USA > California > Sonoma County > History of Sonoma County : including its geology, topography, mountains, valleys, and streams > Part 61
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comitatus, and again I feared that that course would induce them to think that I was personally afraid of them, but a notice from the trespassers two days after my appointment, decided my course of action. The notice which I received informed me that if I dared to show myself in the redwoods, they would hang me to the first tree they came to. Accordingly, the next day I loaded myself down with iron and steel, got a horse, and started for the redwoods alone, having previously learned that their leader was a six-foot- and-a-half Irishman, in fact a perfect giant, by the name of McCabe, who would sally forth from his mountain hiding-place, come to Healdsburg, get half drunk, whip out the town, and return to the redwoods where he had his family. On my approach to the redwoods I enquired for McCabe's shanty ; on reaching it, I found him seated on his shaving-horse making shingles. I dismounted, hitched my horse, and advanced toward him and said: 'Is your name McCabe?' He replied in the affirmative. I added: 'Fighting McCabe?' "They call me so sometimes.' I said: ' Well, sir; I am that detested Judson's agent that you propose to hang to the nearest limb and have come to sur- render myself in execution; my name is Norton.' He dallied a few moments with his drawing knife and then said: 'Suppose we carry our threat into execution.' I made answer that there was no doubt but that they had force enough in the woods to do it, but there would be some of them that would not be worth hanging by the time it was done. He said: 'Well, Norton, what do you propose to do with us ?' I replied: 'Mack, I intend to put every devil of you out of the woods, unless you carry your threat into execution." He was silent for a minute, then said: 'Well, you look and act as if you meant all you say.' I answered : 'I mean every word of it.' ' Well,' said he, 'in case I leave, how long will you give a fellow to get off with his stealings?' I said : 'How long do you want, Mack ?' He replied : 'A week or ten days. I asked : 'Is two weeks sufficient ?' He replied : ' It is.' 'Will you leave at that time ?' 'I will.' I then said : 'That is enough between gentlemen.' Mack left according to agreement. I then went out into the woods where the axes were cracking on every side, some chopping, some splitting rails, others sawing bolts; in fact, it was a busy place. When I approached them I asked them what they thought they were doing there, if they did not know they were trespassers. They wanted to know who I was and what business I had there. I answered: 'I am the agent of Egbert Judson, the owner of this land and timber, and I forbid you to cut another stick and intend to make you pay for the trespass already committed. They commenced to gather around me, using the most insulting language; one of them, point- ing to a large limb on a spreading oak, said: 'We will give you just two minutes to get out of this, and, unless you are gone by that time, we will string you up to that limb.' I drew a revolver and cocked it, and told them to keep their distance, that I would kill the first one that attempted to advance and asked them to give me their names as I intended to prose-
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cute them, each and every devil. They gave me a laughable list which I will not attempt to copy here. After informing them that they were a set of cowardly scoundrels, and not a gentleman in the crowd, I left them and returned to Healdsburg. Johnson Ireland was the Justice of the Peace, and a firm, positive, honest man, and being satisfied that I could trust him, I brought about a hundred suits, using all the aliases I could think of, placed the papers in the hands of an officer, with instructions to serve all he could find in the woods, except my Irish 'giant, with directions to obtain their real names if possible. The actions were for trespass upon personal property, for taking and carrying away posts, rails, pickets, etc. I think the officer got service on sixty-two persons. The cases were set for hearing at twelve o'clock noon. The parties did not arrive in time, and I took a default against the crowd, and at two o'clock in the afternoon of tho same day I was seated in my office (which was on the second-floor over a store on West street) conversing with a friend, when I heard some one hallooing on the street. I walked to the balcony, and saw that the street was crowded with men. Their spokesman called out, "Well, old fellow, there is a man up in the redwoods who wants to compromise with you." I inquired his friend's name. He replied: "Damn you, if you want my friend's name find it out the way you found ours." I said it is very unhandsome in you not to give your friend's name, but as the business of the day is over with me, I will attend to it, but I think you are mistaken in your man. It is not Norton you are hunting; it is Surveyor-General Tracy, or Dr. Frisbie; but as you will not give your friend's name, I will accom- pany you to see your friend. I will