Historic Pinole: Fatal Stabbing With Vague Explanation

This week's Historic Pinole is about a deadly stabbing in town. It's short on details but raises some questions, which is really what makes history interesting.

There is no last name of the victim, and the described motive is speculative. It mentions a hearing in front of the "Justice of the neighborhood" — whatever that means — as the arbiter in the case.

The victim is a man named "Joe." The name of the stabber is John Alvarez. Is he the namesake of Alvarez Avenue in Pinole?

We grudgingly forgive the reporter and editors for the vague description of the incident, on the assumption that authorities might not have known or released as much information as we'd prefer. Although, the stabbing did happen weeks before the article appeared. We're less forgiving of the passive voice construction of the writing.

The article appeared in the July 7, 1864 edition of the Sacramento Daily Union newspaper, which reprinted the news from the Contra Costa Gazette. We present it with the original spelling and punctuation.

FATAL STABBING IN CONTRA COSTA COUNTY.—The Contra Costa Gazette of July 2 says:

A man called Joe was stabbed early in June by John Alvarez, at Pinole. The stab proved fatal, and the man died the next day. The cause is said to have been liquor and jealousy. A hearing was had before the Justice of the neighborhood, upon Alvarez voluntarily delivering himself up. It resulted in his discharge.

This article comes from the California Digital Newspaper Collection, Center for Bibliographic Studies and Research, University of California, Riverside https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cdnc. The collection has digitzed more than 400,000 images from newspapers in the 19th and 20th centuries. Images dated between 1846 and 1922 are in the public domain and not subject to copyright.