"The undersigned do not pretend to say that there is no whisky sold in Port Townsend; but they deny, sir, that you ever saw any of them drunk, or that the citizens of Port Townsend, as a class, are at all intemperate. On the contrary, they claim to be as orderly, industrious, and law-abiding as the citizens of any other town on the Pacific coast or elsewhere.
"Sir, it is scarcely possible that you can have forgotten so soon the marked kindness and hospitality with which you were treated by the citizens of this place during your sojourn here; and now the return you make is to blacken the reputation of our thriving little town, and endeavor to destroy our future prospects. You are, of course, at liberty to choose your own line of travel, but if ever you visit Port Townsend again, we can assure you, sir, you will enjoy a very different reception. Had you confined your misstatements to the Indians, we might have excused it on the ground that it is not customary for public officers to adhere strictly to facts in their reports; but when you go entirely out of your way, and commit such an unprovoked attack upon our character, we feel bound to set ourselves right before the world.
"In charity, we can only suppose that you have been grossly deceived in your sources of information; yet, when you profess to have witnessed personally the evil effects of whisky in Port Townsend, and go so far as to pronounce it 'a benighted place,' we can not evade the conclusion that you must have had some experience in what you say you witnessed; either that, or you deliberately committed a base slander upon the citizens of this place. Although the undersigned consider themselves included in your sweeping assertion, it can not have escaped your memory, sir, that on the occasion of your visit to Port Townsend you found them engaged in their peaceful avocations as useful and respectable members of society; and they positively deny that any of them have ever sold whisky to the Indians, or committed the crime of murder.
"Sir, the undersigned have made inquiry into that portion of your report in which you state that no less than six murders were committed here during the past year, and can only find that two were committed, and neither of them by citizens of this place. The conclusion, therefore, to which the undersigned are forced, is, that you were at a loss for something to say, and invented at least four murders for the purpose of contributing to the interest of your report.
"Sir, when a respectable community are engaged in trying to make an honest living, we think it hardly fair that you, as a government agent, should come among them, and, without cause or provocation, slander their character and injure their reputation. We therefore enter our solemn protest against the unfounded charges made in your report, and respectfully recommend that in future you confine yourself to your official duties.
"(Signed), J. Hodges, B. Punch, T. Thatcher, B. Fletcher, Warren Hastings, Wm. Pitt, J. Fox, E. Burke, and eleven others."
Here was a serious business. I can assure the reader that the sensations experienced in the perusal of such a document, when addressed to one's self through a public newspaper, and signed by fifteen or twenty responsible persons, are peculiar and by no means agreeable. For a moment I really began to think I was a very bad man, and that there must be something uncommonly reprehensible in my conduct.
Upon the whole, I felt that I was a little in fault, and had better apologize. There was no particular necessity for introducing Queen Victoria's front teeth and Jenny Lind's black eye to Congress; and, to confess the truth, it was really going a little beyond the usual limits of official etiquette to "ring in" a public town possessing some valuable political influence.
I therefore prepared and published in the newspapers an Apology, which it seemed to me ought to be satisfactory. The following is as close a copy of the original as I can now write out from memory:
"San Francisco, Cal., April 1st, 1858.
"To Messrs. J. Hodges, B. Punch, T. Thatcher, B. Fletcher, Warren Hastings, Wm. Pitt, J. Fox, E. Burke, and eleven others, citizens, Port Townsend, W. T.: