The Brutal Theft Recovery in Genessee Valley
When a farmer lost $500, he turned to a horrific act of violence to extract a confession from the man he suspected.
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.
Charles Robinson, a farmer in Genessee Valley, was fortunate enough to be possessed of $500 in twenties—a nice little sum, by the way, these hard times. For safe-keeping, he hid it inside the cushion of a lounge in his bedroom, and the hiding-place was known only to himself and his wife. On Wednesday of last week, he had occasion to use some money, and it was discovered that it was missing. No one had been about the place except the family and a Chinese cook, and of course, suspicion pointed at once to the individual. He denied the theft emphatically. He was a good man; an honest man, and, in every sense of the word, one of the noblest works of God. Search was continued with no success. Robinson's stock of patience was exhausted, and he thought he would string the man up. With the assistance of another, he was taken to the barn and a rope placed around his neck, after which he was raised six feet and let down again. He declared he was innocent and knew nothing. The dose was repeated, and still he avowed himself innocent. The torture was increased gradually, and after he had been hauled up the fifth time, he confessed he had stolen it and promised to tell Mrs. Robinson where it was hidden. This he did, and the money was recovered. He had wrapped the coin in paper, placed it in a buckskin purse, and, after rolling it up in a rag, buried it under the milk-house.
“Robinson's stock of patience was exhausted, and he thought he would string the man up.”
This horrific account of vigilante violence against a Chinese worker in 1876 highlights the pervasive anti-Asian sentiment in the Washington Territory, where the legal system was often ignored in favor of brutal, extra-legal punishment. Such 'frontier justice' reflected the era's systemic xenophobia, an ugly precursor to the exclusionary laws and violence that would soon reshape the Pacific Northwest.
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