A Sketch Of The Causes, Operations And Results Of The San Francisco Vigilance Committee Of 1856 Part 1

A Sketch of the Causes, Operations and Results of the San Francisco Vigilance Committee of 1856.

by Stephen Palfrey Webb.

1874

Stephen Palfrey Webb was born in Salem on March 20, 1804, the son of Capt. Stephen and Sarah (Putnam) Webb. He was graduated from Harvard in 1824, and studied law with Hon. John Glen King, after which he was admitted to the Ess.e.x Bar. He practiced law in Salem, served as Representative and Senator in the Ma.s.sachusetts Legislature, and was elected Mayor of Salem in 1842, serving three years. He was Treasurer of the Ess.e.x Railroad Company in the late forties.

About 1853, he went to San Francisco, where he resided several years, serving as Mayor of that city in 1854 and 1855. It was during this time that he witnessed the riotous mobs following the Gold Rush of 1849, and upon his return Salem made notes for a lecture, which he delivered in Salem; and later, with many additions, prepared this sketch, probably about 1874. He was again elected Mayor of Salem, 1860-1862, and City Clerk, 1863-1870. He died in Salem on September 29, 1879. On May 26, 1834, he married Hannah H. B. Robinson of Salem.

There have been several accounts of the activities of the Vigilance Committee, but this is firsthand information from one who was on the ground at the time, and for this reason it is considered a valuable contribution to the history of those troublous days. It certainly is a record of what a prominent, intelligent and observing eye-witness saw regarding this important episode in the history of California. The original paper is now in the possession of his granddaughter, Mrs.

Raymond H. Oveson of Groton, Ma.s.sachusetts.

Many of the evils which afflicted the people of San Francisco may be traced to the peculiar circ.u.mstances attendant upon the settlement of California. The effect all over the world of the discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill in 1848 was electric. A movement only paralleled by that of the Crusades at once commenced. Adventurers of every character and description immediately started for the far away land where gold was to be had for the gathering. The pa.s.sage round Cape Horn, which from the earliest times had been invested with a dreamy horror, and had inspired a vague fear in every breast, was now dared with an audacity which only the all absorbing greed for gold could have produced. Old condemned hulks which, at other times, it would not have been deemed safe to remove from one part of the harbor to another, were hastily fitted up, and with the aid of a little paint and a few as deceptive a.s.surances of the owners, were instantly filled with eager pa.s.sengers and dispatched to do battle, as they might, with the storms and perils of the deep during the tedious months through which the pa.s.sage extended. The suffering and distress consequent upon the packing so many human beings in so confined a s.p.a.ce; the miserable quality and insufficient quant.i.ty of the provisions supplied; the weariness and la.s.situde engendered by the intolerable length of the voyage; the ill-temper and evil pa.s.sions so sure to be roused and inflamed by long and forced companions.h.i.+p without sympathy or affection, all tended to make these trips, for the most part, all but intolerable, and in many cases left feelings of hate and desire for revenge to be afterwards prosecuted to b.l.o.o.d.y issues.

The miseries generally endured were however sometimes enlivened and relieved by the most unexpected calls for exertion. A pa.s.senger described his voyage from New York to San Francisco in 1849, in company with several hundred others in a steamer of small size and the most limited capacity in all respects, as an amusing instance of working one's pa.s.sage already paid for in advance. The old craft went groaning, creaking, laboring and pounding on for seven months before she arrived at her destination. Short of provisions, every sailing vessel that was encountered was boarded for supplies, and almost every port on the Atlantic and Pacific was entered for the same purpose. Out of fuel, every few days, axes were distributed, and crew and pa.s.sengers landed to cut down trees to keep up steam for a few days longer. He expressed his conviction that every point, headland, island and wooded tract on the coast from the Cape to San Francisco had not only been seen by him, but had resounded with the st.u.r.dy blows of his axe during the apparently interminable voyage. His experience, with the exception of the axe exercise, was that of thousands.

