FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 401 



gaged in whaling. In 1886 and 1887 I was twice at St. Panl Island in Bering Sea. 

 Last year I was also at Oonalaska. I went tliere foi- tools and siipi)lies, and the agents 

 of the Alaska Commercial Company supplied me with all I desired at reasouabl rates, 

 and were very courteous and obliging in all things. They invited me very cordially 

 to stop at their stations and seemed desirous of encouraging our frequent visits. In 

 otlier years I was prevented by the ice from visiting these places. We took them let- 

 ters and papers, and carried the mails also for them from Oonalaska to St. Paul. 



From my opyjortunities of seeing the company's business at Oonalaska and at Saint 

 Paul I can couiirm the statement made by Capt. Lewis W. Williams, which I have 

 read, in reference to the same and the company's treatment of the natives. Whilst 

 at Their stations I saw transactions between them and the company's agents in which 

 money passed, and I got some money changed there myself. I saw no mutilated coin 

 there and heard of none. That which I saw the natives receive from the company 

 for skins bought was good United States coin. Some of the men on my ship bought 

 supplies at the company's stores afc Oonalaska and expressed themselves surprised at 

 the cheax)ness of the prices. The prices I paid myself were very low. The prices 

 the company paid the natives for skins I thought high prices. 



George F. Bauldry. 



San Francisco, December, 1887. 



No. 15. 



STATEMENT OF CAPT. ELIJAH E. SMITH. 



I reside in San Francisco, and that has been my home for twenty-seven years. In 

 the year 1865 I was in the employment of the Western Union Telegraph Company, 

 and went in that year to Alaska on an exploring expedition for the purpose of laying 

 out the route for the telegraph line. I went tirst to Sitka and then to St. Michaels, 

 on Norton Sound, on the bark Golden Gate. 



I went up again in the year 1866, in the same employment, and spent' the winter 

 of 1866-'67 in Alaska, with my headquarters at Oonalakleet, a large Indian village at 

 the head of Norton Sound. I went up in the bark H. L. Jlutgers, whilst the ship 

 j^'if/htingale carried up on her deck a small stern-wheel steamer, built at San Fran- 

 cisco. I found the steamer unlit for the service and resorted to canoes, with which 

 we moved about in summer, but in winter we traveled on sleds drawn by dogs. At 

 that time there were Russian trading posts in various parts of the country. My ex- 

 plorations carried me far into the interior. During that winter (1866-67) I went up 

 the Yukon River from Oonalakleet to Nulato. I also visited Anvik that year. 



In the years 1868 and 1869 I was a member of the Pioneer Fur Company, composed 

 of four Canadian Frenchmen, myself, and others, formed for the purpose of the fur 

 trade in Alaska. This continued for two years, during which we traded in fur-seal 

 skins and other pelts, around northwestern Alaska, from Nunivak Island northward. 

 We also bought and traded for walrus ivory. In 1870-71 I was engaged in whaling 

 in the Arctic and Bering Seas, with others, and traded on the Alaska coast and islands 

 for furs and ivory. In 1872 to 1874 I was in the employment of the Alaska Commercial 

 Company, and commanded one of their vessels running from San Francisco to Alaska. 

 I made one trip a year in 1872, 1873, and 1874, stopping at Oonalaska and at the 

 islands of St. Paul and St. George and also at St. Michaels. In 1874 I went into the 

 business of whaling in the Arctic and Bering Seas on my own account and continued 

 in the same business in 1875 and 1876. Since then I have been in the employment of 

 various shippingcompanies, as well as in the United States revenue service. I am very 

 familiar with the Aleutian chain of islands and the coast of Alaska from thence 

 northward to St. Michaels and in fact to the Arctic Ocean. I have been through 

 Bering Straits and around as far as Anxiety Point, on the northern coast of Alaska. 



I am well acquainted with the Alaska Commercial Company and its agents in 

 Alaska, as well as with its mode of doing business there, especially in connection with 

 its trading with the natives, both on the Pribylov Islands and on the Aleutian chain 

 and elsewhere. Whilst I was in the company's employment my instructions were to 

 treat tke natives everywhere fairly and liberally in all matters, and I know those 

 were the instructions to others in their emploj^ment. I know that, by its fair deal- 

 ing, the company has made itself popular with the natives and others with whom it 

 has business. In their purchases from the natives and in their sales of supplies and 

 all dealings with them they have always, where I have been, acted fiiirlj^ and rea- 

 sonably, and I never heard any complaints to the contrary. The only complaint I 

 ever heard from the natives against the company was that they could not obtain as 

 much sugar as they wanted. They, therefore, could not make the intoxicating liquor 

 they call " quass," which they mauufaQture in absence of the usual spirituous liquors, 

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