1885 Tacoma Washington Chinese Expulsion

On November 3, 1885 at 9:30AM, 500 white citizens of Tacoma gathered and marched through Tacoma’s Chinatown. They stopped at every Chinese residence and business and instructed the occupants to get on wagons or march down to a train headed to Portland, Oregon that day. The mob also visited homes and businesses of white citizens to intimidate the supporters of the Chinese community. Several days later, what remained of the once prominent Chinese community was burned to the ground. The mob was methodical in its approach to removing the Chinese populace from Tacoma. This incident became known as the 1885 Chinese Expulsion of Tacoma and it resulted from the culmination of national and regional anti-Chinese sentiment, a culture within the city of Tacoma that propagated anti-Chinese movements, as well as several tragic anti-Chinese events near Tacoma. As a subsequent national and international outcry was raised, several members of the mob were put on trial, but were never convicted. The Chinese community of the American West faced considerable persecution in the late-nineteenth century, and this event in Tacoma was heralded as a way to take action against Chinese communities and became known as the "Tacoma Method."