they were a peaceful and contented people. There were no organized bands of outlaws among them. After the discovery of gold the evolution of a banditti began and they produced some of the boldest robbers and most daring highwaymen the world has seen.

The injustice of their conquerors had much to do with producing this change. The Ameri- cans not only took possession of their country and its government, but in many cases they de- spoiled them of their ancestral acres and their personal property. Injustice rankles; and it is not strange that the more lawless among the native population sought revenge and retalia- tion. They were often treated by the rougher American element as aliens and intruders, who had no right in the land of their birth. Such treatment embittered them more than loss of property. There were those, however, among the natives, who, once entered upon a career of crime, found robbery and murder congenial occupations. The plea of injustice was no ex- tenuation for their crimes.

Joaquin Murieta was the most noted of the Mexican and Californian desperadoes of the early '50s. He was born in Sonora of good fam- ily and received some education. He came to California with the Sonoran migration of 1849, and secured a rich claim on the Stanislaus. He was dispossessed of this by half a dozen Amer- ican desperadoes, his wife abused and both driven from the diggings. He next took up a ranch on the Calaveras, but from this he was driven by two Americans. He next tried min- ing in the Murphy diggings, but was unsuccess- ful. His next occupation was that of a monte player. While riding into town on a horse bor- rowed from his half-brother he was stopped by an American, who claimed that the horse was stolen from him. Joaquin protested that the horse was a borrowed one from his half-brother and offered to procure witnesses to prove it. He was dragged from the saddle amid cries of "hang the greaser." He was taken to the ranch of his brother. The brother was hanged to the limb of a tree, no other proof of his crime being needed than the assertion of the American that the horse was his. Joaquin was stripped. bound

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to the same tree and flogged. The demon was aroused within him, and no wonder, he vowed revenge on the men who had murdered his brother and beaten him. Faithfully he carried out his vow of vengeance. Had he doomed only these to slaughter it would have been but little loss, but the implacable foe of every American, he made the innocent suffer with the guilty. He was soon at the head of a band of desperadoes, varying in numbers from twenty to forty. For three years he and his band were the terror of the state. From the northern mines to the Mexican border they committed robberies and murders. Claudio' and some of his sub- ordinates were killed, but the robber chief seemed to bear a charmed life. Large rewards were offered for him dead or alive and numerous attempts were made to take him. Capt. Harry Love at the head of a band of rangers August, 1853, came upon Joaquin and six of his gang in a camp near the Tejon Pass. In the fight that ensued Joaquin and Three Fingered Jack were killed. With the loss of their leaders the or- ganization was broken up.

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A history of California and an extended history of its southern coast counties, also containing biographies of well-known citizens of the past and present, Volume I, Part 31

Author: Guinn, James Miller, 1834-1918 Publication date: 1907 Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company Number of Pages: 1184

Author: Guinn, James Miller, 1834-1918
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company
Number of Pages: 1184