The Crew That Wouldn't Sail: A Mutiny on the War Hawk
Seattle's shipyard workers and legal system clash as the crew of the brig War Hawk refuses to depart, citing safety concerns, while the city watches a habeas corpus battle unfold.
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.
Habeas Corpus — The crew of the ship War Hawk, having been remanded to prison by Justice Smith, sued out a writ of habeas corpus returnable before Judge Lewis. L. B. Nash and W. R. Andrews appeared in behalf of the gentlemen with 'to-gallant eyebrows,' while the ship was represented by C. D. Emery. Judge Lewis denied the prayer of petitioners, and confirmed the decision of the Justice. The men were remanded to jail to await the vessel's departure.
Put Aboard — The unruly and refractory crew of the ship War Hawk were put aboard last night, by Deputy U. S. Marshal Wyckoff. They declined to go in the ship, saying that she leaked two feet an hour and was unsafe with any cargo save lumber. This we do not believe, as the officers would be afraid to go to sea in such a ship. Some of the men have stayed by the ship all the time she was in port, and say they had no cause to complain of the quality of their food nor the safety of the ship. She will probably go to sea this morning, in spite of all the talk about her unsafety. She is about twenty years old, not more than half the age of the Brontes, Gen. Cobb, Amethyst, and many other vessels in the trade.
This 1876 dispute over maritime safety highlights how labor disputes and worker safety were often framed as personal insubordination rather than systemic issues. Today, we might view the crew's refusal to sail a leaking vessel through the lens of OSHA regulations and collective bargaining, but in the frontier era, such defiance was met with immediate incarceration by federal marshals.
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