"On the highest point of Whale Island, which is a steep islet just offshore near the present village of St. Michael, were the ruins of a kashim and of several houses. The St. Michael people told me that this place was destroyed, long before the Russians came, by a war party from below the Yukon mouth. The sea has encroached upon the islet until a portion of the land formerly occupied by the village has been washed away. The permanently frozen soil at this place stopped us at the depth of about 2 feet. Here, and at another ancient Unalit village site which was examined superficially, we found specimens of bone and ivory carvings which were very ancient, as many of them crumbled to pieces on being exposed.
"Along the lower Yukon are many indications of villages destroyed by war parties. According to the old men these parties came from Askinuk and Kushunuk, near the Kuskokwim, as there was almost constant warfare between the people of these two sections before the advent of the Russians.
"Both the fur traders and the Eskimo claim that there are a large number of house sites on the left bank of the Yukon,[56] a few miles below Ikogmut. This is the village that the Yukon Eskimo say had 35 kashims, and there are many tales relating to the period when it was occupied. At the time of my Yukon trips this site was heavily covered with snow, and I could not see it; but it would undoubtedly well repay thorough excavation during the summer months. One of the traditions is that this village was built by people from Bristol Bay, joined by others from Nunivak Island and Kushunuk. One informant said that a portion of this village was occupied up to 1848, when the last inhabitant died of smallpox, but whether or not this is true I was unable to learn.
"Another informant told me that near the entrance of Goodnews Bay, near the mouth of the Kuskokwim, there is a circular pit about 75 feet in diameter, marking the former site of a very large kashim. A few miles south of Shaktolik, near the head of Norton Sound, I learned of the existence of a large village site. Both the Eskimo and the fur traders who told me of this said that the houses had been those of Shaktolik people, and that some of them must have been connected by underground passageways, judging from the ditch-like depressions from one to the other along the surface of the ground. The Shaktolik men who told me this said that there were many other old village sites about there and that they were once inhabited by a race of very small people who have all disappeared.
"From the Malemut of Kotzebue Sound and adjacent region I learned that there are many old village sites in that district. Many of these places were destroyed by war parties of Tinné from the interior, according to the traditions of the present inhabitants.
"On Elephant Point, at the head of the Kotzebue Sound, I saw the site of an old village, with about 15 pits marking the locations of the houses. The pits sloped toward the center and showed by their outlines that the houses had been small and roughly circular, with a short passageway leading into them, the entire structure having been partly underground.
"The Eskimo of East Cape, Siberia, said that there were many old village sites along the coast in that vicinity. These houses had stone foundations, many of which are still in place. There is a large ruined village of this kind near the one still occupied on the cape.
"On the extreme point of Cape Wankarem, and at its greatest elevation, just above the present camp of the Reindeer Chukchi, a series of three sites of old Eskimo villages were found."
To this, on pages [269] et seq., Nelson adds an account of the villages that "died" on St. Lawrence Island during the winter of 1879-80. Capt. C. L. Hooper, in the "Cruise of the Corwin in 1881, Notes and Observations" (published in Washington, 1884, p. 100) gives the date as 1878-79, and adds further details about these villages.