User:Asiaticus/sandbox/Jack Powers

Jack Powers whose real name was John A. Power, (1827 – November 1860), was an Irish born immigrant who came to New York as a child, who became a soldier in the Mexican American War, in the garrison of Santa Barbara, California. During the California Gold Rush a well known professional gambler and a famed horseman, known as Jack Powers, in San Francisco and later in Santa Barbara and Los Angeles. He had several brushes with the vigilantes of San Francisco in 1849 and 1856 and at Los Angeles in 1857 and with the law in Santa Barbara in 1853.

Long known for his skills as a horseman, on May 2 1858, his skills were demonstrated in a 150-mile time over distance race for $5,000. At that time he was described in the Daily Alta California:

"He is a spare built man, with full sunburnt face, heavy hair and whiskers, and a keen eye."

Soon after this race he was accused by San Luis Obispo vigilantes of complicity in the 1857 murder of two men, and of being the head of the bandit gang, that plagued the southern central coastal region of California, along the El Camino Real with robberies and murders in San Luis Obispo County and Santa Barbara County between 1853 and 1858. This gang was later named the Jack Powers Gang in 1883, by Jesse D. Mason in his History of Santa Barbara County California.

Early Life

Born in Ireland as John Power, he came to the United States with his parents in 1836, and settled with them in New York City. When the Mexican-American War commenced in 1846, John at 19 years of age when he and his older brother Edward joined Company G of the 1st Regiment of New York Volunteers with many of his friends from New York, and went west to be a soldier. His brother was made a corporal. His brother in law, Charles Heffernan, enlisted in Company F, accompanied by his wife, John's sister. The New York Volunteers was a unit organized by Colonel Jonathan D. Stevenson to occupy and settle California, and men in the unit were promised land in the region should the war be successful.

His Early years in California

In San Francisco John Power and his brother transferred to Company F under Captain Francis J. Lippitt, one of three companies of the 1st New York Volunteers which were then sent to Santa Barbara, California. The two other companies were soon sent to occupy towns in the southern part of Baja California Territory, where they saw some action before the end of the war. Power and his company remained there as a garrison, in relative idleness until the disbanding of the Regiment in September 1848, some months after the beginning of the California Gold Rush. Jack Powers remained in the town as a gambler until late in the year when he left for the mines with his brother in law in a party of other men of his regiment. One of those men, James Lynch, later wrote an account of that journey to the goldfields and of their return to San Francisco for the winter of 1848 in his 1882 book, With Stevenson to California, 1846-1848.

When John Power went to San Francisco for the winter, he became a gambler there and also became a associated with the San Francisco Society of Regulators. Powers was accused of being one of The Hounds by the popular vigilante movement organized to rid the city of them after a particularly violent episode against a Chilean settlement in the city during the summer of 1849. On Monday, July 23, 1849, the vigilantes arrested and made prisoners of 20 of the "Hounds", including John Powers, who were then arraigned on charges of conspiracy, riot, robbery, and assault with intent to kill, and all plead "Not guilty." While several others were convicted of various charges, John Powers, was found not guilty on all the charges.

Despite being acquitted of all the charges in a trial, Powers subsequently left San Francisco for the gold fields. There he was said to have had some success. That fall he then went to Stockton, the gateway to the southern mines, where, in a spectacular run of luck, he broke the bank of several large gambling establishments acquiring a fortune variously said to be $50,000 or $175,000, sufficient to make him a wealthy man. He intended a return by steamboat to San Francisco, then take steamships to New York, to take care of his widowed mother who had remained there when he and his brother had left for California. However, persuaded to attempt to make his fortune larger by gambling, he lost most of it, and never left for New York. Instead he became a noted gambler and horseman at San Francisco and at the resort of Mission Dolores between late 1849 and 1851. By this time he had become known as Jack Powers, and was well known to influential people in the city and in state politics.

