USA > Alaska > History of Alaska : 1730-1885 > Part 25
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74
16 When Shelikof was on the point of leaving Bolsheretsk for Okhotsk he was informed that an English vessel had arrived at Petropavlovsk. The vessel proved to be the Lark, and belonged to the East India Company. From Peters, the captain, Shelikof purchased a large amount of goods, reselling them to merchants of Totma and to agents of the Panof company at a profit of 50 per cent. Capt. Peters brought a letter from the directors of his com- pany to the commander of Kanıchatka asking permission to exchange the products of their respective territories. A Baron Stungel or Stangel, prob-
231
CURRENCY AND TRIBUTE.
Okhotsk and Irkutsk, where he arrived in April 1787, after suffering great hardships on his journey. There he lost no time in taking initiatory steps with the view of obtaining for his company the exclusive right to trade in the new colony and other privileges, the results of which belong to another chapter.
We have seen how the Cossacks were enticed from the Caspian and Black seas, drawn over the Ural Mountains, and lured onward in their century-march through Siberia to Kamchatka, and all for the skin of the little sable. And when they had reached the Pacific they were ready as ever to brave new dangers on the treacherous northern waters, for the coveted Siberian quadruped was here supplanted by the still more valuable amphibious otter. As furs were the currency of the empire, the occupation of the trapper, in the national economy, was equivalent to that in other quarters of the gold-miner, assayer, and coiner combined. In those times all the valuable skins ob- tained by the advancing Cossacks were immediately transported to Russia over the routes just opened.
The custom was to exact tribute from all natives who were conquered en passant by the Cossacks, as a diversion from the tamer pursuit of sable-hunting. As early as 1598 the tribute collected in the district of Pelymsk, just east of the Ural Mountains, amounted to sixty-eight bundles of sables of forty skins each.17 In 1609 this tribute was reduced from ten to seven
ably an exile, who was in command at that time, consented under certain conditions. Shelikof, who was well received on board of the Lark and 'treated to various liquors,' describes the vessel as two-masted, with 12 cannon, and carrying a large crew consisting of Englishmen, Hindoos, Arabs, and China- men. Of the four officers one was a Portuguese. Putesh., i. 60-4. The Lark was subsequently wrecked on Copper Island with the loss of all on board but two. The survivors were forwarded to St Petersburg overland. Viages al Norte, MS., 316. Upon finishing his business with Capt. Peters, Shelikof at once set out for Irkutsk.
17 Istoria Sib., vi. 23. In the same year Botcha Murza, a Tunguse chief who had been made a prince by the Russians, presented forty sables to the gov- ernment, and forty additional skins on the occasion of his marriage, promising to repeat the gift every year. An oukaz issued the same year exempted the aged, the feeble, and the sick from paying tribute.
232
COLONIZATION AND THE FUR-TRADE.
sables per adult male, but there seemed to be no de- crease in the number collected.18 Nine years later, however, the animal seems to have been nearly exter- minated, as the boyar Ivan Semenovich Kurakin was instructed to settle free peasant families in the district. After this the principal Cossack advance was into the Tunguse country. In the tribute-books of 1620-1 the latter tribe is entered as tributary at the rate of forty-five sables for every six adult males. In 1622 nine Tunguse paid as high as ninety-four sables.19 Whenever a breach occurred in the flow of sable-skins into Moscow the Cossacks were instructed to move on, though the deficiency was not always owing to exhaustion of the supply.20
Thus the authorized fur-gatherers advanced from one region to another across the whole north of Asia, followed, and in some instances even preceded, by the promyshleniki or professional hunters. The lat- ter formed themselves into organized companies, hunt- ing on shares, like the sea-faring promyshleniki of later times, and like them they allowed the business to fall gradually into the hands of a few wealthy mer- chants. The customs adopted by these hunters go far toward elucidating much that seems strange in the proceedings of the promyshleniki on gaining a foot- hold upon the islands of the Pacific. A brief descrip- tion will therefore not be amiss.
The hunting-grounds were generally about the head- waters and tributaries of the large rivers, and the journey thence was made in boats. Three or four hunters combined in building the boat, which was covered, and so served as shelter. Provisions, arms,
18 In that year the total tribute amounted to 66 bundles, of 40 skins each, and 39 sables. In 1610 it increased to 75 bundles and 12 sables. Ist. Sib., vi. 26-7.
