Alaska (53 page)

As the rumored accusations of thievery intensified, he appeared infrequently in public and when he did he moved furtively, as if he realized that people in the settlement were speculating as to when he would be thrown into irons and bundled aboard the Muscovy

for return to Russia in disgrace. Lieutenant Captain Ermelov did nothing to defuse these rumors; indeed, he encouraged them, waiting for the day when he could inform the man who would come out from St. Petersburg to replace Baranov: 'I think we have a case against him. We'll be leaving for Russia promptly.'

During this time, an American ship put in to Sitka Sound, where it traded openly with rum and guns, now that Baranov no longer had the energy to combat this evil traffic. Then the ship sailed north to the remote settlement in which Kot-leran and his aide Ravenheart continued to collect rifles against the day when they could once more attack the Russians. But now when they learned from the Americans that their old foe Baranov was being shipped back to Russia in disgrace, they decided they had one last score to settle with the old man, and as soon as the ship departed, these two who had fought

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Baranov so assiduously climbed into a canoe and started paddling south to meet for the last time with their adversary.

They were spotted from a distance as they came into the island-studded sound, and as they glided resolutely through the myriad islands, word flashed through the capital that Tlingits in war dress were approaching the hill, and everyone who could rushed down to the waterfront, where with great dignity the two warriors were approaching the landing. When they were close enough for their identity to be established, a wild cry surged through the settlement: 'Kot-le-an is back! Here comes Ravenheart!'

And Baranov himself came down the eighty steps that separated his house from the shore, ignoring those who fell back to whisper about him and going directly to where the canoe was being pulled ashore.

As soon as Ravenheart stepped on dry land he halted, raised his right hand, and launched into a ten-minute oration delivered in a deep, thundering voice. The highlights of his message were memorable:

'Chief Warrior Baranov, builder of forts, burner of forts, your two enemies who destroyed your fort to the north, who lost our fort down here, greet you. In all our battles, you were toion. You fought well. You behaved with generosity when you won. You have given our people who live beyond the palisade a good life. Manager Baranov, we salute you.'

With, this, the two warriors, still big and powerful, moved forward to embrace their old enemy, and after warmly welcoming them, Baranov suggested: 'Let us climb the hill together,' and there on the porch of his hilltop house these three good men who were losing so much surveyed the noble theater in which they had played out their tragedy. 'Up there's the fort we drove you out of,' said Ravenheart, explaining how he had scouted the defenses while smoking salmon. 'And down there's the fort you Tlingits thought could not be taken,' Baranov said, and Kot-le-an surprised them both by saying: 'My heart broke when your cannon shattered our totem, because then I knew we had lost.'

They shared the saddest reversals an older man can know, the loss of dreams, and that evening dusk fell with a heavy sadness, but it was relieved somewhat when Baranov left them for a moment to fetch a most surprising gift.

Retiring to his room, he tied on his wig as ceremony required, placed about his neck the medal proclaiming his nobility, and lifted from a wooden trunk a bulky article in which he-took considerable pride. It was the wood-and-326

leather suit of armor which he had worn when marching against the Tlingit fort. Holding it forth in both arms, he approached Kot-le-an and said: 'Bold Chieftain,' but then his voice broke. For some moments he stood in the growing dark, striving to control his tears, and as his shoulders trembled his wig bobbed up and down, so that he was about as ridiculous as any make-believe commodore could be. Finally he controlled himself, but he dared not trust his voice, so in silence and with a kind of love for these men who had proved so valiant he handed them his armor, even though he had good reason to believe that at some future date, after he was gone, they would come storming back to try once more to destroy the Russians.

IN DISGRACE AND THREATENED WITH PRISON WHEN HE

reached St. Petersburg except that Father Vasili Voronov had volunteered to travel at his own expense to the capital to defend his friend from the insane charges lodged against -himBaranov left Sitka Sound a prisoner aboard a Russian warship, which wandered across the Pacific to Hawaii, whose wondrous islands he had almost brought into the Russian Empire, and then down to the unlikely port of Batavia in Java. Here, in one of the hottest, most feverish outposts of the Pacific, he was kept penned up aboard ship, until his frail body collapsed in final surrender.