William Redmond Ryan, describes meeting him returning from the Mission Dolores in 1849:

"... Jack Power, one of the sporting characters of the country. Jack had been a volunteer; and, on the disbanding of the regiment, becoming infected with the excitement and adventurous character of the wild life which he had led since his arrival in the country, had devoted himself entirely to gambling and horsemanship, in both of which accomplishments he greatly excelled."

"No matter how low the state of his finances, he was never without a good horse, caparisoned in the true Californian fashion; and that on which he was now mounted was one of the most beautiful I had ever seen. It had, however, this striking peculiarity, that it would never gallop straight forward towards any given point, but would advance in a sort of sidelong canter, very pleasing to behold, but requiring great skill on the part of the rider to maintain his seat. In this eccentric movement of the animal Power took great delight, for it afforded him opportunities of displaying his superior horsemanship. In addition to his other accomplishments, he was also an excellent performer on the banjo; and one evening, with three or four others, gave a ... concert in the dining-saloon of the Parker House, which was suitably arranged for the occasion; and, although the tickets for admission were three dollars each, the attraction of our Nimrod's celebrity ensured a numerous attendance."

Powers is described by Barry and Patten, owners of one of the leading saloons in early San Francisco, as among the men they saw when they first knew the Mission Dolores, in 1850:

"...Jack Powers, always well mounted, and dashing along to show the merits of his nag. Jack Powers! with black beard and flowing hair — his glittering, restless, omnivagant eye — the worst we ever looked upon in any living creature — a fascinating terror — sure index of the devil, time eventually proved him to be."

Return to Santa Barbara

Powers returned to Santa Barbara in 1851. From Santa Barbara, he often traveled to San Francisco, Los Angeles and other places to gamble and race horses. In 1852 Powers established a rancho to raise pigs along the Arroyo Burro on lands formerly belonging to the Mission Santa Barbara that he claimed were public lands he was entitled to settle by the conditions for his service in Stevenson's Regiment. This same land had been leased by Richard S. Den and Daniel A. Hill from the Mission some years earlier. Den also claimed to have an 1846 grant to these lands from the last Mexican governor. A suit in the state courts was begun.

In 1853, the state court case over Powers rancho, ended with a ruling in Den and Hill's favor. Powers refused to leave his rancho after losing his court case in the state district and supreme courts, claiming it was not in the states jurisdiction to decide the matter but that of the federal courts. Powers with a group of friends vowed to resist being evicted. He was eventually persuaded to leave his ranch, but only after a bloody clash in the town between some of Power's friends and the sheriff and a posse of 200 who were about to attempt to eject him from his ranch by force. One of Powers friends was killed and two others were wounded, and the Sheriff was badly wounded but managed to kill his assailant, a Californio summoned to serve in the posse.

Mission Santa Barbara in 1856; view from the northeast. The Powers rancho, lay behind the Mission to the right. Powers had left the rancho three years before this picture was made.

Powers Second Conflict with the Vigilante Movement

Following his loss of the rancho, Powers continued living in Santa Barbara County, on a section of land in the north of the county, and living by gambling and racing horses as before. In 1856, he protected and hid the politician Ned McGowan from a posse of the San Francisco Committee of Vigilance who came hunting for him in Santa Barbara. This earned Jack Powers the enmity of that movement and the title of "the notorious" before his name in the San Francisco Bulletin and other newspapers articles from then on.

It would soon lead to him being accused by the Los Angeles vigilantes, (who were also after the Flores Daniel Gang), of being head of a burglary ring that had been plaguing Los Angeles, (a place he often visited to gamble and race horses), in early 1857. Arrested on a warrant from Los Angeles by the Sheriff of Santa Barbara, he made bail but soon fled from Santa Barbara, before a Los Angeles vigilante posse came for him on that charge. That he fled, is understandable when the news came that the posse had summarily lynched two other men, accused of being members of the Flores-Daniel Gang while traveling through the area of the Mission San Buenaventura on their way to arrest Powers. Arrested in San Francisco, Powers fought extradition to Los Angeles while the vigilantes held power there. Eventually he lost the fight in the supreme court and was extradited to Los Angeles, but with the vigilantes no longer holding sway the court in Los Angeles dismissed his case for lack of any evidence.

