[78] It is proper to remark, that Atlassoff sent an advanced party, under the command of a subaltern, called Lucas Moloskoff, who certainly penetrated into Kamtschatka, and returned with an account of his success before Atlassoff set out, and is therefore not unjustly mentioned as the discoverer of Kamtschatka.
This person was sent, in the year 1697, from the fort Jakutzk to the Anadirsk, in the quality of commissary, with instructions to call in the assistance of the Koriacs, with a view to the discovery of countries beyond theirs, and to the subjecting them to a tribute. In 1699, he penetrated, with about sixty Russian soldiers, and the same number of Cossacks, into the heart of the peninsula; gained the Tigil; and from thence levying a tribute in furs, in his progress crossed over to the river Kamtschatka, on which he built the higher Kamtschatka ostrog, called Verchnei, where he left a garrison of sixteen Cossacks, and returned to Jakutzk in 1700, with an immense quantity of rare and valuable tributary furs. These he had the good sense and policy to accompany to Moscow; and, in recompence for his services, was appointed commander of the fort of Jakutzk, with farther orders to repair again to Kamtschatka; having first drawn from the garrison at Tobolsk a reinforcement of a hundred Cossacks, with ammunition, and whatever else could give efficacy to the completion and settlement of his late discoveries. Advancing with this force toward the Anadirsk, he fell in with a bark on the river[79] Tunguska. laden with Chinese merchandize, which he pillaged; and, in consequence of a remonstrance from the sufferers to the Russian court, he was seized upon at Jakutzk, and thrown into prison.
[79] This river empties itself into the Jenesei.
In the mean time, Potop Serioukoff, who had been left by Atlassoff, kept peaceable possession of the garrison of Verchnei; and though he had not a sufficient force to compel the payment of a tribute from the natives, yet, by his management and conciliating disposition, he continued to carry on an advantageous traffic with them as a merchant. On his return to the Anadirsk, with the general good-will of the natives of Kamtschatka, himself and party were attacked by the Koriacs, and unfortunately all cut off. This happened about 17O3; and several other successive commissaries were sent into Kamtschatka, with various success, during the disgrace and trial of Atlassoff.
In 1706, Atlassoff was reinstated in his command, and appointed to conduct a second expedition into Kamtschatka, with instructions to gain upon the natives by all peaceable means, but on no pretence to have recourse to force and compulsion; but, instead of attending to his orders, he not only, by repeated acts of cruelty and injustice, made the natives exceedingly hostile and averse to their new governors, but likewise so far alienated the affections of his own people, that it ended in a mutiny of the Cossacks, and their demand of another commander. The Cossacks having carried their point, in displacing Atlassoff, seized upon his effects; and, after once tasting the sweets of plunder, and of living without discipline or controul, in vain did his successors attempt to reduce them to military discipline and subjection. Three successive commanders were assassinated in their turn; and the Cossacks being thus in open rebellion to the Russian government, and with arms in their hands, were let loose upon the natives. The history of this country from that period, till the grand revolt of the Kamtschadales in 1731, presents one unvaried detail of massacres, revolts, and savage and sanguinary rencounters between small parties, from one end of the peninsula to the other.
