SUMMER SHOOTOUT
December 27, 2010 Jeff Elliott	Leave a comment
Sounds of summer night, Santa Rosa 1907: Crickets, someone's barking dog, lowing of cattle in the stockyard, a freight train whistle, the blamma-blamma of two guys shooting away at each other at close range outside a popular downtown restaurant. Note to the next Broadway producer who revives "The Music Man:" Clue us in that most of the respectable citizens in those cute little nostalgic towns usually carried loaded pistols.
In one of the most sensational events of the year, 31 year-old barber Andy Carrillo was out late Friday night and discovered his wife drunk, apparently flirting with another man. Carrillo socked him in the face and drew blood; the man stumbled back into the restaurant. A friend of the bleeding man charged outside and hit Carrillo who drew his pistol, shooting this man in the chest. Carrillo fired a second shot that broke a window and grazed the cheek of Frank Miller, yet another man inside the restaurant. Miller charged outside with his own gun drawn. He and Carrillo fired at each other at point blank range, but mirabile dictu, neither of them were wounded, and the man shot in the chest was not seriously injured. Carrillo fled with Miller still firing away. Police arrived and began searching for Carrillo, who they found hiding in his bed as if nothing were amiss.
Carrillo was out the next day on $1,000 bail, which was paid in part by saloon man Jake Luppold. It was decided he would appear in Superior Court on charges of assault with a deadly weapon. His wife Jennie, meanwhile, was sentenced to 30 days in jail "as a result of being drunk the night in question."
When the case came to trial, no details were disputed except that the man allegedly hit in the face by Carrillo testified "he was not certain who had struck him." But after three ballots the jury could not decide on guilt, although the votes always leaned heavily towards acquittal.
Why Carrillo was able to shoot someone in the chest yet even not be found guilty of assault is a mystery. Also odd is that his wife served a month in jail for drunkenness, while the usual sentence at the time was 10-14 days. Another woman arrested for public drunkenness paid $5.00 and no jail time, according to the October 29 Republican, and a man arrested the same day was sentenced to five days in jail because he could not pay the $5 fine.
FIGHT DUEL AT EARLY HOUR ON THIRD STREET
Andy Carrillo Engages in Desperate Battle
W. N. Hall Shot in Breast and Frank Miller in Face During Melee Resulting From Attack on Charles Majors
Andy Carrillo who had just shot W. N. Hall fought a pistol duel in front of the Campi restaurant [on Third street, near the corner of B -ed.] shortly before one o'clock this morning with Frank Miller. Both men marvelously escaped injury and although Carrillo escaped from the scene quickly and hid at home he was captured by Officers Yeager and Lindley and locked up in the county jail within half an hour.
There had been a banquet in progress at the Campi, which about 45 members of the Bricklayers and Plasterers' Union were attending. Mrs. Jennie Carrillo, who was under the influence of liquor, had been hanging about the place trying to interest some of the men without result. Finally Charles Majors went out to go home, but discovered that his wheel had been stolen. He reported the loss to the men inside and returned to the walk. Mrs. Carrillo was talking to him when her husband came around the corner and seeing them together walked up and struck Majors a brutal blow in the face, laying open a great gash in his cheek.
Majors rushed back into the restaurant with blood streaming from his face, and when his companions were told of the assault they rushed out with W. N. Hall in the lead. When Hall reached the sidewalk he was met by Carrillo who he struck for assaulting Majors. Carrillo jumped back, drew his revolver and fired at Hall, the bullet striking him just over and dangerously near the heart [then] crashed through the window in the restaurant, imbedding itself in the wall. Hall jumped behind a tree and the others not being armed rushed back. Carrillo fired another shot which passed through the window grazing Frank Miller's cheek.
Miller, who was back in the restaurant, was forcing his way to the door and in an instant was face to face with Carrillo. Seeing him with a weapon Miller pulled his and the two fired almost instantaneously. That one or both were not hit seems marvelous, as they were right upon one another. Carrillo turned and ran up Third street and Miller again fired at him without effect.
