William Hepworth Dixon, White Conquest: Volume 1

One day last week, General Cobb, a lawyer of repute, was shot down in Washington Street by Hannah Smythe. In London, the story of Hannah Smythe would be curious, in San Francisco it is commonplace.

Twelve years ago, according to her story, Hannah came to San Francisco, where she met a sailor named Smythe, and married him — on her side in a match of love. Hannah had saved some money, and the couple went down to Crescent City, in Del Norte county, where she bought a tract of land with her savings, and sent her husband to the Land Office, with instructions to register the purchase in her name. He registered his own. Living in Crescent City, having neither sheep nor cattle, the sailor's wife could turn the land to no account. At length a squatter, one Judge Mason, led his herds into her fields and challenged her to drive them off. She went to law, and lost her cause. Her enemy, she says, was rich, and bribed the local magistrates. When she had lost her savings, Smythe deserted her and the children, leaving her without a cent and with five or six little mouths to feed. On getting a divorce — an easy thing in Crescent City-she left