John C. Hays
(1850-1852) |
|
John Coffee Hays was born in Tennessee
on Jan. 28, 1817. In 1836, after the fall of the Alamo, he moved to Texas
to fight for the Republic of Texas. He joined the company of Capt. E. "Deaf
" Smith, and was appointed an officer and surveyor for the Texas Rangers.
In 1839, he was appointed Captain of his own company of Rangers. In 1846,
now Colonel Hays formed a regiment of Rangers for service in the Mexican
War.
On January 5, 1850, he arrived in San Francisco. In
February of 1850, he announced his candidacy for the office of Sheriff,
running as the candidate of the Whig party. He defeated Democratic candidate
J. J. Bryant, and assumed office on April 9, 1850. After leaving office,
he was appointed United States Surveyor General, and helped found the City
of Oakland. He died in 1883. |
Thomas P. Johnson
(1852-1853) |
|
Johnson was considered a competent
and popular "Southern Gentleman." He was a deputy under Sheriff Hays, and
while Hays was on leave had complete charge of the office of Sheriff. His
administrative skills were such that it won him strong favor with the voters
when he ran for Sheriff. Also, because of the presence of a strong Southern
party in the City, it was felt that this block would vote for him, regardless
of party ties. His three opponents were also competent and respected men,
but Johnson won the election. |
William R. Gorham
(1853-1854) |
|
Not much information has been
documented on this Sheriff, but his term in office surely was not a boring
one, for he served during the period of the most concentrated immigration
of gold rush hopefuls into San Francisco. |
David Scannell
(1855-1856) |
|
David Scannell was born in New
York on January 31, 1820. He arrived in San Francisco on the steamer "Gold
Hunter" in 1851. Scannell ran against Thomas Johnson in 1852 and lost,
but redeemed himself by winning this election. Prior to winning his election
he served as Undersheriff to Sheriff William Gorham. He was a very well
educated man who as an officer served in the Mexican War with extraordinary
distinction, which served as a testimonial to his bravery when running
for the office of Sheriff. He was also praised for being free from the
vices of "dissipation and gambling."
His term of Sheriff was highlighted by articles in
the local papers in which the citizens of the City were exhorted to "Hang
Sheriff Scannell" for being in cahoots with the gambler Cora, who was in
the county jail charged with murder. He was Sheriff during the Second Committee
of Vigilance, and swore in special deputies to guard the jail from vigilantes
attempting to hang the occupants. He was, however, unsuccessful, and the
prisoners were taken in the charge of future Sheriff Charles Doane, who
was at the time the Grand Marshal for the Committee of Vigilance and Major
General in charge of the armed vigilante forces. Both prisoners were subsequently
hanged.
His term ended when the position of Sheriff was declared
vacant by the Board of Supervisors because Sheriff Scannell could not post
the required one hundred thousand dollar bond due to the failure of Palmer,
Cook, and Co. He went on to become the Chief Engineer of the San Francisco
Fire Department, and was appointed Chief in 1871 when the Fire Department
went from a volunteer organization to a professional one. He died March
31, 1893 at the age of 73, much beloved by the citizens of the City. |
Charles Doane
(1857-1861) |
|
Charles Doane, a native of Vermont,
passed his early years in mercantile pursuits. Before he was elected Sheriff,
Charles Doane was a Grand Marshal for the Second Committee of Vigilance,
and while in this post, challenged then-Sheriff Scannell by demanding that
he release two prisoners that were in the Sheriff's custody. Doane won
this confrontation, as he was backed up by 24 companies of Vigilantes and
a cannon. Both prisoners (Cora and Casey) were hung.
