The suspicious character bagged by Cowles was not Harris. But neither was he an innocent man, like Mr. White, of the Truckee arrest. He was an absconding telegraphist named Davis, so Cowles’s efforts were not entirely in vain.
The trap closed on Maloney, the second mate, though Harris remained free. Maloney had escaped to San Rafael, north of the Golden Gate, on the Contra Costa. There, an old friend named William Barnard, who had sailed with him on the Baltic, hid him out on lonely Shafter’s Ranch near Olema. But, at Henry George’s request, Federal Agent Finnegass had written to peace officers in Marin County, giving them a description of both Harris and Maloney. Felix Garcia, constable of Bolinas and Olema townships, arrested Maloney at an isolated shack just as he returned from a hunting trip. His first words were, “Have they arrested Harris?”
According to García, Maloney got a little “excited” and demanded to know by what authority the constable was arresting him. But a pair of handcuffs had a quieting effect on him and he was safely lodged in the Olema Hotel until Federal authorities could collect him. Finnegass welshed on his promise to reimburse Garcia for his expenses ($21) in apprehending Maloney, but Henry George promptly paid the energetic constable $100 in reward. Then he and the other editors laid into Finnegass, already unpopular for his indecision and slowness in taking action, lampooning him as “Colonel, Detective, Chief Operative of the Secret Service Department Finnegass.”
Dennis Maloney, taken before the U.S. District Attorney for questioning, backed up the story told by the crew, claiming that he was compelled by master and mate to be cruel to the crew. He was extremely bitter toward Clarke and Harris. The press noticed that he was lame, with one leg battered by a shell in the battle of Fort Jackson in the Civil War in which he had participated as a Union soldier. Enmity toward Maloney decreased markedly as it soared against Harris.
The Sunrise case began to occupy more and more of the time of the various courts. On October 13, Lejude alias Brant sued Captain Clarke for $10,000 damages for brutal treatment. On the next day, U.S. Marshal William Gouvernor Morris was blasted by the Post for bringing witness Furt—in double irons—through the streets of San Francisco to court, like a criminal. Three days later, Furt sued Morris for $10,000 damages for this humiliation. Another civil suit, the first of a series of modest ones by the crew for $299 each, was filed by seaman John H. Miller against Clarke for damages. (Clarke had called him “a blind old bummer who should have been fed to the sharks long ago” and on another occasion addressed him in these endearing terms as he worked at the main brace, “You blind son of a bitch, why don’t you pull?”) Next the Sunrise herself got into court. She was libeled by the D. A. for $3, 600 for her captain’s violation of the Shipping Commissioners Act (his shanghaiing of men in New York) and the vessel was seized by the Marshal.
When a rumor sprang up that Marshal Morris was about to repeat his earlier outrage of marching the sailor victim-witnesses in irons from jail to court (while the brutal Captain Clarke chose to drive a natty little buggy to court each day), it caused a large, angry crowd to gather on Broadway. But Morris had learned his lesson and he put away his irons. For his first outrage, the Lyceum of Self Culture, meeting in Dashaway Hall, adopted a formal resolution condemning him and demanding his removal. The papers followed suit in denouncing him, the Alta describing him as “eminently worthy of indefinite leave of absence,” and eventually, on December 10, 1873, he was removed from office.
If court calendars were crowded by the Sunrise case, newspaper columns were overwhelmed. One day the Post would write: “How many of us pay five dollars a year to the society for the prevention of cruelty to animals? Cannot we have a society for the prevention of cruelty to seamen? Beaten like dogs until they have lost the last attributes of humanity, no decent man or boy nowadays will trust himself before the mast in the mercantile marine.”
In a similar vein, the Alta editorialized on America’s “floating hells” —“Leaving the Sunrise altogether out of the question, it is notorious that many of our American sea captains are little better than brutes of the most savage and tyrannical character... Our captains and mates are too apt to treat their crews as if they were necessarily enemies. Brutality and abuse are substituted for manly treatment. If American sailors are in many cases grumblers and disagreeable, who has made them so? Treated as human beings, they would act as such. But, instead, they are too often treated as brutes, beaten without cause, hazed and maltreated, fed on unfit food, and their lives while on board ship made a curse.
