Copperopolis History - Black Bart

On July 26, 1875 Black Bart stopped the Sonora-Milton express coach four miles east of Copperopolis. It was the first stagecoach robbery in California history. He wore a really funny outfit consisting of two wheat bags over his legs, a old linen duster coat, a flour sack with eye holes cut into it and a hat that looked like a pointed clown hat. When the stage driver saw him standing in the road with a rifle, he stopped the stage and did what Black Bart said, partly because he looked so weird. During the robbery, Black Bart gave orders to his band of outlaws hidden in strategic positions on a hillside overlooking the area. The only thing the stage driver could see of the other outlaws were their hats sticking out of the bushes. After the robbery the posse discovered Black Bart’s band of outlaws was actually nothing but black hats stuck on sticks behind tall bushes.

After 8 years and 28 robberies his luck ran out. On the morning of November 3, 1883 the driver for the Nevada Stage Company, Mr. Reason B. McConnell, had stopped at Patterson Mine, near Tuttletown and picked up a Wells Fargo strongbox containing 228 ounces of gold worth $4,200 plus $500 in gold coin. Mr. Morley, the regular shotgun guard, was not on the stage that day.

A passenger, 19-year-old Jimmy Rolleri, told the driver he wanted to hunt awhile and would meet him at the top of the hill. When Jimmy got to the top of the hill the robbery was in progress. Jimmy Rolleri shot at the robber and in his haste to run, Black Bart dropped his silk handkerchief. The laundry mark F.X.O.7. was found on it, and after tracing it to a Chinese laundry in San Francisco, lawmen were able to identify the outlaw Black Bart as Mr. Charles E. Boles. He was arrested, put on trial and found guilty of that robbery. He was sentenced to 6 years in San Quentin. The Wells Fargo Company presented Jimmy Rolleri a new rifle with a brass plaque on the stock, which read: “In appreciation for Jimmy Rolleri’s participation in the apprehension of Black Bart.”

After his release in 1888, Black Bart said he would “commit no more crimes” then disappeared, never to be heard from again.

Photo courtesy Wells Fargo Archives

Source shopcopper.org