Little Pete

Who was Little Pete?

Fung Jing Toy, commonly known as Little Pete was a prominent leader of the Som Yop Tong during the Tong wars of San Francisco's Chinatown in the 1890s.

Born Fung Jing Toy in Kow Kong, Canton, China, around 1864, Little Pete immigrated to the United States with his family at the age of five in 1870. As a child he was said to have witnessed a battle between the Suey Sings and the Kwong Docks Tongs in 1875 and studied how the outcome of the battle could have been saved. Becoming involved in San Francisco's underworld by 1885, Little Pete had become a well known Tong hatchetman involved in prostitution, illegal gambling, and opium peddling. On one occasion when he was attacked by members of the rival Suey On Tong. Little Pete, wearing a steel-reinforced hat and chain mail, managed to fight the men armed with hatchets and clubs, driving them off and soon throughout Chinatown he was considered invincible. By 1890, at the age of twenty-five, Little Pete was the leader of the Som Yop Tong and quickly became involved in a gang war with rival Sue Yop Tong during which Little Pete was said to have killed over fifty Tong members.