A number of men were captured and executed by members of the organized citizen calvaries in the days after the murders, but there were also some gross excesses that took place. The most notorious occurred in San Gabriel on Thursday the 29th. The Los Angeles Star reported that
On Thursday last, Mr. Cyrus Sanford, of the Mission [San Gabriel], was attacked by Miguel Soto and two others. Mr. Stockton came to his assistance, and the fight continued for some time pretty sharp, in close quarters. Sanford shot Soto in the thigh, and Soto shot Sanford’s horse four times in the breast. Soto, being disabled, left his horse, and ran afoot to take refuge in a marsh near at hand. He managed to cover up his body with mud and weeds. At this time some of the citizens from Monte., Messrs. Houstin, King, and Ward came up, and set fire to the weeds and burned them off the ground. This exposed the position of the crafty robber, when one of the party, Mr. King, we believe, fired and shot Soto through the heart. The head of the robber was then cut off and taken to the Monte, where it was recognized by Mr. W. H. Peterson, as the head of Miguel Soto, who had been examined before Justice Sackett for the robbery and attempt at murder of Mr. Twist some time ago. [there is a case, dated 23 April 1857, for four men, Juan Gonzales and Benito Juarez—identified above as being part of the Daniel/Flores gang—being among them, along with Eusebio Gonzales and Miguel Blanco—all were acquitted.]
The Star was provided information that "Soto . . . had with him . . a gun, recognized as one lent by F[rancis] Mellus, Esq. to Sheriff Barton, previous to starting on his ill-fated expedition."
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| Los Angeles Star, 31 January 1857. |
In a separate article from the same edition, the paper stated, “a number
of arrests were made at the time by the people of the Mission of San Gabriel,
who afterwards organized a court and tried the prisoners, and sentenced them to
be hung.” This included Juan Valenzuela,
Pedro Lopez, and Diego Navarro. “The
rope having broke in the course of execution, the men were led out and shot
dead.”
“Thus four of the
banditti who recently committed the murder of Sheriff Barton and his three
associates, have expiated their offences with their lives—and others will
follow.” Yet none of these four men were
identified earlier in that day's Star as being members of the Flores/Daniel
gang.
Separately, Miguel
Blanco, while in jail, confessed that Soto, shot at the Mission, was concerned in the
Twist robbery and confessed his own involvement and that of the party. Juan Gonzalez, who may have been the same man of that name who escaped with Juan Flores from San Quentin in October 1856, and Benito Juarez, were in the paper's list of those involved in the Barton murders.
On 23 April, Blanco, Juarez, Gonzalez and the latter's brother, Eusebio, were tried in the county's Court of Sessions, on the charge of stealing $1000 and other items from Twist, who was a Los Angeles citizen militia leader and ex-Santa Barbara County sheriff, and acquitted of the charges. If Juan Gonzalez was the same escapee from state prison, though, he was returned on 24 July.
As for El Clamor Público, its take on the San Gabriel killings was entirely different from that of the Star. Its edition of 31 January reported that "last Thursday, there were four individuals arrested suspected of being accomplices in the late murders; three of them were hung and a fourth killed by gunfire." The paper then criticized the fact that "a company of armed men, under the pretext of being empowered to summaril execute criminals threw themselves like voracious lions on some unhappy victims of their wild appetite, and they have sacrificed them in outrageous scaffolds."
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| El Clamor Público, 31 January 1857. |
In listing the names of the four dead men, El Clamor focused on Navarro, providing a statement from his father that the young man was applying brea (tar) on the roof of the family house and came down when several armed men approached and then seized Navarro and took him to the spot of execution. It was noted that the rope broke when Navarro was swung up, but that "the bloody mob, most of them drunken" then shot and mortally wounded him and that, Navarro's wife, a "heroic woman," took the dying Navarro in her arms and held him until he expired.
The paper concluded this initial coverage with some "Observations," including the fact that here was an instance in which "authorities do not comply with their responsibilities" and although a community might rise up "there is no reason for sacrificing innocent victims in a furor." The editorial went on to note that "In all countries that call themselves civilized, there is a distinction between virtue and vice, but never has it been seen that some will pay for one with the lack of the other."
In coming editions, the equally sharp distinctions between the two papers in the analysis of what happened at San Gabriel became more manifest and heated.
In its 7 February number, the Star decried the "false account of events" propagated by its rival and stated "we deem it necessary to give a correct statement of facts as they were." The paper reported that Cyrus Sanford and two other men were riding near the mission when William M. Stockton, a nearby rancher, rode towards the trip "with a Mexican, while another Mexican approached them from one side," this pair evidently traveling together until Stockton met up with one and the other rode off to the side. When Sanford and his companions were in view, Stockton yelled out "look for that man, he's a thief." The two Mexicans then allegedly fired at Sanford and another man, said to be Navarro rode away and was overtaken at his home. Asked why he fled, Navarro was said to have made up a story about seeking money from one of the pair of Mexicans that owed him. Soto was supposedly one of these two and ran off into the swamp where he was then killed by one of the King brothers of El Monte.
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| Los Angeles Star, 7 February 1857. |
From there "a general search took place, and a large number of suspected persons were taken prisoners—among them Pedro Lopez and Juan Valenzuela." A popular tribunal was held and it was reported that among the jurymen "were some natives" and "a fair and impartial rial was given them." As proof of this, it was stated that "a large number were released." Navarro was said to be "of general bad character, and dangerous to be permitted to live in any peaceable community, and to be connected with thieving parties." Valenzuela was determined to be "an old offender" guilty of involvement "in serveral robberies and attempted burglaries" including a recent theft of sheep. Lopez was accused of being a thief of a mule and "maintaining himself by cock-fighting and cattles-stealing."
Because of these accusations and associations, "each of these men were sentenced to die, and they were executed." As to the claim that Navarro died in the arms of his wife, it "never had any truth in it, but is one of that class articles which has too often, for the last year, appeared in that incendiary publication called El Clamor Publico."
In its turn, that paper, in its edition of the 7th, observed that, even "if all this certain that he [Miguel Soto] was a criminal, his death does not stop being terrible." It related that the firing of the swamp where he was hidden caused Soto, "in the agony of his pain" to "in desperation dig a pit with his hands to bury himself." Then, he was killed and "his head was cut off and the body remained abandoned for food for the animals and birds." It went on to suggest that "Evil be a man and having committed crimes that are detestable to the eyes of the community, the noble heart always takes pity on what he feels for humanity and he does not pursue them as if they were the same as so many animals of the field."
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| El Clamor Público, 7 February 1857. |
A separate editorial in El Clamor claimed that "a general feeling of indignation has been excited amongst our fellow citizens concerning the executions that took place in San Gabriel of the four individuals suspected of being accomplices of the thieves" who killed Barton and his posse members. It further stated that "recent revelations have declared they were not gulty of the crimes attributed to them and if at some time they had done things that merited the exemplary punishment given to them, we are ignorant of it." Declaiming to "antagonize among the races that live here," the paper wrote that "our object is the cause of understanding justice, so that all of this county's inhabitants can live in more tranquil circumstances and in better harmony than before."
Still, El Clamor decried the fact that public vindication had to be satisfied and called for an acceptable reason was needed for "those four people who perished so ignominiously." It ended by stating that "what we ask is what we believe is very just" pertaining "to the rights of equality, justice and liberty that the laws confer on us, as having the privilege of being born here."
The rhetoric would only intensify as will be shown in the next post.
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