A.A. Denny’s Seattle Addition Lots Sold at 1878 Sheriff’s Sale
A sheriff’s notice reveals the brutal efficiency of debt collection in 1878, as land in Denny’s Addition and the Duwamish River banks are liquidated to satisfy private loans.
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.
By virtue of an order of sale issued out of the District Court of the Third Judicial District of Washington Territory, holding terms at the City of Seattle, in King County, on the 15th day of February, A.D. 1878... I have levied upon the property described in said decree... All of lots two (2) and three (3) in block numbered twenty-four (24) in that part of the City of Seattle laid out and platted by A. A. Denny, and known as A. A. Denny’s Addition to Seattle, together with all and singular the tenements, hereditaments and appurtenances thereunto belonging, in King County, Washington Territory. And now, by virtue of said decree and order of sale, on Monday, the 25th day of March, A.D. 1878, at the hour of 10 o'clock A.M. at the Court House door in said City of Seattle, I will sell to the highest bidder therefor, for cash, gold coin, all the right, title, interest and equity of redemption of said defendants, Thomas J. Jackson and Eliza Jackson, his wife, Wm. Benton, James Scott and Andrew Moore, in, at and to the above-described property.
“I will sell to the highest bidder therefor, for cash, gold coin, all the right, title, interest and equity of redemption.”
This notice serves as a grim reminder that Seattle’s iconic neighborhoods were born from cycles of rapid speculation, debt, and court-mandated liquidation. The struggle to hold onto land in a high-pressure real estate market, seen here in the 1878 court records, remains a fundamental feature of the city's ongoing housing instability.
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