Alaska has been called the final frontier, located thousands of miles away from the original
colonies of the United States and still over a thousand miles away from the Continental
US.
It, along with Hawaii, are two of the seven external territories of the United States,
yet only these two are equal in terms of the rest of the states, with the right to vote
in the Presidential election, and have representatives in the US House and Senate.
While Alaska has had a rather recent history with the US, what may be interesting to learn
is that it was colonized by a European power before the United States was even an independent
country.
What was this power you may ask?
In this video, we will be looking at the Russian colonization of Alaska.
Since the Russian independence in the 15th century, land to the east was seen by many
as a mythical place, homeland of the horse nomad, home to a secret power that great empires
held, and fur... don't forget about the fur.
Russian colonization of Siberia was a centuries long endeavor, and one that would catapult
the state to have a massive stretch of territory, even though limited population existed the
further east they claimed.
The last major expeditions of this kind, was that of Semyon Dezhnev back in 1648.
Dezhnev managed to sail around the eastern cape of Siberia, sail into the Bering strait,
and go up the Anadyr River to found an outpost.
A land-bridge between Siberia and the Americas, had been believed to have existed, and while
Dezhnev was likely very un-aware of what was discovered, he proved that no such land bridge
existed, and was the first recorded individual, to have sailed through the Bering straight.
However, the debate still raged as to whether or not a land-bridge did exist, as his discover
was not relied to the Russian government.
It wouldn't be until late 1724, when Tsar Peter the Great, once again called for expeditions.
Early next year, was the first Kamchatka expedition, headed by Vitus Bering.
This expedition, was set out to confirm if a strait existed between Asia and North America.
This he managed to accomplished and had provided useful insights into the geography of Eastern
Siberia.
In total, the expedition surveyed more than 3500 km of the sea, which was later named
after Bering.
Its maps of the area were later used by all Western European cartographers.
But Berings work was not yet done, in 1733, Peter once again called upon his services,
funding what would be known as the Great Northern Expedition.
One of the largest expeditions within all of History.
The expedition had a few goals, one being to find and map eastern Siberia, attempt to
find a northern sea route from the Pacific to the Atlantic, and, if possible, explore
the western shores of Northern America.
All total, over 3,000 individuals were involved in this expedition, and it cost the Russian
state 1.5 million rubles, one sixth of it's annual budget at the time.
That very roughly translates to around 500 million US dollars in modern currency.
This expedition, discovered Alaska to the Europeans, as well as the Aluetin islands,
four more island groups, and heavily mapped out the eastern Siberian and Kuril islands.
However, the inability for Bering to travel above the North-Eastern tip of Siberia, did
crush any dream, of a Atlantic, Pacific route, much to the dismay of Peter.
Bering himself, work completed, did not get to enjoy any reprieve.
After leaving the Alaskan coast in 1742, his ships were grounded in a storm and torn to
pieces, the crew managed to winter over on an island, but there, Bering fell ill and
died, buried, during his greatest discovery.
The survivors of his crew, managed to return a year later, bringing back with them, high
quality otter pelts, something, that interested many individuals indeed.
From 1743 on, small groups of hunters would make the three year long trek across Siberia,
and sometimes, over into Alaska.
Many of them, would settle instead somewhere along the trek, staying in the little outposts
that they made along the way.
It wouldn't be until 1774, that the first permanent settlement was established in Alaska,
that of Unalaska...
Seriously, that is it's name.
The Russians had traded with the native Aleut people on the island since the mid 1750's.
Conflict a few years later, between the native population and Russian trappers, led to a
trading post and later permanent settlement being established.
Many of the trappers enslaved the native population, and had them do the hunting instead, taking
hostages or family members to force them to hunt.
As the riches of the pelts became widely spread, competition between various Russian companies
occurred, and mass enslavement of the Aleut population followed.
With the ascension of Catherine the Great in 1763, she called for peaceful relations
with the Alaskan natives, and while some settlers were more then able to live in peaceful co-operation,
others continued the hostage and family splitting.
Leading to just a few companies controlling the entire operations within the colony.
As the animal population declined, the natives were forced into worse and worse conditions
to meet the demanded pelt quotas.
This led to a number of violent skirmishes between the natives and the Russian colonizers.
The natives did manage to secure a few victories, but these were met with heavily retaliation.
Mass murder, villages being burned, equipment being destroyed or stolen, decimated the already
weakened native population, as disease whipped out over 80% of the population by the start
of the 19th century.
The largest of these retaliations being the Awa'uq Massacre in 1784, otherwise known as
the Wounded Knee of Alaska by some later scholars.
Grigory Shelikhov, the man that essentially ran the whole Alaskan colony, ordered the
massacre after the natives resisted the construction of a settlement on Sitkalidak Island.
Initial skirmishes had the natives retreat to Refuge Rock, where upwards of over 3,000
were slaughtered, since then, the island, even to modern day, lacks a permanent population.
This act of brutality, was too much for many chiefs, who surrendered to the Russians thereafter.
Nevertheless, native resistance was strong in some areas until 1804, when the last major
battle took place, that being at the battle of Sitka.
Even with the natives largely quelled, the Russians never fully colonized Alaska, sticking
instead to the coast and shunning the interior.
But, by this time, the downfall of the colony was inevitable.
It was never particularly profitable in the first place, and the fact that supply ships
from the home country only arrived every few years to drop off provisions, made the colony
extremely dependent on American and British food and material.
Both of whom, were eventually able to cut into the already meager profits of the pelt
trade.
Even still, an ukase, or claim of sovereignty, was proclaimed in 1821, claiming all of Alaska
and most of the Pacific Northwest as Russian territory, with all trading with foreign vessels
prohibited.
Only once was this claim of sovereignty actually enforced, when a Russian sloop captured an
American merchant vessel, but after protest from Washington, the ship was released.
The demand of no foreigners was quickly put to the wayside though, as once again, the
colonists needed the materials desperately from the American populace, and they were
running out of ways to pay.
The British Hudson Bay company was leased southern Alaska in 1839 in return for provisions
and materials, while the Americans were given hunting rights for the same resources.
By the 1860s, the Russian government was ready to abandon its American colony.
Zealous over-hunting had severely reduced the fur-bearing animal population.
This, combined with the difficulties of supplying and protecting such a distant colony, as shown
by the recent Crimean War, reduced interest in the territory.
After the Union victory in the American Civil War, an offer was once again extended to the
Americans for the purchase of Alaska.
Secretary of state William H. Seward, viewed this as a golden opportunity to distract people
from the tensions back at home, as many in the congress were heavily debating the course
for reconstruction, and the Johnson's administration had alienated many in their own party.
The negations were completed after a long-night, with the US purchasing Alaska for 7.2 million
dollars, or two cents an acre.
Seward and many other Americans believed that Asia would become an important market for
the country's products, and expected that Alaska would serve as a base for American
trade with Asia as well as heavily boost American power in the pacific, also, British Colombia
now stood largely surrounded by American territory, and many were eyeing the land, as something
that the US would take soon in the future.
The treaty of purchase passed the United States Senate with 37 votes for, 2 against.
Most newspapers and a fair number of the public were in support or at least neutral of the
purchase, some did consider it a folly, or little more then an Ice-box.
But others saw the potential value in the animal and lumber trade, with hunting still
being the main-stay of the Alaskan economic output until the Klondik Gold Rush in 1896,
in which over 100,000 people traveled to the so-called icebox in search of fortune.
But that, is where the story of the Russian colony ends.