19 Ist. Sib., vi. 218. A force of 40 Cossacks was sufficient to collect tribute and preserve order among the Tunguse.
20 In 1607 complaints reached the tsar that traders from Pustozersk would go among the natives of the Berezof district before tribute had been collected, making it difficult to obtain the government's quota. Ist. Sib., vi. 35.
233
ON THE HUNTING-GROUND.
bedding, and a few articles of winter clothing made up the cargo. A jar of yeast or sour dough for the manufacture of kvass, to keep down the scurvy, was considered of the highest importance. Material for the construction of sleds and a few dogs were also essential, and when all these had been collected and duly stowed, each party of three or four set out upon their journey to a place previously appointed. As soon as the whole force had assembled at the rendez- vous election was made of a peredovchik, or foreman, a man of experience, and commanding respect, to whom all promised implicit obedience. The peredov- chik then divided his men into chunitzi, or parties, appointing a leader for each, and assigning them their respective hunting-grounds. This division was always made; even if the artel, or station, consisted of only six men they must not all hunt together on the same ground.21 Until settled in winter-quarters all their belongings were carried in leather bags. Before the first snow fell a general hunt was ordered by the pe- redovchik to kill deer, elks, and bears for a winter's supply of meat, after which the first traps were set for foxes, wolves, and lynx. With the first snow fall, before the rivers were frozen, the whole party hunted sables in the immediate vicinity of the general winter- quarters, with dogs and nets. The peredovchik and the leaders were in the mean time engaged in making sleds and snow-shoes for their respective chunitzis. When the snow was on the ground the whole artel was assembled at the winter-quarters and prayers were held, after which the peredovchik despatched the small parties to the sable grounds with final instruc- tions to the leaders. The latter preceded their men by a day in order to prepare the station selected; the same practice prevailed in moving stations during the winter. The first station was named after some church in Russia, and subsequent stations after patron saints of individual hunters. The first sables caught were
21 O Sobolnuie Promyssla, 29-42.
234
COLONIZATION AND THE FUR-TRADE.
always donated to some church or saint, and were called God's sables. The instructions of leaders were mainly to the effect that they should look well after their men, watch carefully their method of setting traps, and see that they did not gorge themselves in secret from the common store of provisions.22
During the height of the season stations were fre- quently changed every day, for it was thought that prolonged camping at any one place would drive away the sables. When the season closed the small parties returned to head-quarters, where the leaders rendered their accounts to the peredovchik, and at the same time reported all infractions of rules by the men. The accused were then heard, and punished by the peredovchik if found guilty.23 When all arrange- ments for returning to the settlement were completed the peredovchik would make the rounds of all the sta- tions to see that every trap was closed or removed, so that no sable could get into them during the summer.
In Alaska the methods of the hunters underwent many changes, owing to the different physical features of the field and the peculiarities of the natives. The men engaged for these expeditions were of a very mixed class; few had ever seen the ocean, and many were wholly untrained for their vocation. They were engaged for a certain time and paid in shares taken from one half of the proceeds of the hunt, the other
22 The instructions contained also an admonition to observe certain super- stitious customs, traces of which could be found nearly a century later among the servants of the Russian American Company. For instance, certain ani- mals must not be spoken of by their right names at the stations, for fear of frightening the sables away. The raven, the snake, and the wild-eat were tabooed. They were called respectively the 'upper,' or 'high one,' the 'bad one,' and the ' jumper.' In the early times this rule extended to quite a number of persons, animals, and even inanimate objects, but the three I have men- tioned survived till modern times. O Sobolnuie Promyssla, 29-42.
23 The promyshleniki were treated much like children by their leaders. Some offenders were made to stand on stumps for a time, and fast while their comrades were feasting, while others were fined for the benefit of the church. Thicves were cruelly beaten, and forfeited a portion of their ushina, or divi- dend (literally supper), as it was held that their crime must have brought bad luck and decreased the total catch. O Sobolnuie Promyssla, 56-7.
