The Girl Who Ran Away: A Seattle Hotel Trap and a Lawyer’s Complicity
In May 1882, a 16-year-old runaway from the Puyallup River found herself stranded in Seattle, only to be exploited by a local attorney who deposited her stolen savings in his own name. Chief of Police Woolery intervened, recovering the funds and exposing the legal professional’s unethical conduct.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
A young girl named Palson, whose parents reside on the Puyallup River, created quite a little sensation in town yesterday under the following circumstances: According to her story, her parents about a year ago engaged her to marry a young man named Sherman, living in the same neighborhood. She never favored the match herself, and as the time set for the wedding was drawing nigh, she concluded to leave home.
Accordingly, she gathered together all the loose change there was about the house, amounting to $30, and left for Tacoma, where she expended about $10 for clothing, and with the balance started for Seattle on the Wednesday evening steamer. On board she fell in with a 'limb of the law' from Seattle, to whom she told her story. The lawyer sympathized with her and advised her to return home, but to no avail.
On reaching Seattle, she put up at one of the leading hotels and remained over night. In the morning she had her newly made friend deposit $30 in the bank for her, in his own name. Yesterday forenoon Chief Woolery received a dispatch making inquiries regarding the whereabouts of the girl in question. He at once set to work and soon found her and recovered the money that had been deposited in the bank, and notified her parents of the facts.
Her father came down late last night, and as the girl is only about 16 years old, he will probably take her home with him. In justice to the legal gentleman who figured somewhat in this affair, we will state that he did not know that the money given him for deposit was obtained dishonestly by the young lady.
This 1882 account of a minor fleeing an arranged marriage and being financially exploited by a 'sympathetic' lawyer highlights the precarious legal status of women and minors in the 19th century. While the newspaper frames the girl's theft of her own savings as 'dishonest,' modern readers recognize it as a desperate act of autonomy against patriarchal control, while the lawyer’s action—depositing funds in his own name—is a clear breach of fiduciary duty that would be heavily sanctioned today.
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