“We have seen a very different course pursued on board European ships. There the men were treated as belonging to the same human family and, although all necessary labor and service was required of them, it was not so required as to make the crew continually feel as if they were esteemed to be no better than heathen.
“At least there should be in important ports one officer of the Government whose duty it should be to look out for the interests of the sailor. He is the man that needs the aid of the law and the law officers. Captains of ships, and owners and consignees can generally take care of themselves and of each other. But who will care for Jack, except to rob and abuse him, unless the Government comes to the protection of this much abused class?”
In the state capital, the case was followed with much interest and the Sacramento Record thundered: “We trust the press of San Francisco will not let go of this case until the cowardly scoundrels who first stole men and then hounded them to death have been awarded as much of the deserts as a legal system which is too tender for their villainies, can assign them.”
The relentless search for Harris continued. The police received a tip that he was hiding aboard the Emerald, lying off the Potrero. This seemed like a good lead since the owner of the Emerald also owned the Sunrise. Marshal Ben Carver, a Post reporter, and a San Francisco detective, W. S. Jones, took a plunger out to the ship and searched her from stem to stern. They found no one. Captain Hill came aboard as they were finishing. He blandly told them he knew where Harris was biding ashore but was not about to tell them where. (He also revealed that he had once served a term in San Quentin for “knocking sailors about.”)
The next lead took detectives W. S. Jones and John Coffee to a lumberyard on Steuart Street near Mission. They found a man hiding in a lair within a pile of lumber. In his little cave were food, tobacco, knives and pistols. But the man hiding therein was no Harris. He turned out to be an old burglar and San Quentin alumnus named Salomon.
Captain Clarke was brought to trial in the United States Circuit Court on October 21 for having beaten and wounded fourteen of his crew. Spectators packed the courtrooms and corridors an hour before Judges Sawyer and Hoffman opened court. Colonel W. H. L. Barnes and Assistant District Attorney Morrow handled the prosecution; Milton Andros and Judge Alexander Campbell took care of the defense.
The first witness called was Robert Edwards, a thirty-six-year-old Welshman and a veteran of twenty-two years at sea. Counsel for the defense objected to the general examination of the witness by the prosecution, insisting that they hew to particular offenses charged. Defense counsel complained, “We don’t want to be compelled to defend Captain Clarke on fifty charges.” Asked why Jean Brandt (“Charles Brown’s” real name) went over the side, Edwards said because he was beaten on the head and thighs for not knowing nautical terms. The mate continued to abuse him vocally as he came into the foc’s’le with a bleeding face.
Questioned about his own existence on the Sunrise, Edwards had this to say. “The second day out from New York, Harris and Maloney ran me aft where they triced me up for four hours with my toes barely touching the deck. The captain saw me in this position. I also saw the mate beat Charles Wittpfennig and then hoist him up in the presence of the captain.” The witness recalled that Lejude, Furt, Nils Martinsson and Johnson all received like punishment. Not only did the captain witness several of these corporal punishment bouts of Ha
rris’s, but he used to boast, “There is nothing going on aboard ship that I don’t know about.” In addition, Edwards said, Johnson was left on deck eighteen to twenty hours a day; he was never given more than three to six hours of sleep. Defense counsel leaped on Edwards’ testimony, trying to crack it, but Andros could not shake it a whit.
On the second day of the trial, the court’s doors were burst open and a rush made for seats. Standees considered themselves lucky. Under cross-examination by Andros, Edwards explained his own punishment. “At the time I was triced up, the mate chased me aft and while I was being triced the captain was walking on the opposite side of the deck. I was triced up at what we call the gallows. After being ironed, the mates ran me to the gallows. They did not drag me, they saved time by running me. The mate shoved me over the iron grating near the cabin and I fell on my face. This was before I was taken to the gallows.” Apparently giving honest testimony, Edwards made a point of setting the record straight—“I have never said that the mate dragged me about the deck by the hair of the head. It is not true that I was dragged about the deck by the hair of my head.”
