A Captain’s High-Stakes Mutiny on the Sound
When the ship Richard III was libeled by creditors, the captain held a deputy marshal at gunpoint to make a daring escape.
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 ship Richard III, libeled by her crew for $400, was under the custody of Deputy Marshal Henry Winsor at Tacoma. While the marshal went ashore to verify a bond, Captain Adams of the Richard III made arrangements with the tug Tacoma to depart. When Marshal Winsor returned and attempted to board, Captain Adams drew a revolver and threatened to blow out the marshal's brains. The captain successfully escaped with the ship in tow. The marshal pursued him to Seattle but could not catch him. The vessel later cleared out of Port Townsend, but Captain Adams will face arrest and trial upon his arrival in San Francisco.
“Captain Adams, who was on her deck, drew a revolver, and presenting it at the Marshal's head, threatened to blow out his brains if he attempted to board.”
This brazen act of maritime obstruction highlights the precarious nature of labor and debt in the booming shipping industry of the late 19th-century Pacific Northwest.
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