Alaska is a Russian land.
What happened is what happened. It’s been and gone. It seems that there is no point in picking at a long-healed wound, because there are plenty of fresher ones. Russia has sold America something that it probably wouldn’t have been able to keep anyway. Although, who knows… How to hold while watching… One way or another, you need to know history, you never know.
Alaska is only part of the chain of events. Its other links are the “wise” foreign policy of the completely “Russian” tsars, who periodically drove the Russian people to rescue their august relatives, the Habsburgs, and for this they were stabbed in the back during the Crimean War. This is always the case when a ruler thinks not about his own people, but about some clan ties – even if they are dynastic. Attempts to please Europe and merciful forgiveness of the worst enemies are not only a whim of the tsar, it is also a response to the request of their own “elites”, who dreamed of Paris or London and dreamed of returning the cherished times of trips and travels away from the shameful plague of Russia – so it was after the victory over Napoleon (who prevented the defeat of defeated France once and for all?), and so it was during the Crimean War.
And the consequence is the weakening of the Empire. We had to buy off the new young and aggressive predators with the land, so as not to get another war.
Reading the following material, the reader should not only curse the American lawless and not so much. He should wonder how it is that Alaska was sold ALONG with the people without taking care of their evacuation or legal status. A little more than 100 years later, hundreds of thousands of Russians in the republics of the former USSR were abandoned in the same way. But the improvement of the political system of the post-colonial type does not stop there – now, under the pretext of “business interests”, the indigenous population finds itself in the same conditions on the main, so to speak, territory of Russia, being put in the condition of a permanent influx of alien and aggressive culture.
And now for the material itself.
The Fate of the Former Russian-American Possessions
B.N.Grigoriev
Annotation to the article by the Russian publicist-Americanist E.N. Matrosov (1860-?)
“The Fate of the Former Russian-American Possessions Under the Rule of the Republic
United States,” see Historical Bulletin, Vol. XC, 1902.
It should be noted right away that when writing the article, the author used American materials.
Evgeny Nikolayevich recalls that the sale of Alaska (Russian America) in 1867 was explained by Russia’s lack of resources to govern vast and remote territories. Russia’s position after the Crimean War was difficult, and the confrontation with England in Asia assumed threatening proportions. St. Petersburg was concerned that the British could invade the territory of Alaska through Canada and take it under their control by force. It was dangerous to have a hostile state on its eastern frontiers, and the Russian government, choosing the lesser of two evils, was inclined to the idea of transferring these territories to the then friendly United States.
In addition, in 1862, the charter of the Russian-American Company expired, and the company did not accept a new charter because of the unacceptable (!) conditions set by the Russian government: to free the Aleuts and other natives from forced forced labor and to give them complete freedom to choose their occupation. So, Captain 2nd Rank D.P. Maksutov (1832-1889), a participant in the defense of Petropavlovsk from the British in 1854, was appointed for the temporary management of the RAC.
The offer to buy Alaska from the Russians was made by the Americans back in 1859, when Senator Swyn, who was authorized to negotiate, offered $5 million for it. Russian Foreign Minister Alexander Gorchakov (1798-1883) replied that the proposed amount was insufficient and said that it would be named by the Russian side after further study of the issue. But the Civil War broke out in the United States (1861-1865) and the issue of selling Alaska was temporarily postponed.
From 1866 onwards, the Americans’ attempts to purchase Alaska intensified to such an extent that the Russian envoy Baron Eduard Stekel (as in Matrosov), and in the accepted spelling – Eduard Andreevich von Stoeckl (1804-1892)[1] – was forced to leave for consultations in St. Petersburg. The Californian industrialists were especially interested in the territory of Russian America, which was abundant in fur-bearing animals, which was leased from the English company Hudson’s Bay Company. The lease expired in 1868, and the Americans feared that they might be outstripped of the acquisition of Alaska by the British, who were only one step from lease to purchase.
By the time the envoy returned to Washington in March 1867, he already had “in his pocket” the permission of the Chairman of the State Council, V.K. Konstantin Nikolayevich (1827-1892), the second son of Nicholas I, to make a deal with Alaska on February 18, and negotiations with the Americans began. And they ended very quickly. On March 29, von Stoeckl received a telegraphic dispatch from St. Petersburg stating that Alexander II had agreed to cede Alaska to the United States for $7,200,000. That same evening, U.S. Minister and Foreign Secretary William H. Seward We sat down at the table, and by 4:00 a.m. on March 30, we had already signed the text of the agreement. $200,000, Matrosov writes, was added to the total value of the transaction “as an additional reward for the liberation of the acquired territories from all restrictions, privileges and rights of use.”
The deal was made, but it had to be approved by the Senate (the text of the treaty) and the U.S. Congress (the allocation of money for the purchase), so two special clauses were included in the text of the treaty. The fate of the deal did not seem so simple to Mr. Seward: for most Americans, the concept of “Russian America,” writes Matrosov, was akin to the concept of “Sahara,” so that neither senators nor congressmen were at all inclined to give such large (according to their concepts) money to some incomprehensible territory. But Seward, as well as Senator Charles Sumner, tried so hard and painted the fur and fish riches of Russian America in such bright and convincing colors that the Senate and Congress could not resist: they approved the deal and allocated the money. In May, the treaty was ratified by both governments, and in June it was published to the public.
