miles across Golovin Bay to the mouth of the Fish River, which in delta
form debouches into the bay, and the remaining distance up the Fish
River and the Neukluk (the Indian name for river-flowing-from-the-west),
a tributary nearly as large as the main stream. White Mountain, a spot
where the Wild Goose Company has a storehouse, a depot for its mining
claims above, is about half the way from Chenik to Council, and is the
head of navigation for the several small, light-draft stern-wheelers
which occasionally make the trip in the interest of the larger
mine-owners. It lessens the strain tremendously to get a lift or a tow
from one of these boats; and, having obtained the good will of the crew
of the _Arctic Bird_, and strengthened it by a bottle of whisky, we got
what we wanted. The _Mush-on_ we had, so to speak, tarred and feathered,
and made water-tight and filled with our freight, as much as it could
safely contain, the remainder being stored in the _Arctic Bird_. We were
about to put our boat in tow and set out, when who should suddenly
appear upon the scene but our two friends of the _Lane_, H---- and
T----, with their boat, just returned from Council, looking very tough
and very seedy. We were exhorted to reconsider our plans, and as these
were mining men whom we knew, whose judgment was entitled to respect, we
promptly did so. As the freight was being taken off, though they were
very good about it, the triumvirate crew of the _Arctic Bird_ were not a
little bit amused, for of course it looked as if we had lost our nerve
at the last minute. The returned prospectors had been disappointed in a
piece of ground upon which they had a "lay" or lease, which fact, in the
main, accounted for their premature departure and the lugubrious view
which they took.
So we camped again at the same spot and deliberated. Finally, in the
evening of July 15, we set out, T---- transferring himself to us, and
G---- remaining with H----, the two latter having decided to get somehow
to St. Michaels, thence up the Yukon to the Tanana River, where a strike
had been reported, and big game was said to be abundant. As a matter of
fact, they were obliged to remain at Chenik for a considerable time on
account of the quarantine which all ports had against Nome and vessels
which had touched there.
The _Mush-on_ was the last of the string in tow, which consisted of a
small barge or lighter, containing Wild Goose Company machinery, and the
boats of several others, who were also going up the rivers. My brother
steered the barge, and C---- our boat, according to instructions from
the captain. T---- and I, who felt used up, lounged on some sacks near
the warm engine. After running upon and backing off various mud-flats,
at midnight the _Arctic Bird_ rested at the delta of the Fish River, and
all hands drank coffee, and the whisky which represented our fare. It
was, of course, daylight,--a weird, grayish effect,--and fairly, but not
disagreeably, cold. Then we entered and pushed slowly up the swift and
shallow stream, the mosquitos, for the first time in our wanderings to
date, making themselves manifest and felt. All of us had the same
thought and sensations. For the first time there was a semblance of
"God's country." The beautifully clear stream,--flanked on each side by
scrub willows and an occasional small spruce-tree,--whose tempting water
one could dip up and drink _ad libitum_, seemed in places filled with
fish, darting swiftly about above the gravel bed. Hills that appeared
more like mountains loomed up in the distance, gray in the early light.
There was the inevitable tundra, of course, but it seemed less
all-pervading--it had finally met with some competition.
There were many curves and sharp turns where the boats in tow would have
been wrecked but for the men who, wrapped in their sweaters and coats,
steered them. Many times the _Arctic Bird_ would run upon a riffle
(where the water runs very shallow over the gravel), to be temporarily
baffled and obliged to back off and seek another course. The stream
averaged hardly two feet in depth. Frequently the fraction of an inch
meant progress or failure. When in plain sight and almost in reach of
White Mountain, that fraction of an inch was not in our favor, and it
being then three o'clock in the morning, anchor was thrown out, and all
hands turned in to await the coming of the tide below, the crew pulling
out their mattresses, and the "cheechawkers" (the Eskimo name for
newcomers, universally used in Alaska) conforming their shapes to the
various sacks and baggage. By noon we were disembarked and camped at
White Mountain, a few feet from the river. Our "library" of law books
seemed to weigh a ton. This was the best camping-spot yet. The scene was
pretty; it seemed a healthful place; and water, plentiful and good, was
very near at hand. But the mosquitos were numerous and fiercely
persistent; and before turning in, the tent was sealed as hermetically
as possible, and there ensued a general and complete killing of the
insects that remained inside.