Charles Doane died on October 8, 1862. At the time,
he was a Major General in the State Guard. He had a large and imposing
funeral with military and Masonic honors. The City Guard acted as the Guard
of Honor, and Doane's staff attended in full uniform. Leading citizens
of every profession attended his funeral. |
John Ellis
(1862-1864) |
|
General John Ellis was a Civil
War veteran who fought for the Union at the Battle of Bull Run. He was
nominated for the office of Sheriff on the "People's Party" ticket. He
retired before the end of his term to travel in the East, after receiving
an inheritance. |
Henry L. Davis
(1864-1867) |
|
Henry Davis was born in Newport,
Rhode Island, in 1827. He came to California to earn his fortune in 1850
at the age of 23. He served as a Deputy Sheriff for six years prior to
his election as Sheriff. When he left the office, he became President of
the National Gold Bank and Trust Company. |
P. J. White
(1868-1871) |
|
Patrick James White was born in
Utica, New York, in 1829. He came to California in 1850. In 1858 he was
elected Sheriff of Sierra Co., California. Ten years later he was elected
Sheriff of San Francisco. He ran on the Democratic Party ticket. Beside
servicing as Sheriff, he also was appointed Railroad Commissioner for the
City. |
James Adams
(1872-1873) |
|
Born in Belfast, Ireland, in 1830,
he arrived in California in 1854. He served on the San Francisco Board
of Supervisors in 1869, and in 1872 was elected Sheriff on the Democratic
Party ticket. He also served as a Representative in the State Legislature.
His accomplishments were considered great for a man whose first job in
the United States was working on a farm for eight dollars a month. He used
his financial prosperity to help others also. He donated $4,000, a vast
some in that era, to improve the conditions of prisoners. While this was
undoubtedly a generous gesture, it was looked on as suspect by other City
officials. |
William McKibbin
(1874-1875) |
|
William McKibbin was characterized
as being a very honest and upright citizen. He was the City Treasurer and
was once an Alderman, a post equivalent to City Supervisor. He ran on the
Independent Party ticket. |
Matthew Nunan
(1876-1879) |
|
Nunan was born in Limerick, Ireland,
in 1836, and was fourteen years old when he immigrated to the United States.
In 1855, he came to California, attracted by the mining camps and the promise
of quick riches. He eventually became the owner of the Mission Street Brewery,
an enterprise that suffered a $100,000 loss due to poor management. While
Sheriff, he was instrumental in taking over the functions of the San Francisco
House of Corrections and incorporating those functions into those of the
Sheriff's Department. |
Thomas Desmond
(1880-1881) |
|
Thomas Desmond was born in Cobh,
County Cork, Ireland, in 1838, and immigrated to the United States in 1854.
He was a member of the famous Irish Nationalist Expedition that liberated
six Irish Republican prisoners from Freemantle Prisoner in Australia in
1875. As a member of the Fenian Brotherhood, he felt the injustice of the
six remaining prisoners held by the British for participating in the Fenian
Uprisings of the 1860's. With a group known as the "Clan na Gael," they
raised funds to charter an American flag vessel known as the "Catalpa,"
which was sailed to Australia to free the Irish prisoners.
Prior to running for the office of Sheriff, he worked
as a wheelwright and carriage maker. He was elected on the Workingman's
Ticket in 1880. He died in 1910 and is buried in Holy Cross Cemetery. |
John Sedgwick
(1882) |
|
In addition to being Sheriff of
San Francisco, John Sedgwick was also Superintendent of Jails, then a separate
position in City government. He also served as Collector of Internal Revenues
and as Chief Clerk in the House of Representatives. |
Patrick Connolly
(1883-1884) |
|
Patrick Connolly was born in County
Kildare, Ireland, in 1839. He came to the United States in 1856, spending
his first year and a half in the country in the City of New York. In 1859
he came to California. Prior to becoming Sheriff of San Francisco, he worked
for the California Stage Company. |
Peter Hopkins
(1885-1886) |
|
Peter Hopkins was born in St.
Louis, Missouri. After fighting in the Mexican War of 1846, he came to
California and moved to San Francisco. In addition to being Sheriff, he
also served the City as a Fire Commissioner. |
William McMann
(1887-1888) |
|
A native of Ireland, McMann served
the California State Legislature for two terms after coming to California
during the Gold Rush. He was elected Sheriff on the Democratic ticket.