The extent to which the gold fever had impelled people on s.h.i.+pboard may be judged by the facts that from the first of January, 1849, five hundred and nine vessels arrived in the harbor of San Francisco; and the number of pa.s.sengers in the same s.p.a.ce of time was eighteen thousand, nine hundred and seventy-two. Previous to this time, one or two s.h.i.+ps in the course of a year found their way through the Golden Gate and into the beautiful harbor of San Francisco in quest of hides, horns and tallow, and gave languid employment to two or three Americans settled on the sand hills, and engaged in collecting these articles of trade and commerce. In the closing days of 1849, there were ninety-four thousand, three hundred and forty-four tons of s.h.i.+pping in the harbor. The stream of immigration moved over the Plains, likewise; and through privation, fatigue, sickness, and the strife of the elements, pa.s.sed slowly and painfully on to the goal of their hopes.

Thus pouring into California in every direction and by every route, this strange and heterogeneous ma.s.s of men, the representatives of every occupation, honest and dishonest, creditable and disgraceful; of every people under the sun, scattered through the gulches and ravines in the mountains, or grouped themselves at certain points in cities, towns and villages of canons or adobe. Perhaps never in the world's history did cities spring into existence so instantaneously, and certainly never was their population so strangely diverse in language, habits and customs.

Of course gamblers of every kind and color; criminals of every shade and degree of atrocity; knaves of every grade of skill in the arts of fraud and deceit abounded in every society and place. In these early times gold was abundant, and any kind of honest labor was most richly and extravagantly rewarded. The honest, industrious and able men of every community, therefore, applied themselves strictly to business and would not be diverted from it by any considerations of duty or of patriotism.

Studiously abstaining from politics; positively refusing to accept office; s.h.i.+rking constantly and systematically all jury and other public duty, which, onerous in every community, was doubly so, as they thought, in that new country, they seemed never to reflect that there was a portion, and that the worst, of the population, who would take advantage of their remissness, and direct every inst.i.tution of society to the promotion of their own nefarious purposes.

Absorbed in their own pursuits, confident that a short time would enable them to realize their great object of making a fortune and then leaving the country, the better portion of the community abandoned the control of public affairs to whoever might be willing or desirous to a.s.sume it. Of course there was no lack of men who had no earthly objection to a.s.sume all public duties and fill all public offices. Politicians void of honesty and well-skilled in all the arts of intrigue, whose great end and aim in life was to live out of the public treasury and grow rich by public plunder, and whose most blissful occupation was to talk politics in pot houses and groggeries; men of desperate fortunes who sought to mend them, not by honest labor, but by opportunities for official pickings and stealings; bands of miscreants resembling foul and unclean birds which clamor and fight for the chance of settling down upon and devouring the body to which their keen scent hag directed them; all were astir and with but little effort obtained all that they desired. The offices were thus filled by rapacious and unscrupulous men. The agents who had helped to elect them, or impose them upon the people by fraud, were supported and protected in their villainies; and in the consciousness of impunity for crime, walked the streets heavily armed and ready on the instant to exact a b.l.o.o.d.y revenge for an interference with their infamous schemes, or an attempt to bring them to merited punishment.

In San Francisco the effects of all this were visible at an early period in the prevalence of crime and outrage; in the laxity with which offenders were prosecuted; in the squandering of public property; the increasing burden of taxation; and the insecurity of life and property.

Now and then when the evils of the system weighed with the most depressing effect upon the business part of the community, some spasmodic effort for a time produced a change. But a temporary check only was applied. The snake was scotched, not killed. The ballot box upon whose sanct.i.ty, in a Republican government must the liberties of the people depend, was in the hands of the pliant tools of designing politicians, or of desperate knaves ready to bargain and sell the result of the election to the party or individuals who would pay the largest sum for it. By such infamous arts had many officials of law and justice been placed in situations of trust and power. Could it reasonably be expected that they would honestly and fairly apply the law to the punishment of the friends who had given them their offices, when they added to these crimes against society, the scarcely more flagrant ones of robbery and murder? If it was possible, the people did not believe it would be done. They saw enough to convince them that it was not done.

They saw an unarmed man shot down and instantly killed in one of the most frequented streets of the city while endeavoring to escape from his pursuer. They saw the forms of trial applied in this clear case, and after every quibble and perversion of law which ingenuity could devise had been tried, the lame and impotent conclusion arrived at of a verdict of manslaughter, and a sentence for a short period to the State Prison.