One observation of Edwards brought a rustle from the crowd. “Peter Johnson was an intelligent man when he came on board the ship, though a trifle slow. But when he came ashore here, he was stupid and had to be addressed several times before an answer could be obtained from him. Since Johnson has been ashore, however, his condition has materially changed for the better. It is improving every day.” Soon the court would learn the name the crew fastened on the unfortunate Peter Johnson—“Clarke’s idiot.”
August Wittpfennig was called next. He was in the temporary prison set up in the U.S. Building and thus it took some time to fetch him. Colonel Barnes, irked by the delay, blurted, “If these sailors were convicted felons they could not be handled much worse than they are.” Andros leaped to his feet, protesting that Barnes’ remark was calculated to prejudice the jury. Judge Sawyer stopped the row but scolded Barnes, saying the remark was uncalled for.
Wittpfennig finally reached the stand to tell his story. “I was an able bodied seaman on the Sunrise in the port watch. Corrigan and others were in the watch with me. I received punishment the last of June. I was sending the foretopsail lift down. It leads from the crosstrees to the yardarm. I had the lift in the top and was drawing it down to the deck when it got foul of the leech lines and I hauled it over on the starboard side to clear it, and had to drop it. My arm got so tired I could not hold the lift.
“ ‘Why didn’t you send it down as the boatswain told you? Come down here, you son of a bitch!’ shouted the mate to me. When I reached the deck the mate knocked me down and gave me a black eye. Said the mate, ‘You Dutch son of a bitch, what did you let go of that line for?’ ‘I couldn’t help it, sir’ He knocked me down again. I asked, ‘What are you hitting me for?’ I said to the captain, standing nearby, ‘Do you allow such things on this ship, sir?’ ‘Yes,’ he said. I said, ‘I’ll see whether you can treat sailors as you please, when we get to San Francisco.’ He replied, ‘You! I’ll see to it that you’re in no condition to get to San Francisco! I’ll fix you so that you can do damned little when you get to San Francisco! I’ll put you in irons first.’ I answered, ‘Go along and do it if you allow such things as that.’ Then he ordered the mate to put me in irons.
“This was between eight and nine o’clock in the morning. I hung there until three o’clock in the afternoon. Then they cut me down and gave me five minutes to get my breakfast, which was made up of bread and water. After the breakfast I was placed in the lazarette and ironed and kept there until half past eight o’clock in the morning. That morning I had bread and water for breakfast. This bread and water diet, confinement in the lazarette, was continued for two days. When I appealed to the captain to relieve me he came and, though I said I was sorry for what I had done and would not do it any more, the captain replied, T will not take you out of irons, you son of a bitch. You wanted to get in irons and now I’ll keep you there for my pleasure!’ I was triced up for two days and only let down fifteen minutes for meals... Every man who was placed in irons in that ship was triced up.”
Wittpfennig stated Corrigan complained to the captain that the mate had struck him. “You are lying!” the captain had snorted. When Condiff made the same mistake, Clarke told him “A rope would not make that mark. You lie, you son of a bitch!” Harris used to taunt Condiff after Brown’s death, saying that he did not have Brown’s nerve to jump overboard. But it turned out that he did, on June 25. Of the addled Johnson, Wittpfennig said, “I saw marks or bruises on Johnson’s head. There was a swelling which he said the mate had caused by hitting him with a tar hatchet. Johnson was beaten every day—every day of the voyage.”
Cross-examination of Wittpfennig, rather than shaking his testimony, on the contrary made it stronger as he recalled other incidents.
Then Furt, the ex-bosun (Clarke had replaced him with Peterson six weeks out of New York), began his testimony. “I am thirty-nine years old and a native of Petersburg, Virginia. I first went to sea from Boston six years ago. During the late war I was in the Confederate Army. Since the war I was for fourteen months in the U.S. Navy as paymaster-writer. I was on the Sunrise on her late voyage to this port. I knew the boy, Corrigan. One day Captain Clarke was trying to teach him the ropes. The boy seemed to be dull. Clarke had a large rope in his hands. Every time he gave the boy an order, if the boy didn’t do it right, the captain struck him three or four blows with the rope. He hit him over the head and on various parts of the body. Clarke had the boy in this position about two hours, the boy crying and begging in the meantime.”
