The Saline County journal. [volume] (Salina, Kan.) 1871-1893, 1879-05-15
SITKA, PAST AND PRESENT.

The Gentle Of . Once Valuable Commerce
Reduced to Wreck and Wrstehedness.
Carespondsncs Of the n. 7. Herald.
Sitka was once proud city, the center
of valuable commerce, the headquarters
of all that was great in name and fortune
in the Russo-American possessions. In
the zenith of the Romanof dominion the
Indians were ruled with a rod Of iron, and
the death dealing missiles of artillery and
musketry peering through the stockade
that separated the red man from the whites
we're the only reliable guarantees OF peace
between the conQuerers and the conquer
ed. Once in the distant past, when the
Indians were in the infancy Of experience
with civilization, and before their physi-
cal natures were Frustrated by corruption
they arose in savage wlath and wiped out
tbs Russians in old Archangela few miles
north of this. With little else to occupy
their mental faculties the traditionaly
grandeur of that event has ma2ni6ed from
decade to decade, naturally leaving in the
Indian mind the impression that the white
man is only his superior by being in the
possession of better arms OF destruction.
The savage does not forget any event that
favors or fatters him more than do other
people, and that he should indulge in his
own Fourth of July buncombe speeches
when under the exilarat,ng potatiOus Of
hootchenoo should not be surprising to this
mixed-up community Of nationalities called
the citizens ofSitka. During the latter &C.
cupancy of Sitka by the Russians there was
labor for the Russian, the half-bIeed, and
q market 70. the products Of the Indian
chase. Whatever its character might
have been, there was bread enough for
the willing worker, and to that extent con-
tentment and comparative comfort. The
United States dozen years ago purchased
this whilom Russian possession and an
other class of circumstances follow in the
wake Of the change. For a time por-
ton of the citizens, not all of them, found
more remune, alive employment than be-
fore, but the distinctive character oil
Sitka's past reliable business was trans
ferred to the islands of st. George and st.
Paul, in Behring sea, and the Aleutian is
lands, westward from here 500 to Loo
miles. Every vestige Of the Russian
American Fur company has departed from
Sitka, and the Alaska Commercial Ful
company, its American successor, has MOI
lnow the interest OF dollar where onct
hundreds of thousands marked the annua
) tide of commerce. What now remains o
|; the pleasant past is the wreck and wretch
edness of impotent dependence every
where visible on the street and in tn
novels OF the unfortunate Russian popu
lation who elected to remain here whel
f, Alaska was politically clested portion O
! the United States-an Indian population
shorn of native plowess, welteriDg by thei
. seashore village in filthy degradation
E while their ca:casses are permeated wit
irremedial diseases, contracted from assc
Citations with more favored race. Be
sides these, there is an English-speak.ne
J native American and uaturalized Amer
: can population Of various occupations an
: callings-men, women and children-ina
70 souls. This is the Sitka that calls fC
i the armed protection Of the government.