They saw a gambler, while quietly conversing with the United States Marshal in the doorway of a store on Clay Street, draw a revolver from his pocket and slay him upon the spot. They heard that gamblers and other notorious characters, his a.s.sociates and friends, had raised large sums; that able lawyers had been retained for his defense; and then that his trial had ended in a disagreement of the Jury, soon to be followed, as they believed, by a nolle prosequi, and the discharge of the red handed murderer. They saw an Editor, for commenting on a homicide in the interior of the State, committed by a man claiming to be respectable, and followed by his acquittal in the face of what appeared to be the clearest evidence of his guilt; a.s.saulted by the criminal in a public street in San Francisco, knocked down from behind by a blow on the head from a loaded cane, and beaten into insensibility, and, as seemed, to death; while three of the a.s.sailant's friends stood by, with c.o.c.ked revolvers, threatening to slay anyone who should interfere. Again they saw the farce of trial resulting, as every one knew it would, in acquittal. At length, so confirmed and strengthened were villains by the certainty of escape from punishment, that they did not even trouble themselves to become a.s.sured of the ident.i.ty of their victims. A worthy citizen in going home through Merchant Street between eight and nine o'clock in the evening was approached from behind by a person who, pressing his arm over his shoulder thrust a knife into his breast.

Luckily the knife encountered in its pa.s.sage a thick pocket memorandum book which it cut through, and but for which, he would have lost his life. The intended a.s.sa.s.sin undoubtedly mistook him for another person whom he somewhat resembled. A few days after a gentleman pa.s.sing by the Oriental Hotel heard the report of a pistol, and was sensible of the pa.s.sage of a ball through his hat in most uncomfortable proximity to his head. A person immediately stepped up to him saying, "Excuse me, I thought it was another man."

The ally of the people in times of difficulty and danger, the Press, seemed subservient from choice to this vile domination, or overawed and controlled by it. Experience had proved that its conductors could be true, bold, effective only at the peril of their lives. More than one had suffered in his person the penalty of his allegiance to truth and duty; until at length intimidated and desponding, they had ceased to struggle with the spirit of evil....

One man upon whom public attention was now turned, and whom the people of the City and State began to regard as their champion and deliverer, was James King of William, and he was no common man. He was born in Georgetown, D. C., in January, 1822, and was therefore thirty-four years old at the time of his death. Having received a common school education, he was placed at an early age in the banking house of Corcoran & Riggs at Was.h.i.+ngton City where he remained many years. His health at length failing from steady application to business and conscientious devotion to his employer's interests, he was induced to seek its restoration in the invigorating climate of California. He arrived in the country just previous to the discovery of gold. The marvelous growth of City and State soon required facilities for the transaction of business, and he became a resident of San Francisco, and established the first banking house in that City. For several years he was eminently successful in business; and his strict honesty and integrity secured for him the abiding confidence and respect of the business community. But the sudden and extreme depression in business in 1855 closed his doors as well as those of many other bankers and merchants. By the surrender to his creditors of all he possessed, even his homestead, which, to the value of five thousand dollars, the laws of California allowed him to retain, and which might well be coveted by him as a home for his wife and six children; every claim against him was promptly met and discharged.

Retaining amidst all his reverses, the respect of all who knew him, he engaged as a clerk in the banking house of Adams & Co. where most of his old customers followed him, induced to do so by their confidence in him. After the failure of that firm, he was for some time out of active employment. But compelled by the necessities of a large family to seek it, he determined to establish a daily newspaper and take upon himself the editorial charge of it. For such an undertaking, his large experience in business, his resolute spirit, his sound judgment, his keen insight into character, his lofty scorn and detestation of meanness, profligacy, peculation and fraud, eminently fitted him. The paper, the Evening Bulletin, was first issued on the eighth day of October, 1855. From that day to the day of his death, he devoted all his faculties most faithfully and conscientiously to the exposure of guilt, the laying bare gigantic schemes for defrauding the public, the denouncing villains and villainy in high or low station, and the reformation of the numerous and aggravated abuses under which the community was and had long been groaning. Day after day did he a.s.sail with dauntless energy the open or secret robbers, oppressors or corruptors of the people. Neither wealth nor power could bribe or intimidate him. It would be difficult to conceive the enthusiasm with which the People hailed the advent of so able a champion, and the intense satisfaction with which they witnessed his steadfast perseverance in the cause of truth and the right.