go with one of you, two of you; or three of you, or I will go with your crowd: or I will be fairer still, I will agree to come down there and whale any one of you so blind that your wife will not know you when you get home again. I know your kind better than you know yourselves. Instead of rushing for me, as my friend had anticipated, they commenced gathering in knots, and at the end of an hour there was not one of them on the street. Thus ended the first and last attempt to mob me. My next adventure was in removing squatters from the east side of Russian river. Judson had sent a man by the name of A. J. Soules with a flock of sheep on his own land, on the Sotoyome Rancho, to pasture. The squatters (numbering sixteen families) went and removed Soules and the sheep from the grant, admonishing him that it would not be safe to return. Judgment was obtained in the Federal Court at San Francisco in ejectment against those men, but no one had dared to attempt to enforce it. Having been successful in driving the trespassers from the redwoods, Judson came to the conclusion that, perhaps, I might gain possession of his other land. After consultation, I directed him to send me a deputy from the United States Marshal's office, with the writs of ejectment, which he did. We went over to the field of our new labors, about five o'clock in the evening, having
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previously sent them notice of my intention to remove them in case they refused to enter into a lease, and recognize our title. We found them all at the house where we proposed to commence, all armed with knives or pistols. Over an hour was consumed in trying to get the party to sign a lease, but to no purpose. The evening was chilly, and I could not think of throwing a woman and small children out at that time of the evening. Accordingly, I told them that I would be there at eight o'clock the following morning to put them out. At the appointed hour we were on hand, and found them all there. I again tendered the lease, which was refused. I cocked my revolver, took my position in the gateway, and directed the Marshal to throw the goods out of the house, which he proceeded to do. They made a demonstra- tion as though they intended to make a rush. I warned them to keep back The Marshal got all out but the woman. He came to the door and said, "I cannot get this woman out." I told him to take my revolver and keep the men back, and I would attend to her. I walked in, found her seated in the middle of the floor, and said : " Madame, it becomes my unpleasant duty to remove you," at the same time stepping quickly to her back, bending over, and putting my hands beneath her so as to carry her out. She sprang to her feet, exclaiming, "I guess I can go out myself." After the woman had surrendered the citadel, the man (whose name, I believe, was Weber) remarked, that if it was not too late he would sign the lease. I replied that it was never too late for me to ameliorate the condition of my fellow-man, handed him the lease, which he signed. We went from house to house, all signing leases-thus Judson was restored to his land on the old Sotoyome Rancho. The Russian river and Dry creek valleys at this time were nearly all in the hands of the squatters, which territory was covered with Mexican grants, as follows : Sotoyome or Fitch grant, eight leagues; New Sotoyome, three leagues; the Tzabaco grant, containing something over four leagues. The titles were all confirmed, and patents issued and on record .. Notwith- standing all this, the squatters in possession had their secret leagues all over the county, and forcibly resisted all efforts to dispossess them, and the law seemed to be entirely a dead letter; actions in ejectment were prosecuted to judgment ; writs of restriction were issued and placed in the hands of officers, resistance made by an armed force, the military was called out, a requisition for the militia on one side, and Captain Forsee mustering two thousand squatters on the other side. Parties would be evicted one day, and the next morning would find them in possession of the same premises they had been ejected from the day before. Two thousand men had met and confronted each other in bloodless combat ; both parties marched and counter-marched until the force was played out. Norton, by express command of the Sheriff, was excluded from these wars; they finally left the affair where they com- menced. Though the fairest domain on which the sun ever shone, yet people shunned us as we had no title, or undisputed possession. Things were in this
