On hearing of these threats by native bandidos, James R. Barton, formerly a volunteer under General S. W. Kearny and then Sheriff, at once investigated the rumors; and the truth of the reports being verified, our small and exposed community was seized with terror.
A large band of Mexican outlaws, led by Pancho Daniel, a convict who had escaped from San Quentin prison, and including Luciano Tapía and Juan Flores, on January 22d had killed a German storekeeper named George W. Pflugardt, in San Juan Capistrano, while he was preparing his evening meal; and after having placed his body on the table, they sat around and ate what the poor victim had provided for himself. On the same occasion, these outlaws plundered the stores of Manuel Garcia, Henry Charles and Miguel Kragevsky or Kraszewski; the last named escaping by hiding under a lot of wash in a large clothes-basket. When the news of this murder reached Los Angeles, excitement rose to fever-heat and we prepared for something more than defense.
Jim Barton, accompanied by William H. Little and Charles K. Baker, both constables, Charles F. Daley, an early blacksmith here, Alfred Hardy and Frank Alexander—all volunteers—left that evening for San Juan Capistrano, to capture the murderers, and soon arrived at the San Joaquín Ranch, about eighteen miles from San Juan. There Don José Andrés Sepúlveda told Barton of a trap set for him, and that the robbers outnumbered his posse, two to one; and urged him to send back to Los Angeles for more volunteers. Brave but reckless Barton, however, persisted in pushing on the next day, and so encountered some of the marauders in Santiago Canyon. Barton, Baker, Little and Daley were killed; while Hardy and Alexander escaped.
When Los Angeles was apprised of this second tragedy, the frenzy was indescribable, and steps were taken toward the formation of both a Committee of Safety and a Vigilance Committee—the latter to avenge the foul deed and to bring in the culprits. In meeting this emergency, the El Monte boys, as usual, took an active part. The city was placed under martial law, and Dr. John S. Griffin was put in charge of the local defenses. Suspicious houses, thought to be headquarters for robbers and thieves, were searched; and forty or fifty persons were arrested. The State Legislature was appealed to and at once voted financial aid.
Although the Committee of Safety had the assistance of special foot police in guarding the city, the citizens made a requisition on Fort Tejón, and fifty soldiers were sent from that post to help pursue the band. Troops from San Diego, with good horses and plenty of provisions, were also placed at the disposition of the Los Angeles authorities. Companies of mounted Rangers were made up to scour the country, American, German and French citizens vying with one another for the honor of risking their lives; one such company being formed at El Monte, and another at San Bernardino. There were also two detachments of native Californians; but many Sonorans and Mexicans from other States, either from sympathy or fear, aided the murdering robbers and so made their pursuit doubly difficult. However, the outlaws were pursued far into the mountains; and although the first party sent out returned without effecting anything (reporting that the desperadoes were not far from San Juan and that the horses of the pursuers had given out) practically all of the band, as will be seen, were eventually captured.
Not only were vigorous measures taken to apprehend and punish the murderers, but provision was made to rescue the bodies of the slain, and to give them decent and honorable burial. The next morning, after nearly one hundred mounted and armed men had set out to track the fugitives, another party, also on horseback, left to escort several wagons filled with coffins, in which they hoped to bring back the bodies of Sheriff Barton and his comrades. In this effort, the posse succeeded; and when the remains were received in Los Angeles on Sunday about noon, the city at once went into mourning. All business was suspended, and the impressive burial ceremonies, conducted on Monday, were attended by the citizens en masse. Oddly enough, there was not a Protestant clergyman in town at the time; but the Masonic Order took the matter in hand and performed their rites over those who were Masons, and even paid their respects, with a portion of the ritual, to the non-Masonic dead.
General Andrés Pico, with a company of native mounted Californians, who left immediately after the funeral, was especially prominent in running down the outlaws, thus again displaying his natural gift of leadership; and others fitted themselves out and followed as soon as they could. General Pico knew both land and people; and on capturing Silvas and Ardillero, two of the worst of the bandidos, after a hard resistance, he straightway hung them to trees, at the very spot where they had tried to assassinate him and his companions.
In the pursuit of the murderers, James Thompson (successor, in the following January, to the murdered Sheriff Getman) led a company of horsemen toward the Tejunga; and at the Simi Pass, high upon the rocks, he stationed United States soldiers as a lookout. Little San Gabriel, in which J. F. Burns, as Deputy Sheriff, was on the watch, also made its contribution to the restoration of order and peace; for some of its people captured and executed three or four of Daniels's and Flores's band. Flores was caught on the top of a peak in the Santiago range; all in all, some fifty-two culprits were brought to Los Angeles and lodged in jail; and of that number eleven were lynched or legally hung.
When the Vigilance Committee had jailed a suspected murderer, the people were called to sit in judgment. We met near the veranda of the Montgomery, and Judge Jonathan R. Scott having been made Chairman, a regular order of procedure, extra-legal though it was, was followed; after announcing the capture, and naming the criminal, the Judge called upon the crowd to determine the prisoner's fate. Thereupon some one would shout: "Hang him!" Scott would then put the question somewhat after the following formula: "Gentlemen, you have heard the motion; all those in favor of hanging So-and-So, will signify by saying, Aye!"
And the citizens present unanimously answered, Aye!