Hopefully more on this to come from some of our colleagues...Old explosive opens historic wounds in Kake
Jill Burke | Jun 24, 2011
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http://www.alaskadispatch.com/article/artillery-shell-1869-us-attack-kake-be-defusedWhat in the village of Kake may have at first appeared to be a simple public safety matter has overnight become symbolic of a lingering injustice in Alaska predating statehood. A remnant of U.S. military might from the Civil War era -- an unexploded artillery shell -- has forced villagers in the remote Alaskan community to seek atonement for wrongs committed against them more than a century ago by the U.S. government. They knew this time would come eventually, but they hadn’t planned to have it happen so abruptly. It had, they thought, been a shelved issue they would get to when the time was right. Through a series of unexpected events, that time is now.
It started when a bomb squad from the U.S. Air Force was dispatched to the village Thursday to examine a 30 pound parrott shell, a relic from a time when the U.S. military was exploring the coastline of Alaska before Russia had even sold the territory to the United States. Times were rough and tumble. The Tlingit Indians of Kake and the surrounding region were known to be strong defenders of their home and society. They’d had run-ins with Russians and Americans alike, which escalated in 1869, resulting in the U.S. Navy’s decision to bomb and plunder village and camp sites in Kake in the dead of winter.
Now, after decades of silence on what it calls "atrocities inflicted" by U.S. forces on its people, the Organized Village of Kake feels it can no longer be quiet. The U.S. has never taken steps to right the wrongs of the past and it's time to begin the process, said Mike Jackson, a tribal member.
"This is just the fingertip of the story," Jackson said in an interview Thursday from his tribal office in Kake, explaining that the bombardment in 1869 was just one of several similar episodes in the village's history.
But for now the community will focus on only this one issue -- the destruction of food and shelter for an entire community, dooming its people to either starve and freeze to death or leave. Villagers chose life and left their homes to go live with other tribes, only later moving back to the Kake area but not to the razed sites themselves.
The lone artillery shell -- 4 inches wide and 12 inches long -- has thus become both a symbol of Kake's wound and a catalyst for its healing.
"The shell is an iconic object associated with an incredible trauma inflicted upon them," said Stephen Langdon, a professor of anthropology at the University of Alaska who was called in to consult with the tribe about the situation.
"The bombing of the Kake people was the first act of state terrorism in Alaska," Langdon said.
(Re)discovery
The 30-pound shell isn't a new discovery for the village, but it was new to one of the village's younger members, who ran across it when he was cleaning up a house he planned to rent. The shell was first discovered in the 1940s near a wooden stump, where it appeared to come to rest after driving a hole through what was left of a tree trunk. Villagers at the time decided to hang on to it and keep it safe until the time was right to do something more with it. Most recently, it had been tucked away in the home of one of a relative of Jackson's, who died in 2005. The home sat empty for years until this week, when Jackson's nephew made plans to move in, started cleaning, and stumbled across the shell and told the village public safety officer about it.
Jackson attributes the swift action that ensued to a generation gap: Young people have been taught the history, but aren't old enough to have lived through some of the key moments themselves.
"They are too young to remember what we told them about it," he said.
Word of the unexploded shell traveled quickly, spreading to the Alaska State Troopers and on to the bomb squad at Elmendorf Air Force Base. To the displeasure of Kake's residents, within a day a team was on its way to the village to deal with the unpredictable piece of history, bringing with it a wave of emotion it may not have even known it had in hand.
On his way to Kake, Langdon was seated next to a liason for the state troopers who had also been assigned to the mission, and as they conversed about the situation Langdon said it was clear the person didn't know what Kake had in the past suffered or that the shell was an unavoidable reminder of that pain.
Old explosive opens historic wounds in Kake - Page 2
Jill Burke | Jun 24, 2011
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"We are not dealing with historically informed people," Langdon said.
Worried that the military and law enforcement teams would either take away or destroy the shell, someone made a call to U.S. Sen. Mark Begich's office on behalf of the village. The village wanted to retain control of its artifact and the history it represented. Kake residents were also in mourning, in the process of honoring a woman who had recently died, and wanted the visit postponed. Langdon believes getting Begich involved helped clue Alaska officials in to the sensitivity of what was afoot.
