The Unpaid Wages of a Seattle Pioneer
A Chinese house servant sues the estate of one of the city's most famous pioneers, Henry L. Yesler, for years of back wages.
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.
The case on trial in Judge Osborne’s civil department was that of the Chinese man, Ah How, who is suing the Yesler estate for a balance of $1,911 alleged to be due him for services as house servant and cook in the Yesler family during the life of the old pioneer. Ah How alleges that he worked for Mr. Yesler from February 10, 1882, to December 1, 1884, when he left him to go to San Francisco. He returned to Seattle the next year and took service again with the Yeslers May 1, 1885, remaining there until December 1, 1891. His claim is based on two bills covering these two periods, totaling 112 months and twenty days at $20 a month. On this amount, he admits that Yesler paid him $339 on account, leaving the disputed balance. During the trial, the judge held that since Yesler was deceased and could not deny the statements, certain oral evidence was inadmissible, prompting a complex legal fight over the admissibility of the Chinaman's account book, kept in Chinese characters.
“The judge holding that just as the dead man could not be called to deny the statements such testimony was not admissible.”
Henry L. Yesler is remembered today as a foundational figure in Seattle's history, but this story reveals the invisible labor that sustained the city's early elite. The struggle of a Chinese domestic servant to claim payment from a wealthy estate highlights the deep inequities in legal standing for Asian residents in 1890s Washington.
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