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Chilkoot Pass and Great Gold Rush 1898

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Chilkoot Pass and Great Gold Rush 1898 History and Archaeology 48 3 THE CHILKOOT PASS AND THE GREAT GOLD RUSH of 1898 Richard J. Friesen National Historic Parks and Sites Branch Parks Canada Environment Canada 1981 ©Minister of Supply and Services Canada 1981. Available in Canada through authorized bookstore agents and other bookstores, or by mail from the Canadian Government Publishing Centre, Supply and Services Canada, Hull, Quebec, Canada KIA OS9. En fran~ais ce numero s'intitule Histoire et archeologie nO 48 (nO de catalogue R64-81/19Rl-48F). En vente au Canada par l'entremise de nos agents libraires agrees et aut res librairies, ou par la poste au Centre d'edition du gouvernement du Canada, Approvisionnements et Services Canada, Hull, Quebec. Canada KIA OS9. Price Canada: $7.75 Price other countries: $9.30 Price subject to change without notice. Catalogue No.: R64-81/1981-4RE ISBN: 0-660-10870-4 ISSN: 0225-0101 Published under the authority of the Hinister of the Environment, Ottawa. 1981. The opinions expressed in this report are those of the author and not necessarily those of Environment Canada. Cover: The last 1,000 feet to the summit of the Chilkoot Pass. (Public Archives Canada.) 3 THE CHILKOOT PASS AND THE GREAT GOLD RUSH OF 1898 Richard J. Friesen 5 Abstract 6 Acknowledgements 7 Discovery and Exploration of the Yukon 7 The Fur Trade 7 The Russians and the Russian American Company 8 The Tlingit Traders 10 The Hudson I s Bay Company 11 Early Prospectors Open the Country 16 Scientific Explorers Chart the Chilkoot Pass 16 Arthur Krause, Geographer and Anthropologist 17 Schwatka Begins the Legend of the Chilkoot 21 William Ogilvie, Dominion Land Surveyor 25 Gold in the Yukon, 1887-96 25 Early Prospecting 28 The Discovery 31 The Internal Rush 32 News Reaches the "Outside" 35 Routes to the Gold Fields 35 Introduction 35 St. Michael Route 36 South Alaska Routes 37 The Edmonton Trail 38 Ashcroft and Stikine Trails 40 The Gold Rush Trail, 1896-97 40 The Trails 40 The Chilkoot Pass 44 The White Pass 48 The Lakes and River 49 The Trek Through the Passes, 1896-97 49 The Chilkoot Pass, 1896 53 The Chilkoot Pass, Spring 1897 56 The Mountain Trails, Fall 1897 63 Conclusion 65 The North West Mounted Police Force in the Yukon 65 Establishment of Law and Order 66 Inspector Constantine and the Yukon in 1894 69 Staff-Sergeant Brown, 1894-95 70 Fort Constantine on the Yukon River, 1895-96 72 Pre-Rush Concerns of the Police, 1895-97 74 The Rush and ·the North West Mounted Police 74 Fort Herchmer in the Klondike Gold Fields 74 Reinforcements· Join the Rush 4 77 Fort Sifton on the Tagish River 80 Starvation in the Yukon 84 Outposts on a Disputed Border 89 The Gold Rush, 1898-99 89 The Boom at the Foot of the Trail 92 Competition for Survival 93 The Chilkoot Tramways 95 The Brackett Wagon Road 97 Railroads into the Yukon 99 The White Pass and Yukon Route 101 Steamers on the Upper Yukon 110 Conclusions 114 Endnotes 131 Bibliography 5 The rush over the Chilkoot and White passes reached its zenith in the winter of 1897-98 when an unprecedented number of goldseekers scrambled over the mountain barrier to the Klondike. Actually a place in Yukon history had been secured for the Yukon Pass long before the gold rush. A major trade route for the Tlingit Indians, the natives retained control of the Chilkoot Pass until the 1880s when the prospecting and trading activities of the Europeans and Americans dictated the necessity of a short route into the Yukon. In this study I trace the history of the Chilkoot Pass, emphasizing its important role in Yukon transportation, the great rush of 1898 and the establishment of an administrative structure after the boom period. The Chilkoot Pass played a significant role in the transportation infrastructure throughout the southwestern Yukon that would form the basis for Yukon development. Submitted for publication 1978, by Richard J. Friesen, Historical Resource Consultants, London, England. 6 In the course of preparing this manuscript on the Chilkoot trail 1 received the gracious assistance of many individuals and organizations. In particular, 1 would like to thank the archival staff of the University of Alaska, Provincial Archives of British Columbia, the National Archives in Ottawa, the Yukon Archives and the personnel at the Bancroft Library in Berkeley, California. 7 DIS<DVERi AND EXPWRATlOO OF '!HE YUKON '!he Fur Trade '!he Russians an] the Russian AIrerican Canpany The voyages and discoveries of the unfortunate Vitus Bering, a Danish naval explorer in the service of Imperial Russia, opened the door to the natural riches of North America to the Russian traders. 