Meanwhile the river has been visited by both the English and the Americans. In 1847 Mr. Bell, of the Hudson Bay Co., having heard of the great stream from some of the Indians who visited the fort on Peels River, set out in quest of it, accompanied by a native guide, and reached it by the Rat and the Porcupine Rivers.[16]
Between 1843 and 1867 the river in its lower and middle reaches is freely traversed by the Russian traders. In 1851 Nulato is reached by Lieutenant Barnard, of H. M. S. Enterprise, in search of Franklin, only to be massacred there with some of the Russians and natives by the offended Indians of the Koyukuk. In 1861 Robert Kennicott traverses a part of the Yukon, and in 1865 he, with Capt. Charles S. Bulkley, leads there the expedition of the Western Union Telegraph Co., which is accompanied by William H. Dall and Frederick Whymper, and results in much information. Already, however, in 1863, Strahan Jones, commander of the Peels River Fort, has descended the Yukon to the mouth of the Novitna River or the uppermost point reached by Zagoskin, thus completing its identification as one and the same great stream. This point and the Tanana mark the westernmost penetration by the English (the Hudson Bay Co.).
In 1865 begin American explorations proper. In that year, under an agreement with the Russians, Maj. Robert Kennicott, heading a party of the Western Union Telegraph explorers, crosses from St. Michael to Nulato. Kennicott dies in Nulato a year later, but the explorations are carried on to result eventually in a series of valuable publications, more particularly by Dall and Whymper.[17]
The researches under the auspices of the Western Union Telegraph Co., themselves backed by the Government, are followed by explorations under the direct auspices of the American Government. Thus, in 1869 there is a reconnaissance of the river by Capt. C. W. Raymond; in 1883, that by Lieut. Frederick Schwatka; in 1885 by Lieut. Henry T. Allen; in 1898 by Capt. W. P. Richardson; and these are succeeded by the geological surveys of A. H. Brooks and companions.[18]
From 1878 on commenced placer and mining explorations for gold in Alaska leading gradually to the eventual great gold rush of the later nineties, which brought a whole flotilla of large river steamers and other craft to the Yukon and led to a rapid growth of some of the old and the establishment of a number of new settlements along its banks. The rash passed in turn, many of the miners and others departed, boats became idle and were beached or taken to the St. Michael ship "bone yard," where, together with most of the buildings, they are now (1926) being broken up; and the Yukon has reverted in a large measure to its former primeval, dormant, lonely state.
Such, in brief, is the white man's history of the Yukon, with all of which the river remains but half known, at best. It has never been fully surveyed, which would be a vast and unending task. It contains a large number of barely known little tributaries that are lost in the jungle-covered flats with their many pools and lakes. It has innumerable islands and channels, in which the traveler is easily lost, and it cuts and builds constantly during the open season. Its valley is squally and rainy. The stream may one moment be like a great, liquid, softly flowing mirror, to be in a few minutes churned into an ugly and dangerous roughness from which every smaller boat must seek shelter. Its shores are inhospitable, except for the native fisherman and hunter, and torment man with swarms of gnats and mosquitoes.
But there is no malaria; no snakes or other poisonous things. And when the weather is decent the water, the wooded shores, and the fresh, clean virginal parklike islands have a greatness and charm that compensate for much. Besides which there is the still more intensive allure of original exploration. Botany, zoology, and above all paleontology, find here still a fruitful field, while for anthropology, and especially archeology, the land is still largely a terra incognita.
FOOTNOTES:
[15] There is some confusion about the exact date of Glazunof's journey, partly due perhaps to the fact that he started on Dec. 30. Wrangell (Stat. and Ethnog. Nachricht., 138) says that Glazunof's expedition was outfitted the same year (1833) in which the St. Michael redoubt was established. In Zeleny's abstract of Zagoskin's report (p. 212) and by Zagoskin himself (pp. 6, 23) the departure of the expedition is put a year later, or 1834, which is probably correct. Dall's remarks (Alaska and Its Resources, 276, 338) on the subject contain several errors, both of dates and facts. There is also considerable confusion as to the names Kvikhpak and Yukon. The term Kvikhpak (Kvikh, river; pak, large) is of Eskimo origin and was applied by these to that part of the river which they occupied. The name Yukon, or something near this, is of Indian derivation and was applied to those parts of the river, below Tanana at least, that were peopled by the Khotana or Indians.
[16] Richardson, J., Arctic Searching Expedition, London, 1851, II, 206.