Officer Yeager was standing in front of Germania Hall at the time and rushed to the scene of the shooting at once. Officer Lindley and Skaggs were eating supper in the Boston restaurant and were on the scene within a few moments. Their first effort was to capture Carrillo, and taking the direction of his disappearance a hurried run was made up through First, Second, and Third streets as far as E and back. Then Yeager proposed that Carrillo's home be examined. He and Officer Lindley went to the house, where after some delay the door was opened. Carrillo was found and placed under arrest and taken to the county jail where he was locked up.
Dr. Jesse was called and arrived on the scene in his auto within a few minutes. He took Majors and Hall to his office where he dressed their wounds. Neither are dangerously injured, but it was a close call for Hall. The bullet struck him a glancing blow which saved his life. He remained at the restaurant for some time after the affair discussing it with other members of the union. Miller's face was cut by the bullet which narrowly missed ending his life before he left the restaurant.
– Press Democrat, July 28, 1907
CARRILLO IS FACING JURY
Charged With Assault With a Deadly Weapon
Andy Carrillo, charged with assault with a deadly weapon, was brought to trial Wednesday before Judge Emmet Seawell and a jury. The jury is composed of…
…The first witness was Charles W. Majors, who narrated how he had been banged in the face when he started out of the restaurant where the shooting occurred on the night of the alleged offense. Majors declares he was not certain who had struck him. He returned to the restaurant with blood streaming from his face, and this sight broke up the banquet which was being enjoyed there.
Fred Forget, the second witness, testified to being at the banquet. He saw Majors come in covered with blood, and with other rushed out to the front door of the restaurant. Outside the witness saw Andy Carrillo standing with his hands in his pockets. Walter Hall forged ahead of witness and Carrillo raised his hand containing weapon, and with a string of oaths began firing. Hall need no air breaks [sic] to stop the speed at which he was traveling toward Carrillo. He reversed himself quickly and sped into the restaurant. He had walked right out, turned right around and run back in again.
Hall followed Forget in the narrative being give the jury, and his version of the affair tallied exactly with that of Forget.
Officer I. N. Lindley and Chief of Police Fred J. Rushmore testified to the arrest of Carrillo and the finding of the weapon with which the shooting had been done. Rushmore testified the weapon was still warm when he picked it up in Carrillo's room on First street.
– Santa Rosa Republican, December 11, 1907
THE CARRILLO JURY FAILS TO AGREE
Discharged by Judge Seawell Thursday Night–Stood 10 for Acquittal, 2 for Conviction
The jury in the case of the state against Andy Carrillo failed to reach a unanimous verdict in Judge Seawell's department of the Superior Court and was discharged by the court in the evening when the jurors had announced that it would be impossible for them to agree.
The first ballot taken by the jurors after they had retired was eight for acquittal and four for conviction. Then it was nine for acquittal and three for conviction. Then it went to ten for acquittal and two for conviction, and this is how the jury hung.
The case went to the jury after arguments by District Attorney Clarence Lea and Attorney T. J. Butts, and the instructions of the court, about half past three. The jurors asked to have certain portions of the testimony read to them, and for this purpose were brought into court twice. When supper time came they were taken to the California Oyster Market for supper, accompanied by Deputy Sheriff Don McIntosh. After supper they returned to court and remained in their room until discharged.
TERRORISM ON MARK WEST CREEK
In the summer of 1908, the farmers along Mark West Creek watched in horror as a barn burned with horses and mules inside. As awful as that was, the community was spooked because it was nearly identical to another fire a week before. The farmers believed these were acts of terrorism – and they were probably right.
The second barn to be lost belonged the family of Harrison Finley, grandfather of Helen Finley Comstock, the wife of Judge Hilliard Comstock. She was nine when the fires occurred at the end of August, just as the hop picking season was to begin. Destroyed in the flames was all the harvesting equipment, the family wagons, even "Old Johnny," the horse that was pulling the buggy when Helen's father courted her mother. Whodunnit? According to the Press Democrat story, "some believe it is the work of a crank, who opposes the Japanese, as the farmers used Japs to string their hops."
