ANN SMITH

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The views and language used in this book are the author’s own.
 EDITH MAUDE EATON
(1819 – 1905)

Ann Smith (AKA J. Gregory Smith)

had a life straight out of one of her
adventure stories. When Confederate
raiders attacked her home, she scared
them off with an unloaded pistol and
chased them into Canada, for which she
was made a lieutenant colonel for her
bravery. Despite her fighting spirit, she
was never able to vanquish Victorian
gender biases, and was forced to use her
husband’s name on her novels. After
more than a century, the battle is over.
HOW WHITE MEN ASSIST IN SMUGGLING
CHINAMEN ACROSS THE BORDER IN
PUGET SOUND COUNTRY

BY

EDITH MAUDE EATON

 EDITH MAUDE
ANN EATON
SMITH

HOW WHITE MEN ASSIST IN SMUGGLING CHINAMEN

ACROSS THE BORDER IN PUGET SOUND COUNTRY

“How stupid those smugglers of Chinamen were at Niagara,” said the

man with the sun-browned face. “Not because they were caught, for that
may happen to the best of us, but to employ such commonplace methods
that even a farmer would suspect them if he saw them. Tried to run them
across in a boat where revenue officers are as thick as flies.
“Pshaw! We played a finer game out West. I was in the business three
years, on Puget sound, and I was never caught once, although I’d had
some close squeaks. One of the closest calls I ever had was on my first
trip. Of course, I was quite green then. That was five years ago.
“I had just come down from the Alaskan gold fields, dead broke – so
broke that I was willing to take up any honest scheme that would bring
in dollars. You easterners may laugh at that, coming from an ex-smuggler,
but west coast adventurers have a code of morals entirely their own. Men
out there who would not cheat an individual out of a postage stamp con-
sider it quite legitimate to do the government, when it is only a question
of evading the revenue laws.
“I was in Victoria, then, when I met an Irishman, named Quinland,
with whom I had been shipmate some years before on a sailing ship. He
sized up my condition in a minute, then took me in tow. It didn’t take us
ten minutes to understand each other thoroughly. He gave me $10 on the
spot, and I was to meet him next day outside of town.
“I kept my appointment. It was at a small way house several miles out
of the Esquimalt road. I had been practically on the beach for a week,
so I had no idea that I was any too stylishly dressed. But when I met

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 HOW WHITE
ATLA: MEN ASSIST
A STORY IN SMUGGLING...
OF A LOST ISLAND

Quinland in the bar room he gave me the glassy stare, and it wasn’t till
I had followed him out to the woodshed that he would condescend to
recognize me. Then he was choking mad.
“‘What’s the matter?’ I asked him innocently.
He swore.
“‘What ye think?’ he growled. ‘I don’t want to be seen talkin’ to a dude.
Go an’ take a room for the night, and don’t let on you know me. I’ll sneak
up later with some proper togs. Get that biled shirt and stiff collar off ’s
quick as ye can.’
“I did as he bid me, and an hour later he sneaked up to my room with
a fisherman’s rig – gum boots, overalls, flannel shirt and a slouch hat.
“Early in the afternoon we left the house and struck out across coun-
try for the beach. A sloop was cruising up and down not far off the shore,
but our appearance caused her to stand in shore. She got close in enough
for us to wade out to her and get aboard, then she stood down the Sound.
A white man and two Native Americans had been sailing her – they
were Quinland’s accomplices or confederates; his gang – Rafferty, a big
American-born Irishman, and Jim and Tom, the Native Americans. The
sloop was a big craft and could have carried forty men aboard if neces-
sary. She was fitted up as a deep-sea traveller, and carried all the requisite
appliances for the business.
“It was past evening when we stood in shore again and landed at a
small jetty below. Cluster of huts upon an embankment. We all went
up. There were a few white men in the village, but most of the inhabit-
ants were Native Americans. Ten minutes’ walk brought us to Quinland’s
headquarters, a big, wooden farmhouse. All of us had supper together,
served by their wives, and while we were eating we heard a hum of talk
in some adjoining room.
“After supper we all followed Quinland through a back door and then
I found myself in a large, barnlike room crowded by what I thought were
Native Americans. They had long black hair dangling loose around their
necks, and were dressed in overalls and blankets. But what attracted my
attention was what was being done to one of them. He was leaning back
in a barber’s chair and a Chinaman was sticking a gauze like plaster on
the side of his eye. Then he painted the man’s face with grease paint. The
man got up – he would have been taken for a Native American by any-
body. Another man took his place in the chair. It didn’t take me a second,
in spite of his long hair, to see that he was a Chinaman, but five minutes