What led to this revolt, was the discovery of a passage from Okotzk to the Bolchoireka, which was first made by Cosmo Sokoloff, in the year 1715. Hitherto the Russians had no entrance into the country but on the side of Anadirsk; so that the natives had frequent opportunities of both plundering the tribute, as it was carried by so long a journey out of the peninsula, and harassing the troops in their march into it. But by the discovery of this communication, there existed a safe and speedy means, as well of exporting the tribute, as of importing the troops and military stores into the very heart of the country; which the natives easily saw gave the Russians so great an advantage, as must soon confirm their dominion, and therefore determined them to make one grand and immediate struggle for their liberty. The moment resolved upon for carrying their designs into execution, was when Beering should have set sail, who was at this time on the coast with a small squadron, and had dispatched all the troops that could well be spared from the country, to join Powloutski, in an expedition against the Tschutski. The opportunity was well chosen; and it is altogether surprising, that this conspiracy, which was so general, that every native in the peninsula is said to have had his share in it, was at the same time conducted with such secrecy, that the Russians had not the smallest suspicion that any thing hostile to their interests was in agitation. Their other measures were equally well taken. They had a strong body in readiness to cut off all communication with the fort Anadirsk; and the eastern coast was likewise lined with detached parties, with a view of seizing on any Russians that might by accident arrive from Okotzk. Things were in this state, when the commissary Cheekhaerdin marched from Verchnei with his tribute, escorted by the troops of the fort, for the mouth of the Kamtschatka river, where a vessel was lying to convey them to the Anadir. Besides waiting for the departure of Beering, the revolt was to be suspended till this vessel should be out at sea, notice of which was to be given to the different chiefs. Accordingly, the moment she was out of sight, they began to massacre every Russian and Cossack that came in their way, and to set fire to their houses. A large body ascended the river Kamtschatka; made themselves masters of the fort and ostrog the commissary had just quitted; put to death all that were in it, and, except the church and the fort, reduced the whole to ashes. Here it was that they first learned that the Russian vessel, in which the commissary had embarked, was still on the coast, which, determined them to defend themselves in the fort. The wind fortunately soon brought the vessel back to the harbour; for had she proceeded in her voyage, nothing probably could have prevented the utter extirpation of the Russians. The Cossacks finding, on their landing, that their houses had been burnt to the ground, and their wives and children either massacred or carried off prisoners, were enraged to madness. They marched directly to the fort, which they attacked with great fury, and the natives as resolutely defended, till at length the powder-magazine taking fire, the fort was blown up, together with most of those that were in it. Various rencounters succeeded to this event, in which much blood was spilled on both sides. At length, two of the principal leaders being slain, and the third, (after dispatching his wife and children, to prevent their falling into the enemy's hand,) having put an end to himself, peace was established.
From that period every thing went on very peaceably till the year 1740, when a few Russians lost their lives in a tumult, which was attended with no farther consequences; and, except the insurrection at Bolcheretsk, in 1770, (which, has been already noticed,) there has been no disturbance since.
Though the quelling the rebellion of 1731 was attended with the loss of a great number of inhabitants, yet I was informed that the country had recovered itself, and was become more populous than ever, when, in the year 1767, the small-pox, brought by a soldier from Okotzk, broke out among them for the first time, marking its progress with ravages not less dreadful than the plague, and seeming to threaten their entire extirpation. They compute that near twenty thousand died of this disorder in Kamtschatka, the Koreki country, and the Kurile Islands. The inhabitants of whole villages were swept away. Of this we had sufficient proofs before our eyes. There are no less than eight ostrogs scattered about the bay of Awatska, all which, we were informed, had been fully inhabited, but are now entirely desolate, except Saint Peter and Saint Paul; and even that contains no more than seven Kamtschadales, who are tributary. At Paratounca ostrog there are but thirty-six native inhabitants, men, women, and children, which, before it was visited by the small-pox, we were told contained three hundred and sixty. In our road to Bolcheretsk, we passed four extensive ostrogs, with not an inhabitant in them. In the present diminished state of the natives, with fresh supplies of Russians and Cossacks perpetually pouring in, and who intermix with them by marriage, it is probable, that in less than half a century there will be very few of them left. By Major Behm's account, there are not now more than three thousand who pay tribute, the Kurile islanders included.[80]