In an autobiographical sketch jotted down around 1970, Helen Comstock wrote that the family thought IWW organizers were to blame:
We hired Japanese workers to plant and "string-up" the hops…American workers could not or would not do this work but the budding IWW were constantly making trouble. One year Grandpa succumbed to their demands and hired workers through the organization. It was a terrible failure – The plants were not properly planted, the string trellises were not tied properly – the wires not hooked in place on the poles and many acres of hops fell to the ground – It was a miserable harvest. The next year [we resumed using] Japanese workers. In late August or early September, just before harvest, our barn and the barns of two neighbor hop farmers were set on fire…
When she videotaped an oral history about ten years later, Helen seemed even more certain that the IWW burned their barns, "…because [we] were hiring Japanese instead of white people for the hops. The… IWW was a powerful union at the time, and they had gone to my grandfather and threatened him for hiring Japanese to work the hop fields." Although nothing could be proven, Mrs. Comstock said law enforcement "suspected these IWW because they had been threatening."
But according to the report in the Press Democrat, the Sheriff actually said he "hardly agrees with the Jap theory." Nothing is mentioned in any newspaper accounts about threats made to Finley by the IWW or anyone else.
While the Finleys may have blamed the Industrial Workers of the World (also known as the "Wobblies"), the union was undoubtedly innocent of the crime. The first red flag (pun intended) was the threat over hiring Japanese workers; one of the hallmarks of the IWW that made the organization so radical for the day was that it so inclusive, welcoming unskilled Chinese, Mexicans, Filipinos – "every wage-worker, no matter what his religion, fatherland, or trade." The IWW particularly admired the Japanese workers because they would not tolerate working conditions they considered demeaning or wages they thought unfair.
The other major evidence of Wobbly innocence was that the IWW was barely functioning at the time the barns were burned. There were probably no more than 6,000 members nationwide in the summer of 1908, most of them coal miners. The bank panic of 1907 nearly destroyed the organization as locals folded nationwide, and the Chicago HQ even had to suspend publication of its newsletter. It wasn't until the September convention in Chicago, when a thuggish contingent of loggers from the Northwest called the "Overalls Brigade," who rode freight trains and "beat their way" to the convention, took control of the IWW, leading to a new focus on strikes, boycotts, and (yes) sabotage. The growing wave of violent direct action led to the bloody confrontation in 1913 at Wheatland, where 2,000 striking hop pickers, mostly Hispanic, fought a heavily-armed posse that left four dead. Two IWW leaders were convicted of murder, and in the following years Wobblies embarked on a sabotage campaign that was said to destroy $10 million in California property per annum to extort a pardon from the governor.
But if it wasn't the Wobblies, who done the deed in 1908? There's wide leeway for interpreting critical facts here; it makes a great difference whether Harrison Finley was threatened about the Japanese workers months or a year earlier, or if it happened just hours/days before the barn was engulfed. Or maybe the threat had no connection at all (as the Sheriff seemed to suspect) and it was just an outburst by some racist busybody passing on the road skirting the Finley farm.
Here are five theories, ranked along increasing odds of likelihood:
James Bond's Grandfather In December of 1907, a new trade group was formed in Sacramento: "The Pacific Coast Hop Growers' Union." It really should have been called the "Hop Growers' Trust" because it was almost certainly in violation of the Sherman Act. About two months before the fire, Lord Addington made a speech in Parliament where he declared the Growers' Union "wish to ruin the English hop industry" and presented an incriminating letter written by the head of the group that threatened to sell the West Coast crop below cost. One of the directors of the Growers' Union was Harrison Finley, so the Europeans and East Coast hop growers had somewhat of a motive to disrupt the 1908 harvest and specifically target Finley. It would be interesting to research whether any of the other directors had a similar mishap that season (James Near, the neighbor whose barn burned earlier, was not a director, but almost certainly a member). My guesstimate on the odds of an international (or intercontinental) "hit" ordered on a prominent Sonoma County hop grower: Less than 1 percent.
The AFL Where the IWW reached out to minorities and unskilled workers, Samuel Gompers' American Federation of Labor was anything but inclusive. Gompers – an immigrant himself – called for stiff immigration limits to maintain "racial purity and strength" and charged that immigrants "could not be Americanized and could not be taught to render the same intelligent service as was supplied by American workers." AFL racism particularly targeted Latin and Asian workers, even blocking minority unions from joining the all-important local labor councils. Although the hire-American-workers threat made to Finley sounds very much like the 1908 AFL (who particularly hated the Japanese), the union didn't try to organize the unskilled workforce, such as seasonal hop pickers. My odds on this possibility: Barely 1 percent, and only because the AFL of that era always should be suspected in any labor agitation involving racism.