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 EDITH MAUDE
ANN EATON
SMITH

later, when he got up again, his yellow skin was brown, his eyebrows
straightened out, and I would have sworn he was a Native American.
“In an hour we started down for the landing; we three whites, the two
Natives and twenty of those Indianized Chinamen. The Celestial who
had superintended the make-ups came down as far as the landing. He
was the agent for the highbinder tong in ‘Frisco who imported the Chi-
namen. For each coolie that stepped aboard the sloop he planked down
an American gold double eagle, in all, $400. Quinland divided a hundred
to each of us white men and fifty apiece to the Natives. Pay in advance
was the custom.
“Well, we cast off and set sail, and stood down Sound for the fishing
banks, with three dug-out canoes towing behind us. The Chinamen were
jambed down in the cabin, their baggage piled up in the peak and covered
by fish nets.
“It was about midnight when we saw the red and green lights of a
small steamer bearing right down on us from the American shore. There
was a flash of brilliant light and we sat blinking like owls – they had the
searchlight on us.
“‘Boat ahoy!’ cam the hail.
“Quinland answered:
“‘Hallo!’
“‘What a’ye doing out here?’
“‘Fishing.’ The revenue steamer came close up and made a circuit
about us. Rafferty had dived down into the cabin, but before the cutter
came in on our stern he was up again. Their light shone down our com-
panion way and showed them only a litter of fish nets with one Native
American stretched across the top.
“‘All right,’ came a voice from the revenue cutter. ‘Stand further off-
shore until daylight.’
“But we didn’t. As soon as her stern light dwindled down to a mere
dot we stood in straight for the American shore. It was 3 in the morn-
ing when we hove to about a mile offshore. Then those twenty made-up
Native Americans were tumbled up and put into the three canoes. Quin-
land got into one, I in another and one of the genuine Native Americans
in the third. Rafferty and the other Native American swung the sloop
around on the other tack and in a few minutes they were standing off for
the channel.

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 HOW WHITE
ATLA: MEN ASSIST
A STORY IN SMUGGLING...
OF A LOST ISLAND

“The three canoes made for the beach. We soon landed through a
small surf and hauled the canoes up into the brush. Then the whole crowd
of us struck inland at a quick walk, Quinland leading.
“Dawn was just lighting the horizon when we reached a small clear-
ing. Two wooden shacks stood in the middle. Quinland knocked at the
door of one of them. An old wife came to the door.
“‘Here’s where you stay all day with six of our men,’ Quinland said to
me. ‘If anybody shows up and asks questions, jolly ‘em along. I’ll come for
ye tonight, so you’d better sleep, but be ready to stand off any strangers.’
“Six Chinamen were left under my charge, then Quinland struck out
into the woods with seven and Jim hit off in the opposite direction with
the other seven. Then I fell asleep.
“Next thing I know the old wife was shaking me violently-
“‘Quick! Wake up! Quick! Come men on hoss back!’
“I jumped up in a hurry. The sun was shining in through the dirty,
cracked window. My Chinamen were sleeping about on heaps of nets. I
went outside – five mounted men were coming across the clearing. They
were all armed with rifles and revolvers.
“‘Hello, mister,’ said the foremost horseman as he came up.
“‘Hello, stranger,’ I answered.
“‘How’s fishin’?’ he asked, with obvious carelessness.
“‘Pretty bad.’
“We continued that style of conversation for some time, but I felt I
was talking with a man who had a definite end in view. He was eyeing the
house and its surroundings suspiciously.
“‘Ye don’t mind our restin’ here awhile?’ he said, after a while.
“‘Course not.’
“The five men dismounted.
“‘Come inside and sit down,’ I said. That was evidently what he had
been fishing for.
“By the dim light he could see the Chinamen – four of them. The
other two had gone out to the other house, a sort of store shed for fishing
gear. I saw him eye them for a moment, but evidently he was satisfied at
once that they were Native Americans.
“But my heart gave a jump. One of the Chinamen had disarranged
his wig and you could see a strip of shaven scalp above his ear. I managed
to slip in between him and the revenue man before he saw, and stayed
that way until we went out again.

