No. 243.
Mr. Chang Yen
Hoon to Mr. Bayard.
Chinese
Legation,
Washington, D.
C., February 25,
1887. (Received February 25.)
Sir: It becomes my unpleasant duty to bring to
your attention further acts of violence against Chinese subjects and
injury to their property
[Page 364]
in
violation of treaty rights, additional to the lawless acts which have
been the subject of my previous notes.
It appears from the reports received at this legation and corroborated by
the statements of the officers of the United States and of the public
press, that a considerable body of peaceable and law-abiding Chinese
laborers at the mines on Douglass Island and in the vicinity of Juneau,
Alaska Territory, near one hundred in number, were assaulted in the
month of August last by a band of wicked and lawless men, with arms and
violence, and ordered to cease work and abandon the Territory; that when
the Chinese declined to go voluntarily, the mob of armed men took them
by force, drove them to the sea-shore, put them on miserable, small
schooners, and sent them adrift on the ocean; that they were, after
enduring great hardships, landed on a distant and barren land; that
being kindly taken on board by a passing steamer, they were carried back
to the place where they had been working; that they desired to return to
their employment, but the wicked men who had first driven them away
threatened their lives if they remained, and neither their employers nor
the United States authorities could afford them any protection; that to
save their lives, and with great pecuniary loss and damage, they were
compelled to flee to San Francisco and elsewhere outside of the
Territory of Alaska, having endured further hardship and suffering on
their journey; and that, owing to the reign of terror created by these
wicked men, they have not been able to return to Alaska.
Official information of this outrage has doubtless reached your
Government, as the noble and honored President in his last annual
message to Congress has alluded to it; and General Gibbon, the military
commander in Washington Territory, in his annual report of September 8,
1886, states that “a report has recently reached me from authentic
sources that in the mouth of August a number of Chinese laborers were
expelled from Douglass Island, in the Territory of Alaska, by an
organized party of white men, who acted with great brutality towards
their helpless victims.” The newspaper account which I inclose herewith
will furnish you with some of the many details published by the press at
the time.
It has not been possible for me, owing to the distant locality of these
occurrences, to obtain speedily an accurate estimate of the losses which
have been sustained by the Chinese through these lawless acts; but I
take the liberty to transmit to you a copy of the petition of some of
the sufferers, and as soon as I can obtain further information I will
again communicate with you on the subject. But I have felt it my duty
not to delay longer to address you and to ask urgently that rigorous and
effective measures will be adopted, if not already taken, to bring to
merited punishment the wicked men who have so defiantly violated the
laws and the treaties and have so inhumanly outraged the rights of my
countrymen to their great bodily suffering and pecuniary loss.
Accept, sir, etc.,
[Inclosure 1.—From the Chicago Tribune,
August 15, 1886.]
newspaper account of the
expulsion.
Inhumanity to Chinamen—The brutal
treatment accorded the Celestial miners who were expelled from
Douglass Island and Juneau City, Alaska.
Mr. J. B. Hammond, an engineer and contractor of this city, has just
returned home and gives a doleful account of the recent expulsion of
Chinese miners from
[Page 365]
Douglass Island and Juneau City, Alaska. He also recites the words
of ex-Governor Hoadley, of Ohio; Bishop Warren, of Colorado; Dr.
Haven, of Chicago; Chief-Justice Waite, and others, who were in
Alaska about the time, and all of whom denounced in the most bitter
terms the inhumanity and barbarity that, by intimidation and force,
compelled the defenseless heathen to quit their labors and risk
their lives in small and unseaworthy boats for the long voyage down
the coast to Fort Wraugel.
The facts are stated to be that one hundred armed men visited the
Tread well mine on Douglass Island and ordered the Chinese to leave,
threatening them in unmistakable language with death if they
remained. Somewhat to the astonishment of their employers the
Chinamen expressed a readiness to stay and fight, but, being unarmed
and a ageneral massacre being almost certain to follow any
resistance on their part, it was reluctantly admitted that the only
thing for them to do was to leave. Some efforts were made through
the United States marshal to secure protection for them, but too
late. The Chinese were marched in a body from the mines, taken in
skiffs to Juneau, and then packed on board two small schooners.
There were eighty-seven of them in all, and they so crowded the
boats that there was not even room for them to lie down. To add to
the brutality of the expulsion, they were given nothing to shelter
them from the inclement weather and barely rice enough to keep them
from starving on their four weeks’ trip along the coast. Mr. Hammond
was an eye-witness to the expulsion, and denounces it as a most
cowardly and inhuman proceeding. The Chinamen, he says, were not to
blame for being there, having gone to work under a contract made in
San Francisco at a time when it was impossible to get white labor to
go to Alaska. As it is now, he says, the mine-owners will have to
indemnify the Chinese, and the owners will, in turn, demand
indemnity from the Government.
[Inclosure 2.]
petition of chinese subjects.
San
Francisco, February 7,
1887.
To His Excellency the Chinese
Minister:
The petition of Fung Ah Soey, native of the district of Sunning, and
others, all subjects of China, lately working in the mines on
Douglass Island, Alaska Territory, respectfully sets forth:
That your petitioners were laborers lately employed in the mines on
Douglass Island, Alaska Territory. That on the 8th day of the 7th
month in the last year (August 6, 1886), a party of wicked men, over
one hundred in number, drove your petitioners to the sea-shore, took
them across in small boats to Juneau, and subsequently placed them
onboard small schooners, which conveyed them to Fort Wrangel, where
they were landed on a barren land and left, suffering from both
hunger and cold.
That fortunately a passenger vessel called the Ancon passed by, her master took your petitioners on
board, and carried them back to the place where they had been
working. That the wicked parties, armed with guns, threatened to
kill your petitioners. Your petitioners were greatly alarmed, and
for the protection of their lives fled to the port of San Francisco
in a vessel. They had to borrow money of their employers to pay for
their passage.
That your petitioners, in consequence of their expulsion from the
island, lost all their money and property, amounting in all to
$13,762.65.
That the four leaders of the wicked party are named, respectively,
Jack Timmers, Patrick McGliney, Frank Berry, and George
Wheelock.
That a delay has been occasioned in making this report owing to
sometime having been taken to ascertain the names above mentioned.
That a statement of the losses sustained by your petitioners has
been lodged with the consul-general at San Francisco. Your
petitioners therefore humbly pray that your excellency will kindly
take this matter into your consideration and communicate the same to
the Government of the United States, to the end that proper
punishment may be inflicted on the evildoers and indemnification be
awarded to your petitioners. And your petitioners shall, as in duty
bound, ever pray.
[Signed by various Chinese subjects.]