Of poor Johnson, he said: “He was a Dane, in good health and spirits when he came aboard. He was kept up continually at day, also a great part of the night, having four hours one night and about six hours the next. He was called at five or six o’clock while others in the watch remained below till eight o’clock. During this time when Johnson was so deprived of rest, he was beaten by the captain. On one occasion, he dragged Johnson by the hair of the head across the deck. As a general thing, Johnson was beaten every day by the mate and second mate. His body was covered with bruises. When he arrived here in San Francisco he had lost his mind. He is in the same condition still. He’s like a child.
“It was two weeks after the vessel started before I noticed a change in Johnson. The most sleep he got any twenty-four hours was five hours. The least was none at all. He was frequently kept up all night, getting no sleep at all. Once Johnson stripped off his clothes and showed me his bruises. His body was perfectly covered with bruises.”
Furt continued. “I remember Charles Brandt. The day before he disappeared, the mate set him to tar a bucket. Brandt dropped several spots of tar on the deck and every time Brandt dropped a spot of tar, Harris would hit him and say, “You son of a bitch, do you think you can come on board an American vessel and work like that?”
The Virginian admitted that “Condiff was a poor sailor and all the sailors were pretty drunk off Sandy Hook, especially Edwards who had to be ironed and triced up. But Martinsson was triced up for eight hours for just dropping a marlinspike. Harris hit Lejude once because he did not draw water fast enough. This one time the captain told the mate not to hit the men. ‘Iron them!’ So Lejude was triced up for almost twelve hours. When a man dropped a toggle iron from aloft, the captain ordered the whole watch to stand extra duty for a week. I was at various times kept from my regular sleep during that week; I only got about two hours sleep out of the twenty-four each day.”
The approach of Peter Johnson to the witness stand occasioned much craning of necks for a better viewpoint and a rumble of conversation. The skinny, half-witted wreck of a once hearty fellow testified pretty well, though he tended to ramble and speak in disconnected fashion. But much of what he said made sense and it was a horrifying indictment of master and mate. “I am a Dane. I’ve been on American ships two ye
ars. I was a seaman on the Sunrise. On the voyage I got, some nights, four hours sleep and, some nights, six hours. No more, no more. I was made to draw water and throw it on the ship’s sides all day long. I was sent aloft on the foreyard some nights. One night I was sent up at twelve o’clock and made to stay there till eight o’clock next morning. I went down once to get my coat, because it was cold and raining. The boatswain told me I had better go aloft again, lest the mate should see me. I went up again.
“The mate beat me frequently during the voyage. He used to strike me with ropes, irons, planks and anything he could get. He threw a knife at me once. He hit me with a tar bucket on my head. The captain struck me three times. The beatings I got made marks all over me. The blow the mate gave me with the tar bucket on the head affected me so that I couldn’t stand sometimes.
“I have got plenty of sleep since I got into this port—seventeen hours a day.” (There were great gales of laughter at this statement.) “I am getting better.
“I was one night put on the side of the ship in a tarpaulin and told to look out for flying fish.”
Judge Hoffman then asked, “Did you complain to the captain of being deprived of sleep?”
“No, sir.”
“Why didn’t you?”
Laughter greeted his honest answer, “I thought that wouldn’t help me any.”
In a kindly tone, Hoffman asked, “Peter, do you suffer from loss of sleep?”
“Yes, sir. I was triced up in irons twice. The second time for four hours. I don’t remember how long the first time. On one occasion, when I was wetting down the ship’s side, I became dizzy and was about falling overboard when a sailor caught me. I only got half an hour at meals; the other men got an hour.”
Shanghaiing Days: The Thrilling account of 19th Century Hell-Ships, Bucko Mates and Masters, and Dangerous Ports-of-Call from San Francisco to Singapore Page 19