In the forenoon of the day following, July 17, we felt ready to start.
Even if our boat could have held all our freight, which weighed perhaps
a ton, it was not wise to carry it, on account of the extreme
shallowness of the stream, it being then, according to the "sour
doughs," unprecedentedly low, due to the unusual lack of rain. So half
of the freight was intrusted to John Dejus, a French Canadian, who, with
his partner, was "going up to Council anyhow," and who agreed to freight
our belongings at what was a very reasonable figure, considering the
toil which it entailed. A certain amount of unpacking and rearranging
had to be done in order to have readily at hand cooking-utensils and
food and all the comfort that could be manufactured for the trip up the
rivers. The tow-line was eighty or a hundred feet long, with small
pieces of rope branching out near the end to throw over the shoulder and
pull from, the object being to work from the shore and keep the boat
well out in the stream, in the deeper water. Three of us pulled, and one
sat in the stern and steered with an oar. As a matter of fact, the
fellow who had the latter occupation had the hardest time of it; and, as
we progressed, there was greater enthusiasm for the end of the line than
for the "steering" position, which meant a continual jumping out into
the stream and shoving the boat off from the shore, or backing it off a
riffle and pulling and guiding its nose out against the swift, adverse
current into water perhaps an inch deeper, which saved the situation.
Hip rubber boots were essential. Undoubtedly, it was hard, exhausting
work. We met others with boats less suited to the task than ours,
apparently hopelessly stuck, pulling, hauling, shoving, and swearing. It
was frequently necessary for some unfortunates to unload their boats,
get them over a riffle, and then reload. Others would "cache" part of
their freight (deposit it by the way), and struggle onward, to return
later for the remainder. At first we got along very well pulling from
the shore, though this meant not infrequently falling over one another
when the shore developed into a bank with uneven ground, or delays and
complications arose from the protruding brush. However, as the stream
was very low, most of the work was done from the dry bed. At times the
mosquitos were very annoying; all of us wore netting. One night, when
about to encamp, almost dead to the world, these pests were the worst I
have ever encountered; the atmosphere was black with them. But, on the
whole, the mosquito feature of the trip had been much exaggerated; for,
as we proceeded, the netting was wholly dispensed with, and at Council
City, most appreciated of surprises, these insects were not at all! It
almost took the heart out of one to see returning prospectors or
freighters in their long, narrow skiffs, sometimes assisted by a sail,
come flying down the stream, who, when hailed as to the condition of the
river above, invariably shouted back that it became more difficult. And
it did become more difficult soon after turning into the Neukluk River;
and, furthermore, it began to storm, so that when our tent had been
finally erected, it was a question whether the wind would not tear out
the pegs, which had been driven into the loose gravel of the dry
river-bed, and land us somewhere down-stream. But all that is now an
interesting reminiscence. In spots the stream was black with salmon and
salmon-trout. We passed several camps of the river Eskimos, who were
drying fish, fastened in clothes-pin fashion upon an ingeniously
contrived rack. The Neukluk in places was broad and shallow, or broken
up into a number of streams by alternate gravel bars, or occasionally
the stream broke, forming an island, and it was a question which branch
to follow. Rain for a day added to the complications, but it was not
sufficient to raise the stream. As our destination was neared, the
country appeared bolder, more mountainous, and it was a pleasure to see
once in a while a little forest of spruce on the shore of the stream.