After his term of office, he ran for Mayor in 1892 and was defeated. |
Charles Laumeister
(1889-1892) |
|
Laumeister had a long history
of public service. Aside from his two terms as Sheriff, he was also a member
of the Board of Public Works. He was elected to the State Railroad Commission
in 1911, was appointed a member of the San Francisco Fire Commission, and
was twice president of the Merchants Exchange. |
John J. McDade
(1893-1894) |
|
Prior to his term as Sheriff,
McDade served as a member of the State Senate, who continually fought for
welfare reform. In 1879, he was the head of the "Young Men's Society" in
San Francisco. After his term as Sheriff, he led the way for the improvement
of city streets and eventually was appointed Superintendent of Streets.
He was Sheriff of the County when John McNulty, the last prisoner to be
so honored, was hung at the old County Jail on January 26, 1894. After
this hanging, executions were moved to the State prisoner system. |
Richard I. Whelan
(1895-1898) |
|
Prior to his election as Sheriff,
Whelan was the President of Bland Books, a local publishing agency. He
was appointed by the Mayor to serve on the Board of Education. He was elected
Sheriff on the Democratic ticket. One of his many accomplishments was to
help reshape the jury selection process in the courts. |
Henry S. Martin
(1899) |
|
A "native son" of San Francisco,
he was born in the City in 1858. Prior to running for Sheriff, he ran a
business in the City. He was the Grand Treasurer of the Native Sons of
the Golden West, a very powerful local fraternal organization that had
many politicians as members. He was also President and Director of French
Hospital, which he insured was available to ill soldiers during the Spanish
American War. |
John Lackmann
(1900-1904) |
|
John Lackmann served on the San
Francisco Board of Supervisors for two terms prior to being elected Sheriff.
He was a member of the Abe Ruef "machine," which came crashing down due
to political scandals of the early 1900's. |
Peter J. Curtis
(1904-1906) |
|
Curtis served as a member of the
Board of Supervisors under Mayor Phelan and was involved in the Young Men's
Institute. When he was Sheriff, he appointed William D. Jynes as his Undersheriff
and James J. Donovan as the Superintendent of Jails. |
Thomas F. O'Neil
(1906-1908) |
|
Thomas O'Neil was elected Sheriff
and then immediately indicted for election fraud. He was found not guilty.
O'Neil had the tremendous responsibility of reorganizing the Department
after the great earthquake and fire of 1906. He appointed Tom Finn, a future
Sheriff of San Francisco, as his Undersheriff. |
Lawrence J. Dolan
(1908-1910) |
|
Dolan's term of office as Sheriff
was preceded by his election to the State Assembly in 1897. A native San
Franciscan, he was also a prominent member of the Native Sons and a plumber
by trade. In 1893, he was the commissary in the Sheriff's Department. Following
his term as Sheriff, he was appointed head of the Commission of Weights
and Sealers in 1913, and during his tenure twenty thousand false weights
and measures were discovered in use in the City. While Sheriff, his Undersheriff
was P. J. Haggerty. He died on November 19, 1919. |
Thomas F. Finn
(1910-1911/
1916-1927) |
|
Thomas
Finn was born in San Francisco on November 23, 1873. He received his education
in public and parochial schools, and after attaining prominence in union
labor affairs entered public service. He spent twelve years in the State
Assembly and was elected State Senator.
Finn was elected Sheriff on the Union Labor ticket.
Prior to his election, he served as Undersheriff for Sheriff Thomas O'Neil.
During his later terms as Sheriff, the newspapers dubbed him "Boss" Finn,
for his vast political influence in San Francisco. Sheriff Finn's boast
was that he never lost a prisoner. Sheriff Finn did make reforms in the
jail system, most noteworthy being the transformation of 35 acres of land
into an inmate owned and operated vegetable garden. He died in 1938.
During Sheriff Finn's term the Sheriff was paid $666
a month, the Undersheriff was paid $200 a month, and bailiffs and "jailers"
were paid $100 a month. The Department had a total of 79 sworn and civilian
employees. He died January 8, 1938. |
Frederick Eggers
(1912-1915) |
|
Frederick Eggers was born in Germany
on April 10, 1858. He came alone to the country as a boy of fifteen and
lived in New York, working as a grocer. He moved to San Francisco in 1876,
where he worked in the coffee and tea trade until he was elected Sheriff
in 1912. He served as a member of the Board of Supervisors from 1901 to
1906. Although a Republican, he worked with the Democratic majority on
the Board to further important civic projects.
