Mr. Campbell to Governor Markham .
Your Excellency: Yours of the 25th instant at hand. In your letter you state that the minister of China had represented to the Acting Secretary of State at Washington that he had a telegram from the Chinese consul-general at San Francisco stating that Chinese have recently been outraged, robbed, and murdered in Vallejo. You desire that I shall inform you at once what truth there is in the charge. I have taken some pains to inform myself as to the truth or falsity of said charge, and will [Page 465] say that to the best of my knowledge there is no truth whatever in it. The charge grew out of the following circumstances:
On the night of the 4th of July, at five minutes to 12 o’clock, a small Chinese house caught fire on the roof from fire works. The fire department was promptly on hand and put out the fire. While the fire department was engaged in putting out the fire the Chinese claim that a colored boy by the name of Wilson attempted to set fire to the house in a new place, and they turned him out, and they also claim that while the fire was burning that several young mea carried away some property found in the house. They swore out a warrant for the arrest of Wilson on a charge of arson and nine others on a charge of robbery, all of whom were arrested.
Mr. O. P. Bobbins, district attorney, and L. G. Harrier, his assistant, aided by George Lamont, the ablest lawyer in the county, as special counsel for the Chinese, prosecuted the case before his honor George C. Demmon. They had the case against Wilson continued three times, and the Chinese consul-general sent up from San Francisco the well-known lawyer Mr. T. D. Reardon to assist in the prosecution. Yet nothing could be shown to prove Wilson guilty, and so weak was the case that Mr. Lamont and Mr. Reardon only came here once, and, for lack of evidence, the court was compelled, on July 25, to dismiss the case and discharge Wilson. The charge of robbery is still before the court, and whenever the attorneys for the Chinese think they have sufficient evidence to warrant them to call up the case it will be called up. So much for the outrage and robbery.
There never has been a case of Chinese murder in this city in the eighteen years that I have lived here, although there have been many white men murdered here in that time.
On the night of the 19th instant a fire broke out in a Chinese house, in which a Chinese child 3 years old was burned to death. This fire occurred at about 9 o’clock p.m. It was a moonlight night. The gas was also burning. The house was located at one of the most frequented streets in the city. This may be the case which is claimed to be the murder recently committed here. Yet no such statement has ever been made here. The parents of the dead child have made no charge either in the courts or newspapers of the city, although both are open to them the same as to the rest of the population. Whilst every person in this community regretted the death of the poor child and sympathize with its parents, there is none who believe that the place was set on fire by any white person. We love justice, and this one fact you may believe, that the protection of the law is given to the Chinese in this city as fully and as fairly as to the white portion of our population.
These are the facts in the case as far as I have been able to ascertain them. They are all that is known Of the matter here.
Hoping they may be satisfactory to you, I remain, etc.,