Wobbly Impersonators With the national organization under death-watch that summer, anyone could claim to be an organizer for the IWW and probably no one would dispute it (or care). Rarely was the IWW mentioned in any California paper during 1908 except for little updates about the ongoing cage-match fight between the IWW, AFL, and Miners' Union in Goldfield, Nevada, which was then in its second year. The only paper in the state with news about IWW activity was the Imperial Valley Press, which ran articles about "the plug-ugly tactics and vicious stirring up of strife" in El Centro. According to the newspaper, the "loafing delegates of the IWW" tried to interrupt the cantaloupe harvest that June by trying to drive Japanese field workers away. Local whites were incited to pelt the Japanese with stones, and a wagon carrying workers was attacked and overturned. The Japanese embassy in San Francisco telegraphed the Imperial County sheriff demanding action, but the "IWW" organizers had disappeared. (The following year, however, several actual IWW locals were established in the Imperial Valley.) Did they drift to Sonoma County and torch a few barns two months later? It's doubtful; although there was anti-Japanese racism and use of violence in El Centro, there were no reports of union recruitment in this area. Odds that these were the same characters are again very low, maybe 3 percent.
A Kid With a Match What if the racial threat – and even the advent of the hop picking season – were unrelated to the fire? That two, maybe three, barns in the neighborhood went up in flames might suggest the acts of an arsonist. And at that time of year, there were 130 "incorrigible" boys from "The Boys' and Girls' Aid Society" of San Francisco working a few miles away at the Barlow berry ranch. The place was hardly a carefree summer camp; the papers frequently reported that kids escaped, only to have the police drag them back in handcuffs to collect a bounty. That summer the papers reported several boys fled and were recaptured, most notably one George Springer, "a friendless orphan who was discharged from an orphan asylum because of his bad temper," and Raymond Onion, who had stolen a large sum from his father on the East Coast and traveled to San Francisco. Together, they were "the instigators of most of the trouble which the management of the camp has had during the past three weeks." That the barns were destroyed with horses and cows inside might seem to work against the theory that children might be responsible, but several studies have linked juvenile firesetting with cruelty to animals. Odds: 45 percent. This is the Occam's razor option; there's no simpler explanation than anti-social behavior by a disturbed kid confined to a work camp.
The Pitner Ranch Strikers Even without union representation, there were major Northern California wage strikes by hop pickers in six of the ten years between 1899-1909, sometimes more than one a year. No labor problems were reported in Sonoma County, but the strikes elsewhere often involved racial tension. In 1905, "about a hundred men, mostly tramps," who were picking hops near Wheatland demanded more money and attacked Japanese workers at the ranch when the grower refused their demands; in an ugly 1909 incident near Sacramento, 12 deputies were called to supress a strike by a thousand angry white workers who charged that Japanese hop pickers were better paid and given easier jobs. In this possible scenario, a group of disgruntled hop pickers burned the barns. My odds: 50 percent. Here's why:
The same week the barns burned, there was a wave of small hop picker strikes in the lower Ukiah Valley. Three out of four strikes were settled quickly, but one group of 200 workers, "nearly all from San Francisco," according to the Sept. 1, 1908 Ukiah paper, demanded a 25 percent raise or they would allow no hops to be picked by the non-striking majority of workers. These mid-harvest strike showdowns invariably fizzled – without union muscle to back up the strikers, the foreman would have the sheriff scare the malcontents away and find new unskilled manual laborers, which were never in short supply. (In fact, the PD reported that a "special train of eleven coaches…bound for the hop fiends of Mendocino county, and bearing nearly a thousand San Franciscans" passed through Santa Rosa on Aug. 24.)