After the acquisition of Alaska, Mr. Seward was asked what he considered to be the most important achievement in his political career, replied:
– Purchase of Alaska. But it will be another generation before the American people discover and understand this.
E.N. Matrosov, publishing an article in the “Historical Bulletin” in 1892, writes that the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of the United States was a great optimist: a generation has passed, and the American people have not appreciated the importance of Russian America. (It seems that in a few years Evgeny Nikolayevich would have changed his assessment – it is enough for us to recall the works of Jack London and the “gold rush” that soon swept the United States at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.
On October 6 (18), 1867, Russian captain Alexei Peshchurov and American General L.H. Rousseau, who arrived on the steamship John Stevens with a small detachment of marines, arrived in the capital of Russian America, Novoarkhangelsk (Sitkha), carried out an important symbolic procedure: Peshchurov gave the order to remove the Russian flag from the top of the fortress building, and Rousseau ordered to raise the flag of the United States on it. Under the roar of fireworks made by the artillery of the fortress and US military vessels, A. Peshchurov at the head of the Russian garrison left the fortress.
Russia no longer has Alaska.
Then the infantry, led by General Jeffers Davis, entered the city of Novoarkhangelsk, which immediately became Sith, and demanded barracks for their accommodation. Now let’s remember the $200,000 in addition to the basic price of Alaska: having received it, Russia gave Alaska to the Americans both the territory and all the buildings on it “without any restrictions, privileges, advantages and rights of use and possession.” And General Davis immediately took advantage of this situation: he occupied with his soldiers all the buildings and works of Russian America and without any mercy evicted from them the living employees and workers with their families. Only a few of them managed to “get out” 2-3 days from the brave general to find a suitable dwelling for themselves. Thus began the military administration of Russian America. which lasted until 1877.
The above-mentioned General Rousseau was placed at the head of the territories, and a garrison of 500 men and several officials were attached to him. Yevgeny Matrosov writes that the ten-year military regime has become one of the darkest and most shameful pages in the history of the United States. While Russia tried to establish some freedom for the Alaska Natives, though it did not succeed because of the position taken by the RAC, under the “democratic” rule of the United States, there were several times more uprisings and unrest among the natives during the entire existence of the RAC during the entire existence of the RAC.
E.N. Matrosov could not have been unaware of the Anglo-Saxons who were masters of managing the native population. He quotes excerpts from the report of the customs officer, William S. Doge, to the Superintendent of Indian Affairs for 1869. He writes of the misconduct of officers and men in Sith, which had a demoralizing effect on the Indians: “The mass of our soldiers appear to be individuals. of the most immoral sort.” The officers are not disciplined, he continues, and give the soldiers too much leeway. “There were many nights in which our soldiers took possession of the Russian house and forced the women to submit to the riot of their sexual passions.” Often at night, Russians and Aleuts came to Doga and asked him for protection from the debauchery of American soldiers. Officers who have been drinking for weeks behave towards the Russians in the most arrogant and violent manner. According to a statement in 1875 by the Federal Secretary of War, the number of deserters in an army of 25,000 men was at least 2,100. It becomes clear to everyone what kind of army it was.
Another customs official writes of the role the U.S. military played in the development of Alaska: “Have they ever done anything praiseworthy for the region and its people? Did they support enterprise and contribute to the development of the country’s wealth? Oh no!.. they only hindered such development. Did they seek to enlighten the Indian… and raise his moral level? Leave it to the Indians themselves to bear witness.”
“The root of the evil was, of course, not in the troops themselves, but in the complete ignorance of the region and its needs, which was characteristic of the government of the United States at that time, and is equally different to this day, despite the fact that thirty-three years have passed since the acquisition of Alaska,” E.N. Matrosov rightly concludes. In 1877, the military administration of Alaska was formally lifted, But in essence, the author of the article writes, it continues to this day.
On a territory more than twice the size of any American state, Evgeny Nikolayevich continues, the right to acquire private property was not allowed and established, at least for the construction of dwellings and the arrangement of domestic settlement. Apart from the small plots of land granted by the treaty of 1867 to persons of Russian origin, not an inch of land was allotted to anyone, and the act of undisputed possession, in spite of its long-term settlement, could at any time be abolished by the military administration, and the owner removed by force from the land or from the house.
The miners of ores and valuable minerals, whose entire fortune was on the land, could not dispose of it or enter into any transactions on it, because there were no court rulings on this matter in the region. There was no mention of debt collection. There could be no administration of justice, so that notorious criminals were often not punished, and those who committed the most innocent offenses were imprisoned solely at the discretion of the military authorities. That this was a flagrant violation of the final article of the 1867 treaty and the U.S. Constitution was not worth mentioning.
This explains the fact that most Russians fled Alaska without looking back to escape the tyranny in Russia. A number of them who remained, later petitioned the Russian government to help them leave Alaska, but as the time limit for the Russian government’s interference in the observance of the treaty had expired, their request had no effect. Despite this, the captain of a Russian warship visiting Russian America was secretly conducting an investigation into the situation of the Russians in Sith.