The Great Match Against Time

A little over a year later Jack Powers rode in a famous time over distance horse race, called by its promoter The Great Match Against Time, held on May 2, 1858, at the Pioneer Race Course south of San Francisco. Here he set a record time of 6 hours and 43 minutes over a distance of 150 miles, with 24 California mustang horses, mostly belonging to him. The Daily Alta California wrote:

"The farthest any one horse was ridden at a time was 4 miles, and the least distance 1 mile. He ran at top speed the whole distance. On taking a new horse, he would spring from the saddle, run a few steps, to stretch his legs, and immediately vault into the saddle of the animal which awaited him. Attendants sometimes made the rounds with him, tendering him drink, and receiving his orders."

At the end of the race Powers "publicly offered to bet $5,000 that he would ride 50 miles in 2 hours; and that no other man in California could perform the feat he had just accomplished; and another,that he would accomplish the 150 miles in 5 hours; with English or American stock, to which there was no response. The average time of the race is within a fraction of 23 miles an hour. Powers does not hesitate to assert that he can make much better time than the above."

Bandit Leader?

In late May 1858, shortly after the Great Match Against Time, Jack Powers was again accused of crimes for his role in the activities of Pio Linares and his gang by San Luis Obispo vigilantes. The gang was exposed by witnesses some of the gang had allowed to live, following the May 12th, robbery and murder of two Frenchmen and the kidnapping the wife of one of the victims, at Rancho San Juan Capistrano del Camote, and the killing of a witness nearby, in San Luis Obispo County. These accusations against Powers were based on the forced confession of one of the accused bandits, Jose Antonio Garcia who had been discovered at a nearby rancho by a vigilante posse hunting for the gang. Powers was accused in Garcia's confession of participating with the gang in the killing of two Basque cattlemen in late 1857 on the Nacimiento River near San Miguel.

The vigilantes also made out Powers as being in secret, the outlaw gang leader, of this group of highway-robbers and murderers of the vicims and witnesses, including Linares, Garcia and others, operating in southern and central California for several years earlier. During the Gold Rush era, from 1849 to 1858, robberies and murders had been committed by bandits on the stretch of El Camino Real through San Luis Obispo County and Santa Barbara County, making it the most dangerous route in the state.

On the basis of these accusations, Governor John B. Weller issued rewards for the arrests of the gang members still at large:

" $2,500 REWARD.

WHEREAS, IT IS REPRESENTED To me by the citizens of San Luis Obispo that several atrocious murders and robberies have recently been perpetrated at San Miguel, San Juan de Capistrano, and Camate; and that upon the oath, of respectable men, these crimes have been charged upon the following persons, who are still at large, viz:

JACK POWERS, an Irishman, and generally known as a gambler.

PIO LINARES, is a native of this country, has a slightly dark complexion, is slender, has large sleepy eyes, and without beard.

EL HUERO (light or empty headed) RAFEAL is tall, slender, and quite handsome, with a light mustache.

MIGUEL BLANCO, is also of this country; of low stature, about 20 years of age, is handsome very fair, with a bold face and without beard.

DISEDERIO GRIZALYA, is small and slender, has somewhat dark complexion, large eyes, half open like the eyes of a cat, has no beard and is jovial and pleasant in his manners.

JESUS VALENZUELA, is slender; brother to Joaquin Valenzuela; one of the five Joaquins, and is also called Jesus Chiquito.

NIEVES ROBLES alias FLORIAN SERVIN has a round face, somewhat dark complexion is small, and about 23 years of age.

LUCIANO, El Mestino, or Herdsman, is a hunter of the Tulares.

