NARRATOR
Imagine it's 1856, seven years after the start of the Gold Rush. Across the street from here, you'd see a two-story warehouse converted into a fortress. A wall of sandbags eight feet high surrounds the front of the building and blocks the sidewalk. Entrances along the street are guarded by men with bayoneted rifles. More armed men with rifles and cannons line the rooftop. This was Fort Vigilance, headquarters of a self-organized militia, the Vigilance Committee that fought the corruption that was then rampant among San Francisco's elected supervisors, police, and judges. The Vigilance Committee first formed in 1851, in response to a distinct lack of local law enforcement, says archaeologist Rhonda Robichaud.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
This committee formed up and their signal to meet in mass was the ringing of the monumental fire engine bell. So if there was a crime happening that they needed to attend to, they would ring this bell, and all of the committee members would come and be told what to do. So they patrolled the streets at night to keep it safe.
NARRATOR
After seven months, the committee disbanded. But its members never forgot the idea that San Franciscans could unite in the name of justice. Within a few years, that need would present itself again.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
Around 1850 to '53, the wealth began to peter out and by 1854 San Francisco was in a serious depression. There was so much corruption—there is a fabulous quote by a trial lawyer in I think 1854 or '55, talking about how he had tried in the last four years 1,200 cases of murder, and only received one conviction. So the judges were bought, the juries were bought, like everyone in San Francisco at that time, just was bought.
NARRATOR
Things finally came to a head in 1855 after an egregious episode of election fraud.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
James Casey is voted in as a county supervisor in the fall of 1855, even though his name wasn't on the ballot. So the way he gets voted in is what was a common practice back then called ballot box stuffing. And what you had was a ballot box that had fake sides. So you stuffed the sides full of the person you wanted to win. And when you took it to be counted, you removed the false sides so that the person that you want appears to have gotten the most votes.
NARRATOR
This scandal caught the attention of newspaperman James King, who began writing scathing editorials against Casey.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
King writes an article about Casey talking about the time he spent in Sing Sing Penitentiary. That evening after reading the article, James Casey goes up to James King and says in a public street, "Prepare to defend yourself!" and shoots him, and then goes immediately around the corner and turns himself into the sheriff.
NARRATOR
The members of the old Vigilance Committee decided it was time to act.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
The next day, they put an ad in five different San Francisco newspapers, saying that the members of the Committee of Vigilance are to report to this address at this time tomorrow. Four days after the shooting, they had organized 3,000 men and these were all merchants and men of really good standing.
NARRATOR
A story in the Alta California newspaper described the scene.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
"About 11 o'clock, a brass six pounder," which was a cannon, "escorted by a company of citizens armed with flintlock muskets was planted on Broadway directly in front of the entrance to the jail. The companies of the Vigilance Committee armed with loaded muskets quietly marched through the various streets to the scene of the action. The site was one of the grandest we ever be held."
NARRATOR
The committee wanted one other prisoner and James Casey. The Vigilance Committee was no irrational mob. They conducted their trial. According to California law, there was a judge a jury, a prosecutor and defense attorney, and even an automatic appeals process. But the results came as little surprise.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
They were both found guilty of murder and hung.
NARRATOR
Over the next three months, the Vigilance Committee charged, arrested, and tried more than two dozen notably corrupt or lawless officials. Scores of lesser offenders obeyed orders to leave the city. Hundreds of others fled to avoid prosecution. By August of 1856, just three months after the committee formed, they were ready to disband. Their work was done. In 1999, the Vigilance Committee headquarters was excavated during the construction of the building you see here today. While the building itself burned in the fires after the 1906 earthquake, Rhonda Robichaud and a team of archaeologists found the Douglas fir wood floors of the building still intact.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
We found structural remains—the remains of brick walls, pads for the foundation to sit on, a cache of artifacts here and there.
NARRATOR
The list of artifacts included, quote, "an unusually large number of alcoholic beverage bottles." To be fair, the building was a liquor warehouse before Vigilance took over. Also unearthed were bottles for medicine and ink, penny pipes, and a spittoon. A few lasting remnants of San Francisco's Vigilance Committee.
RHONDA ROBICHAUD
The point about the Vigilance Committee, these weren't paid mercenaries. This was the baker and the blacksmith. These were all people within the community that had lives and jobs that they needed to get to, but decided that this was an important enough thing that needed to be addressed within their city.
NARRATOR
Go on to the next stop for more buried history.
