Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-11-14
OEF|ED DEATH THREAT
Henev. Marked for AssasSina-
ton, Worked Right On.
HE HAS KILLED. HIS NAN
And Was Acquitted With Com.
mendation for the Deed.
WENT PACE IN HIS YOUTH
Won Distinction in Land Fraud
Cases in Northwest and in Frisco
Anti-Graft Crusade.

SAN FRANCISCO, November 14.-Soon
after Francis J. Heney started in clean
ing up the graftridden city of San Fran
CISCO Abe Ruef, the boss and head auc-
tioneer of all the municipal Doodle, had
the impudence to break up meeting held
by the decent citizens of the city in a
hastily constructed hall on the ashes of
one of the downtown blocks
The meeting was held to give counte-
nance to the work of the new special
prosecutor. Ruef had packed the place
with his shouters and strong arm men.
After these men had howled down the
better element a saloonkeeper, one of the
hangers-on at the city hall clambered to
the platform and shouted above the din
OF his brother roughS:
eff this man Heney keeps at his game
we give him just about six months to
live
Defied Death Threat.
That was early in the summer of 1906.
Heney kept right on cleaning up the city,
although he knew that hired thugs dog
ged his footsteps from the time he left
his hotel in the morning until he went
to his bed at night.
1t was in the summer of 1907 over a
table in one of the clubs that Heney an
Swered question put to him by one OF
his newspaper friends.
Get me-" Heney shrugged his Shout
ders as he echoed the question. a
whole lot of fellows have made that bluff
before in my life. Any time they want
to get me they know where to find me if
they'll only come on from the 'front.'
Francis Joseph Heney. the son of an
Irishman, was born in Lima. n. Y, on
March II. 1859. His family moved to San
Francisco in 1868. and there in the lar
west, which was raw and primitive in
those days, he lived his boyhood in the
south of Market district, known tnen as
now as the rendezvous for wild gangs of
youngsters who knew no fear or limit to
their deviltry.
The husky youngster learned to fight
before he learned to read. Later, when
he knew how to read, and was examining
mis- head full Of preparatory stuff for the
matriculation examinations at the Un1-
versity of California, he did not forget
how to fight. He entered tn. university
at Berkeley with the Class of 80
Offered to Even Things.
Heney whipped a man who had branded
him as a d-unkard in the college paper
while he was still a freshman. When the
man he tackled complained to the crowd
that he was smaller than Heney the lat
ter proposed that they fight with revolv-
ers, the smaller of the two having the first
shot. For that the faculty expelled him
from the university.
The youngster who had received his
training south of Market went where
| life was briskest. He taught school
| in Silver City, Idaho, first having proved
| to his overgrown pupils with piece OF
| stove wood that he was capable of teach
\ ing.
He lived wildly. This he was always
ready to admit in later years He drank
1 and gambled-"went the limit as far as
it was raised in the frontier towns OF
Idaho, Arizona and New Mexico.
| Heney shot and killed DR.. j. c. Handy
| in Tucson. Ariz.. in 1883. Handy had
brought suit to divorce his wife. and he
was reputed such a dangerous man that
no lawyer dared to become Mrs. Handy's
counsel. Heney dared.
One day after the judgment had gone
against Mrs Handy the physician met
| him in order to provoke the lawyer into
drawing his weapon and thus be able to
| make good his boast Heney did draw
| his weapon and he shot his assailant
Handy died and a jury not only ac-
quilted Heney but vindicated him with
an open statement that he had done right.
First Fight Against Graft.
| At this time Heney was conducting his
| first fight against municipal corruption
| there in the Arizona town. Year after
year he was defeated. but finally he be-
came the head of his party in Pima
county. Then he grew to be the biggest
| man politically in the territory Presi-
dent Cleveland during his second admin
/ istration appointed him attorney general
/ of Arizona.
T Heney came under the notice of people
in Washington several years later, when
he undertook the defense of Judge Noye!
of Alaska against the order Of removal
by the Department of Justice. Attorney
| General Knox said at the time that he
| admired Heney's uphill work in a losing
| cause, and he offered to make him an
assistant attorney general. Heney de-
| clined
II was about this time that Ethan Allen
| Hitchcock. Secretary of the Interior
| was trying to discover who it was that
| was stealing land from the government
| timber reserves in Oregon, Washington
! and Montana. The Secretary had traced