SETTLEMENT
The sea-otter, a marine animal about four feet in length when fully
grown, with soft, long black pelage of silky texture, is one of the most
valued of the fur-bearers. It was found abundantly all the way along the
Northwest Coast, and especially in the passages about Sitka. It is now
nearly extinct.
The Russians had been gathering the skins of the sea-otter in the
northern waters for years, ever since Chirikof made his voyage to Sitka,
and they were truly an El Dorado, in fur, to the traders who plied their
trade along the coasts. Captain Cook and his sailors, when on their
voyage in these waters, bought skins for mere trifles, some for a
handful of iron nails. These same skins sold for as much as sixty
dollars each in China where they visited on their way home. The story of
the furs went over the world and English, French and American traders
thronged to these waters to sail their ships into the straits and barter
for the rich pelts. To secure a profit of $50,000 on a voyage was not
unusual. Ingraham, the lieutenant of Captain Gray whom we all know so
well for his discovery of the great River of the West, sailed to near
Sitka before his principal entered the river which he named for his
ship, the Columbia. The French ship "Solide," in 1791, sailed from
France to gather a portion of the harvest. Her captain, Etienne
Marchand, anchored in Sitka Bay, and called it _Tchinkitinay_, as
he declares it was known to the natives. To his ship flocked the painted
and skin-clad natives with their peltries for barter. On their persons
he saw articles of European manufacture, showing that other ships had
visited there, and in the ears of one young savage were hanging pendant
two copper coins of the colony of Massachusetts. His success in trade
was not such as he might have wished, so he sailed way, remarking that,
"The modern Hebrews would, perhaps, have little to teach to these people
in the art of trade."
March 31st, 1799, the Yankee skipper, Cleveland, of the merchant ship
"Caroline," sailed into the bay, dropped anchor and fired a cannon shot
as a signal. He was one of those shrewd, lean traders, skilled in
navigation, who sailed from Boston round the Horn, with their bucko
mates, who could drive a tack with the prow of a ship, so to speak, and
in those days there were no corners of the earth where they might not be
found seeking for profit. He was wise to the ways of the sharp trading
canoemen of these waters, and their aggressive proclivities, so he
prepared his ship with regard for all the possibilities of the business.
Around it as a bulwark he stretched a barrier of dry bull hides brought
from the California coast. At the stern was a place prepared for the
trading. Forward on the deck were planted cannon, shotted with shrapnel,
trained so as to rake the afterdeck, and beside each was a gunner's
match.
On the first day, for two hundred yards of broadcloth, he purchased a
hundred prime sea-otter skins, worth $50 each in Canton. Barter was
going merrily on, when a scream from amidships startled the crew. The
Thlingits sprang to their boats. The squaws backed the canoes away from
the ship's sides. Arrows were fitted to bowstrings, spears were poised
and muskets primed. On the ships the sailors lighted the cannon matches
and stood by ready to fire. A fight was hovering in the air when the
cause of the disturbance was discovered. An inquisitive Thlingit pried
between the bull hides opposite the cook's galley, and the cook had
saluted him with a ladle of hot water. In his surprise he upset his
canoe and his family were struggling in the sea. His baby was rescued by
a seaman, amends were made to his injured feelings, and the barter
proceeded as before.
The waters were filled with ships. In a stay of a month the "Caroline"
spoke the ship "Hancock," the ship "Despatch," the ship "Ulysses," and
the ship "Eliza," all of Boston; and the English ship "Cheerful," all
trading for furs among the Sitkan Islands.
The Russians, in their colony on Kodiak Island, were jealous of the
intruders on what they considered as their domain. Gregory Shelikof, a
Siberian merchant, one of the wealthiest and most far seeing of the
leaders among the Aleutian Islands, conceived the plan of combining the
whole of the fur trade in one great monopoly. In pursuance of this
policy he secured a charter from Emperor Paul in 1799, under the name of
the Russian American Company, which gave the exclusive right to all
profits to be derived from every form of resource in the Russian
possessions in America for a period of twenty years. To the management
of his business in the Colony he established on Kodiak Island he
appointed Alexander Andreevich Baranof, a Siberian trader of great
ability and experience. Baranof, the wise and far-seeing Russian ruler
of the Russian American Company, at his factory in St. Paul's Harbor on
Kodiak Island, had long planned the extension of his settlements to the
southeast. The sea-otter catch of the Russians was made by brigades of
Aleuts from the western islands, who went along the shores and to sea as
far as 20 miles, in their wonderful skin boats called bidarkas, to hunt.
When a sea-otter lifted its head from the water to breathe, within sight
of a detachment of Aleut hunters, its fate was sealed, for it seldom
escaped.
