San Francisco Committee of Vigilance

The 1851 Committee of Vigilance was inaugurated on June 9 with the promulgation of a written doctrine declaring its aims and hanged John Jenkins of Sydney, Australia, on June 10 after he was convicted of stealing a safe from an office in a trial organized by the committee: grand larceny was punishable by death under California law at the time. The June 13 Daily Alta California printed this statement: It boasted a membership of 700 and claimed to operate in parallel to, and in defiance of, the duly constituted city government. Committee members used its headquarters for the interrogation and incarceration of suspects who were denied the benefits of due process. The committee engaged in policing, investigating disreputable boarding houses and vessels, deporting immigrants, and parading its militia. Four people were hanged by the committee; one was whipped (a common punishment at that time); fourteen were deported to Australia; fourteen were informally ordered to leave California; fifteen were handed over to public authorities; and forty-one were discharged. The 1851 Committee of Vigilance was dissolved during the September elections, but its executive members continued to meet into 1853. The committee also tried to punish arsonists. ==1856==

, but in its 1856 vigilante context conveyed surveillance as a means of social discipline, not the Masonic meaning of scientific and aesthetic knowledge. Note that Lady Justice is not blindfolded. The Committee of Vigilance was reorganized on 14 May 1856 by many of the leaders from the first one and adopted an amended version of the 1851 constitution. and serving a prison term for Grand Larceny in New York. The combination of the political unrest surrounding the election and the article resulted in Casey's shooting of James King. The 1856 committee was also much larger than the committee of 1851, claiming 6,000 in its ranks. The committee worked very closely with the formal government of San Francisco. The president of the Vigilance Committee, William T. Coleman, was a close friend of Governor J. Neely Johnson and the two men met on several occasions working towards the shared goal of stabilizing the town. Another important figure at this time who would later come to make a name for himself in the Civil War is William T. Sherman. Sherman was running a bank when Governor Johnson requested he become the commander of the San Francisco branch of the state militia in order to curb the activities of the Committee. Sherman accepted the position two days before the murder of King by Casey. The 1856 Committee of Vigilance dissolved on 11 August 1856, and marked the occasion with a "Grand Parade". Notable people included William Tell Coleman, Martin J. Burke, San Francisco mayor Henry F. Teschemacher, and San Francisco's first chief of police James F. Curtis. Vigilante headquarters in 1856 consisted of assembly halls, meeting rooms, a military kitchen and armory, an infirmary, and prison cells, all of which were fortified with gunny sacks and cannons. The 1856 committee also engaged in policing, investigations, and secret trials, but it far exceeded its predecessor in audacity and rebelliousness. Most notably, it seized three shipments of armaments intended for the state militia and tried the chief justice of the California Supreme Court. The committee's authority, however, was bolstered by almost all militia units in the city, including the California Guards. ==Controversy==

From the Daily Evening Bulletin, James King of William, Editor. May 14, 1856: . King had also denounced the corruption of City Officials who he believed had let Cora off the hook for Richardson's murder: Cora's first trial had ended in a hung jury, and there were rumors that the jury had been bribed. Casey's friends sneaked him into the jail precisely because they were afraid that he would be hanged. This hanging may have been a response by frustrated citizens to ineffectual law enforcement, or a belief that due process would result in acquittals. Popular histories have accepted the former view: that the illegality and brutality of the vigilantes was justified by the need to establish law and order in the city. One prominent critic of the San Francisco vigilantes was General W. T. Sherman, who resigned from his position as Major-general of the Second Division of Militia in San Francisco. In his memoirs, Sherman wrote: As [the vigilantes] controlled the press, they wrote their own history, and the world generally gives them the credit of having purged San Francisco of rowdies and roughs; but their success has given great stimulus to a dangerous principle, that would at any time justify the mob in seizing all the power of government; and who is to say that the Vigilance Committee may not be composed of the worst, instead of the best, elements of a community? Indeed, in San Francisco, as soon as it was demonstrated that the real power had passed from the City Hall to the committee room, the same set of bailiffs, constables, and rowdies that had infested the City Hall were found in the employment of the "Vigilantes." ==Influence in British Columbian affairs==

A former member of the San Francisco Committee of Vigilance, physician Max Fifer, moved to Yale, British Columbia at the time of the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, and participated in the organization of a Vigilance Committee on the Fraser River in 1858 to address issues of lawlessness and a vacuum of effective governmental authority created by the sudden influx of prospectors to the new British colony. The Vigilance Committee, which in San Francisco had persecuted disgraced Philadelphia lawyer Ned McGowan, played a role in the bloodless McGowan's War on the lower Fraser in 1858–1859. At the end of the so-called "War", McGowan was convicted by Judge Matthew Baillie Begbie of an assault against Fifer in British Columbia but McGowan's defense statement, which described some of the activities of the San Francisco vigilantes and his own personal experience of vigilantism, impressed and disturbed Begbie who, like Colonial Governor James Douglas was determined to prevent conditions in the goldfields of British Columbia from deteriorating into mob rule. == Flags ==

The flag carried by Committee was usually the Stars and Stripes, it always flew over their armory. Two months after being organized the first flag used to represent the Committee was given to Captain Edgar. It was 14 foot streamer consisting of a red field with a lone star and the words "Vigilance" and "Eureka." On the other side was the seal of California. On August 9th, 1851 they were given a large blue banner at Montgomery street. It had the inscription: "Presented to the Vigilance Committee of the City of San Francisco by the ladies of Trinity Parish, as a testimonial of their approval. Do right and fear not. August 9th, 1851." and on the other side "The Vigilance Committee of the city of San Francisco, instituted June 9th, 1851, for the protection of the lives and property of the citizens and residents of San Francisco." They attached it to a wagon and used in a local parade. Two other flags were flying on Montgomery street, and one was described as: "...inscribed "Pioneer Guards, Co. 4, V. C., organized May 16th, 1856." The flag is illustrated in ''Fireman's Journal and Military Gazette.'' File:Vigilance Committee navy flag.png|Digital reconstruction of the flag given to Captain Edgar Wakeman on August 1, 1851 ==In popular culture==

• The Californians • Death Valley Days: Episode: "The Battle of San Francisco Bay" ==See also==