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condition when Dr. L. C. Frisbie, from Vallejo, employed me to look after his interests in the Sotoyome Rancho. I took his business in hand, and suc- ceeded in making some sales, and getting along pretty smoothly for a few months, but it became necessary to bring several suits in ejectment, which I prosecuted to judgment. One of them was against Riland Arbuckle on a portion of the Sotoyome Rancho, and as he was a boastful, blowing fellow, I thought I would go for him first. The Sheriff dispossessed the party, and levied upon a quantity of barley that was sacked, which we removed to the house for safety. The squatters said they would not resist the officer, but that Arbuckle should be placed in possession again before morning, and that old Norton had better leave with the Sheriff if he knew what was good for him. I, however, thought differently. My client was not there, and I had determined to try strength of nerve with them, and had secured the services of seven young men to aid me. We were all supplied with double-barreled shot-guns and plenty of ammunition. The Sheriff had retired, and about a dozen of the squatters lingered for a time. I had gone out to recon- noiter the premises, when they commenced talking very rough to the boys, telling them that they had better leave as every one of them would be killed before morning, etc. The boys were telling them that they were not there to fight but merely to hold possession under the law. In the carly part of the conversation I had slipped up behind a large oak tree where I could hear every word that passed, and at this juncture I sprang from my concealment and exclaimed, "You are a bombastic set of cowards; you have dared me to hold these premises; now go home and rally your forces for your night attack; you will find old Norton at his post." My boys all bustled up and told them to go or they would boot them, and finally bluffed the fellows from the ground, but on riding off they called back that we would see them before morning. We then made breast works of the sacks of barley in the house, with loop holes through the thin siding, and before it was quite dark I placed patrols up and down tho road with instructions to retreat to our fortifications and notify us, but if the enemy advanced too fast they were to fire a revolver as a signal and make good their retreat. About eleven o'clock I heard the discharge of a revolver, and the two outposts came rushing in and said there was a large company of horsemen rapidly approaching. I formed the command outside of the house under a large laurel tree where it was quite dark. I ordered them to drop down upon their faces on the ground. On came the horsemen, from eighty to one hundred strong. When they got opposite to us and about four rods distant, I ordered "Ready !" All the locks clicked audibly. I said, " Reserve your fire till they attempt to cross the fence." The horsemen wavered for a moment, then with a right-about-face made equally as good time in getting away as they did in coming. I was satisfied that we had not seen the last of them. In consequence of this impression I kept a vigilant
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watch, and about two o'clock A. M. one of my sentinels came running in and said there was a large crowd creeping along the fence. I ordered my force to keep perfectly quiet. I took my old rifle that I had in camp, and skulked along the fence to within about a hundred yards of the foremost of the opposing party, when I slipped out and fired a shot about ten feet over their heads. At this there was another general stampede, and we were again in peaceable posses- sion of the Arbuckle place. I continued to eject the squatters from Frisbie's tracts with greater or less resistance until I had reduced the whole to pos- session. It now seemed to be the general opinion that I was the only one who could successfully cope with squatters, and John N. Bai.hache as one of the Fitch heirs, or rather tenant by courtesy, having married Miss Josephine Fitch, had a large tract of land covered by squatters, and having made many futile attempts to expel them, they had become so well organized and so confident of their ability to forcibly hold the premises, that they actually paraded the streets of Healdsburg, both men and women, with music and banners waving, and seemed to think that if they could only get rid of Bailhache they would be secure in their homes. In consequence of which idea, they made a raid on him and forced him to secrete himself in the Raney Hotel. Seeing his danger, I marched out with a cocked revolver in each hand, and met the mob and persuaded them that I was the man they wanted, and not Bailhache; but they came to the conclusion that they did not want either of us and retired. Still holding forcible possession of his lands, Mr. Bailhache about this time discovered that he had business at Fort Yuma. He moved his family to Santa Rosa and departed. A few months after this I received a letter of attorney from Mr. Bailhache at Fort Yuma, giving me full authority to enter upon any and all his lands in Sonoma county, and expel squatters, etc. I commenced operations under this power, but not until after I had convinced the sheriff who was then acting, that it was not much of an office anyhow, and he had agreed to turn the office over to his under sheriff in case he could furnish the necessary bonds which I believe were about thirty thousand dollars, and by that arrangement I agreed to furnish ten thousand, in consideration of which I was to have the privilege of selecting my own deputy for Healdsburg. This was carried out, and I chose J. D. Bins, and adopted a new system of warfare. I put in teams and went to work hauling off the fencing from the farms on the west side of Dry creek, thus rendering the land useless to them. This drove them to desperation. The teams had been hauling all day, and at evening when the teams were coming in with the last load for the day, as they were approach- ing Dry creek, my team being in the rear with five or six men upon the wagon, my brother among the number, two shots from rifles were discharged in rapid succession, and a bullet from one of them struck a Mr. Ferguson just above the knee, and running down the leg shattered the bones in a ter- rible manner-in fact it was a death shot. My brother drove him to town