235
HUNTING IN ALASKA.
half of the cargo going to the outfitter or owner. If the crew consisted of forty men, including navigator and peredovchik, their share of the cargo was usually divided into about forty-six shares, of which each member received one, the navigator three, the fore- man two, and the church one or two. In case of success the hunters realized quite a small fortune, as we have seen, but often the yield was so small as to keep the men in servitude from indebtedness to their employer. The vessel24 was provided with but a small stock of provisions, consisting of a few hams, a little rancid butter, a few bags of rye and wheat flour for holidays, and a quantity of dried and salted salmon. The main stock had to be obtained by fishing and hunting, and to this end were provided fire-arms and other implements serving also for defence. Since furs in this new region were obtained chiefly through the natives, articles of trade formed the important part of the cargo, such as tobacco, glass beads, hatchets and knives of very bad quality, tin and copper vessels, and cloth. A large number of kleptsi, or traps, were also carried. Thus provided the vessel sets sail with bozhe pomoshtch-God's help.
Mere trade soon gave way to a more effective method of obtaining furs. Natives were impressed to hunt for the Russians, who, as a rule, found it both needless and dangerous for themselves to disperse in small parties to catch furs. Either by force or by agreement with chiefs the Aleuts and others were obliged to give hostages, generally women and children, to ensure the safety of their visitors, or performance of contract. They were thereupon given traps and sent forth to hunt for the season, while the Russians lived in indolent repose at the village, basking in the
24 'Their galliots are constructed at Okhotsk or Nishnekamchatsk, and government, with a view of encouraging trade, has ordered the commandants of those places to afford as much assistance as possible to the adventurers, besides which, the materials of the very frequently wrecked transport vessels, though lost to government, are found the chief means of fitting out such an enterprise, and greatly lessen the expense.' Sauer's Geog. and Astron. Exped., 275.
236
COLONIZATION AND THE FUR-TRADE.
smiles of the wives and daughters, and using them also as purveyors and servants. When the hunters returned they surrendered traps and furs in exchange for goods, and the task-masters departed for another island to repeat their operation.
The custom of interchanging hostages while engaged in traffic was carried eastward by the Russians and forced upon the English, Americans, and Spaniards long after the entire submission of Aleuts, Kenaï, and Chugatsches had obviated the necessity of such a course in the west. Portlock was compelled to con- form to the custom at various places before he could obtain any trade, but as a rule four or five natives were demanded for one or two sailors from the ship.25 On Cross Sound, Sitka Bay, and Prince of Wales Island the hostages were not always given in good faith; they would suddenly disappear and hostilities begin. As soon as they ascertained, however, that their visitors were watchful and strong enough to re- sist, they would resume business.
Meares observes, among other things relating to Russian management, that wherever the latter settled the natives were forbidden to keep canoes of a larger size than would carry two persons. This applied, of course, only to the bidarka region, Kadiak, Cook Inlet, and portions of Prince William Sound. The bidars, or large canoes, were then as now very scarce, being made of the largest sea-lion skins, and used only for war or the removal of whole families or villages. The Russians found them superior to their own clumsy boats for trading purposes, and acquired them, by purchase and probably often by seizure under some pretext, as fast as the natives could build them. In their opinion the savages had no business to devote themselves to anything but hunting.
A portion of the catch was claimed as tribute, although the crown received a very small share, often none. Tribute-gathering was a convenient mantle to
25 Portlock's Voy., 269.
237
THE ALEUT HUNTERS.
cover all kinds of demands on the natives, and there can be no doubt that in early times at least half the trade was collected in the form of tribute, by means of force or threats, while at the same time the author- ities at home were being petitioned to relinquish its collection, "because it created discontent" among the natives.
The tribute collected by the earlier traders was never correctly recorded. The merchants frequently obtained permission from the Kamchatka authorities to dispense with the services of Cossack tribute- gatherers, and gradually, as the abuses perpetrated under pretext of its collection came to the ears of the home government, the custom was abandoned alto- gether. Subsequently the Russian American Com- pany obtained a right to the services of the Aleuts on the plea that it should be in lieu of tribute formerly paid to the government. At the same time it was ordained that those natives who rendered no regular services to the company should pay a tribute. The latter portion of the programme was, however, never carried out. The Chugatsches and the more northerly villages of Kenaï never furnished any hunters for the company unless with some private end in view, and no tribute paid by them ever reached the imperial treasury.