He died on 16 April 1819 near the strait which separates Java from Sumatra, and almost immediately the sailors weighted him with iron, tied his beloved medal about his neck, and tossed him into the ocean.

Three men of noble bearing had wrestled with the Pacific Ocean and all had perished in their attempt. In 1741, Vitus Bering died of scurvy on a forlorn island in the sea named after him. In 1779, James Cook was slain on a remote beach in Hawaii. And in 1819, Aleksandr Baranov died of exhaustion and fever near Sunda Strait. They had loved the great ocean, had conquered it in part, had been destroyed by it, and had been consigned in death to the vast, consoling sea.

Baranov was not a great man and sometimes, as in his enslavement of the Aleuts, not even a good man. But he was a man of honor, and in the Alaska he molded his memory would always be revered.

IN 1829, TEN YEARS AFTER THE DEATH OF BARANOV, THE

old warship Muscovy put in to Sitka Sound, bringing as passenger from St. Petersburg a bright-eyed young university

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graduate who was returning to his home island after a course of study in which he had distinguished himself. This was in the time when his father's friend, Kyril Zhdanko, served as the interim chief administrator, a notable appointment in that he was the first Creole to occupy that powerful position. The returning young man was Arkady Voronov, himself a Creole as the son of the Russian priest and the Aleut convert Sofia Kuchovskaya. Twenty-eight years old, he came with an appointment as assistant manager of trade affairs and with a passionate attachment to a young woman he had met during a visit to Moscow. So, after greeting his parents with the affection that had always marked his relationship to them, he paid his respects to Chief Administrator Zhdanko and then repaired to his room in the priest's quarters next to St. Michael's Cathedral, the little wooden church with the big onion dome and the pretentious name.

There, as soon as his bags were stowed, he wrote to his beloved back in Moscow: My darling Praskovia,

The voyage was simpler than the others had predicted. Five easy months, with a halt at the Cape and another in Hawaii, where I had expected to find many friends from Baranov's day. Alas, they are now our enemies because of errors made by others, and I'm afraid we've lost our chance to make those islands part of our empire.

Sitka Sound is as beautiful as I remembered it, and I long for the day when you stand here beside me enjoying its majesty of islands and mountains and lovely volcano.

Please, please convince your parents that it is safe to make the trip, which really isn't so long, and then to live here in what's becoming a major city.

I have given your silhouette in its ivory frame the place of honor on my table, the first item to be unpacked, and I am now hastening to the offices of The Company to acquire data on New Archangel so that your parents can be reassured that it is a real city and not merely an outpost in the wilderness. I shall resume this letter before I go to bed.

When young Voronov left the cathedral and climbed the hill to the castle, where Zhdanko waited to instruct him as to his duties, he saw all about him the signs of a bustling town, not a city as he had described it to Praskovia, but a prosperous 328

settlement which no longer depended solely on furs for its wealth. In one direction he saw the tall windmill that operated a grist mill; in another, the smoking fires where fat from various sea animals was being rendered for soap. There was a walk for spinning rope, a smithy for forging varieties of gear, a boilermaker who made his own rivets, a foundry for casting bronze, and all sorts of carpenters, sailmakers and glaziers.

What surprised him was one small shop for making and mending watches, and another for the repair of compasses and other nautical instruments. And for the general population, there was one tailor, three dressmakers, two doctors and three priests. There was also a school, a hospital, a place for public dining, an orphanage run by his mother, a library.

Stopping at a corner where the main road intersected with one perpendicular to the bay, he asked a man carrying boards: 'Is this place always so busy?' and the man replied: 'You ought to see it when an American ship puts in to trade.'

