Princess Angeline
Daughter of Chief Seattle
Princess Angeline, born Kikisoblu, Kick-is-om-lo, or Wewick (1820?-May 31, 1896), eldest daughter of Duwamish Chief Seattle (Si'ahl, Sealth, Seathl or See-ahth), for whom the City of Seattle is named, became a Seattle cultural icon following her death, immortalized in popular images such as this circa 1900 colorized postcard of an Asahel Curtis photograph (University of Washington Special Collections, Portraits Collection, Item POR746).
Kikisoblu was eldest daughter to Chief Seattle and best known of his eight children by multiple wives. Born around 1820 at what is now Rainier Beach in the City of Seattle, named for Chief Seattle by the chief’s friend David Swinson “Doc” Maynard, one of the principal founders of the town, Doc Maynard’s wife Catherine Broshears Maynard reportedly told Kikisoblu: "You are too good looking a woman to carry around such a name as that, and I now christen you Angeline."
Kikisoblu or Angeline is famously known for conveying a warning from her father to the residents of Seattle about an imminent attack during the Puget Sound War of 1855-1858 that came to be known as the Battle of Seattle, January 26, 1856, which gave the townspeople time to prepare fortifications.
Kikisoblu remained a lifelong resident of Seattle, even after the 1855 Treaty of Point Elliott signed by her father required the Puget Salish people to relocate to designated reservations. She lived in cabins on the Seattle waterfront built for her on Western Avenue between Pike and Pine Streets at the site of today’s Pike Place Market. She supported herself by doing laundry and selling handwoven baskets on the boardwalks of Seattle. Becoming a popular subject for Seattle’s pioneer photographers such as Frank LaRoche and Edward S. Curtis, Kikisoblu charged twenty-five cents for every photo taken of her. King County picked up her grocery bills from a Seattle grocer she frequented. Converting to Christianity like her father, after her death in 1896 Princess Angeline was buried in a canoe-shaped coffin at Lake View Cemetary on Capitol Hill, at her request next to one of her friends, Seattle pioneer Henry Yesler.
An early Twentieth Century Webster & Stevens copy of a circa 1893 photograph of “Queen Angeline at Her Palace” on the Seattle waterfront taken by pioneer Seattle photographer Frank LaRoche.