Los Angeles in 1850

Cowboys, gamblers, bandits, and desperados of every description brought to the Los Angeles of the 185os a tone of border-town mayhem. Rough statistics indicate that in 1850 a murder occurred for every day of the year. The Reverend James Woods, a scholarly Massachusetts Presbyterian, arrived in October 1854, hoping to bring the gospel and social order. Despite the beauty of surrounding vineyards and orange trees, he noted, Los Angeles was a hellhole, a valley of dry bones, a city not of angels but of demons. An orgy of murder fills the diary Reverend Woods kept during his desperate ministry of six months. In his first two weeks alone, ten Angelenos met violent ends. Ordinary citizens walked the streets armed with pistols, bowie knives, and shotguns. Cruelty was everywhere. He was horrified to find an Indian servant girl dying in the street, abandoned by a household wishing to avoid burial expenses. A young cowboy, David Brown, sentenced to hang for the shooting of Pinckney Clifford, refused to see Woods, telling the sheriff he would rather have a bear in his cell than a minister. Shortly after, Brown was dragged from the jailhouse and lynched. The mob was led by Stephen Clark Foster, mayor of Los Angeles and a Yale man.