Now, therefore, by virtue of the power vested in me, by Constitution and laws of this State I hereby offer the following REWARDS for their arrest and conviction:

For JACK POWERS, Five Hundred Dollars

For PIO LINARES. Five Hundred Dollars

For RAFEAL MONEY, alias RAFEAL HENADA. alias EL HUERO RAFEAL, Five Hundred Dollars.

For MIGUEL BLANCO, Two Hundred Dollars.

For DESEDERIO GRIZALVA, Two Hundred Dollars.

For NIEVES ROBLES, Two Hundred Dollars.

For JESUS VALENZUELA, alias JESUS CHIQUITO, Two Hundred Dollars.

For LUCIANO, El Mestino, Two Hundred Dollars.

Done at Sacramento, California, this 31st day of May, A. D., One Thousand Eight Hundred and Fifty-Eight.

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand, and affixed the Great Seal of the State. JOHN B. WELLER.

Attest: Ferris Forman, Secretary of State."

After the state governor issued this $500 reward for him on May 31, Powers, fearing arrest and delivery to vigilante justice in San Luis Obispo, was aided by friends in San Francisco, who hid him from the police, until he could flee the state on June 3, 1858. The August 27, 1858, Daily Alta California would later report:

"The Elizabeth Owens sailed from San Francisco on the 3d of June, for the mouth of the Colorado, but was obliged to put into Guaymas for water. ... The notorious Jack Powers went down on the schooner from San Francisco to Guaymas, and was still there when the vessel left, notwithstanding the reports that he has lately been seen in Lower California."

Garcia, the one witness that placed Powers at the scene of one of the gangs crimes., was hung by the vigilantes at San Luis Obispo, Tuesday June 8th, 1858, instead of being held as a witness for a trial of Powers, five days after Powers had left San Francisco for Mexico.

Exile in Sonora and Death

From the Los Angeles Star, in October 9, 1858 came word from Jack Powers:

The notorious Jack Powers is in Hermosillo. He has plenty of money, and is enjoying himself as it nothing had happened. He says that in two years he intends to return to San Francisco.

In June 1859, from Sonora, in the Guaymas correspondence of the San Francisco Herald came the following:

"Jack Powers, about whom so much has been said, has located himself at Hermosillo, where ho has opened a fine hotel. Jack is in high feather with the Peiquiera Government and the Mexicans generally, and in consequence is able to render great assistance to Americans traveling through the country, who are free to stop at Hermosillo. And to his credit be it said, that he has in all cases where it has come under his notice aided them. I know two parties myself, who left free, that took letters to Jack. Jack says he is no friend to filibusters, as the Mexicans have treated him kindly, but will aid his countrymen whenever and wherever he can, who are peaceably traveling through the country or pursuing a legitimate calling in it. He says in a short time he will again visit California and face his enemies."

From the September 30, 1860 Daily Alta California:

"Jack Powers left, a short time ago, for Arizona. He has, I believe, purchased a ranch a few miles from Tucson, on which he intends to keep some horses he bought to sell the government. He also has a contract for making brick for a new fort about to be put up by the United States. Powers has many friends in Sonora and friends who would perhaps do as much for him as any he ever had in California. And of his whole conduct since he has been here has been most quiet and inoffensive, but little attention is paid to what is said of him in California."

However the truth was that after two years, gambling and running a ranch in the Mexican state of Sonora, in 1860, he drove a herd northward into New Mexico Territory to sell it in a new mining boom town on the Mimbres River. However he found this boom was only a rumor upon reaching the Territory.

Then on November 2, 1860:

BY TELEGRAPH.

[Special Dispatch to the Alta California.]

[Per Pacific and Atlantic Line.]

Los Angeles, Nov. 2.

Murder of Jack Powers.

We learn from Mr. R. O. Cossett, who passed here on the Overland mail stage to-day, that the notorious Jack Powers was murdered on his ranch a little south of Tubac, Arizona, by his Mexican peons. He had some seven or eight hundred head of stock on his ranch when he was murdered.