The passages between the islands about Sitka were called the "Straits"
by the Russians, and in them the sea-otter skins were taken by the
thousands. It was not unusual for a Russian hunting party consisting of
a hundred bidarkas to take on one expedition 2,000 skins of the
_Morski bobrov_, as they called the sea-otter.
The animals were becoming scarce in the seas about the western islands
and Baranof was compelled to replenish his trade by the catch of the
southeastern waters. In 1795 he sent one of his ships as far south as
the Queen Charlotte Islands and it visited Sitka on the way. Two
thousand skins were secured by the hunters while on this voyage. In the
same year Baranof himself paid Sitka a visit, coming through the strait
from the north in his little schooner "Olga," a 40-foot boat, and he
named the passage for his craft as Olga Strait. On the shore near his
anchorage he erected a cross; the bay he named Krestof Bay, and he then
selected the locality of his future settlement.
In the spring of 1799, Baranof sent orders to the toyons, or chiefs, of
the tribes on the islands around Kodiak to assemble the hunters. Five
hundred and fifty bidarkas, each manned by from two to three Aleut
paddlers, came in answer to his call, and with two convoying ships he
set sail for Sitka Sound. On July 7th he landed at a bay six miles north
of the present town of Sitka, purchased a tract of land from
Skayeutlelt, a local chief, and began the construction of a post which
he named redoubt St. Michael. The building was done under great
difficulties. Rain fell incessantly. There were but thirty Russian
workmen as most of the Aleuts returned to Kodiak, hunting as they went.
Of the men who remained ten had to stand guard constantly, for the
Thlingits were not to be trusted. Barracks, storehouses, quarters for
the commanding officer, were constructed; a bath house also, for the
Russian must have his bath, and the whole was surrounded by a stockade
and strengthened by blockhouses. Their troubles were not all with the
elements, for during the winter the scarcity of provision and other
causes brought scurvy to add to their discomfort. Their food was mostly
yuhali (dried salmon), but during the winter the hunters took 40
sea-lions, and in the spring many seals were killed in the bay by the
Aleuts.
The natives, called Thlingits at the present, were known as the Kolosh
by the Russians. They were divided among themselves in their feelings
toward the new settlers in their midst. Some looked with extreme
disfavor upon the establishment, while others were friendly. The young
and turbulent warriors were hostile. A messenger was sent to invite them
to a prasdnik (holiday) at the fort. He was taken prisoner by them and
detained until Baranof landed in their midst with an armed force and
demanded his release, when they set him free and ridiculed the incident.
At a dance at the fort many of the Kolosh came with long knives
concealed under their cloaks. Their treachery was detected and their
design frustrated. The courage and caution of Baranof held them in check
until spring when he departed for Kodiak, leaving strict instructions as
to the precautions to be observed during his absence. After his
departure the discipline grew more lax and the Kolosh became more bold.
The watchful savages at last saw an opportunity to rid themselves of
their new neighbors.
On a June day of 1802, the exact date is not recorded, a horde of
painted savages burst from the forest, clad in all the paraphernalia of
war masks and barbaric armour. A fleet of war canoes landed warriors on
the beach in front of the redoubt. In the attack that followed the
stockade and buildings were reduced to smoking ruins, the magazines were
robbed of rich stores of furs, most of the defenders died on the spears
of the Kolosh or were tortured till death relieved their sufferings, and
the women and children were made slaves. Skayeutlelt, the false friend
of Baranof, directed the battle from a nearby knoll and his nephew,
Katlean, was one of the principal actors in the bloody tragedy. A few
survivors who were hunting in their bidarkas or were in the forest,
escaped to the ships of the English and American traders which were in
the bay.
Captain Ebbetts on an American ship and Captain Barber of the British
ship "Myrtle" were in the harbor. Some of the survivors on reaching
these ships asked them to rescue their countrymen. Captain Ebbetts
ransomed several prisoners, but Captain Barber adopted a more effective
course. Chief Katlean and Chief Skayeutlelt came on board his ship to
trade. He at once put them in irons and threatened to hang them to the
yardarm of the ship if the captives remaining in the hands of the
natives, and also the plundered sea-otter skins, were not immediately
surrendered to him. The threat was effective, the greater part of the
sea-otter furs and several captives were brought on the ship and
delivered to him. He then took the ransomed captives from the other ship
and sailed for Kodiak, where he demanded a ransom of 50,000 rubles from
Baranof for the captives. The ransom was later reduced to 10,000 rubles
which was paid by Mr. Baranof.
