Hatchet Men: The Story of the Tong Wars in San Francisco’s Chinatown

by Dillon, Richard

  The chief had less success with gambling, since fan-tan players switched from brass “cash” (Chinese coins) and American silver to beans or buttons to fool his raiders. Either Cockrill was of excellent character or he was an able politician. Since he served only one term as chief, deliberately, the former is the more likely. His flowery pronouncement in regard to fan-tan was laudable enough. In his opinion it was far better for a few fan-tan operators to go unpunished for a misdemeanor than to have the police assuming unauthorized and arbitrary powers. A decade or so later this policy would be exactly reversed. City hall, in desperation at the number of tong killings, adopted a “get-tough” policy in Chinatown which infringed on many honest Chinese people’s rights but which paid off in terms of affecting the tongs.

  Tense as the situation was in the mid-’70s, it would have been much worse but for the restraining influence of men like Cockrill and Governor William Irwin. The latter, when he addressed a great anti-Chinese meeting in 1876, cautioned his listeners against violence. Of course to Cockrill an order was an order and an ordinance was an ordinance. While he stood ready to protect the Chinese from violence he also continued the enforcing of hazing legislation, such as the Cubic Air Ordinance. He arrested 518 Chinese for this offense in April, 1876, alone. Ambivalence came to be an occupational disease with police patrolling Chinatown eighty and ninety years ago.

  In the spring of 1876, the new chief of police, Henry H. Ellis, had his hands full with the anti-coolie crowd and was also presented with one of the first major tong outbursts. Several Chinese witnesses against murderer Muck Son were violently assaulted in St. Louis Alley by 15 to 20 highbinders. The intimidation attempt failed because of prompt police action. The officers seized 4 or 5 of the hatchet men and locked them up. In all probability the attack was Muck Son’s idea; he had learned how to deal with witnesses in the past. He had committed burglaries in Spanishtown, San Mateo County, in 1866, but incredibly the local authorities had locked him up with the sole witness against him. Not only did Muck Son make his escape but he closed the mouth of the witness forever by killing him.

  So grave was the situation in 1876, that General John W. McComb notified the chief of police that the militia was ready to turn out to help him to preserve order on the shortest notice should the anti-coolie men resort to mob violence. Luckily the police department’s strength had again been raised and the chief could now rely on a force of 325 without calling on the state troops. Ellis was a firm and resolute man. He neither panicked nor hid behind the militia’s skirts. This New Englander was a veteran of the vigilance committee and had served as Deputy United States Marshall during the Civil War. (He would eventually spend twenty-two years on the force.) He was a professional peace officer.

  Despite all of Ellis’s watchfulness the Centennial Year and the one which followed it were the highwater marks of the shameful period of anti-Chinese agitation in San Francisco. Prejudice, selfishness, ignorance and bigotry were handmaidens of the sand-lot demagogues. In March, 1876, Mayor A. J. Bryant appointed a committee of twelve to report on Chinese immigration. The Anti-Chinese Union was formed that year and the eventually discredited but then widely read document, “Chinese Immigration, its Social, Moral and Political Effect,” was sent to the United States Congress from San Francisco. Reverend Gibson accused Mayor Bryant of being an out-and-out sand lotter himself, probably for his allowing the Board of Supervisors to revive the despicable Queue Ordinance. The uneasy presidents of the Six Companies again requested the Government of China to stop further emigration to America of its nationals, fearing mob violence on the Embarcadero when so-called coolie ships arrived. The officials also wrote Bryant: they listed the abuses the Chinese had suffered, including unprovoked and unpunished acts of violence, and asked him for protection. And they called his attention to the widespread rumors of an imminent attack upon Chinatown—rumors which were causing much anxiety among the Chinese people.