On November 16, 1860, the Daily Evening Bulletin, published a letter from its Arizona correspondent at Fort Buchanan, Arizona, dated October 31, 1860.

"Additional Particulars of the Murder of Jack Powers

"Some three months ago Jack Powers came up from Sonora with 500 head of cattle, also a lot of sheep and horses. He first stopped on what is known as the Potrero ranch, 4 miles north of the Line. Wishing to find better grass, he moved to the Babacomari ranch (deserted some 40 years ago on account of the Apaches, and belonging to the Spanish family Elias.) Jack came up with 30 Yaqui Indians , who deserted him for fear of the Apaches. While at the Babacomari ranch Capt. Ewell sent him some dragoons until he could get peons to herd his cattle. The Apaches appearing on the ranch, he left for the Potrero ranch, occupied by Montgomery & Smith, and built a house half-a-mile from them, where he settled, with four peons, to herd his cattle. (I forgot to mention that he was on his way to the Rio Mimbres, but on his arrival here, he learned that the mines were a failure, and so he stopped at this point.) On Thursday last [October 25, 1860] Grundy Ake called to see Jack, and asked him if he was not afraid to stop with along with the Mexicans. He answered that his life was safer with Mexicans than Americans.

"On Friday night, Montgomery and Smith called at his (Jack's) place, to ask if their (Montgomery & Smith's) hogs had been around. Jack said yes, and wished them to remain over night, as they would be sure to find them in the morning, when they came out of the tules. But Montgomery and Smith said they would come about daylight. On returning in the morning, they found several hogs at the house, and Jack Powers lying on the floor with his throat cut, and skull cracked by a blow on the head. The hogs had badly mangled his body. He was buried on the Sunday, by the farmers living around Calabasas (the U.S. Custom House). Later on the day of the burial, an American, who came up from a small town called Imcorza, met the four peons with a half-breed American (supposed to be Cherokee) on their road down to Sonora. The half-breed was riding Jack's horse. None of the party was leading any animals. It appears that Jack had row with his peons and they killed him, taking all his animals, and everything that was valuable, together with five horses. Mr. Boza of Calabasas, has for the present taken charge of Jack's stock."

Powers in later Histories

In the years following his death, the vigilante accusations, unanswered by Powers, became accepted truths, even by people who had known him. In 1873, Powers was described by Barry and Patten, owners of one of the leading saloons in early San Francisco, as among the men they saw when they first knew the Mission Dolores, in 1850:

... Jack Powers, always well mounted, and dashing along to show the merits of his nag. Jack Powers! with black beard and flowing hair — his glittering, restless, omnivagant eye — the worst we ever looked upon in any living creature — a fascinating terror — sure index of the devil, time eventually proved him to be.

In 1883, Myron Angel, used the articles written for the San Francisco Bulletin by Walter Murray a leader of the San Luis Obispo Vigilante Commitee in 1858, as his account of Powers deeds in his History of San Luis Obispo County, California.

• Mason, Jesse D; History of Santa Barbara county, California, with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Thompson & West, Oakland, Cal., 1883

• Storke, Yda Addis, A Memorial and Biographical History of the Counties of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Ventura, California Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, 1891.

For Further Reading

See Gold Dust and Gunsmoke: Tales of Gold Rush Outlaws, Gunfighters, Lawmen, and Vigilantes (1999) by John Boessenecker.

References

• Asbury, Herbert. The Gangs of New York. Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1927. ISBN 1-56025-275-8
• Baker, Gayle. Santa Barbara. Harbor Town Histories, Santa Barbara. 2003. ISBN 0-9710984-1-7
• Mason, Jesse D; History of Santa Barbara county, California, with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Thompson & West, Oakland, Cal., 1883
• Storke, Yda Addis, A Memorial and Biographical History of the Counties of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Ventura, California Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, 1891.
• Tompkins, Walker A. Santa Barbara, Past and Present. Tecolote Books, Santa Barbara, CA, 1975.
• Tompkins, Walker A. It Happened in Old Santa Barbara. Sandollar Press, Santa Barbara, CA, 1976.
• Tompkins, Walker A. Santa Barbara History Makers. McNally & Loftin, Santa Barbara. 1983. ISBN 0-87461-059-1

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Tompkins, version.