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 EDITH MAUDE
ANN EATON
SMITH

“I followed. There was a look in his eye that left me uncertain wheth-
er he suspected or not. After ten minutes he and his fellows mounted
and rode off. Before they disappeared into the woods I saw them talk-
ing earnestly, and one of them looked back as though sizing the layout
of the land.
“It was early afternoon, so I had had some good sleep. My uneasiness
was too great to allow me anymore. I worried along until sunset, when
we all ate together. It was while so occupied that I heard quick footsteps
outside and Quinland came in pretty much excited.
“‘Hurry up!’ he said. ‘They’re onto us. Some one’s split on us and the
revenue men and the sheriff ’s gang are laying for us along every road.
Quick! Get your men together, and follow.’
“It didn’t take us a minute to do that. We’d just got into the woods
when we heard horses galloping along a road we had just crossed. In ten
minutes we came on another clearing where the rest of our outfit were
congregated. From there the twenty-three of us struck off into the woods
again at a quick pace. We kept that up for two hours about. Then we
came to a road.
“‘Wait here, and lie low in the brush,’ Quinland ordered. Then he and
the Native American struck out on the road, leaving me there with the
twenty Chinamen.
“I waited for an hour or so. Then came the rattle of wheels and a wag-
on with four horses pulled up on the road before us.
“‘Come along, fellers.’ It was Quinland’s voice. The wagon was loaded
with loose hay. The Chinamen were made to pile into the middle of it;
then we covered them up.
“Two horses had been tied to the rear of the wagon. Quinland un-
loosed them.
“‘You an’ Jim get on these,’ he said. ‘I’ll drive. Jim goes ahead. You drop
astern about 500 yards an’ keep yer ears open.’
“I did, and the wagon moved on. I just kept the rattle of wheels with-
in sound, so’s I wouldn’t lose my way. We kept this up till near morning,
when I heard the beat of hoofs behind. In a minute I was up to the wagon.
“‘They’re coming!’ I shouted.
“We had rehearsed our Chinamen well. In another moment they had
jumped out of the wagon and scattered into the woods. I followed them
with my horse.

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 HOW WHITE
ATLA: MEN ASSIST
A STORY IN SMUGGLING...
OF A LOST ISLAND

“Quinland drove slowly on. Two minutes later five men dashed by and
we heard them halt him. I left my horse with a Chinaman and sneaked
up to where the wagon had been halted. Quinland was talking with the
same five men who had interviewed me. I recognised the leader’s voice.
I couldn’t get close enough to hear what Quinland said, but finally the
revenue men rode on. We waited ten minutes then Quinland whistled
and came out with them, and they piled in again. Then we went on.
“When morning light came, we found ourselves well up in the Olym-
pic mountains, a pretty wild country. We camped there all day, well off
from the road. Next night we went on, but weren’t bothered by the reve-
nue men again.
“Six days later we delivered our Chinamen safely into the hands of a
highbinder agent at a railroad town, and he shipped them off to ‘Frisco.
We received another $400 and returned to Port Angeles.
“Since then I’ve helped run over 200 Chinamen into the United States.”