At length, on the fourteenth day of May 1856, the anxious fears and gloomy forebodings of his family and friends were realized.... His a.s.sa.s.sin, James P. Casey, was well-known and of evil repute in the City.

Bold, daring, and unscrupulous, his hand was ever ready to execute the plans of villainy which his fertile brain had conceived. Sentenced in New York to imprisonment for grand larceny in the State Prison at Sing Sing for the term of two years, and discharged when that term had nearly expired; he soon after sailed for California. Shortly after his arrival, he was chosen Inspector of Elections in the Sixth Ward of San Francisco.

Here he presided over the ballot box, and was generally believed to have accomplished more ballot box staffing, ticket s.h.i.+fting and false returns than any other individual in the City or State. He made, as was generally believed, his office a means of livelihood, and held the City and County offices in his hands to be disposed of in such manner as might best promote his interest or fill his pockets. Year after year by this means he was acc.u.mulating money, until he was reputed to have made a fortune, although never known by the people to have been engaged in any honest industrial occupation in California. For the purpose perhaps of adding the levy of blackmail to his other modes of acc.u.mulation, he established a newspaper, called the Sunday Times, and without principle, character or education, a.s.sumed to be the enlightener of public opinion and the conservator of public morals. During the few months of its existence, the paper was conducted without ability; advocated no good cause; favored no measures for promoting the public interest or welfare; attained no measure of popularity; and its discontinuance inspired no regret, but was felt rather to be a relief.

The thought seems now to have suggested itself that having been so long the distributor of offices to others he might well a.s.sume it himself; and thus while obtaining position in society, enlarge his sphere of operations in plundering the public. Accordingly a ballot box at the Presidio Precinct in the suburbs of the City was so arranged or presided over by friends or pliant tools, that four or five days alter the election, the law being conveniently silent as to the time which might be consumed in counting votes and making the return, it was made to turn out James P. Casey a member of the Board of Supervisors of the County, although not known to have been a candidate for the office at the Polls on the day of election. In this responsible position, he could find his way on important Committees, be able to squander the resources of the County, and by his vote and influence a.s.sist in pa.s.sing the most exorbitant claims, of which, it is to be presumed, he received a satisfactory percentage.

So high-handed an offender against the law and the rights of the people could not escape the notice or the withering rebuke of Mr. King. He fearlessly proclaimed him a convicted felon, and dealt with him as one of the princ.i.p.al of those offenders against all law, human or divine, with whom San Francisco had been so long and so terribly cursed.

The Bulletin of May 14th, in which the charges founded upon the most incontrovertible evidence, of Casey's conviction, sentence and discharge from Sing Sing, was made in the plainest terms accompanied with comments upon his ballot-box stuffings and other criminal acts in San Francisco, was published at an early hour in the after noon. At four o'clock Casey called at the Editor's room and demanded of Mr. King what he meant by the article in the Bulletin just issued, and was asked to what article he alluded? "To that" was the reply, "in which I am said to have been formerly an inmate of Sing Sing State Prison." "Is it not true?" said King. Casey replied, "That is not the question. I don't wish my past acts raked up; on that point I am sensitive." King then pointed to the door which was open, and told him to leave the room and never enter there again. Casey moved to the door saying, "I'll say in my paper what I please." To which King replied "You have a perfect right to do as you please. I shall never notice your paper." Casey said, "If necessary, I shall defend myself." King, rising from his seat, said, "Go, and never show your face here again." Casey immediately retired.

At five o'clock, his usual dinner hour, Mr. King left his office. With his arms crossed under his Taima, as was his wont, and his eyes cast down, he pa.s.sed along Montgomery Street apparently in deep thought, and at the corner of Was.h.i.+ngton Street began to cross the street diagonally.

When about half across, Casey stepped from behind an Express wagon, dropped a short cloak from his shoulders, and uttering a few words, the only ones heard by Mr. King, as he said on his death bed, being "Come on," immediately discharged one barrel of a large revolver into Mr.

King's breast. Mr. King drew himself up, and then made a slight motion sideways, indicating plainly to the few persons in sight at the time, that he was. .h.i.t. The spectators immediately ran in towards him, and a.s.sisted him into and seated him in the Express Office. He was badly wounded in the left breast, and was apparently in a dying condition.

