This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1892 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER L. David Neagle--Taken Under Writ Of Habeas Corpus To San Francisco--The Questionable Transfer Done Under Cover Of Darkness And In Secrecy--Released Without A Trial--An Ingenious Document. The Federal authorities having assumed the responsibility of the death of Judge Terry, his slayer was to be taken care of by that arm of the service, and means must be provided to release him from his imprisonment at Stockton. While there was no danger of any undue or violent proceedings against him, or any thought of his life being in danger, the fact that he had committed an act which was a crime against the laws of the State of California, and that he was amenable to its courts of justice, must be evaded in order to consummate the travesty on justice and set the prisoner free. He was, for the time being, the servant of the United States and the paid agent of the department of justice, and although that high tribunal should be held above suspicion in its every act, there was something which caused it to concoct and execute a scheme, worthy only of the actions of the celebrated "Council of Ten," in the dispensation of justice. When the highest judicial tribunal in the land has to resort to scheming, and to carry out its ( 454 ) schemes in secret and the darkness which protects the burglar and highwayman, the natural and only correct inference is that justice must be thwarted and crime covered up. The spectacle of a special train under cover of darkness and under orders from the United States Circuit Court, stealing its way across the plains, in an enlightened, free, and sovereign State, to take from a county prison a man who, although he had killed his fellow-man, was in no danger of punishment, has all the evidences of a desire to usurp the...

Excerpt from Life of David S. Terry: Presenting an Authentic, Impartial and Vivid History of His Eventful Life and Tragic Death Terry's disgust for politics and political meth ods - the value HE placed upon justice - IN cidents OF his honesty IN the face OF the tempter - strong southern views. I4 5 - 1 52. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

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William Sharon was one of the most colorful scoundrels in the nineteenth-century mining West. He epitomized the robber barons of the nation’s Gilded Age and the political corruption and moral decay for which that period remains notorious; yet he was also a visionary capitalist who controlled more than a dozen of the greatest mines on Nevada’s mighty Comstock Lode, built the Virginia & Truckee Railroad, manipulated speculation and prices on the San Francisco Stock Exchange, and revived the collapsed Bank of California. One enemy called him “a thoroughly bad man—a man entirely void of principle,” while a Comstock neighbor called him “one of the best men that ever lived in Virginia City.” Both descriptions were reasonably accurate. In this first-ever biography of one of Nevada’s most reviled historical figures, author Michael Makley examines Sharon’s complex nature and the turbulent times in which he flourished. Arriving in San Francisco shortly after the Gold Rush began, Sharon was soon involved in real estate, politics, banking, and stock speculation, and he was a party in several of the era’s most shocking business and sexual scandals. When he moved to Virginia City, Nevada’s mushrooming silver boomtown, his business dealings there soon made him known as the “King of the Comstock.” Makley’s engaging and meticulously researched account not only lays bare the life of the notorious but enigmatic Sharon but examines the broader historical context of his career—the complex business relationships between San Francisco and the booming gold and silver mining camps of the Far West; the machinations of rampant Gilded Age capitalism; and the sophisticated financial and technological infrastructure that supported Virginia City’s boomtown economy. The Infamous King of the Comstock offers a significant fresh perspective on Nevada and the mining West.