From Zhdanko himself he learned the facts about his new post: 'I'm proud to have at my right hand the son of two people who have been so important to me. Your father and mother, Arkady, are special, and I hope you remember that. But you asked for the facts. Total population inside the palisade, nine hundred and eighty-three. That's three hundred and thirty-two Russians with the right to return to the homeland, and a hundred and thirty-six of their wives and children. Then we have a hundred and thirty-five Creoles who do not have the right of return. We have forty-two children in the orphanage, a horrible number, but we do have accidents and parents do run off. To round out, we have inside the walls three hundred and thirty-eight Aleuts helping us with our hunt for sea otters and seals. Total, nine hundred eighty-three.'

'And do the Tlingits still live outside the palisade?' Arkady asked, and Zhdanko replied grimly: 'They better.' Then he summarized the Russian experience with this brave, intractable people: 'The Tlingits are different. You never pacify a group of Tlingits. They love their land and they're always ready to fight for it.'

'So you think the walls are still necessary?'

'Positively. We never know when those people out there are going to try once more to drive us off this island. Observe our cannon up there,' and when Arkady looked up at the hill he saw that three of its guns were aimed down at the bay to fend off any ships which might intrude unexpectedly, but nine were directed at the Tlingit village outside the walls.

What reassured him even more than the guns was the 329

energy with which Russians, Creoles and Aleuts attacked the problems of daily living.

A few educated Creoles like himself or trusted ones like Zhdanko supervised Company affairs, and Russian clerical types like Mr. Malakov kept accounts, but most were out in the sun conducting the businesses that one would expect to find in a thriving seaport. The average Creole did manual labor and most Aleuts went out regularly in their kayaks.

He did not find time to finish his letter that first evening, for Chief Administrator Zhdanko and his Creole wife invited him to the hill, where sixteen Russian men, each convinced that he could govern the colony better than the Creole, and their wives had joined to welcome young Voronov to his new post, and he was awed by the handsome new building which had replaced the house he had sometimes visited when Baranov occupied it. The place was now quite grand, with several stories, imported furniture and an even better view of Sitka Sound because obstructing trees had been removed. 'Everyone calls it Baranov's Castle,' Zhdanko explained, 'because we feel that his spirit still resides here.'

It was a gala evening, with a husband-and-wife team playing four-hand music on the two pianos and a set of surprisingly good baritone solos by Chief Clerk Malakov.

He sang first a selection of arias from Mozart, then a rousing medley of Russian folksongs in which the guests joined, and finally, a most moving rendition of 'Stenka Razin' whose grand, flowing notes reminded his listeners of distant Russia.

Next night, after a day of inspecting the palisade and seeing the intricate gateway through which a limited number of Tlingits were allowed entry to trade, Arkady did find time to complete his letter: I have now seen New Archangel inside and out, and I beg you, Praskovia, to gain permission from your parents to sail here on the next ship, for this is a complete little city.

We have a good hospital, doctors trained in Moscow, and even a man who fixes teeth.

The houses are made of wood it's true, but each year the city grows, and both the chief administrator and I expect it to have two thousand citizens before very long.

Of course, it has that now if you count the Tlingits who live outside the walls.

And I must tell you one thing more, which I confide with great pride. My father and mother occupy a place of considerable honor in this part of Russia. He is known far and wide, through all the islands, for his 330

piety, and he is loved by the natives because he has taken the trouble to learn their language and help them in their way of life before he ever importunes them to become Christians. If there is a saint walking this earth today, it is my father. Indeed, they call him a living saint.

And Mother is his equal. She is, as I told your parents most explicitly, an Aleut born, but she is now, I do believe, a better Christian than my father. Goodness radiates from her face and sanctity from her soul.

I was, as you may remember, awed by the notable traditions of your Kostilevsky family and said many times that you had a right to be proud of your heritage, but I feel the same about my father and mother, for they are establishing the new line of nobility for Russian America.

One terribly important fact, Praskovia. When you leave Moscow to come here, you must not think of yourself as going into exile at the ends of the earth. People leave here all the time to return to the mainland. Irkutsk is a splendid city where my family served in both government and the church. Hawaii is gorgeous with its wealth of flowers. And some travelers go back to Europe by way of America, which takes a long time if you round the Horn but which is, I am told, rewarding.