  In 1876 and 1877 there were times when Chinatown looked like a ghost town. A reporter described a walk through the Quarter on one such occasion:

  At nine o’clock last night the streets in the Chinese quarter were almost deserted and nearly all the stores closed. Special policemen were stationed at each corner and the place had decidedly the appearance of a town under martial law… The dozen Chinamen stationed on Dupont and Jackson Streets were probably members of the noble Highbinder Association or pickets ready to warn their countrymen of any approaching danger. The hoodlumistic element was lightly represented but restrained from acts and even words of violence by the presence of the police who were stationed at nearly every corner and who guarded the entrance of every alley. Never in the last fifteen years have the streets of this great part of San Francisco been so free of Chinamen as they were last evening.

  Mass meetings still peddled the myth sociologists called the “coolie fiction”—that the immigrants were all enslaved coolies kept in debt bondage to the Six Companies. The latter continued to be confused with tongs and were described as “secret organizations, more powerful than the courts.” At first the speakers urged full protection and the guarantee of rights to the Chinese already settled in California. What was wanted, they said, was an immediate cessation of the immigration of coolies. But the listeners were of neither the mentality nor temperament to draw fine distinctions. In any case, the Anti-Chinese Union was soon openly boasting that it would not only secure a complete stop to Chinese immigration but would also obtain the forced repatriation of every Chinese on the Coast. Little wonder the board of presidents was a worried body of men.

  The Six Companies sent a “Memorial” to President Grant at this time, having President Lee Tong Hay of the Chinese Y.M.C.A. sign it. The document reminded the President of how industrious and law abiding the Chinese people had always been in America—never interfering with the established order of politics or religion. It proudly stated that the Chinese had opened “no whiskey saloons for the purpose of dealing out poison and degrading their fellow men.”

  In their manifesto the Six Companies actually put themselves on record as supporting the prohibition of further Chinese immigration. They did this so that troubled American minds would be relieved of worry over excess labor and resultant depression. They also suggested the repeal of the Burlingame treaty but reminded the American people that it was the white capitalists who were calling for cheap Chinese labor, and getting it.

  Whether true or not, stories began to appear in the press at this time to indicate that Chinatown was preparing for a siege by becoming an armed camp. The newspapers reported a run on pawnbrokers’ shops for revolvers and bowie knives. One dealer alone was said to have sold sixty pistols to Chinese in one day.

  On April 1 the Six Companies sent a letter to Chief Ellis accusing him of setting up a double standard of justice—of making few arrests when the victims of assaults were Chinese. This was published in the daily Aha California. The American Missionary then attacked the police force and “the policeman who, for a consideration, has known how to shut his eyes or be somewhere else when Chinese gambling and prostitution come too clearly into view on his beat.” Partly as a result of such attacks as these, Chinatown’s special force of police was discontinued in 1877. These watchmen and auxiliary police had won a reputation, probably well deserved, of being bribetakers and bribegivers rather than law officers. For “protection” service some of these specials earned up to $1,000 a month. They were not related to the police department’s regular Chinatown squad.

  On April 5, 1876, a riot seemed imminent and the Six Companies’ presidents again appealed to Mayor Bryant. He gave orders to the police to protect the Chinese Quarter at all costs. He swore in 200 extra men, but there was no riot. On May 17 the Six Companies received a threatening letter purportedly from an organization calling itself the San Francisco Anti-Coolie Secret Society. If they did not clear San Francisco of coolies within twenty-one days the society would clea
r them out by force of arms. It was all bluff, or a hoax. One of the Six Companies’ presidents turned the letter over to the chief of police but nothing more was heard from the society, if it actually existed in fact.

  During April and May the police closed down Chinatown’s gambling houses as potential trouble spots during that riotous period. They were booming again by August—probably after a June or July payoff to politicians.

  The hearings of the State Senate’s investigating committee on the Chinese question did not help matters any. The committee heard mostly biased, anti-Chinese witnesses, some of whose testimony was so wild it had to be stricken from the record. F. L. Gordon was one such muted star witness. He claimed that a Protestant missionary (Reverend Gibson?) was engaged in the business of selling Chinese women for the purpose of prostitution.