In the meantime Casey was hurried by his friends and the Police to the Station House in the City Hall, and from thence, when the demonstrations of the immense mult.i.tude of infuriated citizens became awfully threatening, in a close carriage, to the Prison on Broadway, where, within stone walls, he might, as he did, receive the visits an congratulations of his admirers and the haters of the good man, whom he had slain; and lay his plans for eluding justice as so many before him had done. But he reckoned without his host. His hour had struck. The Avenger was on his trick, never more to lose sight of him till he had forced him to a speedy, public and ignominious death. The People, whom he had so long abused and deprived of their rights, as at last almost to have learned to ignore their very existence, had reached that point at which forbearance had ceased to be a virtue. Through the City darted with the speed of light the intelligence of his crime; and to the scene of it rushed from all the streets, lanes and by ways of the City, with wild haste and fearful imprecations, the thousands upon thousands whom that word of fearful import had filled with sorrow, hate and desperate resolve. Filling every street and avenue in the neighborhood with the innumerable mult.i.tude which swayed to and fro like the tempest tossed waves of ocean; the main body continued for hours, loading the air with hoa.r.s.e murmurs or angry shouts; detachments breaking off from time to time to rush with frantic speed and hurl themselves successively but impotently upon the iron doors and stone walls of the Station House or Jail.

During the evening, so threatening became the demonstrations of the people that every effort was made by the authorities to reinforce the Police. Armed men were dispatched from time to time to be stationed around and on the top of the Jail. They were received, as they made their way through the dense ma.s.s with hootings and execrations. The Mayor vainly endeavoured to obtain a hearing, and to calm the fiery pa.s.sion of the mult.i.tude. With wild rage, fruitless clamor and ineffective effort, that great crowd waited impatiently but vainly for some leader to give direction to their energy. At half past eleven a mounted battalion consisting of the California Guards, First Light Dragoons and National Lancers, were mustered, supplied with ammunition, and marched off to the Jail, where they did duty during the night.

The safety of the Prison being now provided for, the people quietly dispersed to their homes, not, however, until a Committee, consisting of Messrs. Macondry, Palmer and Sims in whom they had confidence had been sent in, and reported to them that the prisoner was securely locked in a cell within it.

Meantime, amid this wild tumult of the people, a number of merchants and other prominent and influential citizens had a.s.sembled in a store in the lower part of the City, and there after full consideration of the intolerable condition of affairs, it was resolved forthwith to organize a Vigilance Committee. At an early hour the next morning another meeting was held and a Const.i.tution adopted, the publication of which was sometime after sanctioned by the Executive Committee.

This Instrument was deliberately approved, and was subscribed by several thousand citizens of San Francisco, who, in action under it, periled life and fair fame. The following extracts from it will show the causes of the movement; and the ability and determination of those who inaugurated and prosecuted it to its final issue:

Whereas it has become apparent to the citizens of San Francisco that there is no security for life or property either under the regulations of society, as it at present exists, or under the laws as now administered, and that by the a.s.sociation of bad characters our ballot boxes have been stolen and others subst.i.tuted, or stuffed with votes that were never polled, and thereby our elections nullified; our dearest rights violated; and no other method left by which the will of the people can be manifested; therefore, the citizens whose names are hereunto attached, do unite themselves into an a.s.sociation for maintenance of the peace and good order of society; the prevention and punishment of crime; the preservation of our lives and property; and to insure that our ballot boxes shall hereafter express the actual and unforged will of the majority of our citizens; and we do bind ourselves each to the other by a solemn oath to do and perform every just and lawful act for the maintenance of law and order, and to sustain the laws when properly and faithfully administered. But we are determined that no thief, burglar, incendiary, a.s.sa.s.sin, ballot box stuffer, or other disturber of the peace shall escape punishment, either by the quibbles of the law, the insecurity of prisons, the carelessness or corruption of the police, or the laxity of those who pretend to administer justice; and, to secure the objects of this a.s.sociation, we do hereby agree, that the name and style of the a.s.sociation shall be "The Committee of Vigilance, for the protection of the ballot box, the lives, liberty, and property of the citizens and residents of the City, of San Francisco."

