Mining Camp Courts

These "mining camp courts" were another name for an assembly of all who swung a pick or held a claim.  It voted on punishment for theft and murder, decided ownership and boundaries of claims.  It did not decide minor personal disputes or collect debts.

The early Western mining court lacked permanent officials (except the occasional alcalde) and also lacked written laws.  No records were kept.  Anyone could call it into session.  Anyone who didn't see the urgency of the reason for the session, simply didn't come.  

There is a recorded case in Jackson Creek Camp (in present day Oregon) where the camp wanted the Alcalde Rogers to resign but he kept refusing.  A case came before him concerning a miner who had lost his property to his partner do to a crippling accident.  Rogers refused more than once to hear the case.  In 1852, over one thousand miners left their jobs that day to form their own court of appeals.  They elected a fellow miner as judge and retried the case that Rogers wouldn't, complete with jury, counsel arguments and witnesses.  The ownership case was found in favor of the injured man and Rogers was disposed.  The majority rule kept corruption out and suppressed violence.

Even though they lacked written laws, the mining camps were not lawless.  Sometimes, however, vigilantism was necessary to deal with those who tried to take over what government they did have.  Unlike what it sounds like, vigilantism took tact and courage as well as considerable organizing ability to be used successfully.  

Next time - we will take a look at one of the best recorded examples of vigilantism

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Today in Pioneer History: "On July 23, 1918, Della Sorenson begins her murder spree which ends with seven family members dead by poisoning in Nebraska, most of them babies.  Her reason?  She enjoyed attending funerals...You can read more details at This Day in History at the History Channel Website.  She was found to be schizophrenic and committed to a state mental asylum in 1925.

No Law is a Law

"We need no law" wrote an old pioneer of the mining camps. Since we have discussed vigilante law in these camps, there is another record of a far different viewpoint.  Contrary to the legends surroundings the mining camps there was order. Their law was spontaneous, for the good of the community, not the individual self.   Like law in colonial America, law was nothing more than the customs "to which the mind of man runneth not to the contrary."

 

These transient communities were suspicious of all elaborate, explicit and recently written rules. They come from places where "law" had been reduced in value and force, so they saw law as everyone's
to understand, to defend, to enforce.

Like the settler's association clubs, these communities were also intensely communal before they had a well-organized government.  A pioneer of both California and Nevada mining camps talked of how
there was little law. but a large amount of good order, no churches but a great deal of religion, no politics but a large number of politicians, no offices but strangely no office-seekers.

The mining camps on the whole were at least as orderly as life in settled communities. A wash basin full of gold dust could be left on a table in an open tent undisturbed.  No police yet provisions and tools
were seldom stolen. Theft murder and violence of all kinds were rare.

So some legends speak about the rowdiness and toughness of mining camps while others, like this one show orderly men living in harmony. How can that be possible?  Like any other thing that happens, I suppose,  it depended on the people.  And maybe since Vigilante judgment on those that did do real crimes was quick and harsh (likes hanging within an hour of the crime as we talked about in the last post) maybe it served as its own law, therefore there were no need for a list of do's and don’ts, they just knew.  We have unspoken rules like that, and families have things you just know that you can't get away with.  No need to write those down because no one living in that household would even consider doing that!

 

Next time- How did Mexico and the Governor of California with these camps without laws?

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Today in Pioneer History: "On July 16, 1935, the first parking meter was installed.  The meter was known as Park-O-Meter #1 and it was installed on the southeast corner of what was then First Street and Robinson Avenue in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.  The meter was the brainchild of Carol C Magee because of the over-crowding of downtown area.  His "brainchild" soon spread to every town and city in the United States.  

Time is Money

Going back to the mining camp laws of the 1840s and 1850s of a couple of posts ago, these were communities in the West made up of temporary, or transient people,  They were far from courts and government institutions.  Given this kind of community there were problems.  Put man together in a place without structure or rules and you have problems.  These mining camps were rough and tough.  By the very way they were settled, there were those who did not see rules as necessary.  The Vigilante style of law that prevailed was unique to mining towns across the West.

Miners preferred speedy justice - time was money.  Especially in the early days of the Gold Rush, a man was worth $16 to $100 a day.  Mining laws set by the Spanish ordered cases decided without delay.  A few hours could mean the difference between lucky and unlucky.  Those that decided cases received no pay, there were no jails and no guards - no place or time to worry about fair trial or juries.  Many times the accused was hung within a hour's time.

Popular forms of punishment included banishment, whipping and of course, hanging.  The methods were cheap and speedy.  In a community were a man might be there today and gone tomorrow, literally, the law had to act today if it was to be effective.

Josiah Royce, American philosopher, whose family went West in 1849, wrote a book California that describes Vigilante law in mining communities thus..."it was harder to work for a Vigilante Committee for a month than for a lifetime on a legal jury in a quiet town."  

Next time...More western mining laws.

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Today in Pioneer History: "On July 13, 1787, the Northwest Ordinance was enacted which structured the settlement of the Northwest Territory and created a policy for adding new states to the United States.  

The Laws of Gold and Silver

Like the settler's associations who made the laws for the newly settled communities in the West, gold mining towns did the same thing.  Mining towns were also beyond the range of effective federal law.  Miners who arrived first, like the first settlers, simply made their own laws.

As early as 1851 in California, the rule was that mining claims shall govern based on the "usage, regulations and customs."  By 1866 there were over 500 self-organized mining districts in California, 200 in Nevada and 100 each in Arizona, Idaho and Oregon.  There were 1100 of these self-governing mining districts across the West.