But now the tow-line was practically abandoned, and it was a case of
hauling and shoving the boat with hands and shoulders, one of us
frequently going on in advance to discover a route which would afford
the necessary passage, or to kick out a channel through the stones and
gravel. It was a wonder to me frequently that some of us were not bowled
over, tired as we were, by the strong, swift current. Sometimes it was
too much for poor human nature to stand, and the one would curse the
other liberally for not doing this or that, all to be forgotten and
forgiven after the inner man had been appeased and rest obtained.
At last, late in the day of July 19, on rounding one of the many curves
of the river, Council City, in the bright evening sunlight, burst upon
the view, the prettiest, best sight that we had seen in Alaska. The
peculiar light seemed to magnify it, to make it stand out very clear and
distinct. There is a sudden high plateau, terminating abrupt and sheer
at the stream in a rocky cliff some thirty or forty feet high, bare for
the most part, but covered here and there with a growth of moss and
shrubbery. This elevation tapers down to the level of the stream, where
the little camp of miners marks, at the east, the point where Melsing
Creek flows into the Neukluk, and also falls off at the west, where the
large camp or general reservation is found, free ground for all. Along
the plateau and beyond--a sprawling, scattered collection of log
cabins, saloons, and dance-halls, with here and there a sod house or
tent--is Council City. Back of it, to the north and west, along the foot
of a bleak mountain which seems to shelter the camp, is the narrow belt
of invaluable timber. The river-bed here is perhaps a hundred yards
wide, but at that time the greater part of it was visible, the stream
breaking above and coming down in two rapid, narrow forks touching each
side of the shore. Across the river and the bar, and following its
course, is a long stretch of tundra reaching out for several miles to
low and barren mountains in the south and west. In a straight line
southwest, over the tundra and mountains, it is said to be eighty or a
hundred miles to Nome.
In the late autumn of 1897, a number of prospectors, on being told by a
native that there was gold in this section, set out from Chenik. They
wintered at the present site of Council, and in the following spring
staked out what seemed to them the best mining ground in the surrounding
country, the richer claims being on Ophir Creek, a tributary to the
Neukluk, several miles above Council City. This, therefore, is the
pioneer mining camp in northwestern Alaska, but known to comparatively a
few only, on account of its inaccessibility.
We passed the camp at Melsing Creek, and, exchanging salutations with
the men there, who knew how we felt, proceeded slowly along the foot of
the cliff, over the last riffle. Then, making fast the _Mush-on_ among
the other boats, we pitched our tent near the stream on the
"reservation"--there at last. This experience from White Mountain to
Council was the hardest physical work which any one of us had ever done
or ever expects to do. The distance from White Mountain is generally
estimated to be twenty-five or thirty miles. Leaving there at ten
o'clock Tuesday morning, and making good average time, we were at
Council at half-past eight Thursday evening, the actual working time
being twenty-three hours, and the remainder being spent for rest and
meals.
IV
THE INLAND COUNTRY--THE MINES
This place had the appearance of a real mining camp. The men one saw,
for the most part, looked like the genuine article. A number said that
this was _the_ country. Many were non-committal--they were making ready
their packs for the "mush" to the auxiliary creeks above, where they
thought the richer deposits were. All had to admit that it was an
auriferous country, that "colors" could be found everywhere along the
creeks, but the question was, and always is, Will it pay to work the
ground? It frequently happens that one is the owner of a mining claim
which undoubtedly contains a fortune in gold, but the unfortunate fact
remains that it will cost him more money to get the gold from the ground
than the value of the gold which is in it. All agreed, however, that
this looked something more like "God's country." There was a verse going
the rounds whose sum and substance was that the devil had to be
punished, and, therefore, had been sent to Nome.