That there shall be Rooms for the deliberations of the Committee at which there shall be some one or more members of the Committee, appointed for that purpose, in constant attendance at all hours of the day and night to receive the report of any member of the a.s.sociation or of any other person or persons whomsoever of any act of violence done to the person or property of any citizen of San Francisco; and if in the judgment of the member or members of the Committee present, it be such an act as justifies or demands the interference of this Committee, either in aiding in the execution of the laws, or the prompt and summary punishment of the offender; the Committee shall be at once a.s.sembled for the purpose of taking such action as a majority of them, when a.s.sembled, shall determine upon.

That whereas, an Executive Committee has been chosen by the General Committee, it shall be the duty of the said Executive Committee to deliberate and act upon all important questions and decide upon the measures necessary to carryout the objects for which the a.s.sociation was formed.

That whereas this Committee has been organized into subdivisions; the Executive Committee shall have power to call, when they shall so determine, upon a Board of Delegates, to consist of three representatives from each division to confer with them upon matters of vital importance.

That the action of this body shall be entirely and vigorously free from all consideration of, or partic.i.p.ation in the merits or demerits, opinions or acts, of all sects, political parties, or sectional divisions in the community and every cla.s.s of orderly citizens, of whatever sect, party or nativity may become members of this body.

No discussion of political, sectional or sectarian subjects shall be allowed in the Rooms of the a.s.sociation.

That no person accused before this body shall be punished until after fair and impartial trial and conviction.

That whenever the General Committee have a.s.sembled for deliberation, the decision of the majority upon any question that may be submitted to them by the Executive Committee shall be binding upon the whole; provided nevertheless, no vote inflicting the death penalty, shall be binding unless pa.s.sed by two thirds of those present and ent.i.tled to vote.

That all good citizens shall be eligible for admission to this body under such regulations as may be prescribed by a Committee on qualifications; and if any unworthy persons gain admission, they shall, on due proof, be expelled. And, believing ourselves to be executors of the will of a majority of our citizens; we do pledge our sacred honor to defend and maintain each other in carrying out the determined action of this Committee at the hazard of our lives and our fortunes.

By this Const.i.tution, it will be seen that the responsibility of deliberating upon the subjects which demanded the interference of the Vigilance Committee was devolved upon the Executive Committee consisting of twenty-three persons. Of this Committee, the largest number were merchants, but most of the professions and occupations were represented on it. Many of its members were men of large fortune and extensive business; all of them were men of standing and good character, and possessing the confidence and respect of the community. All sects in religion, and parties in politics had representatives among them. They were shrewd, sagacious, business men; never seeking office; having no taste for excitement; desiring only to be protected in their rights, and to be able to devote their energies uninterruptedly to their business.

Only a sense of intolerable wrong and oppression could have induced such men to leave their employments and engage in so anxious, laborious and perilous an undertaking. Having a.s.sumed the task, never did men devote themselves more entirely to the discharge of the duties which it imposed. Freely at all times did they contribute their money to defray expenses incurred. Faithfully did they dedicate all their forecast, sagacity and wisdom to insure success; upon which indeed, their fortunes, and lives depended, and which a single mistake might involve the loss.

The writer of this sketch was never more profoundly impressed than when, on two occasions, he was summoned, at half past twelve and two o'clock in the morning to the Executive Chamber as a witness. The room was of the plainest, even rudest, appearance. A semi-circular table was liberally supplied with stationary, and around it sat gravely, with faces paled by long continued vigils, anxious thought and awful responsibility a few individuals, some of whom he recognized, and knew to be quiet, humane, order-loving men. On a raised platform sat the President, and in front of him the Secretary. These few grave men, seen at so late an hour, by dim candle lights, the leaders of an armed insurrection, usurpers of all power, rule and supremacy in a City of at least sixty thousand inhabitants; whose commands thousands of their armed fellow citizens obeyed implicitly; who, in disregard of all law, arrested, imprisoned, tried and executed offenders; but whose power, boundless and undisputed as it seemed, rested solely on the conviction of their fellow men that they were just, wise, patriotic and true; would faithfully administer the despotic power of which they were the depositaries; and cheerfully resign it whenever the work of the regeneration of society was accomplished. If this conviction should be shaken, the a.s.sociation must instantly be dissolved and each of these leaders and directors of it be left to die upon the scaffold. Well might any person of the slightest sensibility look on such a body of men with the utmost interest and curiosity, and in the contemplation be filled with deep and solemn thought.

