The Wrong Chin Quong: A Smuggling Case Collapses in Seattle
Federal officers arrested the manager of Wa Chong & Co. as an opium smuggler, but Portland witnesses took one look and said he was the wrong man—while the real suspect sailed for China.
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.
Chin Quong, general manager of Wa Chong & Co., was dismissed by United States Commissioner Spriggs yesterday, the Portland officials who came to identify him having no sooner seen him than they said he was not the Chin Quon they wanted for smuggling $72 worth of opium into the United States.
Chin Quon, the accused smuggler, has been a resident of Portland for years and was known to have made large sums in his business. Hearing of the indictment, he quietly came to this city and went on to Vancouver, whence he took the steamer to China. Meanwhile Deputy Marshal Bridges arrested Chin Quong, manager of the Wa Chong Company, as the guilty man, and released him on bail to await the arrival of two Portland officers to identify. The latter arrived yesterday morning, and no sooner saw Chin Quong at Commissioner Spriggs’ office than they said he was the wrong Chinese man, and he was instantly discharged.
“No sooner saw Chin Quong ... than they said he was the wrong Chinese man, and he was instantly discharged.”
Mistaken identity in an exclusion-era case shows how fast a name could become a trap. The real accused man simply left for China, a reminder that early immigration enforcement often rested on fragile identification and racialized assumptions.
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