We dined that evening at midnight, our meals being somewhat irregular in
those days. On the 19th of July this definite resting-spot had been
found, and here we would try our luck until the close of the season. The
most desirable and healthful position seemed to be up on the cliff where
the log buildings, which denoted the heart of the "city," were
situated. It was soon learned that the place had been surveyed,
imaginary streets provided for, and town lots duly awarded. This fact
was discovered the next day, after we had selected a spot for encampment
and were about to level it off. Just then we were interrupted by an
individual who held the proud position of town recorder, who, pleasantly
enough, said that we were about to squat in the center of a _street_,
and that, although he personally had no objection, our camping there
would establish a precedent which might cause trouble. We shall not
forget old Pete Wilson, a Swede living in a sod house near by, who came
forward and told us that we might camp upon his neighboring lot until
the fall, "free gratis," and who further said that he would trust us
not to set up a title to the ground adverse to his. This is but one
instance of the many kind and generous acts of which such men are
capable; and it was the beginning of a neighborly association with this
hearty old miner, who contributed in many ways toward our agreeable
sojourn at Council City.
After singling out the least humpy spot, the tundra was torn and hacked
off it until a layer of damp clay earth was reached. This was then
pretty well leveled and ditched, in the belief that, by giving the sun a
good chance at this surface, it would become ideally dry, a fine place
to sleep over. But, though the sun was unusually friendly and, at times,
in the middle of the day, hot, that ground remained as damp as ever. We
realized at last that frozen earth and ice beneath, a barrier to the
seepage, made the trouble irremediable. Two large tents, one made to
open into the other, were used, respectively, to sleep and to cook and
eat in, and near the side of this oblong arrangement was erected the
"office" tent. A bunk put together and a folding cot, picked up at
Chenik, kept us off the ground at night. It is a tribute to the general
healthful conditions of that country that during the seven weeks we
lived there, despite the night dampness, which seemed at first of ill
omen, none of us was afflicted with even a cold. For warmth, comfort,
and protection, a reindeer-skin is invaluable.
There were perhaps two hundred persons about Council at that time. Most
of the miners had made their camps above, on the creeks where their
claims were situated, to remain there during the working season, though
many trudged back into town periodically for supplies and what not. Of
course the number of saloons, with their dance-hall and gambling
adjuncts, was entirely disproportionate to the population of the place,
but their proprietors were looking forward to activity in the late fall
and winter, when mining would cease. A number of horses and mules had
been brought overland from Nome, small fortunes in themselves. People
were continually straggling in, and, camped as we were on the bluff,
with that last riffle into Council almost at our feet, when a splashing
sound, intermingled with a bumping noise against the stones and with
oaths and exhortations, was heard, one, or all in chorus, would exclaim,
"Another case of 'mush.'"
Very soon, and in no modest fashion, the signs "Attorneys at Law" and
"Surveyors" were flashed upon the public. There were two other lawyers
at Council, but no other surveyors. It became at once necessary to
examine the mining records and learn the system, if any, of indexing,
with reference to searching titles; and it was in this connection that
we met Mrs. A----, the duly-elected recorder for the El Dorado mining
district, which district is thirty miles square. The wife of the agent
there of one of the large companies doing business in Alaska, she had
come with her husband to Council a year before; had spent the long
winter there; and, commanding the respect and admiration of the mining
community, had been elected recorder to straighten out and keep honest
records in the books, which hitherto had been in the custody of some
rather suspicious predecessors. Young and good-looking, her face was
both refined and strong. Some of Bret Harte's characters were suggested.
With great labor and intelligence she had brought order out of chaos,
and had so indexed her books with reference to creeks and individuals as
to render the work of the searcher comparatively simple.
A few words concerning mining law as applied to Alaska seem now
appropriate. The United States laws, which control, permit an individual
to "locate" and hold as many tracts or parcels of ground as he desires,
each not exceeding, however, twenty acres in area, _provided_, first,
that there be a bona-fide discovery of gold; second, that the ground be
properly staked or marked out; third, that at least one hundred dollars'
worth of work be done on each claim every year. It is further provided
that the miners may organize a district, elect their own recorder, and
make rules and regulations which shall have the force of law in so far
as they are reasonable and not in conflict with the federal statutes.