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as fast as possible, but he never rallied from the nervous shock, and died the next day. Until this murderous attack I had not been thoroughly aroused, but after the death and burial of young Ferguson I took a posse of ten men, all thoroughly armed, and went with them in person, threw out a few out- posts to prevent any further shooting from the brush, and threw out the goods from their houses and burned them to the ground. In this way I went from house to house, until I had burned down all the dwellings on the Bailhache premises occupied by squatters. They followed us up en masse, and at length one of them said, "I would like to know who sets those build- ings on fire; I would make them smart legally." I replied, " what, you appcal to the law who have so long trampled law and justice beneath your feet ! You shall be gratified!" I said, "Jim Brown, fire that house;" he did so, the house was soon in flames. I said, "now take your legal remedy." Brown (a brother of Mayor Brown of Santa Rosa) was indicted, but a nol. pros. was entered in the case, as the house was mine, I having authorized the act there being no property of others in it nor no living being under our statuto, the act was legal. Some of the houses were good two-story buildings, but I treated them as I would have done a lot of rats' nests; under the circumstan- ces there was no alternative. After reducing the dwellings to heaps of smouldering ruins, the squatters continued to hang around like the French sol- diers around a burning Moscow until the elements drove them away to the hills, where some of them put up temporary adobes on the adjacent govern- ment land. In our attempt to keep the raiders from the different places, we had only been successful in gaining possession of a small portion, and in order to perpetuate my possession, I commenced repairing the fences, and on two or three occasions in the night they fired them. But I was ever on the alert, and discovered the fire in time to prevent much damage. My next effort was to find some one who would dare to take possession of some one of the places. At last I found a man by the name of Peacock, a powerful, resolute fellow, who proposed to purchase a piece of the land which a man by the name of Clark had been claiming, and whose house had been burned down. He contracted and entered into possession and guarded a fine lot of hay, a volunteer crop growing on the place. The hay had matured and he cut and cocked it, but in the intermediate time, contrary to my counsel, had made great friends with and confidants of the previous squatters, who had been evicted, and to whom, among other things, he told them that he was going to see my brother, to get his team to bale his hay the next day, and that he should be absent that night. I strongly opposed it, but he assured me that everything would be safe, but did not convince me. I was on the watch, and about two o'clock A. M., I discovered a bright light arise from the neighborhood of Peacock's hay. I rushed around, awakened Bailhache, Ransom Powell, and two or three others, and started for the scene of the fire. We succeeded in saving about one-third of his hay. On Peacock's
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return it was impossible to convince him that the Prouses had any hand in this, or that they knew anything of it. He continued his former relations with the Prouses for about one month after this time, he having gone to board with them. One day at dinner a dispute arose at table, and the two Prouse brothers set upon him; one of them, armed with something that the evidence afterwards disclosed as being somewhat like a bucther's cleaver. They cut and hacked Peacock up in a terrible manner, to that extent that for a long time his life was despaired of; for which offense I sent Daniel Prouse to the penitentiary and we continued to hold possession; the land being desirable farming land, and others seeing that our possession could be held, commenced purchasing, and thus Bailhache was restored to his possession, which put an end to the squatter difficulty on the Sotoyome Racho. About this time I was requested to take charge of the Tzabaco Rancho, by John B. Frisbie, and W. H. Patterson, of San Francisco, sending the request by James Clark, then Sheriff of Sonoma county, who held writs of ejectment against all the settlers on the Russian river side of the grant. I had been acting for them for more than two years as their agent, selling and leasing the Dry creek portion, where they met with but