In December of 1863, near the six-month old gold camp of Virginia City, which was then in the Territory of Idaho, a young German, named Nicholas Tiebolt, was found murdered. An armed posse headed by James Williams was formed to bring in three suspects, Long John, George Ives, and George Hilderman. They were tried in miners' court in Nevada City, a few miles downstream from Virginia City, December 19-21, 1863. Long John turned states witness and gave testimony implicating George Ives as the murderer. Although he maintained his innocence to the end, George Ives was convicted and sentenced to die by hanging. George Hilderman was sentenced to banishment, and Long John went free. Assuming that Ives was really guilty, you could say that justice was done, and the accused had a jury trial with counsel to represent him. This was the last time this would happen in Montana for a long time.

Wilbur Sanders, a lawyer recently arrived from the States with his uncle, Sidney Edgerton, acted as the prosecuting attorney.

Just before he was hanged, George Ives reportedly said, "I am innocent of this crime; Alex Carter killed the Dutchman." Although one man was convicted and hanged for the crime, a group of men decided that justice by a jury in a court was too slow and ineffective. Five men were sworn in by Wilbur Sanders as the first members of the Montana Vigilance Committee, patterned on the San Francisco model (1856). They took as their first goal the capture and trial of Alex Carter. But the Ives trial was the last in what is now Montana for years to come. Instead of orderly arrests, trial courts, and sentencing, a reign of lynching took place. By the end of February, 22 men had been lynched, one whose identity was unknown.

The most famous victim was Henry Plummer, born in Maine, spent 10 years in California, came to Montana in September 1862, elected Sheriff of the Bannack Mining District in May 1863, married one of the few single white women in the territory in June 1863, and was hanged by a mob at Bannack on January 10, 1864.

Some of the men hanged may have been guilty of some crime, some were innocent of any crime, but there is no written record of a confession by any one of them. Not one of those lynched in a public place admitted to a crime as they were hanged.

There is an extensive literature on the vigilantes, mostly based on two early accounts, one by Dimsdale, written in 1865-66, and the other by Langford, written in 1890. These two books constitute one of the most successful coverups, or "spin-doctoring" in history. Only recently in the books by Ruth Mather and Fred Boswell have these accounts been challenged.