l
for Charles Cora, and it was on that trial that he made the most
eloquent and extraordinary argument and plea of his life in a criminal
case. It was not a packed jury in Cora's case. Care had been taken to
empanel only good, respectable citizens, some of whom, a short time
afterward, became members of the Vigilance Committee, and in great or
less degree participated in the seizure of Cora from the county jail and
in his condemnation and execution. Three of the jury were prominent
Front street merchants. Notwithstanding all the feeling against Cora,
the popular unrelenting prejudice, and the great preponderance of the
foremost legal minds of the San Francisco Bar, to his prosecution, Alex.
Campbell, General Williams and Colonel Sam. Inge, U. S. District
Attorney, to assist the public prosecutor, the jury disagreed, and of
the jurors who held out against a verdict of guilty of murder were three
Front street merchants and others of equal high standing in the
community. Cora was held for another trial, and it was while awaiting
this that he was seized by the Vigilance Committee, taken to their rooms
and hanged.

The excitement consequent upon the killing of Richardson did not
culminate in the formation of a Vigilance Committee, similar to that of
1851, but it influenced the public mind in that direction. It was the
piling of the combustibles which required only the next spark from the
electric battery to fire the heap to consuming flames. There were still
in the city a round number of the early Vigilance Committee which had
ridden San Francisco of the "Sydney thieves;" some who had also, in
1849, suppressed the "Hounds;" and they were prepared again to meet
violence and lawlessness with the stronger arm of organized force and
the quick, sharp vengeance of the lex talionis.

The occasion soon came. May 14th, 1856, between 4 and 5 o'clock,
afternoon, James P. Casey shot James King of William on Montgomery
street, at the corner of Washington, He fired only one shot. King was
facing Casey as he fired; he immediately staggered and fell. A crowd
gathered in a very few moments. Casey was taken into custody and Sheriff
Scannell hastened him to the county jail in a hack. The excited crowd
followed and clamored for his life; they wanted to hang him at once.
Then followed the organization of the Vigilance Committee, mainly
directed by members of the Committee of '51. An Executive Committee of
forty-one members composed the head an