  Civic leader Sam Brannan, the apostate Mormon Saint turned millionaire and a man who should have known better, advocated violence against the Chinese in May while the State Sunday school convention, perhaps eager for a crack at heathen souls, rose up in support of the Chinese against their persecutors. The Marin Journal did its bit to keep trouble brewing by crying out that the Chinese of San Francisco, “by a secret machinery of their own, defy the law and keep up the manners and customs of China and utterly disregard all the laws….” Police Judge Davis Louderback made a public statement that he thought the Chinese mendacious, but doubted very much that they had secret tribunals in the city.

  Gotham was viewing the San Francisco crisis with rapt attention. The New York World deplored the deterioration of the social climate in San Francisco, and in its editorial columns observed that the holy crusade against coolies was being run by brawlers, hoodlums, small politicians eager to curry favor with labor during a depression, and by newspaper sensation mongers. The World was sure that the overwhelming majority of Californians were against the nonsensical crusade. Perhaps the World was right. But it was also right when it observed that the voice of common sense could not be heard in the midst of the turmoil raised by the agitators.

  If 1876 was a bad year, 1877 was even worse. Ill feeling mounted among the sand-lot crusaders as news of strikes in the East reached them. On July 23, 1877—to be known in police annals as Riot Night—a three-day reign of terror began.

  A mass meeting of perhaps 10,000 was held in the sand lots fronting the city hall that night. The most rabid anti-coolie men seized control of the meeting and the mob began to march on Chinatown. Suddenly shots were fired into the crowd from nearby buildings and two men fell wounded. This attack angered the hoodlums all the more. As the first windows of Chinese establishments—outside of Chinatown—were smashed by young hoodlums 1,500 soldiers of the National Guard were put on an alert in the city’s armories. But the enormous crowd broke up and only a splinter group plunged on toward the Quarter. They were turned away from a Chinese washhouse just off Leavenworth by a courageous and defiant policeman, Officer Charles A. Blakslee, who stationed himself with drawn pistol in front of the building. Officer John Sneider, on horseback, drove them away from another washhouse at Pacific and Taylor Street, but they wrecked a Chinese laundry at Leavenworth and Turk Streets, still far from Chinatown, and then set it afire. When firemen tried to put out the blaze the young ruffians impeded them and cut their hose. A white woman upstairs in the building was almost killed by the flames.

  The mob of from 500 to 600 men surged down Geary Street to Dupont. There they started up the hill to Chinatown, but at Pine Street they found their way barred by Captain William Y. Douglass and a solid line of police stretching from one side of Dupont Street to the other. The ranting rioters charged the police in an attempt to break through by swamping them with sheer force of numbers. Officer James Pugh, in arresting a hoodlum who had assaulted a Chinese, was roughly handled by the mob and had his revolver taken away from him. But the police swung and chopped with their batons, sending clubbed and bleeding ruffians staggering to the pavement. Timely police reinforcements arrived from city hall and the line held firm. Sergeant John W. Shields and Sergeant Abraham Sharp led charges which forced the rioters back. But the maddened crowd pressed its siege, shouting a monotonous but ominous “To Chinatown! To Chinatown!” An overexcited special reporter for the Sacramento Record-Union, flashed the word to the State Capital.

  “The police hold Dupont Street at the corner of Pine,” he began, “against the main body of the mob while strong squads are posted at the intersections of cross streets west of Dupont, the main object being to keep the mob from Chinatown.” By the time the reporter had filed his third dispatch to the capital at 12:50 A.M. the police were in complete control and had even arrested the man who had fired into the crowd out of wanton mischief. No other shots were fired. The militia was not called out. It was a proud moment for the tired but only slightly battered cordon of police.

  A second mob of from 500 to 600 tried to outflank the picket line of policemen and to overrun the upper end of Dupont Gai by approaching from the Broadway, or North Beach, side. But here, too, a police line held fast. The Chinese stayed off the streets and locked themselves in their homes, shuttering their windows tightly. Only one small party of attackers broke through the police lines. This handful penetrated to Washington Street, above Stockton, where they stoned the windows of the Chinese Mission before they were arrested.

