Return to the El Dorado County Page Return to El Dorado County TalesWritten by Joanne Burkett from research taken from Paolo Sioli's History of El Dorado County California, from El Dorado Co. birth, marriage, death and land records and often from interviews.
It was a Wednesday - March 27, 1861. Two coaches rumbled along the Placerville to Folsom route on the old stage road to Sacramento.
Leander "John" White, one of El Dorado County's earliest inhabitants as well as one of its pioneer stagecoach drivers, drove the lead coach, and a man named Crowder was driver of the companion coach.
White was a married man. In 1855, he had returned to Canada and brought his wife and their two children back with him to California.
It was early that spring day as White approached Deer Creek. He was dismayed to find it in a flooded condition and the bridge washed away. He reined his team in until Crowder caught up with him, then signaled that he was going to run the horses and coach across the flooded creek.
Crowder warned him to turn back and advised the passengers to get out of the coach. White hesitated only a moment before impulsively plunging his team into the deep and swiftly running water.
The raging current caught the front of the wagon and spun it around. It overturned, uncoupling the forward running gear. Luckily, this move disconnected the coach from the frightened horses and they swam to freedom. White was not so lucky.
Fastened to the stagecoach by the drawn-up leather apron, he struggled to escape, but was floated out into the stream. He bobbed up and down a couple times as he willed himself to reach and gain the bank, but was all too quickly sucked under by the swift current.
Later, a man by the name of Shed lost his own life trying to dislodge White's dead body from some driftwood that was tangled against an old dam where the current had taken him. Sadly, White's poor judgement had not only cost him his life, but the life of another.
Sometimes it was wasn't only poor judgement that led to disastrous results. Sometimes it was just plain carelessness.
It was sometime after 9 p.m. on June 30, 1864. Six armed men robbed a pair of stagecoaches that were traveling together along the narrow grade a couple miles above Sportsman's Hall.
Ned Blair and Charles Watson were the unlucky stage drivers.
Before the robbers rode off with 11 sacks of gold bullion and a small treasure box, their leader handed Watson a receipt which read: "This is to certify that I have received from Wells, Fargo & Co. the sum of $___ cash, for the purpose of outfitting recruits enlisted in California for the Confederate States army." It was signed, R. Henry Ingrim, Captain Com'g Co. C. S. A.
When the two coaches finally arrived in Placerville, Sheriff Staples, constables Van Eaton and Ranney, policemen Bailey and Williamson and several men from the stage line hit the trail in hot pursuit of the robbers.
The next morning, the sheriff and two of his men found a pair of the robbers sleeping like babies at Thirteen Mile House and arrested them. Unbelievably, the two men had overslept.
Meanwhile, Staples, Van Eaton and Ranny tracked the robbers to Somerset House, which was on the road to Grizzly Flat.
When the landlady told them that, indeed, there were six men sleeping upstairs, Staples rushed up and surprised them. As he drew on them, they opened fire and so did he.
When the smoke cleared, Staples was dead, one of the robbers had a bullet in his face for his trouble, and Ranny was badly injured.
On Aug. 2, Henry Jarboe, George Cross, J. A. Robertson, Wallace Clendenin, Joseph Gambill, Thomas Poole, John Ingren, H. Gately, and Preston Hodges were arrested in Santa Clara County. During their trial, one of their own, Allen H. Glasby, named them as accomplices.
On Nov. 22, Hodges was convicted of murder in the second degree and sentenced to 20 years at hard labor and Poole drew the most extreme penalty and was executed the following September. So much for the Confederacy.
Sometimes, however, a crime resulted in a wrongful arrest.
In 1871, a former minister of the Baptist church in Uniontown, returned to find the town all but deserted, the old church abandoned and in shambles. However, its bell, which he remembered as a fine specimen that possessed a wonderful tone, was in perfect condition still, with only a good cleaning and replacement of its rotted rope needed to return it to its former glory.
Without consulting the church's trustees, the minister set to work. He climbed into the belfry with the owls and bats, removed the bell and transported it to Coloma, where he planned to express it to his new church in Sierra County the next day.
When the little town's remaining citizens heard what happened, they followed the minister to Coloma, where the Justice of the Peace advised them to seek council. Within 15 minutes, the young lawyer they hired had written up some papers and handed them to the town's constable, who promptly arrested the bell. Yes, the bell!
What happened to the minister? Well, the minister skipped town and didn't show himself again and the bell remained in jail - probably awaiting its trial.
Is that what's meant by the term "frontier justice?"
Permission is granted by the author to use or republish this article, but proper attribution to the author -- Joanne Burkett -- is requested.
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Last Updated on: 3 December 2003