Naval actions in 19th century Southeast Alaska

Alaska history is in the news in the past couple days, opening some of the deep wounds of Alaska Natives.  On Thursday in Kake, a Tlingit village of around 500 on Kupreanof Island in Southeast Alaska, Air Force bomb demolition experts arrived to dispose of a shell.  It had been fired by the US naval ship Saginaw in 1869.  The village was shelled and the crew of the Saginaw burned and pillaged much.  The shell had been discovered in a tree trunk around 1940, and had been an open secret in Kake and served as a history lesson about the 1869 attack.  Word got out this week, and a demolitions team went to the village.  Many in Kake feared the government was trying to take away what is considered a part of their heritage.  Calls to State and US Senators allowed that the shell will remain in private care and be returned once diffused.  Villagers hope it opens up discussions with the US government about compensation for the shelling.

The news recalls a difficult time in Alaska's history that led to the end of direct US military rule.  Following the purchase of Alaska from Russia in 1867, Alaska was organized as the Department of Alaska, run directly by the US Army.  Incidents broke out almost immediately between the US military and the Alaska Native inhabitants.  This incident in Kake occurred when the navy killed an Alaska Native from Kake in a scuffle.  The Natives in return killed two miners on Admiralty Island.  In reply, the Saginaw sailed from Sitka and bombarded Kake and small camps nearby.  No one was killed, but the village was not largely inhabited again for many years.  The Saginaw sailed to Hawaii, where in 1870 it struck a reef and sank.  The wreckage was found by divers in 2003.  

USS Saginaw

 

This incident was followed up a little over a decade later with a more infamous incident.  In 1882, an Alaska Native crewmember from Angoon was killed in an accident aboard a whaling ship.  Angoon demanded reparations in the form of blankets.  The navy responded by shelling the village, as well as setting fires.  Angoon effectively was destroyed, it's residents homeless and without supplies for the long winter.  Many people in the rest of America felt the navy had acted too rash in the bombardment.  Two years later, Congress passed the Alaska Organic Act of 1884, ending 17 years of direct military rule.  Angoon would wait until 1973 for a $90,000 settlement from the US government.

Reactions to the prospect of the shell being confiscated shows how sore the issues regarding the bombardment still are among the Alaska Natives in Southeast.  It proved to many at the time that the US military was not there to protect them, but to suppress them.  The mistrust has lingered to this day among many Alaska Native peoples who view the United States as an occupier rather than a homeland.

Presidents Day

Today is Presidents Day, the holiday started originally as George Washington's birthday.  It got me thinking about the role of US Presidents in Alaska history.  In general, Alaska has been a backwater of presidential politics.  Never more than three electoral votes, it has been solidly in the Republican column since statehood in 1959 (the only Democrat to win Alaska was LBJ in 1964).  This has made it so that campaign visits by presidential candidates are almost unheard of.  In 1960, Vice President Richard Nixon had vowed to campaign in all 50 states.  Many historians question his choice of campaigning in Alaska during October during a close campaign, arguing his time would have been better spent in close states like Illinois or Texas.  After that, Alaska did not so much as sniff presidential politics until the selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as VP nominee in 2008.

Though not on the radar for presidential politics, US Presidents have had a role in Alaska history.  After the Alaska Purchase, the new land was largely ignored in Washington and directly administered by the US military.  Future President Benjamin Harrison helped push Alaska into civil administration with the Organic Act of 1884.  The Act termed Alaska a District, not a territory.  The civil laws would be the same as Oregon, the nearest state (Washington was still a territory).  The US President would have great powers in appointing Alaska officials up until Statehood.

It would not be until the 20th century that Alaska really began to garner interest in Washington.  In the early part of the century, interest grew in improving the transportation infrastrucure in Alaska.  After the failure of private attempts to build a railroad from the southern coast to Fairbanks,  congress passed the second Organic Act in 1912.  One provision stated that the president the authority to decide on the railroad routes in Alaska.  It fell to Woodrow Wilson to make the decision.  In the end he decided on the line running from Seward up through Cook Inlet and the MatSu valley to Fairbanks.  An outgrowth of this line was the railroad camp at the Ship Creek anchorage that became the town of Anchorage.  Eventually, President Warren Harding became the first president to visit Alaska when he arrived to drive in the golden spike signifying completion of the railroad.  The federal government would own the Alaska railroad until the 1980s. 

 Harding driving the Golden Spike

During the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Alaska saw great changes.  Farmers from poverty stricken areas were settled in the MatSu valley.  Alaska saw great growth in the military presence in the construction of bases and the highway to quickly move equipment from the lower 48.  In 1944 after the Japanese had been expelled from Alaska territory, FDR toured the Naval bases in the Aleutians.  Harry Truman supported Alaska statehood, but all efforts stalled in the US Senate.  It was during Dwight Eisenhower's term that Alaska achieved the statehood goal.  Ironically, Eisenhower has some reluctance due to the impression that Alaska would become a Democratic State.

Eisenhower parades through Anchorage 1960

Since statehood, the US president has had less opportunity to explicitly dictate terms in Alaska and the action has shifted more to Congress.  Still, there continues to be an uneasy relationship between state and federal rights.  The large amount of Federal land within the State of Alaska gives Presidential cabinet members a large amount of power to set policy in Alaska with regards to oil leases, mining, and fishing.  The changes in policy with each administration lends itself to calls for more state control.  It is a friction that will likely continue for future presidents. 

Reagan met the Pope in Fairbanks in 1984 when both were in the middle of world trips