The endless petitions of the white population for the introduction of at least minimal laws on the civil administration of the region were constantly ignored by the US Congress. Russian America turned into a country of only restrictions and prohibitions: logging and its export were banned, seal hunting was banned, leaving it in monopoly use by some industrial company, smoking of bread wine was prohibited, etc. Apart from the payment of salaries to military and customs officers, the federal government had no other obligations.
In 1881, the people of Alaska, driven out of patience by the idleness of the authorities, met in Juneau, Yuno, and elected one Motrom Ball as their representative to Congress. As expected, Ball was not admitted to Congress. The “interregnum” in Alaska continued until the Senate finally passed the Civil Administration Act in 1884. Alaska became an administrative and judicial district with the capital city of Sith, and a governor was appointed, but no law was passed to allocate land to those who wished to do so, except for the allocation of land for the extraction of coal and other minerals. The military regime was abolished, but civil administration in the full sense of the word was not introduced – they got off with half measures.
In 1888, two members of the Democratic Party were delegated from Alaska to the party’s central body, and the Republicans followed suit the following year. These delegates were able to speak in the Senate and Congress and encourage the parliamentarians to take some steps. In 1890, the Alaskans elected local steamship owner James Carroll as their representative to Congress and authorized him to push for the passage of the necessary laws in the region.
Carroll did not “spread his thoughts over the tree” and immediately made an offer to Congress: since the United States did not need Alaska, he was ready to buy it from the government at any time for $20 million. This made the congressmen think and “scratch their heads.” The next step, in 1884, was the election of an Alaskan delegate to Congress, a certain Thomas Nowell. The Alaska deputy, however, did not have time to participate in the work of the congress, since it was a short 3-month session. But the ice did break, and work on the legal development of Alaska began. If in 1890 the population of the region was only 4,300 souls, then in 10 years it reached 32 thousand. People were finally allowed to settle on the land for free, and a law of 1899 introduced normal legal proceedings. Permits were issued for smoking and the sale of bread wine. In the same year, a “gold rush” broke out in the region, and its population began to grow rapidly.
In this wave, a new reign of lawlessness and crime has emerged, and at the time of writing, Matrosov writes, Congress is working out new measures and laws to curb crime and regulate the allocation and use of land. The first and most important law was the law on the establishment of order in the trade in alcoholic beverages. Thus, Evgeny Nikolayevich writes, thanks to the presence of gold placer deposits in Alaska, the American government finally began to deal with it quite seriously. In general, the ignorance of both ordinary Americans and government officials about Alaska was so striking that, in Matrosov’s opinion, it was difficult for a normal person to understand it.
At the time of the purchase of Alaska, there was no information about its mineral wealth and gold, and the main tidbit for the industrialists of California, Oregon, and Washington was the seal fishery. A few and the most astute of them hastened to obtain a lease from the government for these industries and formed the so-called “Alaska Industrial Company” (APK) with a fixed capital of $2 million. Some Russian subjects, mainly Jews from the western Russian regions and Poland, hastened to buy up sealskins and ships, and some of them united in the company of Hutchinson, Kohl & Co., but they could not compete with the Americans. Because the “APK”, using the cover of the government, acted impudently, impudently, and there were no laws for it.
The 20-year activity of APK, which has become the most powerful company in the world, is, according to Matrosov, one continuous series of the most egregious abuses, turning into a real robbery with the reduction of the native population of the Pribylov Islands into real slaves. All congressional investigations into the company’s activities have come to nothing. In 1890, when the lease of the Pribylov Islands from the agro-industrial complex expired, Alaska was finally able to breathe a sigh of relief.
E.N. Matrosov concludes the article with an exposition of the fate to which the Indians of Alaska were subjected. Unofficially, it was still called the “Land of the Indians,” and although the U.S. Department of Internal Affairs has a Department of Indian Affairs with a huge staff of officials, nothing has been done to improve their living conditions or raise their standard of living for the “Russian Indians” of Alaska who have converted to Orthodoxy. It is not surprising, therefore, that they feel so far removed from the American government that all their eyes and hopes are directed to Russia and the Russian Czar. To a large extent, such sentiments are supported by the remaining Russian Orthodox priests there.
The “Russian Indians” have no confidence in the American authorities. When the governor of Alaska, Brodie, left for Washington, D.C., to establish a real civilian administration of the region, rumors began to spread among the local natives that the American authorities were planning to herd them all into reservations, fence them off with an iron fence, and post a guard.
E.N. Matrosov calls the natives naïve people. I think that if he had lived to a later time, he would have expressed himself differently. And these rumors had a very real basis: we know how the United States exterminated the Indian population in other regions of the country, herding them into reservations and forcing them to die of hunger. In fact, the task of the Department of Indian Affairs was to establish reservations for Indians.
As for Alaska… What can I say: what fell from the cart is lost
[1] By the way. E.A. Stoeckl did not have a baronial title, although Westerners call him a baron.