GREAT EXPECTATIONS Chapter Two

 

I reject the idea that people are born evil. But then consider the level of cruelty required to spend ten years patiently inflating the dreams of a lonely and abandoned young woman (above), before smashing her psyche into a billion pieces on the anvil of your own ambition, almost as an afterthought in a plot to steal the modern equivalent of $116 million.  Now, that is doing evil.

Evil's name was James Addison Reavis (above) and he was the second son of a Missouri shop keeper He  was half Welsh, one quarter Scots and one quarter Mexican. James grew up fluent in both Spanish and English. And, as any young creature entering the world, his initial survival depended on the skills nature had provided him and his ambition. In James' case, nature had made Missouri a border state, torn between Union loyalties and Southern sympathies. 

When civil war broke out in 1861 the 18 year old James volunteered for military service in a Confederate regiment, where he  discovered he had a facility for forging his commanding officer's signature. He supplemented his army pay by selling passes to his fellow soldiers, until the officers grew suspicious. 

Before things got to too hot, James (above) wrote himself a pass and changed sides, enlisting in the Union Army. Because the Federal side was paying bounties for recruits. After the war James returned home with confidence in his own survival skills, and, oddly, having added the Portuguese language to his skill set.

James Reavis now fell in with a group of organized criminals - real estate agents. They put his skill with a pen to work again, creating the missing link in many a false legal ownership trail. And it was as a real estate agent, aptly  named George Willing, who introduced James to his life's work.  That was not Willing's intent, of course.  

The scam Willing was running had been born in the treaty which ended the Mexican/American war of 1846 to 1848.  The United States annexed all or parts of the future states of New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah and California. 

To avoid rebellion in these new territories the U.S. government pledge to respect all land titles and contracts signed under Mexican law, including the original Spanish land grants. And that is where George Willing came into our story, in 1871, with a fake bill of sale from a one time Mexican citizen. 

Willing claimed that in October of 1864, while working on a mining claim in Black Canyon, Arizona Territory (above) - about 50 miles north of Phoenix -  he had bought the mineral rights for a poorly defined section of land from a Miguel Peralta (Spanish for "high rock" or mountain) in exchange for $20,000 in gold, some mining equipment and some mules.

Willing had forged a written the bill of sale (above) in pencil, supposedly on the only piece of paper in the mining camp. But he said he could not file a record of the sale until three years later, in Prescott, Arizona, the territorial capital. Of course by then, the claim had proven profitable to somebody else. 

This type of challenge to an existing claim was called “a floater” and was not unusual in mining districts. Because of this it was was popular with scam artists, because the real mine owners would often settle the suit out of court by paying for a "quick claim",  just to avoid the expense of proving the claim false at lengthy trial. And it turned out there were several established mines already working the land which Willing was now claiming title to. 

But so familiar were the local miners with this particular scam that George Willing's filing quickly resulted in threats of tar and feathers. So George had retreated from Prescott, first to Sacramento, California, where he had used the fake bill of sale to secure a loan, which paid his way home to St. Louis, Missouri. His intention, once there, was to continue to pursue his false claim, but this time in a safer venue - the Federal courts.

In Missouri over the next two years, James Reavis and George Willing spent many hours discussing how best to secure the financial backing they required to pay for their legal blackmail of the real claim owners. They teamed up with a lawyer named William Gitt, who was an expert, of a sorts, in old Spanish land claims, including one out of Guadalajara, Mexico dating back to 1847. Mr. Gitt had been forced to abandon that particular case after a Mexican bench warrant had been issued for his arrest for fraud.  And as they invested more time and effort in constructing their fraud, they enlarged his claim.  

Gitt lectured James and George about the intricacies of Mexican and Spanish land law. And in January of 1874, on Gitt's advice, James and George formed a legal partnership. Then, they separated. George Willing took the paperwork they had “discovered” (meaning created) by rail and horseback back to Prescott, Arizona, to re-file his claim on the mines in Black Canyon. James Reavis took a train to New York City, where he boarded a ship, bound for San Francisco.

Step one in the plan was for James to meet up with a Sacramento, California (above), merchant named Florin Massol.  Massol was the dupe who had loaned Willing money years earlier on his fake land claim. The collateral Willing had offered to guarantee the loan were the fraudulent mining rights on the mythical Miguel Peralta land grant. Paying back the loan would provide a seemingly valid paper trail for the fake claim. 

Step two was for James to travel on to Prescott, Arizona (above) later that summer with the mineral rights now free and clear, and appearing unconnected to George's earlier filling for the same imaginary Peralta grant.  The idea was that two seemingly unconnected individuals filing separate claims on the Peralta grant would increase the pressure on the mine owners to settle the suits even quicker. But upon arriving in San Francisco, James received a startling letter from an Arizona Sheriff.

The letter was addressed to the only name found in George Willing's address book -  James Reeves, care of general delivery, San Francisco. According to the sheriff, George Willing had safely arrived in Prescott in March of 1874, and had immediately filed his claim at the Yavapai County Court house. Willing had then checked into a hotel (above), eaten a hearty dinner and retired to his room  In the morning, he was found dead. George Willing was willing no more. 

The sheriff offered no cause of death. Maybe it had been a heart attack, or maybe someone remembered George Willing from his earlier adventures in questionable mining claims. The sheriff was only interested in preforming his civic duty, and finding someone to pay the undertaker. And with that shocking news, the partnership was dissolved and whatever plans had been assembled to profit from the mythical Peralta land grant, died with George.

But George's death also left James Reeves was in a terrible fix. He was not interested in paying for poor George's funeral. He wasn't even happy about being connected in public with George's claim. But, according to the sheriff's letter, the papers James had forged to support George's claim on the mining lands, were still on file at the Yavapai County Court house. James Reavis could not pursue his own claim without those papers. But, if George's death had not been accident, Prescott, Arizona might not be the safest place right now. James Reavis needed time to think. And he needed money. So, on 5 May 1874, he got married.

The lucky lady was Ada Pope. After a short honeymoon, James went looking for work and Ada never saw him again. Six years later the unfortunate lady finally filed for divorce. In the meantime, James had found a job as a school teacher in the tiny Southern California farming town of Downey (above). 

After two quiet years laying low in Downey,  James returned to San Francisco (above), where he became a newspaper correspondent for "The Examiner" and "The Call", specializing in covering the Public Land Commission.  

From this position James made himself familiar to the most powerful men in the city, including two  who had just built the Southern Pacific line, the western half of the transcontinental railroad, Collis Huntington and Charles Crocker (above) - two of the biggest crooks in American history.. By now a plan had formed in James' mind, a way to re-assemble the pieces of his search for wealth and security.

It would be a great gamble. But then America had been built on gambles, usually with other people's money. And that was just what James Addison Reavis was going to  do - use other people's money to steal a fortune for himself. 

- 30 -