Sheriff Ben Thorn
A true wild West sheriff, Benjamin K. Thorn’s colorful law enforcement career spanned more than half a century in California’s gold fields. His six-guns and courage made him one of the greatest lawmen in American history.
Ben Thorn was Sheriff of Calaveras County for nearly a half century. He started his law enforcement career April 15, 1855 when he was appointed as a deputy by newly elected Sheriff Charles Clarke. Before his career was over, he chased and corralled some of the worst bad men the State of California had ever seen. In addition to covering all of Calaveras County, Thorn’s pursuits led him all over the Mother Lode, including Tuolumne and Mariposa Counties, to places like Mt. Bullion, Coulterville and Hornitos. Calaveras County is now the home of the famous Jumping Frog Jubilee and one time home to Samuel Clemens, also popularly known as Mark Twain.
In 1849, at the age of 20, Ben moved to California from his hometown of Plattsburg, New York in search of gold. He was consumed with gold fever and an interest in mining that stayed with him for life. He arrived in the town of Mokelumne Hill and worked on a nearby claim in Rich Gulch. While working in the mines, Thorn’s indomitable personality led him into a series of disputes, some of which involved gun and knife. From these, young Ben Thorn earned a reputation as a man who always came out on top.
In these disputes, Thorn showed little patience with the local toughs who preyed upon lesser men or innocent victims. These acts did not go unnoticed by the law in Calaveras County which ultimately led to his appointment as a deputy. Sheriff Clarke tasked his new deputy with ridding the county of its many gangs of ruffians and desperadoes. Thorn was ably fit for the job. He was only 5 foot 8 inches but well-built and possessed of superb strength, a result of years of hard labor working in the placer mines. A deadly pistol shot, Ben Thorn had keen instincts about human nature and was a stranger to fear.
It was only a few weeks before young Deputy Thorn tackled the worst band of thugs in Calaveras. They were led by Jess Miller and “Longhair” Sam Brown, both notorious hard cases. Other gang members included “Bunty” Owens, John Hicks, Al Richardson, “Kaintuck” Chambers and “Punch” Choisser. Each wore a Mexican sash and fought with knives and guns with relish. “Longhair Sam” was by far the worst of the bunch. He was known to have killed a number of men and bragged that he did not count Mexicans or Chinese.
After a particularly brutal brawl in a gambling hall in Calaveritas (near San Andreas), where the gang stabbed and killed several Mexicans; the bandits fled to a nearby cabin. Thorn was summoned and after a brief investigation, trailed the bandits to their hideout. Leaving his posse on the road, Thorn walked without a gun in hand some 200 yards to the door of the cabin. During that long walk he had the opportunity to watch several guns pointed at him from within. As he approached, “Longhair Sam” opened the door.
Thorn arrested the entire gang without incident. When he inquired why Brown and his gang did not shoot, Brown replied that he knew they would be taken in short order and felt he would get a square deal from Thorn. Brown was ultimately convicted of manslaughter and served two years in San Quentin. After his sentence, he returned to Calaveras where he immediately flogged an arch-enemy with a bull-whip. After that incident, Thorn suggested to Brown that he might find the climate more appealing elsewhere. Brown left for the Comstock Lode, a silver mining operation in western Nevada. There he ran up a list of killings and came to his end at the hands of a normally peaceable innkeeper who sieved the murderer with buckshot.
One of the most dangerous scoundrels Thorn ran down was Santiago Molino, a Chileno who already had six dead men to his credit. Molino worked the mines briefly in San Andreas but moved his operation to El Dorado County. Upon his arrival, he hired a blacksmith to make him a dagger that was two feet long and weighed eight pounds. He carried it in a leg sheath, which was popular among the Chilenos at the time. On the night of December 15, 1856, a friend got into a fight with a local. As the two were wrestled on the ground, Molino pulled his knife and with one plunge killed both men. Molino fled the area and the townspeople offered a large reward, and notified law enforcement officials around the state.
Ben Thorn worked diligently to find the killer and in January, 1859, he learned that Molino was holed up in a mine near Mariposa. With another officer named Fred Wesson, they headed for that location and arriving after two days of hard riding. They found Molino and a friend in a cabin near the mining camp. Upon being told they were under arrest, Molino and his pal went for their guns. The lawmen were close enough to overtake the two bandits and quickly subdued them. Thorn and Wesson took them from the cabin but after a short distance, Molino bolted and ran, desperate to re-gain his freedom. Chasing him in the dark, Molino’s white pants could easily be seen. When Thorn realized he would not be able to catch him, he fired three shots from his six-gun leaving Molino mortally wounded.
The Mariposa Sheriff quickly summoned a coroner’s jury which exonerated Thorn in a matter of minutes. About two dozen of Molino’s fellow Chilenos watched with daggers in their eyes, but none of them had the nerve to take on Thorn and the Mariposa lawmen present for the inquest.
In October 1858, Ben got word that a wanted fugitive was holed up in the Tuolumne River Canyon about five miles east of LaGrange (now covered by Don Pedro Reservoir). Pedro Ybarra had been hiding there in a cave, along with an American and three Mexicans, for the past eighteen months. Along with two deputies, Thorn rode to the hideout, finding Ybarra and the others on the banks of the Tuolumne River. Seeing the lawmen, the bad guys splashed their way across the river to retrieve their guns. Ben immediately recognized Ybarra and succeeded in heading him off. He was quickly taken into custody and returned for trial in Mokelumne Hill.
Thorn took a wife on October 30, 1859. He presented her with the most expensive home in Calaveras County at the time. (The Thorn home is still standing and in use today on St. Charles Street in San Andreas). There was a lot of controversy as the public wondered how a deputy sheriff could afford a mansion. Some said Ben was padding his own accounts from the tax collecting being done as part of his job as lawman. Others claimed it was a legitimate purchase funded by the several gold mines he owned during his tenure in office.
This controversy had no effect on his career, which extended through the end of the 19th century. There were times when Ben Thorn drew criticism for using his six-gun to take down the bad guys as some believed he was too quick on the shoot. After each shooting, Thorn was defended by local and San Francisco newspapers. The Mariposa News always seemed to find a way to support Thorn in each of his controversial arrests, even though Mariposa County is some seventy miles south of Calaveras. Thorn’s legendary exploits continued through the turn of the century, until he was stricken with paralysis in November, 1902. He served out his term of office, retiring on January 5, 1903 at the age of seventy three. He died two years later at his daughter’s home in San Francisco.
Ben Thorn was no old west legend, but a real man with human failings. In the final evaluation it must be said that his good deeds vastly outweighed the bad. He richly deserves recognition as one of the great lawmen of the American frontier. B
<strong>Jim Waddell</strong> is a retired law enforcement officer and graduate of the FBI National Academy. In his nearly 40 years of service he worked for two sheriff’s departments and was a chief of police. Jim is a firearms instructor and competed in many statewide pistol matches. He lives in central California where he grows almonds.