He won the election against then Sheriff Finn in one
of the most bitter contests for Sheriff. Egger's wife demanded and led
a recall vote against him, which succeeded in getting Sheriff Finn reelected
to the post in 1916. Eggers was constantly concerned about the situation
in the jails, and visited them daily. He established both a truck garden
and a bakery in the jails.
Sheriff Eggers was the first Sheriff to put personnel
in a standard uniform. On January 1, 1914, deputies and guards assigned
to the County Jails were to wear "a suit of drab khaki with brass buttons.
The other deputies, bailiffs and keepers will wear a suit of blue serge,
with brass buttons, except in the cases of bailiffs in the civil courts,
who, instead of brass, will have an insignia on the lapel of their coats
designating the title of the office." |
Thomas Finn
(1916-1927) |
|
Second term: See
above |
William J. Fitzgerald
(1928-1935) |
|
For 16 years, Fitzgerald worked
as a construction engineer while earning his law degree from Hastings.
Fitzgerald made some dramatic changes in the Department, and was a leading
jail reformer in his time. He was instrumental in the construction of a
new "state of the art" jail facility at City owned property in San Mateo
County. This jail, which cost $850,000 to build, was dedicated on July
1, 1934.
It replaced the old Ingleside Jail, which was built
in 1872, and the women's jail, which was built in 1858 and had been partially
destroyed by the 1906 earthquake. The jail incorporated the new humane
ways of dealing with prisoners, including a working 50 acre farm.
Sheriff Fitzgerald was the first to modernize the jail
commissary system, issuing vouchers instead of money. He reorganized all
clerical duties within the Sheriff's Department, and moved the Sheriff's
Offices into Room 333, City Hall, where they were located until City Hall
was closed for renovation in 1995. The offices are now located in Room
456. |
Daniel C. Murphy
(1936-1951) |
|
Born Dec. 12, 1881, Daniel Murphy
was the president of both the State and City Boards of Education. As Sheriff,
he also was president of the State Sheriff's Association. He was the first
Sheriff to revert commissary profits from the jails into the City Treasury.
One of his main boasts was that, as Sheriff, he never felt it was necessary
to carry a gun. |
Daniel Gallagher
(1952-1956) |
|
Dan Gallagher was born Sept. 6,
1896, in the City of San Francisco. He served as Supervisor prior to becoming
Sheriff. He was praised for his jail reforms, and he worked to pass legislation
that would grant higher pay to women employees. He also worked out a program
for prisoners to earn time off their sentences for work performed in various
programs. It was under his term of office that the current seven pointed
star used to identify Deputy Sheriff's was introduced (3/14/53). He died
in office May 6, 1956, and was succeeded by Acting Sheriff John P. Figone,
who was appointed as interim Sheriff pending appointment of a permanent
Sheriff by the Mayor. |
Matthew C. Carberry
(1956-1971) |
|
Matt Carberry was a City Supervisor
and President of the Fire Commission. He was appointed as Sheriff by the
Mayor to fill the term of the deceased Sheriff Gallagher, and was subsequently
reelected. He continued the reforms that Sheriff Gallagher had started
on the jail system. His Undersheriff was Francis Smith. Sheriff Carberry
had problems with both prisoners and labor issues towards the end of his
last term of office. He was defeated by a new reform candidate, Richard
Hongisto, when the conservative vote was split during the election. |
Richard Hongisto
(1972-1978) |
|
Defeating incumbent Sheriff Matt
Carberry as a reform candidate, Dick Hongisto was a San Francisco Police
Officer for ten years. He initiated numerous programs to upgrade conditions
within the county jails, including actively involving community groups
and starting prisoner programs. His first years in the Department were
stormy, as labor issues nearly led to a strike.