Early Life

Born in Ireland as John Power, he came to the United States with his parents in 1836, and settled with them in New York City. While there he learned gambling, courtly manners, and how to ride a horse; he also made the acquaintance of many street toughs in the run-down districts of the Bowery and Hell's Kitchen. When the Mexican-American War commenced in 1846, he joined the 1st Regiment of New York Volunteers with many of his friends from the streets of New York, and went west to be a soldier. The New York Volunteers was a unit organized by Colonel Jonathan D. Stevenson to occupy and settle California, and men in the unit were promised land in the region should the war be successful.

By the time his unit had reached San Francisco, sailing around Cape Horn, Powers had already become a sergeant, under Captain Francis J. Lippitt in Company F of Stevenson's regiment which was tasked with occupying Santa Barbara. When they landed at West Beach the war was already over for Santa Barbara. John C. Frémont had captured the town on December 27, 1846, and accepted the surrender of the Mexican forces in Los Angeles two weeks later. Powers and his men from the Bowery entered the town in early 1847 as an occupying force.

It did not take long for the charismatic Powers to become popular with the locals. He had good looks, good manners, and his horsemanship impressed even the local caballeros, who expected the ability from a gentleman, but not from a Yankee. But when Powers' unit was mustered out on August 7, 1848 after the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, he left town, going north to San Francisco. Many of the men of his Regiment went instead to the gold fields, intending to get rich. Powers intended to do so as well, but by using his peculiar talents, those that required a city.

Powers' skill as a gambler paid off richly in San Francisco, where he amassed a fortune in the gambling halls in that rowdy frontier town. Briefly he was involved with the Barbary Coast-neighborhood gang of toughs known as "The Hounds," which took part in robbery, murder, and rape of the non-"American," and particularly Hispanic and Catholic, residents of the city; many of the members of this gang were fellow refugees from the streets of the Bowery, Five Points, or Hell's Kitchen in New York. Powers fled town to avoid being lynched by vigilantes, and returned to Santa Barbara around 1849, where he found a job caring for the horses belonging to the influential De la Guerra family.

Santa Barbara - Rise to power

It was a profitable choice of employment, for he intended to be a highwayman. De la Guerra owned numerous ranches along the length of El Camino Real, all with good horses; charged with their care, and out of sight of his employer, he could do what he wanted. When Salomon Pico's band was broken up in 1851, Powers brought its remnants together under his own leadership. Powers arranged for fast horses to be available at points along the route to assist him and his gang with getaways. During this period, ranchers were making a fortune on the gold fields – not on ore, but on selling cattle to the hungry mining camps at an enormous profit. After driving their cattle north from the ranches of Santa Barbara County, they would return with their baggage full of gold dust or "octagonals" – gold ingots or "slugs" worth fifty dollars – and in the lawless climate these travelers were a tempting target.

The Sheriff in Santa Barbara at the time was Valentine Hearne, who shared Powers' hatred of the Hispanic residents from whom the town had so recently been taken. He gave little resistance to Powers, as Powers and his "Band of Five" began what historian Walker A. Tompkins described as a "reign of terror" that lasted until approximately 1855. During this period, in which Powers and his gang were active as highway robbers up and down El Camino Real, the route connecting the old Mission towns, the stretch from Santa Barbara to San Luis Obispo was notorious as the most dangerous place to travel in California. Mutilated bodies appeared regularly along the road; Powers had the uncanny knack for appearing in the gambling halls of Los Angeles or elsewhere almost instantly after a new murder along the route, fooling people into thinking he was uninvolved: but what they did not know was that he always had fresh and fast horses ready at strategic points along the trail. Yet suspicion persisted because some of the eyewitnesses told tales of magnificent horsemanship by one of the masked bandits – a skill Powers had earlier been too proud to hide.

