Daily Sitka Sentinel

A Sentinel Series A LOOK BACK IN SITKA Part 11

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the 11th in a series by William S. Dodge, the first U.S. collector of customs in Alaska, who stayed in Sitka after the Oct. 18, 1867, transfer. Alaskans had no right to self-government, but Dodge and others wrote a democratic town charter and elected a city council with Dodge as mayor. Dodge’s account of Sitka’s first two years under the American flag appeared in the July 9, 1876, issue of the Alaska Herald, a San Francisco newspaper. Alaska historian Chris Allan discovered this history in a university archive and made it available to the Sentinel.

Part 11 of a series

Today: The 1869 People’s Convention in Sitka to petition Congress for a civil government for Alaska.

By W.S. Dodge

THE PEOPLE’S CONVENTION, 1869

    The next event of moment was the call of the people for a mass Convention at Sitka to urge upon Congress the necessity for a Civil Government.  The Convention was held on the 3rd of October, 1869.  Delegates were present from Kadiak, Unalaska, Cook’s Inlet, Stikine and Tongass.  Hon. J.H. Kinkead was President.  Judge Storer was Chairman of the Committee on Resolutions, and reported a series of five, ably drawn and fully expressive of the necessities and interests of the people.  A petition was presented from the Aleutian population of the islands, signed by them in person, appealing for civil rule.  An address was made by W.S. Dodge, completely reviewing the affairs of the Territory, its resources, the wealth that lay dormant and only needed legislation on the part of Congress to convert it to the use of all citizens; and demonstrating not only the necessity, but the practicability and wisdom of at once establishing some simple form of civil government.  Wm. Kapus, Collector of the Port, and one or two others also addressed the Convention.
    A full report of the proceedings—speeches, resolutions and all—was published in the Times.  Letters containing original documents and copies of every necessary paper, etc., were forwarded to the Chairmen of the House and Senate Committees on Territories; bills were introduced, referred, reported and voted upon:  but in the end the whole matter was buried—probably for the whole period of Grant’s administration—through, almost, the sole efforts of James Nye, Senator from Nevada, who, while blatant with professions of love for republican institutions, championing the cause of civil liberty in Cuba and Mexico, deliberately trod under foot the humble petition of the pioneers of the far northwest, the latchet to the shoes of the least of whom he is unworthy to loose.
    With this action, Sitka lost heart, trade declined, population decreased, poverty became the share of all; the last hope of the people was blighted, and from that time the little star which had risen in the far North—and which betokened the birthplace of a new, higher and holier civilization—began to pale and disappear behind the gathering clouds of governmental neglect, corruption and contempt.

WAN-BIRD CASE

    The last event of any importance occurring at Sitka during my residence was the murder of Lieut. Cowan, of the U.S. Revenue Service, in December, 1869.  Wm. B. Bird, formerly a soldier in Company D, Ninth U.S. Infantry, was charged with the crime.  So indignant and so outraged did the people feel that they were on the verge of summarily executing lynch law. The mob had a rope around his neck and were in the act of hanging him, when Judge Storer, then Mayor of the city, and others interfered, saving the man, and were in the act of trying him by jury, when Gen. Davis, returning from Washington, ordered him into military custody, where he was kept in durance vile for a long time.  Finally, in the Spring of 1871, he was turned over to the civil authorities of Washington Territory, and after a protracted struggle he was, at the November term, 1872, of the District Court at Vancouver, convicted of murder.  His counsel filed a motion in arrest of judgment, on the ground that the Court had no jurisdiction.  Judge Green, at the April term, 1873, at Vancouver, W.T., sustained the motion on the grounds set forth therein, and ordered Bird discharged.  So he is a free man, the maxim “Once in jeopardy,” etc., saving him.  The people of Sitka saved themselves from a great moral stain.  The law was invoked and its mandates were obeyed.
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Monday: Two years after the transfer, and no civil government, Alaska’s bright promise has not been realized. The seven reasons for Sitka’s decline.