My relative, David Cooper, was a jailer in Sonora, and in his spare time, was a miner for gold (like everybody else there at the time). The Betz story is one of the more colorful recounted in David's journal. It seems this man, Betz, who unfortunately is never given any other name in the journal, was in David's jail temporarily until being transported to state prison. I will quote the journal:

One of the prisoners I had at that time was a man named Betz who had received a sentence of fifteen years in the state prison. He was a nasty fellow, and when I looked at him I saw murder in his eyes. Taking him for a serious desperado I kept a sharp lookout for him. And I knew he was working some schemes with the jail cook. The cook was in for a petty case. I would send him downtown to get things for me, such as meat, flour, potatoes and beans. Of course I kept a pretty close eye on him, as well.

The cooking was done inside the jail and I had a hatchet to split kindling wood. All the knives and forks and dishes were kept in the jail. I also had a long table and benches in there. I would go in almost every day to play cards with them and joke with them to kill time, so they wouldn’t get too gloomy or fret about their situation in jail. I noticed that Betz would eye me once in a while with a very sharp gaze. So I thought I would lay for him, as I was satisfied he meant mischief.

My rule was to pull all prisoners who were in irons into their cells at 6:00 p.m. And then in the morning each one had to take his blankets out into the yard to sun for a while. It was a problem to keep clear of body lice and keep the jail clean.

My usual custom was to lock up and go downtown. But after thinking about Betz I noticing the regularity of my pattern, and began to change it. So then when I locked up and started downtown I would go just a little ways and then go back on the sly, and listen to hear if there was anything unusual going on in the jail. I never allowed them to talk after going to bed, so it should have been quiet.

When I got my ear up close to the wall I discovered the sound of sawing going on. That didn’t cause me much concern for I knew the jail was on flat bedrock.

Now Mr. Dawson [This man, also a prisoner, was soon to be released as his charges were not valid for a conviction] had his bed along the side of his cell on the outside wall. And he kept his ears open to hear what was going on.

But he said nothing to me until he found out their whole plan. One day he came into my office and when I gave him a stool, he sat down and said, “I have something to tell you. I have learned all I need to know. Keep your eyes open and be careful, as they are planning to kill you day after tomorrow with that hatchet by the stove. They don’t suspect me at all,” Dawson said. “They don’t know that I have heard the whole plot.”

I passed him through to the jail cells again and in an hour or two I went back to see whether they all had taken their blankets out. I came to Betz’ cell and there were his blankets lying on the floor. When I asked him why his blankets weren’t out in the air he had nothing to say. I told him to go right in and get them and take them outside. He chewed the rag a little and finally went and got them.

I opened the door and followed Betz outside to the yard. He hung them up and then went back inside. I followed him back to his cell to examine it. What I found, where his blankets had been on the floor, was a plank in the floor almost completely sawed through.

I called him over to confront him with what I had found. I asked him what he was doing that for. At that point it seemed awfully strange to him just how the planks had gotten sawed. Then I told him that I had been listening to him sawing from when he first started it. But I didn’t really care too much about it since I knew the jail was built on flat rock and it wouldn’t do him any good to cut a hole there.

Then I told him to take a seat on one of the benches. I walked up to him and lifted his shackled feet to find he had the rivets almost sawed off. He had the sawed creases filled with something like black putty to hide them from sight, or so he thought. I didn’t say a word.

I had been examining their irons every morning and had not seen the saw marks at all until just then. But instead of tipping my hand at that point, I simply locked the door and went out to tell my smith to come by in the morning.

The smith came by early the next day with his hammers and enough rivets for not one but two pair of shackles. After all, my cook had a hand in this, too. I found out that Betz had promised him fifteen hundred dollars to help him escape. The plan was for the cook to distract me so Betz could brain me with the hatchet.

I left the smith in my office and went into the jail, telling the cook to get up on top of the cells and get me the largest shackles that were up there. He hunted around for a while but finally found them and handed them down to me. Then I called in the smith.

I told Betz to take a seat and then told the smith to push the heads off the old rivets. That surprised old Betz as he thought I hadn’t seen the condition they were in.

After the smith had removed and replaced the rivets in Betz’ irons, I told the cook to bring over those extra large shackles. I had him take a seat. And then if lightning had struck him he couldn’t have been more surprised than he was when I told him I knew he had been helping Betz.

I had the smith put those big shackles on him, and as they were going on, he cried and carried on, begging me not to put them on him. But on they went. It was 45 pounds of chain. The cook had only a week or two more of jail time but he wore those heavy chains the whole time. And the next week Betz was taken to the state prison.

Their plan had been to use my usual pattern, which was to unlock the door, then go unlock the cells and go out again. The cook was to call to me at that point so Betz could get me from behind. The cook, himself, told me all about it after Betz was gone. He said Betz had taken two case knives and just cut them into each other. That made saws of them and it didn’t take him long to saw the heads off the rivets.


That's all the journal has on Mr. Betz, but it contains two other such stories about the jail and much more on other subjects. I am quite excited about the prospect of its pending publication. If there is any connection with this particular Betz I would appreciate whatever you could add to the story prior to publication of the entire manuscript, probably in 2010.