The Waterfront Confidence Game
A sailor from the U.S. steamer Grant learns a hard lesson about poker and 'accommodating' strangers on the waterfront.
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.
James Brown, John Maloney and H.W. Patterson were arrested by Detective Roberts on suspicion of being implicated in bunkoing John Soderstrom out of $17. Soderstrom, who was recently discharged from the U.S. steamer Grant, was walking along Front street when he was accosted by a man asking for the Northern hotel. The stranger befriended him, mentioning a 'friend' named McLean who needed an engineer for a mine. They visited an 'office,' which turned out to be a gambling den. Soderstrom was enticed into a poker game, and after being gifted chips to start, he was eventually swindled out of his money by men holding better hands. He later reported the men to the police.
“Such a disappointment 'made him tired,' and he concluded that he wouldn't wait for McLean, who had not yet put in an appearance.”
Bunko schemes targeting sailors and newcomers were common on Seattle's rough-and-tumble waterfront in the 1890s. This story serves as a reminder of the era's lack of safety nets for itinerant workers, who were often the primary marks for predatory gambling rings.
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