[80] Captain Krusenstern informs us, that the people in Kamtschatska, and more especially the Kamtschadales, are decreasing in number very rapidly, and from different causes. They are subject to several epidemic complaints; one of which, he says, carried off upwards of five thousand persons in the years 1800 and 1801. But the principal causes of depopulation, which, if not speedily removed, threaten the total extinction of the inhabitants, are not dependent on the severity, or even any peculiar maladies of the climate. It is to the excessive use of spirits, and an extraordinary disproportion in the number of females, that this serious evil is to be chiefly imputed. The great moral defect in the character of the native Kamtschadale, is his propensity to drunkenness; in which, it will readily be believed, he finds companions amongst his neighbours; and in which, still more unfortunately, he is absolutely encouraged, for the most fraudulent purposes, by the petty agents of the American Company, and the other merchants in Kamtschatka. Nothing can be more infamous than what is related by Krusenstern on this subject. Let the following description suffice. It is applied by K. indeed to a state of matters which formerly existed without controul, but which the government, he would have us believe, has lately endeavoured to destroy. How far this interference has availed, or is likely to avail, may be conjectured, though not without some very painful emotions, from the circumstance admitted by K. himself, that there are few Kamtschadales remaining on whom its benefits can operate; and the opinion he has also given, that before many years have elapsed, these few will perhaps have entirely disappeared. "With no other wares," says this candid man, "than a large quantity of very bad gin, the merchants travelled about the country to procure furs. As soon as one of them arrived in an ostrog, he treated his host with a glass of spirits. The Kamtschadales are all so unfortunately attached to strong liquors, that it is absolutely impossible for them to resist the pleasure of getting intoxicated. As soon as he has drank a glass of gin, which he receives for nothing, he instantly begs another, for which, however, he must pay; then a second, a third, and so on. Still, however, he has had his spirits unadulterated; but the moment he begins to be intoxicated, instead of pure spirits, they give it him mixed with water; and in order that the deception may be carried on with the more security, the merchants have the vessels, destined for the spirits, called fliäga, divided into two parts; in the smaller one of which they carry their unmixed spirits, and in the other the mixed. The merchant now continues to ply the Kamtschadale with the weaker liquor, until he becomes perfectly senseless, and then takes possession of his whole stock of sables and other furs, alleging, that they are to pay for the quantity of spirits which he has drank. Thus, in an unfortunate moment, the Kamtschadale loses the reward of many months labour and cost; and, instead of providing himself with powder and shot, and other necessary and indispensable articles, such as would have contributed to his own and his family's comfort, he has exhausted all his wealth for one debauch, which only weakens him, and renders him more helpless and destitute for the future. This wretchedness is accompanied by a depression of spirits, which must have a pernicious influence on his body, already weakened by disease, and which, at length, from the total want of substantial food, and of medical assistance, becomes unable to resist such frequent attacks upon it. This appears to me the cause of their annual decrease, assisted by epidemical disorders, which sweep them off in great numbers." But another cause has been assigned in addition to this very deplorable one, and this it may now be necessary to specify a little more particularly. Let the words of the same writer be taken in evidence, and we may say we have very little reason indeed to give ourselves any concern about the condition of the people in this distant settlement.--"The prospect of any increase of the inhabitants of Kamtschatka was very much diminished, not only by the smallness of the number of the remaining Russians and Kamtschadales, but by that of the women bearing no kind of proportion to the men. At Saint Peter and Saint Paul, where the number of inhabitants, including the military, amounts to one hundred and fifty, or one hundred and eighty persons, there are not five-and-twenty females. It frequently happens, that the company's ships and transports winter here, and the number of men is often increased to five hundred; while, on the other hand, that of the women remains always the same. The consequences of this pernicious disproportion are unproductive marriages, and a total decline of all morals. I do not remember to have seen more than five or six children at Kamtschatka, and these partly belonged to the officers, and partly to such of the inhabitants as had distinguished themselves by their exemplary conduct. All the marriages, with the exception of three or four, were entirely unproductive." It is almost needless to remark, that if the suggestions which Krusenstern has given, have not been adopted and acted on, the superiority of the diminishing agents will have wrought such an effect since his visit, as may render it problematical whether or not this country ought to be reckoned amongst the inhabited regions of the earth.--E.
I understood that there are at this time, of the military, in the five forts of Nichnei, Verchnei, Tigil, Bolcheretsk, and Saint Peter and Saint Paul, about four hundred Russians and Cossacks, and near the same number at Ingiga, which, though to the north of the peninsula, is, I learned, at present under the commander of Kamtschatka; to these may be added the Russian traders and emigrants, whose numbers are not very considerable.