Digital Bob Archive

MAY 20, 1881-The mining camp of Rockwell has now also became a Navy town and with most of our miners at work in the basin, the Navy predominates in the town area. As Commander Glass promised to do when he visited here early in the month, he sent over Lt. Comdr. Rockwell, for whom the camp is named, with 23 officers and men, including several Marines. The contingent arrives here on the mail steamer California, which also towed the launch. With them came an interpreter, D. Sokoloff, who speaks the Tlingit language, an Indian policeman named Shukoff, and a gatling gun. The Navy officers have been quartered in George Pilz?s frame house and the men in a rented cabin until their own quarters can be built.

Rockwell?s first task was to resettle the Indians who had flocked to the camp from their villages and whose tents occupied much of the townsite area. This was quickly accomplished. The Takus, who had moved here from several villages to the south, were settled along the shore south of the townsite. The Auks, who had come from Auke Bay and Youngs Bay, moved to a site along the beach west of town, toward the mouth of Gold Creek. All who moved were compensated for their trouble with funds collected from the miners.

For the Navy reserve, Rockwell selected a site on the ridge west of town, at the end of the newly laid out Fourth Street. Master Gus Hanus quickly surveyed the boundaries of the Navy reserve, then began a survey of the street lines as they had been roughly marked out earlier by the street committee. The Navy reserve was quickly cleared of trees and brush and the gatling gun was set up there, on the highest part of the hill, in a position that commands both Indians villages as well as the town itself. The Navy men are now at work erecting two buildings on the site as quarters for both officers and men and storehouses for their equipment.

As promised by Commander Glass, there has been no interference by the Navy with the progress of mining and the fears of those who had protested against ?martial law? in the camp have subsided. A number of the Navy men have staked mining claims, both placer and lode, and this has been generally accepted as their right. So far they have found little time to work their claims.