Gold Hill daily news. [volume] (Gold Hill, N.T. [Nev.]) 1863-1882, 1865-10-28
Our Sam Francisco Correspondents.
SAN FnANo1sco. October 25, l865.

This day / am on the stool OF repentance.
Now is the winter Of my discomfort and
humiliation. About this time I am n
gagged in eating humble pie. Hear me for
my cause, and keep your mouth shut I'M
til I am through, that you may shabby
the case In all its bearings. I have spo-
ken of an earthquake in my two previous
letters as IL such a thing actually hap
pened. g.rv.g1rr rgL ra...
TAXI IT ALL BACK.
San Francisco was not shaken up by an
earthquake at all, on Sunday, the 10th
day of October, 1866, nor any other time,
and never will be again. The long list Of
houses demolished, partially shaken down,
or badly damaged, published by the Alto,
Bulletin, Cal, and Examiner, was made
"out of whole cloth" by the enterprising
locals of those sheets, merely to kill time,
and give an air of liveliness and enterprise
to their otherwise dull columns. There
was, it is true, q slight tremor up in the
vicinity of Santa Cruz, where a few build
ings were thrown down, and a few cracks
opened in the ground-where the job of
creation was slightest, and only partly
finished up anyhow-but in this vicinity
nothing Of the kind occurred. 1t is pos
sible that some nervous people might have
fancied that they felt a slight shake, but
we are convinced that they did not. and
that most of the marvellous stories of hair
breadth escapes, etc were concocted by
the self-same locals after the pretended
earthquake. The cracks in buildings
down town were, as a general rule, old
ones, which re-opened on account of the
drouth, and the piles Of broken brick and
mortar which you will see in front of our
stores and public buildings, merely indi-
cate the fact that our citizens are repair
ing their plastering, roofs, walls, etc.. be-
fore the rainy season, as usual they do
| that every year, and show their good
sense in doing so. 1t is true that a few
people were seen running around town
with plastering and bricks and things in
their hair after the pretended shake, but
| this was owing to the fact that q lot OF
graceless ~loafers pitched such trifes off
the tops of houses, out Of clear c~ussedness,
to disturb the meeting Of the Rev. Mr..
| Crisis. in Sacramento street, in front Of
the What Cheer House, and to see how
| big an excitement they could get up by
hollering Earthquake" at the same
time. Very few buildings were injured,
nobody was killed outright, and our poor
est houses would have stood ten times as
hard a shock without "fazing" them.
Nobody was scared, and everybody made
fun of everybody else after it was over.
Now, l trust that this explanation will
prove satisfactory to you and the public
generally, and we shall hear no more
about Earthquakes in San Francisco"
If you think that my statement OF the
| case don't harmonic with the facts as
| you have learned them, c%ontradicts itself
in places, and outrages common sense, l
cannot help it. The fact is, my boy, in
the excitement of the moment | so far
forgot my duty as a newspaper writer as
to indulge in the unwanted luxury Of tell
ing the truth without looking at the con-
sequences. In doing so I damaged the
credit of San Francisco in New York and
at Mud Springs, and lowered the price Of
real estate. My friends. on whom l am
dependent for my daily bread, saw that,
and insisted on my retracting and taking
water at once. l am no Missionary, and
don't banker after the crown of martyr
dom ; ] therefore retract at once. Ohlige
me, my boy, by believing me-or pretend
ing to do so-and let it be understood be-
tween US hereafter that there was no earth
quake at all. Don't you think on the
whole, my boy, that such is the more SEM
sible way Of treating the case: What
good would it do me to stick to the truth.
| She never paid me anything for my SER
vices, and don't own any real estate. Let
truth shift for herself, and he thankful
that she has not fallen bodily into the
hands of San Francisco two per cent. a
month note shayers. as in that case she
would have had no shift left. Don't let
me hear any more about her or the Garth
quake.
THE OBSCENE PHOTOGRAPH ROW.
Much comment has been made by
papers in the interior on the case of A. P.
Johnson, who was arrested last week for
manufacturing obscene photographs, and
allowed to deposit only $1,000 bail, which
was Of course forfeited. The case was bad
enough, and Johnson richly deserved more
than he got, but in justice to the young
women of San Francisco, l must say that
a great deal of fiction has been mixed up
with a few facts by the correspondents and
editors who have treated upon it. The
pictures sliced by the police were all ex-
amined in my presence, and instead Of
being those of respectable young girls,
were, without an exception, those of no.
torious prostitutes. The business Of TAX
ing such pictures, to be used as advertise
ments for houses of ll-fame, is so much
below that of an ordinary pimp, that I
lack words to express my contempt for the
beast who would follow it, but there was
not the slightest evidence obtained by the
police to show that he was the party, or
one of the parties in this city engaged in
getting up by the combination process,
pictures of respectable girls in the most in
famous positions. This business has been
carried on here extensively, Us / long
since informed your readers, but no trace
| Oh SuCn plCIuICo WSIS AOuil0 III hAs 6uiCl .
The report that the pictures of utterly
nude and semi-nude women found in his
gallery were genuine pictures of the
daughters Of respectable families in San
Francisco, taken from life, il utterly un-
true, and a gross SANDER on the women Of
our city. The row raised will do good,
however. as it will make people cautious
about trusting their wives and daughters
pictures in the hands Of any but artists Of
reputation above suspicion, and will check
if it does not break up entirely, a business
which is a disgrace to humanity. 81
FUNERAL or ENERA WRIGHT.
The funeral of General Wright and
wife, on Saturday last, was . noticeable
affair, and / believe there are now few
who will claim that the honors paid the
gallant old soldiers memory were not
well deserved. Mistakes he may have
made; he may have been too lenient with
traitors in the hour of our country's peril,
but his heart was in the right place, and
his action while in command of the De-
partment Of the Pacific is now generally
conceded to have saved US from the hor-
1