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Collection: Directories and Documents > Historical Clippings
Historical Clippings Book - Nevada County Citizens (HC-07) (296 pages)
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Page: of 296
OLD HARRIET
Anything can happen in a gold camp. Nevada City, besides
having a state named after it, can claim fame on several counts,
Perhaps the strangest is the manner in which the town launched
the distinguished career of Lorenzo Sawyer, whose decision as
a federal judge ended hydraulic mining and created a hundred —
ghost towns, but saved the valley farms from being buried under —
a flood of tailings.
In 1852, as a struggling young lawyer, he was called upon
to defend in the case ofa woman known as Old Harriet, who owned .
a saloonand practiced the oldest profession on Broad Street, over°
looking Deer Creek, Harriet had a consort who tended bar and
acted as bouncer at her establishment. One stormy night late in
1851, a miner named Pat Berry, deep in his cups and flush from
a recent bonanza, disappeared, His haked body was found in-an
eddy of Deer Creek two or three days later. A deep wound on his
forehead showed a considerable flow of blood, indicating he had
suffered a blow on the head before drowning.
_ Berry was last seen alive at Old Harriet's place, a circumstance which led to the arrest of Harriet and her man, who were
charged with robbery and murder. The prosecution was able to .
build a strong case in circumstantial evidence, and local opinion .
was that this evidence, plus Harriet's soiled reputation, would —
bring a quick conviction,
Sawyer's defense was based upon the fact that recent rains
had Wasted ou the bridges across Deer Creek. The intoxicated
Berry, attempting to cross on a slippery log, must have fallen .
and hit his head on the rocks below. Less convincingly, the defense contended that the body was stripped of clothing by the
rushing water which carried it some six miles down stream.
_ With the arguments for prosecution and defense completed,
the judge, in a state of doubt, took the case under advisement for
several days, During this time, two men together undertook to
cross Deer Creek on the same log which Berry must have used.
One of them slipped and fell intothe water. All attempts at rescue
failed, and the victim disappeared, Several days later, his body
was found in the yery pool where Berry'shad been recovered, On
the head appeared a large, bloody wound. Furthermore, this body,
too, was almost entirely nude!
The trial of Old Harriet was immediately reopened, and the
charges were of course dismissed. Upon hearing the news, Harriet herself uttered the words which contained the summation
of her good fortune. "The Lord has intervened," she exulted,
"to save an innocent woman!" pate
"Innocent'' was not a word ordinarily to be used in describing
Old Harriet. But she was indeed innocent of the murder of Pat
Berry,and the proof of her innocence provided the spark for the
successful career of Lorenzo Sawyer, federal judge and justice
of the California Supreme ©ourt.
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