San Francisco Police Department

Jenny Lind City Hall

The Marshall's Office was located on the first floor facing Kearny Street, and the police office and jail were on the basement floor, with entrances on Dunbar Alley. (The adjacent El Dorado saloon was later absorbed into the government complex and the upper floor was badly damaged by an earthquake in 1865.) There was much opposition to its acquisition, including public demonstrations and a duel between a newspaper editor and a council member. The facility served fairly well until it was destroyed in 1895 to make way for a new Hall of Justice.

In 1856, San Franciscans voted in another charter that would govern the city for the remainder of the century. Under the provisions of that charter, the Department was to be governed by a commission comprised of the Mayor, the Police Court Judge and the Chief Executive Officer of the Department, now re-designated from City Marshal to Chief of Police. The position of Chief, like that of Mayor and Police Court Judge, were to be elective, but at two-year intervals. Officers were to be removed only for cause.

Up to that time there had been several attempts to place officers in uniform, resisted by the officers on the grounds that uniforms were a sign of European servitude as represented by servants' livery. In 1856 the new commission made wearing a uniform a condition of employment. A blue uniform, similar to that coming into fashion in eastern departments was selected. In 1862, however, the blue uniform was replaced by one made from gray cloth.

1862 Uniforms

Legend has it that San Franciscans chose a gray uniform in 1862 at the urging of a police commissioner with roots in the South. Given the pro-union sentiments prevalent in San Francisco during the Civil War, such an explanation is unbelievable. The real reason is that San Francisco was largely unpaved in 1860s and the dark uniforms would show the dust.

It was also during this period, in 1864, that a series of telegraph stations were inaugurated to which officers would report on duty by telegraph before proceeding to their beats in what were then the outlying settled portions of the city. The first rudimentary telegraph system in 1864 tied the Station at Mission Dolores, the Harbor Station at Pacific and Davis, and the Chief's house at 930 Clay Street with the Central Telegraph in City Hall. As population pressure moved outwards, little stations were added at Hayes and Laguna and at Jones and Pacific in 1865. The following year the Fourth Street Station (at Fourth and Harrison) was in operation.

The Telegraph system, designed in part to mobilize officers quickly in case of disorder, was first put to the test in April, 1865 on the occasion of the riots which followed the arrival of the news of President Lincoln's assassination in the strongly Unionist city.