The Ukiah Dispatch-Democrat, which covered all hop picking news in Northern California, noted that ten John Doe warrants were issued for leaders of this strike "on the Pitner place" (which was just a couple of miles north of Ukiah) commenting that the rest of the crew were then expected to return to work: "This action will doubtless solve the situation as the majority of the pickers are anxious to return to their labors." The article also gave clues that this strike was more worrisome than usual. The foreman sought legal advice about how to deal with the strikers from a Ukiah lawyer. The newspaper reported that the leaders of the strike "have been the cause of a great deal of complaint by the farmers who live near their camps. Garden truck, poultry, fruit, etc., has been disappearing at an alarming rate since the beginning of the hop picking season." Although the Ukiah paper otherwise ended reports of any labor conflict with news that the workers were back in the fields and all were happy, the Pitner strike was apparently left without closure; did the pickers go back to work? Were the ringleaders found and arrested? The newspaper is silent.
My likely-case scenario is that the arsonist(s) were pickers who walked away from the hop fields near Ukiah and were heading back to San Francisco. It was most likely the Pitner ranch strikers (particularly their ten leaders, who had reason to flee because of the warrants), but it could also have been a loose confederation of malcontents from several of the strikes in the area. They might have targeted the Finley ranch because it appeared to be the largest to someone passing on the road, although it was overall a mid-sized farm with a long, rectangular shape because it was squeezed between the roadway and Mark West Creek.
This interpretation presumes motive – that the person/group disparaging the Japanese workers wanted to take over their jobs immediately. That's supported by Helen Finley Comstock's remark that the stranger was unhappy "because they were hiring Japanese instead of white people," as well as the speed at which the Finleys and neighbors apparently linked the anti-Japanese comment to the arson. Like the Imperial Valley impostors, they might have expected to intimidate Harrison Finley by saying they're "from the IWW" and demanded he fire his Japanese workers and hire them at once. When Finley refused, they torched his barn in revenge and to terrorize other farmers.
Evidence is circumstantial, I'll grant. But thinking about it over several months, I kept coming back to the report about the Pitner ranch strikers being chicken thieves. The bank panic of 1907 nearly destroyed the U.S. economy; unemployment among skilled trade union workers reached 9.5% in the month the barns were burned, more than double the year before. In some parts of the country, the situation was beyond grim; unemployment in New York state reached 36 percent, with 200,000 estimated to be out of work in New York City alone. Charities were overwhelmed with appeals for help; crime skyrocketed; a vast number of men, probably millions, became unemployed drifters. Among those who came up from San Francisco for field labor in the late summer Mendocino heat might have been New England woolen mill workers, once-soft-handed Philadelphia shopkeepers, or an entire family from Ohio, all near destitute. Drawn by newspaper ads promising weeks of steady work, they found the prevailing wage in 1908 to be 80¢ per hundred pounds of cleaned hops, which meant that a picker was lucky to make $1.50 a day, about half the prevailing wage for manual labor. And on top of that, some growers demanded the workers rent tents from them and pay for food. It's unknown what conditions were like for workers on the Pitner ranch, but with an epidemic of food being stolen from nearby gardens and backyards, we can guess that the situation was not good.
Growers like Harrison Finley treated workers well, many returning every year with their families for the harvest. But other growers had conditions that could have been the despicable inspiration for The Grapes of Wrath. It's not hard to understand that workers on those farms would have become bitter and resentful and crazy angry, even willing to, say, torch the barns of blameless farmers who simply asked them to go away (read update here).
It's also not hard to understand how people could have been radicalized by these experiences. None may have carried the "red card" of the IWW in 1908, but you can bet that many were card-carrying Wobblies in years to come, and who can blame them.
BARN NEAR CITY BURNED
James Near's Property Destroyed Friday Night
The large barn of James Near, adjoining this city, was totally destroyed by fire Friday night. With the building were twenty-five tons of hay, harness and other property. A buggy shed and harness shop were also destroyed. There were eleven horses in the barn, but with the exception of one they were removed without injury. The animal caught in the flames is Mr. Near's fine driving mare and it is hoped her injuries are not serious. Some fencing and grass in the pasture caught fire but was extinguished. The flames so near the city attracted many people to the scene…
HORSES AND MULES BURN TO DEATH IN BARN FIRE
Disasterous Fire on Harrison Finley Place
The large barn on the Harrison Finley place, north of town on the Mark West Springs road, was totally destroyed by the fire shortly before midnight Saturday night together with fifteen tons of hay, two horses, two mules, eight sets of double harness, a heavy truck and a spring wagon. The only insurances as far as could be learned was on the mules.
