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David Neagle2024 Oct 27
David Neagle led one heck of a life. Raised amidst the California Gold Rush, he was a gunslinger and prospector and saloon owner and mining foreman and marshal and bodyguard and when he was arrested, his case went all the way to the US Supreme Court where a precedent-setting ruling is now named after him. He was deputized as sheriff in the town of Tombstone, Arizona and worked alongside the Earps keeping the law, but most interesting of all is his involvement with Justices David S. Terry and Stephen J. Field.
David S. Terry was a monumental asshole who somehow became one of California's earlier state supreme court Chief Justices (voted in during a special election). Although when his pro-Southern Slave State politics failed to earn him re-election he blamed his good friend the free-soil Senator from California David Broderick, and then resigned his place on the bench to kill Broderick in a duel. A generally violent man, Terry was known for threatening people with a bowie knife he kept on his person. After a stint fighting in the Civil War (on the wrong side) he returned to California as a lawyer and represented in court a woman named Sarah Althea Hill against her former lover, William Sharon.
William Sharon was another monumental asshole (perhaps even a bigger asshole than Terry) who was a banker and also briefly the US Senator from Nevada (although he rarely showed up to Senate). Sharon used his position as bank agent among the Comstock Lode prospectors to control their operations, loaning them money only to starve them out and forcing them into bankruptcy so that the bank could foreclose on the mineral rights. He also swindled his business partner William Ralston out of his fortune. The part relevant to this story, however, is that Sharon kept Sarah Althea Hill as a mistress.
Until he got bored of her, that is. Hill was significantly younger than him and something of a firecracker, having a reputation for threatening those who crossed her with a Colt revolver she kept in her purse. And so when Sharon dumped her, she filed a lawsuit claiming that he actually couldn't do that because they were secretly married.
And in that lawsuit she was represented by David S. Terry, the first asshole. Although Terry and Hill weren't just working together, they were also sleeping together, and soon got married.
Stephen J. Field was also a judge and also something of an asshole, although more known for being rude than for threatening people with knives of swindling them of their fortune. He was one of the judges in the Circuit Court that heard Hill's case, and the one who spoke the ruling that Hill's documents were forgeries. She did not care for this ruling, and screamed and reached for her gun. The marshals subdued her, and lawyer/husband Terry sprung to her defense with his bowie knife. David Neagle was there, however, shoving his gun in Terry's face and arresting the pair of them for contempt of court.
When Judge Field returned to California the next year, Neagle was assigned to protect him. Which proved fortuitous, as Field and Terry (along with Hill and Neagle) had the poor luck of catching the same train from LA to SF. When the inevitable happened and Terry confronted Field, presumably with some violent intent, Neagle proved himself once again quicker on the draw, shooting Terry in the heart and ear, killing him.
It was this act of self-defense which landed Neagle in jail, as at that time what Neagle did was not technically legal. But to nobody's surprise, when Neagle's case reached the Supreme Court, the judges were happy to rule that someone like Neagle defending their lives was, in fact, quite legal actually thank you very much (even with Field recusing himself from the vote).
Neagle's reputation now well-cemented, his later years were spent as a bodyguard for hire, working for various wealthy and powerful men. He finally passed away in 1925, at 78 years old in Oakland.
David Neagle led one heck of a life. Raised amidst the California Gold Rush, he was a gunslinger and prospector and saloon owner and mining foreman and marshal and bodyguard and when he was arrested, his case went all the way to the US Supreme Court where a precedent-setting ruling is now named after him. He was deputized as sheriff in the town of Tombstone, Arizona and worked alongside the Earps keeping the law, but most interesting of all is his involvement with Justices David S. Terry and Stephen J. Field.
David S. Terry was a monumental asshole who somehow became one of California's earlier state supreme court Chief Justices (voted in during a special election). Although when his pro-Southern Slave State politics failed to earn him re-election he blamed his good friend the free-soil Senator from California David Broderick, and then resigned his place on the bench to kill Broderick in a duel. A generally violent man, Terry was known for threatening people with a bowie knife he kept on his person. After a stint fighting in the Civil War (on the wrong side) he returned to California as a lawyer and represented in court a woman named Sarah Althea Hill against her former lover, William Sharon.
William Sharon was another monumental asshole (perhaps even a bigger asshole than Terry) who was a banker and also briefly the US Senator from Nevada (although he rarely showed up to Senate). Sharon used his position as bank agent among the Comstock Lode prospectors to control their operations, loaning them money only to starve them out and forcing them into bankruptcy so that the bank could foreclose on the mineral rights. He also swindled his business partner William Ralston out of his fortune. The part relevant to this story, however, is that Sharon kept Sarah Althea Hill as a mistress.
Until he got bored of her, that is. Hill was significantly younger than him and something of a firecracker, having a reputation for threatening those who crossed her with a Colt revolver she kept in her purse. And so when Sharon dumped her, she filed a lawsuit claiming that he actually couldn't do that because they were secretly married.
And in that lawsuit she was represented by David S. Terry, the first asshole. Although Terry and Hill weren't just working together, they were also sleeping together, and soon got married.
Stephen J. Field was also a judge and also something of an asshole, although more known for being rude than for threatening people with knives of swindling them of their fortune. He was one of the judges in the Circuit Court that heard Hill's case, and the one who spoke the ruling that Hill's documents were forgeries. She did not care for this ruling, and screamed and reached for her gun. The marshals subdued her, and lawyer/husband Terry sprung to her defense with his bowie knife. David Neagle was there, however, shoving his gun in Terry's face and arresting the pair of them for contempt of court.
When Judge Field returned to California the next year, Neagle was assigned to protect him. Which proved fortuitous, as Field and Terry (along with Hill and Neagle) had the poor luck of catching the same train from LA to SF. When the inevitable happened and Terry confronted Field, presumably with some violent intent, Neagle proved himself once again quicker on the draw, shooting Terry in the heart and ear, killing him.
It was this act of self-defense which landed Neagle in jail, as at that time what Neagle did was not technically legal. But to nobody's surprise, when Neagle's case reached the Supreme Court, the judges were happy to rule that someone like Neagle defending their lives was, in fact, quite legal actually thank you very much (even with Field recusing himself from the vote).
Neagle's reputation now well-cemented, his later years were spent as a bodyguard for hire, working for various wealthy and powerful men. He finally passed away in 1925, at 78 years old in Oakland.