The Russians had attempted to find the mineral of the mountains, and in 1848 a Mr. Doroshin, a mining engineer, had been sent out from St. Petersburg to search for mineral wealth in the colonies. He was not successful enough to make it of profit to them, although he found coal on Cook Inlet, gold on the Kenai Peninsula, earth promising to bear diamonds near Kootznahoo, and copper was known to be on the Myednooskie, or Copper, River.
Discharged soldiers of the garrison were the first to take to the hills with pick and shovel. Nicholas Haley, an old-time prospector of Arizona, who came with the troops to Sitka, was one of the most energetic and daring of these. Year after year, with pick and shovel, with rifle and blankets, Nicholas attacked the rugged mountains. Rich specimens were brought in and yielded enough when brayed in a mortar to keep him in a grubstake, but it takes capital to develop a hard rock mine and capital was wary. So Nicholas toiled on year after year, keeping up his assessments and living on hopes until at last he passed over the Great Divide to a Better Diggings.
Others tried it. In 1878 a mining company was organized at Sitka, but there was not yet a law under which a claim could be legally taken. Ledges were found, small mills were placed on the ground at the Stewart Mine, the Lucky Chance and elsewhere, and later great fakes were promoted at the Pande Basin and elsewhere. But it was years after that when two Indian boys, hunting on Chicagof Island, lay down to drink at a stream, and, behold, in the shimmering water was white rock with yellow, glittering particles dancing in the clear stream. With the fear it was but fools gold they took specimens and marked the place where they were found. When they reached Sitka they submitted these samples to Judge DeGroff, and to Professor Kelly of the Sheldon Jackson School. It was pronounced to be gold, pure shining, yellow gold, and richer than the most sanguine had hoped for. After much labor and many disappointments the ledge was located from which the float came, and today that mine, the Chicagof it is called, is known as the richest and best paying mine in the United States in proportion to the money invested, and more than one fortune has been taken out of the tunnels in the mountain.
Off the shores of the continent, reaching far off to the westward almost to the shores of Asia are vast fishing grounds, perhaps the greatest in the world. A great submarine plateau stretches along shore, past the Aleutian Islands and into Bering Sea. There are estimated to be forty thousand square miles of cod and halibut banks that are known to the surveys. The fisheries of Gloucester and Cape Cod fade into insignificance and the famous Newfoundland Banks are but small in comparison.
Sitka goes back the farthest in historic memory of any city of the Northwest. When Lewis and Clarke came to the mouth of the Columbia River she was looking out over the Pacific from her stockaded walls and Resanof was sailing to search for locations for new colonies. When Astoria was founded she was placing her outpost on the Russian River in California. Before San Francisco was a city she sent her bidarkas to take the sea-otter from under the very noses of the Padres in their missions. Here the civilization of the East met the progress of the West, the Orient and the Occident met here and met without bloodshed. Sitka, with her wealth of fisheries in the waters at her doors, with her wealth of mineral in the ledges at her back, with the wealth of forest on the mountain slopes around her, is in the same latitude as Edinburgh, Scotland. The time is coming when she will have population, and wealth; beauty she already has. What more is wanted for the happiness of her people? Only energy, perseverance, and thrift, and those will be forthcoming.
CHAPTER IX
WHAT TO SEE
Approaching Sitka by the usual steamer route from the north at a distance of six miles the site of Old Sitka is passed. It lies to the left of the steamer track, in a small bay, and is marked by a native house which is visible from the ship. From near this place, looking to the westward, the first sight of Mount Edgecumbe is to be had between the islands. On approaching the town the ship goes through a narrow channel between Japonski Island at the right and the townsite at the left. Near the middle of the channel a rock is marked by a buoy and along the shore is the native village, or “Ranche,” with a sloping beach upon which in former days the canoes were drawn up. The paths by which they were brought from the water may be seen, marked by the rocks being thrown to each side from the track.