Another method of obtaining furs, outside of the regular channels of trade, was in furnishing supplies in times of periodical famine caused by the improvidence of the simple Aleuts. A little assistance of this kind was always considered as a lien upon whatever furs the person might collect during the following season. This pernicious system, unauthorized as it was by the management, survived all through the regime of the Russian American Company, and one encounters traces of it here and there to the present day.
At the time of the first advance of Russians along the coast in a south-easterly direction native auxili-
238
COLONIZATION AND THE FUR-TRADE.
aries, usually Aleuts, were taken for protection as well as for the purpose of killing sea-otters. Soon the plan was extended to taking Aleut hunters to regions where trade had been made unprofitable by unlimited competition. This was first adopted on a larger scale by Shelikof and brought to perfection under the management of Delarof and Baranof. From a business point of view alone it was a wise measure, since it obviated the ruinous raising of prices by sav- ages made impudent by sudden prosperity, and at the same time placed a partial check on the indiscriminate slaughter of fur-bearing animals. Yet it opened the door to abuse and oppression of the natives at the hands of unscrupulous individuals, and in the case of the docile and long since thoroughly subdued Aleuts it led to something akin to slavery. It was also attended with much loss of life, owing to ignorance, careless- ness, and foolhardiness of the leaders of parties. It certainly must have been exceedingly annoying to the natives of the coast thus visited to see the ani- mals exterminated which brought to them the ships of foreigners loaded with untold treasures. The Kaljush hunters could not fail to perceive that the unwelcome rivals from the west, though inferior in strength, stat- ure, and courage, were infinitely superior in skill, and indefatigable in pursuit of the much coveted sea- otter.
It was but natural that in a brief period the very name of Aleut became hateful to the Kaljush and Chu- gatsches, who allowed no opportunity to escape them for revenge on the despised race, not thinking that the poor fellows were but helpless tools of the Rus- sians. Numerous massacres attested the strong feel- ing, but this by no means prevented the Russians from pursuing a policy which, to a certain extent, has been justified by the result. As the minds at the head of affairs became more enlightened, measures for the protection of valuable animals were adopted, the ex- ecution of which was possible with the docile Aleut
239
INTER-TRIBAL TRAFFIC.
hunters, while it would have been out of the question with the stubborn and ungovernable Kaljush.
As long as operations were confined to Prince Will- iam Sound, with the inhabitants of which the Aleuts, and especially the Kadiak people, had previously meas- ured their strength in hostile encounters, the plan worked well enough. Subsequently, however, contact with the fierce Thlinkeets of Comptroller Bay, Yaku- tat, and Ltua inspired the western intruders with dis- may, rendering them unfit even to follow their peaceful pursuits without an escort of four or five armed Rus- sians to several hundred hunters. On several occa- sions a panic occurred in hunting parties, caused merely by fright, but seriously interfering with trading opera- tions. Vancouver mentions instances of that kind, when Lieutenant Puget and Captain Brown at Yak- utat Bay successively assisted Purtof, who commanded a large party of Aleuts sent out by Baranof.26
The reports of these occurrences by Purtof and his companions corroborate the statements of Puget and Brown, but naturally the former do not dwell as much upon the assistance received as upon services rendered. With regard to Captain Brown's action, however, the Russian report differs somewhat.27
Previous to the arrival of the Russians a consider- able interchange of products was carried on by certain of the more enterprising tribes; the furs of one section being sold to the inhabitants of another. The long- haired skins of the wolverene were valued highly for trimming by tribes of the north who hunted the rein- deer; and the parkas or shirts made from the skins of the diminutive speckled ground-squirrel (Spermophilus) of Alaska, which occurs only on a few islands of the coast, were much sought by the inhabitants of nearly all re- gions where the little animal does not exist. The new- comers were not slow to recognize the advantages to
26 Vancouver's Voy., iii. 233-5.
27 For Purtof's report, see Tikhmenef, Istor. Obos., ii. app. 66-7.
240
COLONIZATION AND THE FUR-TRADE.
be gained by absorbing the traffic. Within a few years it was taken from the natives along the coast as far north as Cook Inlet and Prince William Sound, but beyond that and in the interior a far-reaching commerce, including the coasts of Arctic Asia in its ramifications, has existed for ages and has never been greatly interfered with by the Russians, who fre- quently found articles of home manufacture, originally sold by traders in Siberia, in the hands of the tribes who had the least intercourse with themselves.
