The Gringos (Annotated & Expanded Edition)

We grew up on Westerns on T.V., and we think we know about vigilantes--spontaneous groups of killer mobs thirsting for a hanging. But Gringos sets the record straight with the story of "The Vigilante Commission," historically, wealthy landowners who set themselves up as official vigilantes to bring rough justice to the lawless West during the gold rush. But The Commission in San Francisco quickly becomes corrupt, as such organizations inevitably do, and the members descend into savagery every bit as destructive as the outlaws they are meant to control. And their determination to hang anyone who gets in their way triggers the flight of our hero and anti-hero into the "wilderness" where the struggle for land, gold, and women is to the death. Their odyssey is complicated by the enmity between land-squatter whites and "Californians" who obtained their titles to the land from the Mexican and Spanish governments, claims that the U.S. government only acknowledged after lengthy court battles that lasted decades.

This legal and illegal struggle for the land is the basis for Gringos. Throw in a a saucy senorita men are willing to fight for, and trouble is guaranteed.