little opposition to their title; but before stating my action on the Russian River valley, I must state one incident that occurred on the Dry creek portion. I had been up Dry creek, serving some notices on parties who had not paid up, and was returning, mounted on a little gentle mare, and while jogging along, right opposite the widow Bell's old place, where there was an old watering trough and spring, at a large redwood stump, surrounded by a dense growth of redwood sprouts, when a shot was fired. I felt a concussion, and at the same instant my mare made a jump sideways, nearly throwing me from my saddle. I recovered myself and dismounted. I saw the brush wiggle and shake, and made for the point. The party took to his heels, running through the thick brush and up a very steep hill, and I only got a sight of his back. He wore a bluish-gray coat and a low black hat, and was rather a short man, and that was all I could tell of my would-be assassin. I was unarmed and had no way of stopping him. On examination I discovered that the bullet had passed through both sides of my vest, having entered the right side of my vest, high in the breast, and passing through my outer shirt, in front of my breast, and passing out of the left side of the vest. This was at a time when strangers thought us a set of desperadoes here, and there was but little said about it, as I did not wish to add to our reputation in that line. When I came in I showed it to Bailhache, D. F. Spurr, and, may be, two or three more. I still have the vest, and if this reaches the eye of the perpetrator of the deed he may congratulate himself on the fact that I could not recognize him. And now to the squatters on the Russian river side of the grant, hostile almost to a man. When the Sheriff informed me that he was under my instructions I told him to go home, and if I needed him I would let him know. I then went to Frisbie and Patterson,
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saying that in case I entered upon the hazard of attempting to manage the squatters to send me an unconditional power to survey, segregate and sell all the lands upon such terms and time as I should deem proper, being accountable to no one for my actions in its disposition. They immediately sent me the asked for power, which was communicatel to the settlers in a very exaggerated manner, they being led to believe that I would eject them from their homes without an opportunity of purchasing at any price. Whereupon their secret organization met, I having two trusty friends in that organization, who hastened to me, and communicated to me so much of the proceedings as in their judgment was necessary to preserve my life. I was told by them that it was determined in counsel that my death was essential in order to defeat the measures about to be carried into effect; and by resolution by them adopted, it was resolved, that if I ever showed myself upon the Tzabaco Rancho I was to be killed like a snake by whoever discovered me; and in addition to this, they balloted to see whose duty it was to be my special executioner to hunt me out and kill me. Those men begged of me, under the circumstances, not to come on to the grant. I fully comprehended the fact, that these men were in a state of desperation, as we held one judgment over them in the sum of ten thousand dollars, for use and occupation of the premises, and another judgment of ten thousand dollars, obtained on injunc- tion bond, making a total of twenty thousand dollars; together with writs of ejectment against every one of them. After due reflection, I resolved to " beard the lion in his den," and to fight the devil with fire, and when I was all ready, I hitched my pony to the buggy, and started for the Tzabaco Rancho. After placing a quart bottle of old Bourbon under the buggy seat, and arming myself in case of trouble, I drove to the ranch, which is about six miles from Healdsburg, following the Geyserville road, and adjoining the Sotoyome Rancho on the west. I drove up opposite to the house of one Captain Vessor then living close to the line, and saw the old captain in his yard hewing out a plow-beam. I stopped my horse, and called cut, "Captain Vessor, will you step this way?" He dropped his ax, and came to the road ; when about five or six feet from the buggy he raised his spectacles, and recog- nizing me he instantly became as black as a thunder-cloud. I jumped out of the buggy, and confronting him, said: "I am informed that you men have, in solemn conelave determined to shoot and scalp me if I ever came on this grant, and as shooting is a game that two may play at, I will commence now," at the same time running my hand under the buggy seat. The old captain threw up both hands, commenced running backwards, exclaiming, " Don't, don't." " I'll be hanged, if I don't !" at the same time bringing the whisky bottle to bear upon him. A pleasurable sensation, after the most abject fear, wrought another change in the captain, when he laughingly exclaimed: "Oh, God! you might have shot me with that long ago." I then gave the old man a shot in the neck, and bade him get into the buggy, but
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