The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1900-03-24
THEY Cannot GET AWAY
HUNDREDS WHO WOULD LEAVE
BUT CAN'T.
See Their Limited Resources Growing
Smaller-Are Unable to Get Work
Must Soon Beg or Starve.

The situation of "a large number of
men who are held here involuntarily
by quarantine regulations is growing
more and more acute every day. Up
wards of a hundred have applied to
the steamship agencies within the last
few days, urging that they be given
steerage passage. A great many of
them have taken the Haffkine prophy
Tactic serum in the hope that a GER
tificate of it would enable them to
book. A great many others are ready
to do so, or would do So if it would aid
them in securing passage. They haV7
the money to pay their passage If they
could get away by early steamers. If
! they are detained here much longer
they will not be able to pay their pas
sage. There is no work for them to
be obtained here, and no immediate
prospect of it. They are simply living
on the little means they brought here
with them, or have been able to save
since they came here. Each day their
resources are growing smaller
Many of them are mechanics, car
penters and that sort of artisans. The
plague put stop to building opera
tions except such as were necessary
| in the construction of detention and
relief camps With this cessation of
building operations employment at their
! trades ceased. The general stoppage of
| RGIIlnR
| employment at anything else. There
is no immediate prospect of building
! operations on any large scale being
| resumed. The lack of building material
1 would alone prevent this for some time.
One of the men who is numbered in
| the hundred or more who are in this
situation, carpenter, who has sought
everywhere for employment, says that
| there are not more than fifty white
! carpenters who have employment at
| the present time. He came here in
| October, and was employed up to the
time the plague broke out. He attrib-
utes the lack of employment to the sus-
pension of building operations. Prac-
tically no new work is being started,
and as work begun before the plague
| broke out is completed, the men are
laid off With no prospect of finding
a job anywhere else. Some building
operations already begun, have had to
be stopped, he says, for lack of ma
terial He says that at the present
time he has money enough to pay
steerage passage and expenses Incl
dental to 1T, but not enough to pay
f1rst-claSs passage. If ne is not able
to get away soon, he win not be able In
a short time to pay steerage passage
He has taken the prophylaetic serum
secured his passport and tried every
means to secure passage but without
| dNdll. lie says MS SITUATION IS precisely
that of at least fifty or sixty Others
he knows personally, and of a hundred
he knows of by hearsay. He thinks
that some Governmental or concerted
action ought to be taken to enable mer
who are in his situation to get away
before they become a charge on the
community. What he and those in the
same situation ask, is not financial as
sistance, but some arrangement where
by they could SECURE passage with theil
own money
From the number of communication
received on the subject at this office
oral and written, and the number o.
anxious inquiries that are made at tht
steamship offices, and at DIR. Carmich
aePS office, there would seem to be nj
doubt but the situation is becoming
a very grave one. There is some tall
of bringing it to the attention of th'
Board of Health by means of commu
nication on the subject, setting fort1
the actual state in which the individ
uals of this class are situated.
Tt was announced today, in respons
to inquiries by a number of those men
that the China would not take pas
sengers. and that if the Moana took an!
1t would only be flrst-class passengers