Matters came to a head in 1853. Powers was confident enough to cease his banditry and come into the open, and he seized the Mission Santa Inés along with the adjacent Rancho San Marcos. This fertile and profitable operation was leased to prominent local rancher Nicolas A. Den, coincidentally a fellow Irishman who had come to California during Mexican times. Powers attempted to steal the cattle from the ranch but Den caught them during the attempted roundup, and with an armed force he humiliated Powers, making him run for his life, and recovering all the cattle in the process. Powers, not one to turn the other cheek, came back for Den – but not right away.

Battle of Arroyo Burro

Upper San Roque Canyon, near Santa Barbara, California; bandit Jack Powers held this area in the early 1850s, defeating even the local sheriff.

Powers seized control of an uninhabited structure in the Arroyo Burro (now San Roque Canyon, in the vicinity of Stevens Park at the Foothill Road bridge), and claimed it as his own, along with his company of bandits, many of whom were supported by the recently arrived American residents of Santa Barbara. His gang of squatters fortified the place, ignoring calls to leave. Den won a judgment against them in district court. Powers even appealed to the California Supreme Court, but lost. The new sheriff, William W. Twist, was required by law to serve notice on them to leave, so he gathered a posse of 200 men at the Aguirre Adobe, at Carrillo and Anacapa Streets, to go to Arroyo Burro, about three miles away, and evict them.

Powers was not one to wait: seizing the initiative, he sent a small band of his outlaws to disrupt the organization and assassinate the sheriff. Reaching the Aguirre Adobe, one of them fired one shot at the district attorney, who had just stepped out of the building, putting a hole in his hat; another stabbed Sheriff Twist in the back, seriously injuring him; but a barrage of gunfire from the assembled force brought both outlaws down and the others ran, with the posse in pursuit.

The posse arrived out-of-breath at Arroyo Burro Canyon, to be met with a hail of bullets, and stopped short. After a brief negotiation, Powers informed the leader of the posse (Twist, injured, had stayed behind) that his gang would kill any man that passed a huge sycamore tree (the "Outlaw Tree", still standing at 134 North Ontare, not far from State Street). Seeing that the bandits were dug in, well-armed, and determined, the posse backed away in defeat.

Powers continued his highway robbing in the vicinity, but not for long. He abandoned his camp in Arroyo Burro when he heard that a band of better-organized and uniformed vigilantes, similar to the one that had defanged the "Hounds" in the Barbary Coast, was riding down from San Luis Obispo to eliminate him (according to another source, he heard that a company of U.S. Marines was on its way). By the time the vigilantes reached Santa Barbara, he was gone, leaving behind nothing but the persistent legend of buried treasure which accompanies most hurried bandit exits. However Powers and his gang continued to plague the central coast under Pio Linares while Powers moved to Los Angeles.

Twist later recovered from his knifing, but along with the mayor he resigned in 1855 due to the continued lawlessness in the area, lack of competent backup, and an anti-Anglo backlash. While a judge occasionally issued arrest warrants, there was no one to carry them out until later in the decade. At one point, California Governor John Bigler dispatched a U.S. Navy warship to Santa Barbara to restore order.

Later career and death

The departure of Powers was just one step on the tenuous return of law and order in Santa Barbara and the surrounding region, which had been lawless since the takeover from Mexico. After leaving Santa Barbara, Powers went first to Los Angeles, where he became overlord of a gambling operation, but in 1858 his role in the activities of Pio Linares and his gang in the robbery and murder of 2 men and the kidnapping the wife of one of the victims, at Rancho San Juan Capistrano del Camote in San Luis Obispo County. His identity came to light after the capture and confession of a member of his gang. Governor John B. Weller issued rewards for their arrest:

" $2,500 REWARD.

