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Volume 068-3 - July 2014 (8 pages)
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Page: of 8
NCHS Bulletin July 2014
Judge Stidger vs Judge Barbour
Stidger sold his Herald shares in February 1854, and concentrated on his law practice. Eight months later he was
attacked on the streets of Marysville by District Judge
William T. Barbour and Plummer W. Thurston. Stidger
filed a complaint and the grand jury indicted Barbour for
assault with a deadly weapon. Four years later, Stidger
wrote a series of letters to the Nevada Journal to document the seemingly endless twists and turns of the case.
In the first letter, published November 12, 1858, he wrote:
In the month of June 1854, a man by the name of
Plummer W. Thurston (he is now dead) was tried in
the Court of Sessions, Yuba County, for an assault with
a deadly weapon upon the person of Dr. J. W. Winter
. . aS the latter was about leaving a steam boat at the
Marysville landing, and without any cause or provocation, beat him severely with an axe or pick helve over
the head and body, breaking one of his arms and one or
two of his fingers, and otherwise bruising him severely.
For this offence [Thurston] was found guilty .. . and
was sentenced by a jury to pay a fine of $500 and be imprisoned in the Penitentiary for a term of six months. ...
From this sentence Thurston took an appeal to the
Court of the 10th Judicial District—Judge Barbour’s. In
August 1854 the case was argued before Judge Barbour
and submitted to him for his decision. The question at
issue was whether the District Court had appellate jurisdiction. [The] Supreme Court had decided, months
previous to that date, that the District Court had no
appellate jurisdiction, yet, up to October 1854 Judge
Barbour had not rendered his decision. . . .
At that time I was engaged in the Herald Office in the
capacity of Reporter; and in consequence of my position became intimate with all the facts in the cases under consideration. I was on intimate terms of friendship
with Judge Barbour, and felt disposed to sustain him if I
could do so consistently with my ideas of propriety and
my sense of duty to the public.
During this excitement... much was said by many of
the best citizens of Marysville against Judge Barbour’s
conduct, not only for his neglect in fixing a time for
passing sentence .. . but also for his neglect to decide
the case of Thurston... . He was denounced in unmeasured language and threats were made that he should be
impeached, not only for his utter neglect of his duties
but also for his drunkenness and debauchery. All sorts
of things were said of and against him .. . and more than
one person intimated . . . that he had been bribed by
Thurston to smother his case if possible.
Feeling it to be my duty .. . to keep the citizens of
Marysville and Yuba county apprised . . . I addressed
a communication to the Editor of the Herald, asking
in polite and moderate language what had become of
Thurston’s case... On Saturday morning Oct. 14, 1854,
the Herald appeared, containing my communication.
That day I was attacked by Thurston and Barbour—the
former armed with a revolver and the latter with a large
bowie-knife—and between the two I was badly beaten.
But for the interference of a friend, I probably would
have been killed...
At the Nov. *54 term of the Court of Sessions Barbour
was arraigned under the indictment and pleaded not
guilty. ... Barbour filed an affidavit in which he set forth
that he could not have an impartial trial in Yuba county,
in consequence of the prejudices existing against him
among the people, &c.... the Court of Sessions granted
his petition and ordered the papers . . . certified to the
Court of Sessions of Nevada county.
The first term of that court .. . was held on the first
Monday of December 1854. A few days prior to that date
... I was informed by a gentleman—a lawyer now residing at Marysville—that I need not attend at Nevada,
that the case would not be tried at that term of the court,
&c. He assured me he was posted relative to the matter, and doubted whether the case would ever be brought
to trial in any court. When pressed by me for further
information concerning the whys and wherefores of his
objections, he stated that the papers in the case had been
stolen from the Clerk’s Office . . . I immediately sought
the District Attorney . . . [who] ascertained that on the
same day in which the case was ordered by the Court of
Sessions to be transferred to Nevada county, the papers
were purloined. ...
I went immediately before the Grand Jury and had
him re-indicted. [Judge Barbour] was arrested and arraigned upon this last indictment; but before he could
be brought to trial, the papers in the former case, that
had so mysteriously disappeared were all very suddenly
replaced in the Clerk’s Office. Here was a dilemma. Two
indictments for the same offense were hanging over his
head; one of them was ordered to be tried in Nevada
county, the other was not. Barbour had a choice, he preferred Nevada, and elected to be tried there... .
In 1855, I think at the February term, the case was
called up in the Court of Sessions of Nevada county. I
was on hand as a matter of course. Buckner & Hill appeared as counsel for Barbour, and that indefatigable
and able lawyer, A. A. Sargent, Esq., in behalf of the
People. Every impediment which the learned counsel for
Barbour could invent was thrown in the way to prevent
a trial; but the Court being composed of honest, sensible
men, overruled every objection, quirk and quibble...
and ordered the case to proceed.
Finding that conviction stared him in the face, and
that the penitentiary would be his doom if a trial were
had, and finding that he had a Court to deal with that
understood the law, and knew no friends or enemies