  The correspondent of the Record-Union paid the police a well-earned compliment as the mob began to melt away: “The prompt and courageous action of the police barely prevented a bloody riot, for had the mob gained the heart of the Chinese quarter, it would have been impossible to foretell the result.”

  Another anti-Chinese meeting on the 24th kept the crowd’s momentum up. Again the hordes gathered in front of the city hall, as if to defy the municipal government itself. Handbills had mysteriously appeared during the day to announce a great rally. Notices had been left at newspaper offices by anonymous callers who bought space, paid in cash, and hurried out.

  The prescient but anonymous Sacramento reporter predicted: “It is quite probable that in view of the present and possible future disturbances, efforts will be made to effect some organization among the better class of citizens looking to the maintenance of law and order.” He was right. Chief of Police Ellis, fearing that a mob might wield itself together in such numbers as to overwhelm his police force, welcomed the formation of what amounted to a third vigilance committee, although it was not so designated. William T. Coleman, the old “Lion of the Vigilantes,” came out of retirement to head up an executive committee and an informal army which grew within a day or so from 150 to 5,000 citizens. The formation was called the Committee of Public Safety, rather than a committee of vigilance, but it was soon dubbed “the Pick Handle Brigade”—for the armament it relied upon most. The committee issued a stern statement to the public, stating that it recognized there was a Chinese problem, but that “the public peace and security to life and property in this city shall be maintained and protected at all hazards.” This was followed at noon on the 29th by Mayor Bryant’s proclamation summoning all law-abiding people in San Francisco to assist in the preserving of peace from “a large class of desperate men and women.” All he asked them to do, however, was to remain quietly at home and not to form crowds in the streets. General H. A. Cobb suggested that military help be summoned, but Chief Ellis declined to call in the militia except as a last resort. Nevertheless, Governor Irwin asked the Secretary of the Navy for United States naval vessels from Mare Island. Wide-eyed children and adults alike saw the U.S.S. Pensacola, Lackawanna and Monterey, with a force of marines aboard, steam up to the Embarcadero in battle array. The Pensacola anchored within cannon range of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company docks—a prime target of the rioters because of the company’s policy of hiring Chinese to man its ships. The Lackawanna’s guns covered the Ferry Building. On Alcatraz two companies of troops were readied for action. Admiral Murray was prepared to land marines and blue jacket
s—armed with rifles and Gatling guns—from his small flotilla at a moment’s notice.

  Mayor Bryant did his best to quiet a nervous city. He stated, “There is no cause for individual excitement. The city has a force of ten thousand men ready for an emergency… Any attempt to excite a riot will be crushed at the commencement… The law is supreme and shall be maintained at all hazards.”

  The ranks of the Pick Handle Brigade were swollen by more and more volunteers. Whole posses of special police were sworn in. Even the grand Army of the Republic mustered for action. These veterans were still young men in 1877 and were sworn in as law officers to help sustain the peace. Four rifle companies of thirty of them—and some Confederate veterans as well—were formed np and headquartered at Dashaway Hall under Colonel James H. Withington. All gun stores in the city and all fire alarms were placed under guard. The better-class citizens—even those not accepted for active duty—laid up stores of arms and ammunition.

  The mob quickly began to realize the magnitude of its plans. The Peoples’ Reform party and the Anti-Chinese party suddenly repudiated any connection with the rioters. P. J. Healy of the Workingmen’s party took exception to the speeches of the rabble rousers, and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers stated publicly that it had no sympathy with the hoodlum demonstrators. Archbishop Joseph Sadoc Alemany asked all Catholics to enforce law and order. (Firebrand Dennis Kearney, a member of the Pick Handle Brigade who later became the greatest coolie hater of them all, eventually accused His Grace of becoming a tool of the “coolie protectors.”)