Official Records
The records of the U.S. Circuit Courts for the Districts of California are included among Record Group 21 and are split between the:
National Archives at San Francisco
1000 Commodore Drive
San Bruno, California 94066-2350
Email: sanbruno.archives@nara.gov
and the:
National Archives at Riverside
23123 Cajalco Road
Perris, California 92570-7298
Email: riverside.archives@nara.gov
Guides to the holdings of the regional archives are available at: https://www.archives.gov/san-francisco/holdings
and https://www.archives.gov/riverside/finding-aids
A published description of the records is also available in the Guide to Federal Records in the National Archives of the United States, 1995 (http://www.archives.gov/research/guide-fed-records/index.html ).
Bibliography
Cosgrave, George. Early California Justice: The History of the United States District Court for the Southern District of California, 1849-1944. San Francisco: Grabhorn Press, 1948.
Fritz, Christian G., Michael Griffith, and Janet M. Hunter, eds . A Judicial Odyssey: Federal Court in Santa Clara, San Benito, Santa Cruz, and Monterey Counties . San Jose: San Jose Federal Court Advisory Committee, 1985.
Fritz, Christian G. Federal Justice in California: The Court of Ogden Hoffman, 1851-1891. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1991.
---. "The Judicial Business of a Nineteenth-Century Federal Trial Court: The Northern District of California, 1851-1891." Western Legal History 5 (Summer/Fall 1992): 217-251.
Gordan, John D., III. Authorized by No Law: The San Francisco Committee of Vigilance of 1856 and the United States Circuit Court for the Districts of California . Pasadena and San Francisco: Ninth Judicial Circuit Historical Society and United States District Court for the Northern District of California Historical Society, 1987.
Hall, Kermit L. "Mere Party and the Magic Mirror: California's First Lower Federal Judicial Appointments." Hastings Law Journal 32 (March 1981): 819-837.