The origin of the fire is a mystery. It was first seen by Charles Maddux as he drove home from Santa Rosa. Mr. Maddux rushed to the Finley residence, roused the family, and gave the alarm. Joseph Brandt, a neighbor, got his large touring car and gathered up all the neighbors for miles and a bucket brigade was soon formed to fight the flames, but all to no avail.
The barn was enveloped in flames when first discovered and at no time was there any chance to rescue the animals or property after Mr. Maddux arrived. The flames were seen for miles in all directions, and created considerable excitement. Messages of inquiry were received by the Press Democrat regarding the fire while it was in progress. The barn was a large structure, being 25×60 feet, and two stories. The hay was stored in the loft. The loss will be quite heavy on Mr. Finley.
– Press Democrat, August 23, 1908
ARE INVESTIGATING THE INCENDIARY FIRES
The destruction of the barns of James Near and Harrison Finley on the Mark West road, near the junction of the Healdsburg road, within a week of one another, has caused considerable uneasiness in the neighborhood. Speculation is rife as to the cause of the fires. All are firm in the opinion that they were set by some one intent on getting even for some imagined injury. Some believe it is the work of a crank, who opposes the Japanese, as the farmers used Japs to string their hops. They say they were unable to get other help. Sheriff J. K. Smith returned Monday evening after a two days investigation as much in the dark as ever. He found some tracks, but was unable to follow them to any tangible results. He hardly agrees with the Jap theory.
UNSPEAKABLE ACTS
In the upside-down legal views of 1907 Santa Rosa, some acts considered child abuse weren't, and acts not viewed as abuse of children were truly criminal. (Got that?)
In the first story below, a warrant was issued for a man who whipped a horse – but his crime was cussing within earshot of women and children, not the horsewhipping. As mentioned here before, "using profane and vulgar language in the presence of children" was even considered a more serious crime than child neglect.
The other item finds a child molester held for trial on charges of lascivious conduct. That the case reached Superior Court was unusual; in 1906, another offender was told to get out of town by the police, and a Justice of the Peace gave a "hugger" just six months in county jail for "indecent exposure and making improper proposals to young girls" (MORE).
As a side note, the editors of the Press Democrat and Santa Rosa Republican should be commended for publishing these stories, and particularly for naming the offenders. Some newspapers in that era had a policy of ignoring sexual abuse crimes against children; a few years before, The New York World – probably the most sensationalist newspaper in the history of America – pointedly refused to print a story about the molestation of a 6 year-old girl that appeared on front pages of other papers. In a 1903 speech, NY World publisher Joseph Pulitzer said that the press should not "offend the good taste or lower the moral tone" and that "frankness should be linked with decency" – yet in the very next breath defended his paper's "long and dramatic accounts of murders, railroad wrecks, fires, lynchings, political corruption, embezzlements, frauds, graft, divorces, what you will."
SAMUELS CHARGED WITH USING VULGAR LANGUAGE
A warrant has been issued against Tom Samuels, charging him with having used vulgar and profane language in the presence of women and children. Officer I. N. Lindley swore to the complaint, and an additional one of cruelty to animals may be placed against the young man.
It is alleged that while Samuels was driving along Fifth street Saturday evening the horse became unruly and he began to beat it with a whip. A protest from those who witnessed the action is declared to have brought forth an avalanche of profanity and a language which was decidedly more expressive than elegant. Samuels has so far evaded capture.
OLD MAN ADMITS SERIOUS CHARGE
At a preliminary examination held in Justice Atchinson's court on Saturday morning [after] an elderly man, named Joseph Dunlap, confessed that he was guilty of lascivious conduct towards a little girl. He was held for trial in the Superior Court, and he has announced his willingness to enter a plea of guilty when he comes up before the higher tribunal.
The man could not give bail and was returned to jail. While he only admits that he acted improperly towards one little girl it is alleged that this is not true.
– Press Democrat, April 21, 1907