Memorandum for the Assistant Secretary Regarding Rock Fee from Special Immigrant Inspector Fred Watts, Jr.

Immigration inspectors were skeptical when Rock Hang, a Chinese cook who lived in Seattle, Washington, filed paperwork to allow his son, Rock Fee, to enter the United States. Rock Hang claimed his son was a U.S. citizen who had gone to China with his family in 1894 and was entitled to return to the land of his birth. Immigration officials doubted Rock Fee, and suspected he might be a “paper son” who was posing as Rock Hang’s son and using false documents to enter the country. Interviews with family members contradicted each other. There was no ship passenger record of Rock Hang returning to the United States from China after leaving his family there. And the individuals who gave evidence on his behalf were suspected of being “professional white witnesses,” who had been paid for their testimony. Rock Fee was denied entry, and when he appealed, the special immigrant inspector in his case concluded that “this is another of the many attempts . . . to make an American citizen out of a Chinese coolie.” Rock Fee was placed aboard the SS Tremont and deported to China on January 11, 1907.