1 Bering died during the winter of 1742 on his second voyage of discovery, but the return of his ship, the St. Pete~, with its cargo of magnificent furs and tales of the bounty of fur-bearing animals on the islands off the North American continent was enthusiastically welcomed by the fur-hungry Russians. Russian fur hunters lost little time planning further expeditions to the new land of Alaiska (Alaska). Continued Russian exploration, and more importantly, the endless pursuit of the ever-retreating fur frontier, led the Russian hunters and traders through the Aleutian Islands to the Alaska Peninsula and southeast along the Alaskan mainland during the early 19th century. The search south into the islands of the Alexander Archipelago brought the Russians into contact with the Kolosh (Tlingit Indians), the most warlike and independent people the Russians had encountered in the eastward expansion. The Tlingit maintained a sporadic and uneasy peace with their newly acquired Russian trading partners - a peace that was marked by slaughter, rapine, retaliation and revenge on both sides. The establishment of New Archangel (Sitka) on Baranof Island in the Alexander Archipelago after 1800, its subsequent sacking by hostile Tlingits and its violent re-establishment by Count Baranof characterized the often disturbed peace. Nevertheless, Sitka developed as the headquarters of the Russian American Company. The trading company held an imperial trade monopoly over all the Russian territory in North America. This monopoly was renewed and maintained periodically, making Alaska the domain of a fur-based commercial enterprise, until its sale to the United States. Throughout the period of Russian control of Alaska, the settlements were invariably located on promentories near the mouths of rivers or on bays and generally on the extremities of the mainland, reflecting the pressing necessity of the maritime hunt and the native hostility. Relatively little attention was paid to large-scale systematic investigation of the interior. The Russians wanted furs and the other resources of Alaska were of secondary interest. Rumours of gold and the search for it, that would later consume Alaska and the Yukon, was not allowed to thwart the fur trade, although a local rush in 1850-51 to the Kenai Peninsula on the south coast of Alaska illustrated the disruptive force of a gold rush. 2 While the Russians traded with many of the northwest Indian peoples, including the various tribes of the Tlingit Indians, there is 8 no evidence to indicate that any attempt was made to penetrate the interior from southeast Alaska. Ironically the Russians located their 19th-century headquarters at Sitka less than 200 miles from the headwaters of the "Great River" Yukon which they called the Indian name Kwikhpak. 3 The ascension of the Yukon would absorb much of their time and energy in later years. The area at the head of Lynn Canal was occupied constantly from 1799 onward and as early as 1813 the Russians had established a trading post in the village of Chil'khat (Chilkat) at the foot of the Chilkat trail which led into the Yukon River valley. The Russians did not attempt to cross the mountains into British Territory or to gain access to the interior, but it is inconceivable that the Russian fur traders would have been unaware of the passes through the mountains north of Lynn Canal. 4 Their Indian trading partners carried the Russian trade goods into the interior, exchanging them with-the Indians along the Yukon River for the furs that were taken back to the Russians on the coast. In all likelihood, the Tlingit, in an attempt to safeguard their status as middlemen, refused access to the Russians who were content to have the furs brought to them, avoiding the disruption of open warfare. In 1832 the establishment of Mikkailovsky Redoubt or St. Michael In Norton Sound on the west coast of Alaska began the exploration of the Kwikhpak (Yukon) River. By 1839 the Russian traders had reached some 400 miles up the Yukon and established a block house-trading post at Nulato. Lieutenant Lavrenity Alexkseyevich Zagoskin, under orders from the chief of the Russian American Company, Baron Petrovich Wrangell, pushed 150 miles farther up the Yukon In 1842, to a point just east of Ruby, Alaska. A leaking hide boat and the swiftness of the Yukon current forced Zagoskin to abandon his hopes of exploring the Yukon to its source. 5 Instead he concentrated his efforts on charting the lesser Kushokwin River eastward into the interior. Thus the Russians managed only a superficial penetration of the vast interior of Alaska. It would be left to the British Hudson's Bay Company and to the ·Americans to unlock the secrets of the Yukon River. '!he Tlingi t Traders The Tlingit Indians controlled almost all of the Alaska panhandle and were destined to come into direct and overwhelming contact with the white culture. The period of contact, always marked by conflict, finally resulted in the devastation of the Tlingit economy.
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