Many perplexing questions arise, however. Our laws are too liberal and
loose, leaving open too wide the door to fraud and blackmail, such as
exist galore in Alaska, and which could not be practised under the
carefully drawn Canadian statutes. For instance, though the law requires
that a claim shall be distinctly marked or staked, there is no provision
made as to how it shall be marked, nor is it made obligatory that the
stakes shall be maintained. The fraud and confusion arising from this
situation are aggravated in this barren country, where timber is very
scarce, and the original stakes, for the most part, are made from the
inadequate scrub willow found along the creeks.
Placer-mining (as contradistinguished from quartz) consists in
extracting loose particles of gold from the alluvial deposits in ancient
river-beds. Claims which border upon and include sections of the present
streams, greatly reduced in size, are known as "creek" claims, and are
generally supposed to be the richest. There is on every creek a
"discovery" claim, and all the others upon it are known as Nos. 1, 2, 3,
etc., "above" or "below Discovery," and are so staked and recorded.
Those claims which are located farther up the bank, and which do not
embrace the stream, are called "bench" claims, and are known frequently
by the name of the wife or daughter of the miner, or by any fanciful
designation. It was this latter class of claims which, up to that time
ignored or overlooked, in the middle of the season were discovered to be
in many cases richer than the creek claims. Many who had left the
country, disgusted and crying out against the laws which permitted a few
individuals to take up and hold an entire creek, had passed over this
good ground without even prospecting it. On the other hand, more
persistent miners had secured rich claims where apparently there was no
ground to stake. The twenty-acre claim is usually staked out in the
shape of a parallelogram 1320 feet by 660 feet. One is likely to locate
rather more than less ground than that to which he is entitled.
Therefore, some of these canny old boys would measure along with their
tape-lines, spell out a "fraction," and immediately seize upon and hold
it.
We were early impressed that there was no "fake" about this country. It
was a continuation of the wonderful formation which, beginning in the
west back of Port Clarence, extends eastward and back of Nome to the
Golovin Bay country. Clients began to drop in. In many instances they
sought free advice; and, sometimes, when the conversation had reached
the legal point, it became necessary to instruct our callers that, if
they desired to know anything further, our consultation fee would be
exacted. It was therefore a case of pay up or move out. For Alaska, our
law library was imposing and complete. Certainly it was the best in
Council City. The surveyors (T----working in as chainman) were busy.
We had been settled only a few days when First Lieutenant Offley of the
Seventh United States Infantry, with thirty-odd men from St. Michaels,
trudged by our camp, and it was good to see them. The lieutenant had
been sent to preserve law and order and hold military court pending the
passing of the country into the hands of the civil administration, and
the arrival at Council of the United States commissioner, as provided by
law. They camped in their round tents near the river and beyond the
reservation, in our plain view, whence the various bugle-calls came to
us very clearly and marked the time of day.
The world is very small. It soon developed that, after the Cuban
campaign, Lieutenant Offley and my brother, by chance, had traveled
together in the same train from Montauk Point, in the same seat, and the
lieutenant, weak from Cuban fever, had been assisted over the ferry to
New York by my brother. Neither knowing the name of the other, they next
met at this jumping-off place.
Throughout his stay at Council the lieutenant performed his duties with
an ability and conscientiousness which commanded the respect of the
community; and there was much for him to do which was both novel and
perplexing--for instance, the assumption of the judicial role. One of
the things which tried him sorely was the case of a woman physician, who
had wandered down from the Klondike country and squatted with her tent
on a lot which somebody else claimed. The case was argued before the
lieutenant, and the decision went against her, and very properly. She
refused absolutely to vacate, insisting upon being a martyr; and, though
the duty was unpleasant, for the sake of example at least, she was put
under arrest, with generous jail liberties. Finally she was sent down
the river with a corporal's guard to the higher authorities at St.
Michaels.