The Const.i.tution likewise provided for a Board of Delegates, with whom the Executive Committee might confer whenever matters of vital importance should require it. This body was organized by the choice by each company of two of its members, who, with the Captain, should be its Delegates. When the military organization of the force was completed, the field officers were added to the Board of Delegates; and when the organization included many regiments, the number of Delegates was of course larger. Whenever the death penalty had been decided upon by the Executive Committee, the whole evidence upon which it was based was submitted to the Board of Delegates, and a two-thirds vote of that Board in confirmation of the Executive vote was required before it could be inflicted. The element of discussion thus introduced into a body essentially revolutionary, and whose success might be supposed to depend upon the secrecy, promptness and unfaltering determination of its councils and of the blows it struck, was thought at the time to be likely to detract from its efficiency, if it did not endanger its existence. But the good sense and prudence of the members restrained the innate Yankee propensity to speech making, and this danger, with many others, which from time to time threatened to make s.h.i.+pwreck of the organization, was happily surmounted.

The Const.i.tution having been adopted, the doors of the Committee Rooms on Sacramento Street were opened for initiation into the body.

The greatest caution was exercised to prevent the admission of any disreputable or unreliable man. Every person presenting himself was carefully scrutinized at the outer door by a trusty guard and at the stair head within by another; and if unknown to them, was required to be vouched for by two respectable citizens. From Thursday the 15th until Sat.u.r.day the 17th at two o'clock P. M. a crowd of people were constantly pressing forward for admission. On Thursday both battalions of the City military refused to act further as a guard upon the Jail; and the companies for the most part disbanded; several of them reorganizing as part of the Vigilance Committee force. The defense of the Jail being thrown entirely upon the Sheriff; he placed arms and ammunition in it; and made strenuous efforts to provide a force which might suffice with his Deputies, the Police & co. to accomplish that object. On Friday his Deputies were very busy in serving printed notices upon all citizens whom they could induce to receive them, or to listen to their reading.

The summons was to meet at the Fourth District Court Room in the City Hall at half past three o'clock to aid him in keeping the peace. The meeting took place at the time and place appointed, but for various reasons, did not prove a very decided success. The replies made when the question was propounded to each individual whether he was prepared to proceed with the Sheriff to the Jail to defend it against all a.s.sailants, were very various. A merchant said he had been summoned, but he refused most positively to move, and wished it to be most distinctly understood that he was not a member of the Vigilance Committee, nor did he intend to act against it. A lawyer declined serving, and on his reason for doing so being required, said he was afraid; as he was afterwards in the ranks of the Vigilance Committee, with a musket on his shoulder, it may be presumed that his fear was of fighting against the people. A medical man professed great doubts about his ability; said he was not accustomed to the use of firearms, and thought it not unlikely that he might wound himself or kill his neighbor. At length, a party started with the Sheriff for the Jail; but whether their sober second thought was discouraging; or they had no stomach for the fight; or found their courage oozing out of their finger ends; the number began to diminish immediately after starting; at every corner some would detach themselves from the group; at every saloon or restaurant a distressing hunger or thirst would silently but imperiously demand a halt; and as the Jail was neared, a light pair of heels was frequently put in requisition without the slightest ceremony. As might be supposed, the number that finally reached their destination, was distressingly out of proportion to the work to be done; and the Sheriff, after detaining them for a time, was reported to have dismissed them with but scant courtesy.

Bulletins meanwhile were issued daily and almost hourly, by the physicians in attendance upon Mr. King, detailing his condition. They were posted in conspicuous places, and were read and commented upon by eager and excited crowds. The enlistments into the Vigilance Committee were constantly going on. The French citizens held a meeting and tendered their services to the Committee, and a battalion of three hundred men was at once organized and armed. The Germans had no separate organization, but were distributed in large numbers through the various companies. Arms were collected from all quarters; cannon were obtained from s.h.i.+ps lying at the wharves or in the harbor; the gunsmiths shops were thronged; dray loads of muskets and ammunition were taken to the Jail and the Committee Rooms; armed men guarded and observed the Jail night and day; and although every thing was done quietly, no person could escape the conviction that an awful crisis was impending. In all the streets men on foot and horseback were constantly pa.s.sing and repa.s.sing, apparently engaged in their ordinary pursuits; but a close observer could detect by the interchange of a word, a motion, or a significant glance, that they had a mutual understanding and a common purpose, and were on the alert and quick and observant of all that was pa.s.sing.