Sheriff Hongisto did much to improve the working conditions
of the Deputy Sheriff. Training was increased to comply with current state
standards, and uniforms and safety equipment were issued. During his tenure
in office, City Prison was turned over from the jurisdiction of the SFPD
to the jurisdiction of the Sheriff (1976).
In 1975, Sheriff Hongisto was easily elected to a second
term. In 1978, he resigned his office to become the Police Chief of Cleveland,
Ohio, and then the Director of the New York State Dept. of Corrections.
His Undersheriff, James Denman, was appointed Acting Sheriff pending the
appointment by the Mayor of a successor. In 1980, Hongisto returned to
the City and was elected Supervisor, became City Assessor, and then was
appointed Chief of Police by Mayor Frank Jordan in 1990. His term as Police
Chief was brief, and he was forced to resign resulting from a scandal regarding
stolen newspapers. |
Eugene A. Brown
(1978-1979) |
|
Eugene Brown is a native San Franciscan
who graduated from George Washington High School and attended the University
of San Francisco, where he was a member of the famous 1956-68 Dons NCAA
Championship basketball team, an All-American guard, and a member of the
USF Hall of Fame. After college, he was a San Francisco deputy sheriff,
police officer and investigator. He served in the Department of Justice
and was the Civil Rights Director of the Western States Region of the Small
Business Administration.
Sheriff Brown was appointed by Mayor George Moscone
to replace Sheriff Hongisto when Sheriff Hongisto resigned. Although his
short tenure was marked by a number of escapes. Sheriff Brown introduced
many improvements to the Sheriff's Department, including an improved food
delivery system for inmates, upgraded medical care and an improved fire
prevention program.
Brown was defeated in his bid for election to the office
by Michael Hennessey. |
 photo by Luke Thomas
Michael Hennessey
(1980-Present) |
|
Michael
Hennessey has served as Sheriff of San Francisco for 27 years, and was elected
to his seventh term in November 2003. As Sheriff, he has won widespread
recognition for the outstanding success of his innovative in-custody treatment
programs. He is one of the nation’s pioneers in establishing direct
supervision jails that have proved to be safer and more cost effective than
traditional linear jails. He has also been nationally recognized for his
recruitment program for women and minorities, including gay men and lesbians.
His staff is among the most diverse in the nation and reflects the diversity of
San Francisco’s population. At the height of the AIDS crisis, he was
named Law Enforcement News’ Man of the Year for leadership in fact-based
policy and training regarding AIDS in jails and prisons.
Sheriff
Hennessey’s efforts to rehabilitate prisoners include a wide range of prisoner
education and substance abuse recovery programs, such as SISTER, a drug
treatment program for women, and the Garden Project, a post-release job-training
program. Recidivism studies show that both of these programs significantly lower
participants’ rate of re-offense and return to custody.
Sheriff
Hennessey was instrumental in implementing another innovative in-custody
treatment program, Resolve To Stop the Violence (RSVP), which was started in
1997 and is a result of collaboration between organizations that advocate for
victim’s rights and provide services for survivors and the San Francisco
Sheriff’s Department. RSVP offers treatment for male offenders with violent
histories, services to victims of violence and restitution to the community for
the harm caused by violence. RSVP was honored in 2004 with the prestigious
Innovations in Government Award from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard
University.
In
September, 2003, Sheriff Hennessey opened the Five Keys Charter High School,
which provides prisoners with the opportunity to earn high school diplomas while
in custody. Prisoners who are released before they complete the curriculum
may continue their studies at the Post Release Education Program, or PREP.
The name Five Keys refers to the five most important factors in successful
re-entry to the community after incarceration: education, employment,
recovery, family and community. It is the nation’s first charter high
school to be operated inside a county jail.
A
native of Iowa, Sheriff Hennessey graduated from St. John’s University,
Minnesota, with a bachelor’s degree in history, and received his J.D. from
University of San Francisco in 1973. He is the longest serving Sheriff in
California and the only one who is a lawyer. In 1975, he founded and
directed the San Francisco Jail Project, a legal assistance program for indigent
prisoners with civil legal problems, and provided training for law students and
new lawyers while offering technical assistance to the Sheriff’s Department. |
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