McGowan's War

McGowan's War was a bloodless war that took place in Yale, British Columbia in the fall of 1858. The conflict posed a threat to the newly established British authority on the British Columbia mainland (which had only just been declared a colony the previous summer), at the onset of the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush. It was called Ned McGowan's War after one of the conflict's main antagonists.

Ned McGowan was one of a group of associated miners at Hill's Bar, the richest and first gold-bearing bar of the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, at which a ramshackle "town" had sprung up, 5 miles below Yale. Hill's Bar was under the control of McGowan's party of former San Franciscan firemen associated with the Law and Order Party, who had flourished from the claim they had named "The Boatmen of San Francisco". Yale, on the other hand, had fallen into the sway of members of the notorious San Francisco Vigilance Committee, which had ruled San Francisco through summary execution of suspected criminals. They were also the arch-enemies of the Law and Order Party – and of Ned McGowan especially.

The tragedy of judicial errors took on great importance to colonial authorities as soon as it was known that Ned McGowan was a part of the conflict between the leaders of the two mining communities. McGowan's reputation in the San Francisco papers had preceded him to British Columbia – so much so that when he first arrived in Victoria he was summoned by Governor James Douglas, who instructed him to conduct himself accordingly in the Queen's domains. It seems that Mr. McGowan, a US miner, had fled California in somewhat of a hurry.

After a respectable career as Philadelphia lawyer and erstwhile state politician in Pennsylvania, which ended in a scandal from which he was later absolved, McGowan moved to California and became a judge of the Barbary Court, an Associate of the Court of Sessions, and other juridical positions. But California being the way it was in those days his associates there were gamblers, thugs and worse. McGowan and his friends became involved with the Law and Order Party and he ran afoul of the powerful and even more dangerous Vigilance Committee.

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