On Sat.u.r.day evening, May 17th, in consequence of a telegraphic dispatch from Mayor Van Ness earnestly requesting his presence, Governor Johnson arrived in the City from Sacramento. He was met by General Sherman whom he had appointed Major General of the Militia, Ex-Mayor Garrison and some others. After a long conference with the Executive Committee at two o'clock in the morning, he went with a sub-committee of that body to the Jail. The Sheriff agreed that a detachment of ten men of the Vigilance force should be permitted to enter and remain in the Jail to satisfy the people of the safe keeping of the prisoner. It was agreed the Committee should not take advantage of the permission to wrest the prisoner from the hands of the Sheriff, but that if they should resolve such a course, they would withdraw their guard. At two o'clock P. M. on Sat.u.r.day, the process of enrollment was suddenly stopped. Two thousand six hundred men had then been enrolled. In the evening the whole force was broken up into twenty-six companies or divisions, as they were called first, of one hundred men. Each division then made choice of its officers, consisting of a Captain, two Lieutenants; and Sergeants and Corporals were likewise appointed. The Command-in-Chief was entrusted by the Executive Committee to Colonel Charles Doane; who, in all the subsequent military operations proved himself to be a most skillful tactician and efficient commander. The great body of the force at first under his command, was infantry armed with flint-lock muskets, afterwards changed for percussion ones. There were, in addition, a company of horse; two companies of riflemen, and artillerists for two field pieces. The evening closed with a sharp drill of all the divisions.

Sunday the Eighteenth day of May was bright and beautiful. It dawned on the pleasant and picturesque City slumbering in its holy light. The roar and tumult of the populous City in its hours of business were stilled.

The sun shone joyously in the deep blue sky, undimmed by cloud or vapor.

All was hushed in the breathing repose of nature, and the soft and fragrant air, the still earth, and the unruffled surface of the magnificent bay, graced and dignified by grand old Monte Diavolo looking down upon it from its far off border, seemed united together in the same sweet spirit of devotion. As the day wore on, the bells of the various churches rang out their summons to the house of G.o.d. No unusual movement or sound in the early morning gave token of that calm solemn, most fearful uprising of the people which, at a later hour, was to make that day one never to be forgotten by any who took part in or witnessed its extraordinary events. The Executive Committee with consummate prudence had kept their plan of action profoundly secret.

At an early hour in the morning the Commander of the force issued orders to the Captains of Companies to notify their men to appear at Head Quarters, No. 41 Sacramento Street, at nine o'clock A. M. ready for duty. Time was of course required to circulate the notice through the City; but soon the men began to congregate from all quarters and the building, extensive as it was, by half past ten o'clock, was filled, both above and below stairs. A most extraordinary a.s.semblage was that which filled those large halls on that Sabbath morning. Men of every rank, occupation and condition in society obeyed that summons, and silently took their places side by side, prepared to do their duty and abide the issue whatever it might be. Many of these order and peace-loving citizens had never before, when in health, been absent from church on the Sabbath day or had the slightest skill in the use of arms, or knowledge of military movements, yet so really a military people are the Americans, and so completely overmastered was every man by the sentiment and purpose common to all; that the precision with which the whole body handled their arms, and marched without music, was remarked with astonishment even by officers of the regular army.

After a short drill in the Rooms, ammunition was distributed, and orders issued to load with ball. The companies then moved in succession into the street. Not a drum was struck, or other instrument of music sounded, but in silence the various detachments moved by different routes upon the designated point. Such a body of men have been seldom if ever seen united, armed, and resolutely bent upon accomplis.h.i.+ng such an object.

The high and low, rich and poor, men of all cla.s.ses, ages, and nations; the merchant, the dairy man, the professional man, the clerk, the porter, the father and son, the philanthropist, the patriot, the Christian, all were in the ranks of this great Company; and with flas.h.i.+ng eyes and compressed lips marched in silence to accomplish what they deemed an absolutely necessary measure of Retribution and Reform.