I've labored long and hard for bread,
For honor, and for riches,
But on my corns too long you've tred,
You fine-haired sons of bitches.
These words, scrawled on the back of a Wells Fargo waybill, made a marked man of stagecoach bandit and poet (Po8, to be more precise) Charles E. Boles – aka Charles E. Bolton, but best known as Black Bart. Though the self-described Po8 would leave verse at the site of only one other robbery, he is thought to have robbed more than 25 stagecoaches in an eight year span from 1875 until his eventual capture.
The last of those robberies took place on this day in 1883 – as Black Bart returned, for the first time, to the location of his original crime in California’s Calaveras County. In an embellished if not altogether romanticized account, historian George Hoeper sets the scene for that that fateful day in his book Black Bart: Boulevardier Bandit
It was barely sunup and a chill breeze was riffling the surface of the Stanislaus River on the on the morning of November 3, 1883 when Reason McConnell halted his stage in front of the Reynolds Ferry Hotel. Inside the hotel, in the glow of kerosene lamps, McConnell could see people moving about. He noted with satisfaction that the ferry was tied up on his side of the river. That would save him several minutes of valuable time.
A door slammed and nineteen-year-old Jimmy Rolleri, whose mother, Olivia Antonini Rolleri, ran the hotel, came dashing down the hotel stairs with several letters in his hand.
“Good morning, Mac,” he called, as he traded the letters for a bundle of mail for the hotel. Then, taking notice that the stage carried no passengers, young Rolleri paused before starting down the hill to operate the ferry.
“Mac, can I catch a ride up to the top of the hill with you? That last storm must have started pushing the deer down from the high country. Jim Baker stopped on his way to Sonora last evening and said he saw two big bucks up there on the flat above Yaqui Gulch. I’d like to get a shot at one of them – we could use the meat.”
Boles (who took his stage-robber name from the 1871 short story The Case of Summerfield by William Henry Rhodes) held up the stagecoach shortly after Rolleri had disembarked. Unaware of the hunter in his midst, Black Bart went casually about the business of plundering the carriage after sending McConnell away with only his horses. As Hoeper tells it, it was while pausing to catch his breath atop a hill that McConnell spotted Rolleri in the distance and signaled to his former passenger. The pair rendezvoused and returned in pursuit of Black Bart.
The outlaw spotted his would-be captors (or killers) in time to make a hasty escape, but was grazed by one of Rolleri’s bullets. Dropping some of his loot as he fled, Black Bart left behind the clue that would ultimately lead to his arrest.
“Sheriff Tom Cunningham of San Joaquin County was always at the scene of the robbery as soon as possible in an endeavor to locate evidence,” recalled former Wells Fargo agent James E. Rice some years later.
Cunningham’s staying qualities were finally rewarded after Black Bart’s holdup of the stage from Sonora to Milton on November 3, 1883. Arriving at the point where the stage was robbed, the sheriff examined the ground very closely. Suddenly he reached down and picked up a handkerchief, which incident marked the end of Bart’s career. Cunningham examined the handkerchief very closely and the officers who were with him eagerly waited to see what he would say. “At last we have a clew,” he said and directed his associates’ attention to the laundry mark “FX07.”
The handkerchief was taken to San Francisco and after a long search similar marks were found on other linen in a laundry, by Harry Morse, head of the Morse Patrol and Detective Agency of San Francisco. While Morse was in the office of the laundry investigating the marks on the handkerchief, he was told by the proprietor that the gentleman who owned that particular handkerchief was a respected customer, having mining interests in California, and he occasionally called at the laundry. By a rather remarkable coincidence, the “owner” of the linen walked into the building while Morse was there and the detective immediately engaged him in a conversation by stating he understood he was interested in mines. Incidentally Morse told him he had some property he would like to submit for his consideration and that he would be glad to show him sample of ore as well as give him other details of the mining prospect. Bart apparently “fell” for what his newly made acquaintance had to offer and agreed to accompany him to the latter’s office on Montgomery street. When Bart entered and took in the surroundings, he was satisfied he had been trapped for he threw up his hands and exclaimed, “Gentlemen, I pass.”
This portrayal, too, may stray a bit from absolute fact; BlackBart.com suggests a surrender every bit as civil but far less sudden and willing. What seems not to be in dispute is that Black Bart was a gentleman among thieves. Working alone – though at times cleverly using props to convince his quarry that he had others in his gang – he never fired his gun or harmed anyone while committing his crimes. While there was a coarseness to the pair of poems that made him famous, his reputation was as a remarkably polite highwayman.
A hero he was not, but a character he surely was. To this legend of the Wild West, on the anniversary of his final heist, a beer born not far from the many sites of Black Bart’s exploits: Hop Sauce double IPA from Sacramento’s Rubicon Brewing Company. Both poetry and mystery, Hop Sauce’s array of hop flavors wrap themselves around a rich and sweet malt flavor, while the faint suggestion of a velvety white head recedes into glistening amber. As we drink to the history and folklore of Black Bart, we drink also to the good health of Rubicon itself. The venerable brewpub celebrated its 21st anniversary this past weekend. Cheers, and here’s to many more.
Here I lay me down to sleep
To wait the coming morrow,
Perhaps success, perhaps defeat,
And everlasting sorrow.
Let come what will, I'll try it on,
My condition can't be worse;
And if there's money in that box
'Tis munny in my purse.
--Black Bart, the Po8
1878
