Digital Bob Archive

30 January 1980

NOVEMBER 1, 1881-Commander Henry Glass, U. S. Navy, in charge of the operation of that service in Alaska and stationed at Sitka aboard the steam sloop Wachusett, has decided to close down the Navy?s station here at Rockwell-Harrisburgh. Captain Glass, then commanding the Jamestown, established the station here last spring when he feared there might be trouble among the miners themselves or between the miners and the Indians who had settled here. Lieut. Commander Charles H. Rockwell was sent here with a contingent of men and built the station on the hill west of camp. No real trouble ever developed. Such disputes as arose between miners were settled by the old expediency of a miners? meeting, and the Indians have proved peaceful, hard working and altogether good neighbors. Mr. Rockwell, for whom the miners voted last February to name the camp, has been ordered to pack up the moveable equipment and to turn the buildings over to Mr. Thomas Willson, our deputy Collector of Customs, for his own use or for such other purposes as may be appropriate. The barracks is the largest building in the camp and may be put to use as a meeting place and social hall. Mr. Rockwell and his men will leave for Sitka on the mail steamer, due any day.

On the same steamer will be Mottrom D. Ball, former Collector of Customs for Alaska, who has been here in connection with the several lode claims in which he has invested. In the election for an Alaska Delegate to Congress, on September 5, Mr. Ball received 236 votes to 57 for M. P. Berry, also a former Collector of Customs. Mr. Ball will go on to Washington D. C., to be there for the opening of Congress on December 5 and will there present his credentials to the Committees on Territories and argue his case for a non-voting seat in the House of Representatives. He carries with him the hopes of all Alaskans for more attention and consideration from the government in Washington. Mr. Ball is not unacquainted with that part of the country. He was born and grew up in Fairfax County, Virginia, which adjoins one side of the District of Columbia. As a true Virginian, he served in the army of the Confederacy and after the war practiced law for some years at Alexandria, just across the river from Washington. We shall eagerly await word of his success in the Nation?s Capital.