The self-governing districts all had the basic belief that they should and could make and enforce their own laws.  In July of 1866 Congress recognized that wherever these districts "did not conflict with the laws of the United States, they should prevail.  The rules and regulations of the miners form the basis of the present admirable system arising out of necessity.  They become the means adopted by the people themselves for just protection of all. The local courts recognize these rules, the central idea of which is priority of possession."  

Some things were unique to mining towns.  Like the settlers, the proper title then belonged to those that discovered it, those who arrived first, but continual use of the claim was necessary for legal ownership in a mining town.  No one was allowed to hold on to a claim longer than they used it.  The first person to reach a stream could draw out as much as he could use, not just for mining but for irrigation of farms, livestock, etc.

This priority law for both settler's and for mining towns lasted until at least the end of the century all across the West.  

Next time...New topic?

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Today in Pioneer History: "On July 5, 1957, John Lennon meets Paul McCartney for the first time.  John was scheduled to play at the Woollton Parish Church Garden Fete as part of the Quarrymen group.  Paul, only 15 years of age showed up to listen to 17 year old John and his band. Paul was introduced by a mutual friend and played a guitar riff for John...the rest is history as they say.

Towns Grew Mighty

Not all mining towns died away after the ore was gone.  Some achieved permanence and grew into major cities - case in point, Denver.  The area around Pike's Peak had been rumored to be full of gold.  In 1850 prospectors headed for California found traces of it, but not enough to stay.  By 1858 a small group of miners spread word of another Sutter's Mill-like find,  By March of 1859, wagon trains were forming along the Missouri River with "Pike's Peak or Bust" on them.

About 50,000 seekers flooded into the new town of Denver.  Few were rewarded for their effort in gold, however.  Their wagons now read "Busted, by God!" and were known as "go-backs" as they went back home. Still thousands remained and in the 1870s they actually found a bonanza of silver. 

Another town called "the Gateway to the Mother Lode" was Sacramento.  In 1839 John Augustus Sutter had founded his baronial estate there at the junction of the Sacramento and America Rivers.  When Sutter came near to bankruptcy, he transferred his property to his son, who founded the town of Sacramento that same year.  Steamboat traffic sprang up on the river, carrying freight and passengers from San Francisco to the mines.  It became a headquarters and supply depot for those headed for high country.

When the mining boom ended, Sacramento was already the state capital and the center of farming of the Great Valley.  It became the westernmost point of overland mail and stage line, in 1869 the transcontinental railroad brought more fame. 

Next time - The Famous Comstock Lode
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Today in Pioneer History:  "On July 27, 1806, Meriwether Lewis shoots a Blackfoot Indian trying to steal his horses. The Blackfoot were one of the fiercest tribes of the Great Plains around the Marias River.  Lewis had hoped to meet peacefully with the Blackfoot but that all changed with the shooting.

This is Familiar!

Enter the familiar mining town scene - wild and crazy overnight.

Long before the secret was out and covered wagons in droves began arriving, Arizona was unfriendly to any pioneers.  Many lost their lives to the murderous Apache, to the elements, and to whiskey and accidents.

But when the wagons began arriving at Tombstone, they kept coming.  By 1879, Tombstone was organized and emerged overnight as a metropolis in an otherwise wild country.  Stage coach service was established from Tuscon to Benson.  Main streets bore the names Tough Nut, Allen and Fremont.  Saloons like the Alhambra, the Crystal Palace, and the Oriental sprang up along with the prostitutes who serviced them.  Gamblers in well tailored frock coats arrived as soon as the final proof of "civilization" was apparent.

The five newspapers were born the Epitaph, the Evening Gossip, the Prospector, the Nugget, and the Expositor.  Tombstone became like the mining towns of the rest of the Wild West - wild and unruly.

Next time - Interesting characters and places of the new town

Pioneer Pieces: Greater than the Comstock

Comstock from the very start was the standard to which all others were compared.  "Greater than the Comstock" became THE phrase when overnight established towns emptied out, always in haste across the mountains and desert in search of the next big prospect of wealth.

First used in 1860's,"Greater than the Comstock" was heard in mining circles, and in speculator's circles - reportedly sending the market into a see saw. Long after the Comstock itself was no longer, new prospects at such places as Rawhide, Bullfrog, Rhyolite brought many with only the belief that this was the "big one".

Those who belonged to this group ranged from the top hats on Nob Hill in San Francisco with their millions in discovered gold and silver, to the poor pioneer who, after a lifetime of searching,  had only his mule and his pride left. Banks financed these bonanza fevers, even shady stock promoters like those that swindled millions out of British investors and brought relations between the US and Britain to an all time low in the 1800s.

Was anything "Greater than the Comstock"?  Next time...

Pioneer Pieces: Mining Towns had Character (s)!

Like the gold mining towns of California, Nevada's mining towns were a rough sort...just a step above civilized behavior. Women were starting to trickle in to join their husbands, but there were only basics in the way of housing, schooling and opportunities for women.  It was unusual have organized women's clubs, church activities or employment for women in the early mining towns.

But of course there was always an exception, and Eleanor Dupont was that exception in Nevada City.  Nicknamed "Madame Moustache", Eleanor ran the Nevada City gambling house where she dealt a mean hand of Rock Mountain (21 to us), and Keno.  Eleanor managed to keep a "good woman of character" reputation in Nevada City despites her owning and running the city's gambling house.

Next time ...more characters of the Nevada mining towns