Year: 1876




At about IL CLOCK last night fright
ful accident occurred at the Royal China
Theater, No. 626 Jackson street, which
in It's horrible details and scenes of ter
ror was unequaled by any event which
has occurred in the Chinese quarter for
many day. The entertainment at this
theater last evening was given as q bene-
| fit to one of the most popular actors who
perform at the theater, and the house
was crowded from the bottom of the pit
to the outermost recesses of the gallery,
every bench being occupied. In the
neighborhood of3, 900 men had crowded
into the place, quite a number of Chi
nese females being present, but only
two or three white men. At about II
o'clock, while the drama at present run
ming there was being played, small
fire in some mating in the gallery,
which had caught by the sparks from a
cigarette or cigar in the hands of some
careless Chinaman was discovered. The
man who made this startling discovery,
regardless of the consequences, even if
he had foreseen them, sounded the
alarm Immediately in his own tongue,
which everybody understood to mean
destruction and death by burning. The
utmost confusion prevailed, and panic
ensued. The large numbers OF Chinese
in the auditorium rushed frantically for
the door, while those packed in the gal
lery did the same. Some twenty-five or
thirty men from the lower part of the
house reached the door first and were al
most simultaneously overwhelmed by the
frightened crowd which was surg
ing down from the gallery. The
doors, which are double and each about
twelve feet high by six feet wide, were
closed, but the resistless torrent of yell
low humanity poured down the stairs,
through them without attempting to
open either, and the consequence was
that the foremost crowd, about thirty
in number, were scarcely out before the
stairway broke, and the massive door
fell upon and crushed them to the floor,
while over it crowded and jostled the
dense audience without thought of
the consequences. In the meantime,
the premature fire, which had made no
headway, was summarily quenched by
Christian Chinaman named Adam
Quinn, who, besides stamping upon it,
took off his coat and covered it. The
actors upon the stage were entirely ig-
norant of the cause of the panic, and
did not stop to inquire, but continued
with their performance, which had the
effect of staying many of the frightened
Chinese who were trampling everything
down in their efforts to effect an exit.
The passage of the dense crowds through
the entrance and the heart-rending
shrieks of the crushed and dying under
the doors alarmed several policemen on
Jackson street, who Immediately en-
deavored to effect an entrance into the
theater and sent TO the police station for
assistance. Officer Duffield, special
on jackson street, was one of the first
white men who essayed to stem the
panic-stricken tide flowing out of the
doorway, and he was obliged to use his
club vigorously before he could stop a
single man in his way. Half dozen
stalwart policemen, from the watch
which was just about to leave the station
for duty on their respective beats, re-
paired quickly to the scene. and the
combined efforts of dozen officers were
nece ssary to stop the outgoing Chinese.
The work was accomplished by knock
ing several Celestials about, and the re-
mainder, realizing that the danger in the
theater, wha ever 1t was, had disap-
peared, fell back on the crowd and
checked their frantic companions.


By this time Capt. Douglas, with a
dozen more policemen, arrived with
large crowds of white men, who, hearing
the alarm, had rushed to the spot. The
railing of the stairway leading from the
gallery to the lower floor had given way,
and several of the frightened men had
fallen down, only to be crushed under
foot by their equally terror-stricken
companions. The tide having been
checked, the officers raised the prostrat
ed door and removed the dead and dy-
ing from beneath it. Some were stone
dead, while all under it were more or
less injured. Nineteen were conveyed
to the street dead, and seven others who
were rapidly dying.


The bodies were ranged along the
sidewalk. The entrance to the theater,
hall about forty feet in length by
some twelve in width, occupied on one
side by couple of Chinese fruit vend-
ers, was cleared away, and the panic
stricken audience allowed to pass out.
The news of the accident spread like
wildfre, and over thousand Chinese,
men and women, from all parts of Chi
natown, thronged to the scene, and the
sidewalk, the entire length of jackson
street, between Kearney and Dupont,
was completely lined with half-nude Ce-
lestials, gazing with blanched faces ut
each body IA it was carried out into the
street. One stalwart Chinaman, weigh.
ing about ITO pounds, was brought out
and laid upon the walk, his clothes torn
and his body lacerated by the many feet
that had trampled relentlessly over
him. His face was black with
suaocation, and the crimson fluid
was running in stream from his nose
and ears. Life had not yet left him,
but in his dying agonies he writhed and
crawled about the pavement, swinging
his bare arms in the air, and shrieking
for the relief that could not come. At
the right of the doorway, and at the
foot of the four or five steps from the
theater door to the floor of the hallway.
is stairway descending into dark
alley. Several of the foremost Chinese
of the crowd that were crushed under
the falling door had been precipitated