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 Dry Diggins was the first of
thirty mining camps to spring up around Coloma, where gold was
discovered by James Marshall on January 24, 1848. While other camps,
such as Bottle Hill, Georgia Slide, and Murderer's Bar just faded away,
Hangtown, or Placerville, was a survivor, along with Diamond Springs, El
Dorado, Shingle Springs and Georgetown. The miners quickly became
short-tempered with the rising crime rate and the lack of
readily-available law enforcement, so they took the law into their own
hands. Criminals were punished in short order, whether it be flogging or
hanging, based on snap decisions made by impromptu courts with
hastily-formed juries. If you voiced your reasonable objections in favor
of a more lengthy but fair trial for the accused, you'd risk swinging
along side of him, or them.
Flog Five, Hang Three ~ The
first lynching in the camp, a triple hanging, came after a gang of five
tried to rob a miner of his gold dust. They were caught and each
received a whipping of nearly 40 strokes. Then someone in the crowd of
2,000 said he recognized three of the five (two Mexicans and one Yankee,
or was it two Frenchmen and a Chilean?) as being wanted for involvement
with a murder on the Stanislaus River. At that the three suspects, who
were still weak from the flogging they took, were immediately tried,
sentenced and hanged by the crowd. There was one dissenter, E.G. Buffum,
who stood on a stump and protested on behalf of the accused, saying they
were too weak from loss of blood to either stand or speak in their own
defense. His valiant efforts were in vain, however, and he himself was
threatened with lynching by the angry mob if he didn't 'shut up'. Buffum
escaped with his life and later became the senior editor of the Alta
newspaper in San Francisco. The three suspects were hanged together from
the huge oak tree in camp. The location of this well-used hangin' tree
is marked by a dummy dangling from the second story of the Hangman's
Tree Historic Spot in downtown Placerville. The stump is said to be in
the cellar.
Crone Swings ~ A lynching in 1850 resulted from an incident that happened at the El Dorado Hotel, when a miner accused a young monte dealer of "waxing the cards". The card dealer was Dick Crone (also called "New Orleans Dick", "Bloody Dick", and "Irish Dick", but not to be confused with "Rattlesnake Dick", an equally ornery character who terrorized Auburn for a time), who threatened to cut the miner's heart out if he accused him of cheating again. When the miner repeated the words, the gambler drew a large bowie knife, plunging it into the miner's chest twice, twisting it around the second time. Miners flocked into town from outlying diggins to locate and punish Crone. He was found hiding in Coffee's tavern, and was promptly tried (with witnesses testifying), convicted, and hanged that very evening by a jury of thousands. Fed Up ~ The vigilante lynchings,
with their often deserved but sometimes questionable justice, brought
about a measure of peace within the camp. The criminals hadn't left the
scene completely, however. They just moved their business to the
outskirts of town, ambushing miners. These bushwackers had a gang-like
network, complete with in-town spies, secret handgrips, and special
passwords. (Could it be that they also wore their cowboy hats backwards,
sported red or blue kerchiefs, and bagged their Levi's?) A vigilante
committee was formed to deal with this problem.
Enough of the Gore ~ What about the glitter? The first year, $1 million worth of gold came out of Cedar Ravine, running south from Main Street on Cedar Ravine Road, and another million from Log Cabin Ravine, running north from Main Street and now called Bedford Avenue. One panful of white clay taken from Hangtown Creek contained 75 ounces of gold dust. One fabulous cache after another was discovered. A lady found a 16-pound nugget while on a walk and served it to her husband in a skillet for dinner. Oregon Ravine, the original mining site (about a half mile west of Cedar Ravine running south of Main Street and now called Benham Park) was the richest of all, where half-inch nuggets were found just by hauling a sackful of dirt down to the creek to process. Placerville produced about $25 million in placer gold alone, not including the hardrock quartz mining and hydraulic mining ventures that were initiated when placer gold profits dwindled. They Really Dug Placerville ~
Miners dug for gold just about everywhere in the camp. Traffic through
Main Street was hampered at times by men mining right in the street,
digging holes wherever they reckoned gold would be found. They dug up
the floors in their cabins. They dug into the steep ravines, cliffs, and
hillsides. They plucked gold out of mortar on buildings with pen knives.
And there are several reports of miners saying a few parting words at a
fellow man's gravesite, then getting a glimpse of gold sparkling in the
newly-turned earth, and, well, you know the rest of the story. . . .
A Needed Change ~ The camp grew in population, becoming the third largest city in California, behind Yerba Buena (San Francisco) and Sacramento. (Los Angeles came in a distant 15th place at the time.) It had some fine big-city amenities and became more family oriented, more law abiding. So, in 1854, in an attempt to get rid of the grim sobriquet "Hangtown", the townsfolk elected to make "Placerville" its official name of record. The "little town at the gold deposits." Now how could that possibly conjure up visions of anything unpleasant? But the fact is that the term Hangtown has proved to be an inescapable part of our past, still being used now and then to refer to Placerville. Hangtown Hung In There ~ What was responsible for Old Hangtown's survival, when many mining camps disappeared as soon as their gold did? It was situated on a prime transportation route over the Sierras, from Sacramento to Nevada, becoming an important stop for the Pony Express, which barreled in and out of town from 1860 to 1861; for stage lines, such as Wells Fargo & Co.; for freight transportation to and from the Comstock Lode in Nevada. After the turn of the century, Placerville Road became a part of the first transcontinental highway, U.S. 50. Placerville is the government seat for El Dorado County and is still an important stop for travelers coming and going over the Sierra Nevadas. A bustling town in its own right, it may outgrow its reputation as a bedroom community for Sacramento commuters. Maybe.
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