Captain Cook indulged in profound speculations with regard to the channels through which some of the natives he met with on the Northwest Coast had acquired their evident acquaintance with iron knives and other implements, but this, the most probable source, was unknown to him. Later navigators found evidence of the coast tribes assuming the rôle of mid- dlemen between the inhabitants of the interior and the visitors from unknown parts. In August 1786 Dixon was informed by natives on Cook Inlet that they had sold out every marketable skin, but that they would soon obtain additional supplies from tribes living away from the sea-shore.
A century of intercourse with the Caucasian races has failed to eradicate the custom of roaming from one continent to another for the sake of exchanging a few articles of trifling value. The astuteness dis- played by these natives in trade and barter was cer- tainly one of the reasons which caused the Russians to devise means of getting at the furs without being obliged to cope with their equals in bartering.
As far as the region contained within the present boundaries of Alaska is concerned, the fur-trade to- ward the end of the last century was beginning to fall into regular grooves, which have never been essentially departed from except in the case of the Kaljush, who, relying on their constant intercourse with English and American traders, persistently refused to be reduced
241
THE CHINA MARKET.
to routine and system, and maintained an independent and frequently a defiant attitude toward the Russians. Under the rule of the Russian American Company the prices paid to natives for furs were equal in all parts of the colonies with the exception of Sitka and the so-called Kaljush sounds, where a special and much higher tariff was in force.28
A more gradual change began also to affect the share system of the Russians, embracing two kinds of share-holders, those who with invested capital had a voice in the management and their half of the gross receipts, and another class, laboring in various capaci- ties for such compensation as fell to their lot when the settlements were made at stated times and after every other claim had been satisfied. The disadvan- tages of this system were obvious. On one hand the laborer was entirely dependent upon the agents or managers of his immediate station or district, who were sometimes honest, but far oftener rascals, while on the other hand the hunters and trappers and those in charge of native hunting-parties had every induce- ment to indulge in indiscriminate slaughter of fur- bearing animals without regard to consequences.
By the time Kamchatka was discovered and con- quered the number of private traders had greatly increased, and another market for costly furs had been opened on the borders of China, a market of such im-
28 The introduction of a well-defined business system as well as regula- tions to check the threatened extermination of fur-bearing animals came only with the establishment of a monopoly, and this involved both time and in- trigue. The founder of the so-called colonies as well as his successors in the management had but one object in view, to control the fur-trade of Russia in Europe and Asia. Shelikof was shrewd enough to understand that in order to obtain special privileges or protection from the government, it was neces- sary to make a display of some more permanent business than the fur-trade; and with the sole view of furthering this end projects of colonization and ship-building were launched in rapid succession, but there can be no doubt that Shelikof himself had no faith in these undertakings, for with his sanc- tion the convicts, mechanics, and farmers sent from Siberia by the authorities were at once distributed among the trading posts and vessels of the Shelikof and Golikof Company. Petrof, Russ. Am. Co., MS., 2-4.
HIST. ALASKA. 16
242
COLONIZATION AND THE FUR-TRADE.
portance that not only the carrying of skins to Russia was curtailed, but large shipments of furs were made from Russia to the Chinese frontier, principally beavers and land-otters from Canada, these skins being carried almost around the world at a profit.29
No attempt was made by Russians during the eighteenth century to send furs to China by water. That route was opened by English traders to the Northwest Coast as soon as it became generally known that furs had been disposed of in China to great ad- vantage by the ships of Captain Cook's last two expe- ditions. The sea-otter and sable shipments from the Aleutian Isles and Kamchatka were still consigned to Irkutsk, where a careful assortment was made. The inferior and light-colored sables, the foxes of the Aleutian Isles, the second grade of sea and land otter, etc., were set aside for the Chinese market. Defective skins were sent to the annual fair at Irbit, for sale among the Tartars, and only the very best quality was forwarded to Moscow and Makaria, where Armenians and Greeks figured among the ready pur- chasers.30
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.