Two years passed before much is again known of Sitka. English and
American captains sailed their ships into the harbor and gathered the
furs which Baranof had endeavored to garner in the storehouses of the
Russian American Company. In the summer of 1804 Baranof gathered a force
at Kodiak with which to cross the Gulf of Alaska to re-establish his
post. There were one hundred and fifty bearded _promyshileniks_, or
fur hunters, and over 500 Aleuts in their skin bidarkas. With him were
the ships "Alexander," "Ekaterina," "Yermak," and "Rostislaf." When they
reached Sitka they found there Captain Lisianski of the Imperial Russian
Navy, with the ship "Neva," one of the first Russians to circle the
globe, and who came to help to recapture the post.
The Indian village of Sitka was almost in the same place as the present
town, grouped around the Baranof hill which was called by the Russians a
_kekoor_. On the top of the kekoor was a redoubt, and a stronger
fort was near the mouth of the Indian River, or _Kolosh Ryeku_.
On the morning of September 28th the Russian ships moved to a point
opposite the village, the "Neva" being towed by a hundred bidarkas. The
Sitkans abandoned their village and the fort on the hill and withdrew to
the stronger fortification near the river. Baranof landed a force and
occupied the kekoor, planted cannon on the top, then opened negotiations
for the surrender of the other fort, but his overtures were rejected by
the Indians.
The ships were brought near the river fort and the cannon were trained
on it. The fort was built of thick logs in the shape of an irregular
square, with portholes on the side next the sea, and inside the breast
works were 14 barabaras, or native houses.
The walls were of such thickness that the cannon shot from the "Neva"
made but little impression on the structure. Baranof was impatient and
urged an attack. Reinforcements were landed from the ships under command
of Lieutenants Arbusof and Polavishin. The hunters, sailors, and Aleuts
flung themselves against the fortifications, but meeting a murderous
fire were driven back in disorder and only saved from disaster by the
protection of the fire of the ships. Ten men were killed and 26 wounded,
and among the wounded was Baranof.
Captain Lisianski then took command and moved his ships nearer the
shore. A canoe with reinforcements and a supply of powder for the
Indians approached among the islands but a shot from the "Neva" struck
it, the powder exploded, and the Indians who were saved from the wreck
were taken on board the Russian ship. The bombardment was steadily
continued until the 6th of October, when the Kolosh proposed to
surrender, and a parley was held, but during the night they evacuated
the fort and went over the mountains to the north. In the fort were left
the bodies of 30 warriors and also the bodies of five children who had
been killed to prevent their cries making the retreat known to the
Russians. The only remaining survivors were two old women and a little
boy. A few straggling warriors remained lurking about, seeking revenge,
and a few days later they killed eight Aleuts who were fishing on
Jamestown Bay.
How the Kolosh went over the mountains was long a mystery to the
Russians. They reached the shore of Peril Strait and crossing to the
north shore placed a fort near the entrance to Sitkoh Bay which was
stronger than their old fort at Indian River and where over 1,000 people
gathered. A tradition among the old Indians says that the fugitives
first went to Old Sitka, then over the mountains to the northeastern
side of the island. On the way they suffered extremely from fatigue and
hunger, and one Sitka Indian who lives on Peril Strait relates that his
father was a child at the time of the exodus. His father carried him
till exhausted, when he abandoned him, and his mother then took him up
and carried him the remainder of the way.
The property left in the fort by the Kolosh was taken out, the
fortification was burned and the canoes on the beach were broken to
pieces. There was enough remaining of the structure that some of the
remains of the foundation may yet be seen in the forest which has sprung
up around it in the Indian River Park, although more than a century has
since elapsed.
[Illustration: Sitka in 1805--From Lisianski's Voyage.]
Then began the restoration of the post, on the present site of Sitka,
and with energy and despatch the building of a new Russian settlement
proceeded. Around the kekoor the native houses were removed, and along
with them more than a hundred burial houses with the ashes of the bodies
which had been burned. The great tribal houses, or barabaras, as they
are called in the Russian accounts, were spacious, some measuring 50
feet in width and 80 feet in length.[2] In their place rose the town of
New Archangel (_Novo Arkangelsk_,) and on the kekoor was built a
redoubt. This was the official name and generally recognized by the
Russians, but the name Sitka was early used by them. Baranof frequently
used the term Sitka in his letters, and in the letter of the Minister of
Finance to the Minister of Marine, from St. Petersburg, April 9, 1820,
Sitka is used in several places. The name Sitka, or Sheetkah, in the
Thlingit language, means, in this place, that this is the place, or the
best place, implying superiority over all other places.
All winter there was cutting of logs in the forest and by the spring of
1805 there were eight substantial buildings, the space for 15 kitchen
gardens had been cleared, the livestock brought on the ships were
thriving, and an air of prosperity pervaded the place.[3] Surveys of the
harbor were made by Captain Lisianski who also made the first ascent of
Mt. Edgecumbe, and who then sailed for Kronstadt, Russia, by the way of
Canton, with a cargo of furs for the China trade valued at 450,000
rubles.[4]