WHEREAS, IT IS REPRESENTED To me by the citizens of San Luis Obispo that several atrocious murders and robberies have recently been perpetrated at San Miguel, San Juan de Capistrano, and Camate; and that upon the oath, of respectable men, these crimes have been charged upon the following persons, who are still at large, viz:

JACK POWERS, an Irishman, and generally known as a gambler.

PIO LINARES, is a native of this country, has a slightly dark complexion, is slender, has large sleepy eyes, and without beard.

EL HUERO (light or empty headed) RAFEAL is tall, slender, and quite handsome, with a light mustache.

MIGUEL BLANCO, is also of this country; of low statue, about 20 years of age, is handsome very fair, with a bold face and without beard.

DISEDERIO GRIZALYA, is small and slender, has somewhat dark complexion, large eyes, half open like the eyes of a cat, has no beard and is jovial and pleasant in his manners.

JESUS VALENZUELA, is slender; brother to Joaquin Valenzuela; one of the five Joaquins, and is also called Jesus Chiquito.

NIEVES ROBLES alias FLORIAN SERVIN has a round face, somewhat dark complexion is small, and about 23 years of age.

LUCIANO, El Mestino, or Herdsman, is a hunter of the Tulares.

Now, therefore, by virtue of the power vested in me, by Constitution and laws of this State I hereby offer the following REWARDS for their arrest and conviction:

For JACK POWERS, Five Hundred Dollars

For PIO LINARES. Five Hundred Dollars

For RAFEAL MONEY, alias RAFEAL HENADA. alias EL HUERO RAFEAL, Five Hundred Dollars.

For MIGUEL BLANCO, Two Hundred Dollars.

For DESEDERIO GRIZALVA, Two Hundred Dollars.

For NIEYES ROBLES, Two Hundred Dollars.

For JESUS VALENZUELA, alias JESUS CHIQUITO, Two Hundred Dollars.

For LUCIANO, El Mestino, Two Hundred Dollars.

Done at Sacramento, California, this 31st day of May, A. D., One Thousand Eight Hundred and Fifty-Eight.

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand, and affixed the Great Seal of the State. JOHN B. WELLER.

Attest: Ferris Forman, Secretary of State."

Finally there were enough warrants for his arrest that he left the country, going to Mexico.

The August 27, 1858, Daily Alta California reported:

"The Elizabeth Owens sailed from San Francisco on the 3d of June, for the mouth of the Colorado, but was obliged to put into Guaymas for water. ... The notorious Jack Powers went down on the schooner from San Francisco to Guaymas, and was still there when the vessel left, notwithstanding the reports that he has lately been seen in Lower California."

Details of the last years of his life are sparse. He left Los Angeles probably to escape a lynch mob, going to the Mexican state of Sonora where he ran a ranching operation in the mountains northeast of Hermosillo. In November 1860, he fought with one of his own men over a woman. She and her lover murdered him and hurled his body into a mesquite-fenced enclosure filled with starving hogs.

The uneaten portion of his corpse was buried in the Arizona Territory south of Tubac, near the town of Nogales, Sonora.

References

• Asbury, Herbert. The Gangs of New York. Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1927. ISBN 1-56025-275-8
• Baker, Gayle. Santa Barbara. Harbor Town Histories, Santa Barbara. 2003. ISBN 0-9710984-1-7
• Mason, Jesse D; History of Santa Barbara county, California, with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Thompson & West, Oakland, Cal., 1883
• Storke, Yda Addis, A Memorial and Biographical History of the Counties of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Ventura, California Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, 1891.
• Tompkins, Walker A. Santa Barbara, Past and Present. Tecolote Books, Santa Barbara, CA, 1975.
• Tompkins, Walker A. It Happened in Old Santa Barbara. Sandollar Press, Santa Barbara, CA, 1976.
• Tompkins, Walker A. Santa Barbara History Makers. McNally & Loftin, Santa Barbara. 1983. ISBN 0-87461-059-1

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