"When the senator's office is calling you that heightens your attention and your willingness to understand what this object was and it's deeper context," he said. In the end, on Thursday when the team descended on Kake, he said everyone "dealt with the tribe in a very responsible manner."
The Air Force crew X-rayed the bomb and determined it was safe enough to leave with the tribe but not safe enough to let sit as a potentially live piece of artillery. It would have to be defused, and the Village of Kake agreed to hire someone to do it.
A painful past
Located on Kupreanof Island in southeast Alaska, Kake was at one time a crossroads of the Tlinglit nation. They controlled trade routes and defended themselves from Outsiders. When Russians and Europeans began to enter the picture, the native of Kake began to engage with large Euro-American powers that were exploring Alaska.
For Langdon, who has studied the historic interactions, the U.S. forces that Kake would by 1869 come into contact with were marked by domination and subjugation. The men sent to enforce order in Alaska and in Kake were the very same men who were coming out of the U.S. Southwest campaign against the Apache Indians, and the same men who had spent time rounding up the Arapajo Indians.
The conflict in 1869 began when a U.S. sentry in Sitka shot and killed a youth from Kake. In retaliation, family members of the murdered youth killed two non-Native traders. The next show of force would come from the U.S.S. Saginaw, which over the course of two days shelled the village sites, destroying, burning and pillaging the "tribal houses and food caches in the heart of winter," according to the village.
The account fits with Langdon’s research. Military powers had a history, not only in Kake but also in the village of Angoon, of conducting retribution so severe that it crippled a population's ability to survive. Unlike Kake, Angoon sought reparations for a U.S. bombardment it suffered in 1882, and in 1973 won a $90,000 settlement.
Kake has never sought a financial remedy or an apology. But it may. Village leaders are in discussion about how to proceed and have already signaled that they intend to begin talks with the U.S. Department of Defense about it. They are consulting academic, spiritual and cultural leaders, and will also review their options with attorneys, Jackson said.
"This particular situation is extraordinarily complicated," Langdon said. "This is of enormous significance historically and culturally."
A prepared statement from the Organized Village of Kake sums the current situation up best: "In the words of the late Thomas Jackson Sr., 'There will be a time this history and artillery shell will have to be brought out.' June 2011 has become that time."
Expert will be brought in to defuse Kake ordnance
By KLAS STOLPE Juneau Empire
Posted: 06/24/2011 11:26:41 AM PDT
Updated: 06/24/2011 11:30:46 AM PDT
JUNEAU, Alaska—Della Cheney remembers playing with a family heirloom growing up in Kake, a rather strange looking metallic object that wasn't easily moved about. "It was very heavy," Cheney said. "At least 25 pounds."
The heirloom? A roughly 12-inch long, 30-pound unexploded round of ammunition that struck the village more than 140 years ago.
Or in the words of one of the descendants who found the shell resting on the other side of a hole in a Southeast rainforest soaked stump, "It was an annoying object when you stubbed your toe on it but a great conversation piece."
Kake elder and magistrate Michael Jackson, Della's brother, remembers the shell being in the family forever.
Jackson said the shell had been buried in Kake since 1869.
When a Kake resident was clearing property for the building of the Alaska Native Brotherhood Hall in the early 1940s, the 30-pound Parrott Shell and other shrapnel was found near a rotten stump with a hole in it.
"That was why it didn't explode," Jackson said. "It went through the stump and was laying on the other side of it."
The late Thomas Jackson Sr., Michael's father, became the caretaker of the shell and once said, "There will be a time this history and artillery shell will have to be brought out."
The shell passed within the family without incident for decades until older brother Norman Jackson died in 2005. The shell stayed in his house because no one was staying there.
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Recently a nephew wanted to move into the family residence and the shell came up in conversations with a Kake Village Public Safety Officer.
The VPSO contacted Alaska State Troopers in Juneau who contacted Homeland Security who then contacted an explosives unit at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage. The actions happened so swiftly, many in Kake feared the government was again trying to take away a part of their heritage.
"Our hope is it can be determined safe and can remain in the community," Trooper Capt. Kurt Ludwig said. "We just want to err on the side of caution. Sometimes unexploded explosives that have been around a long time can be even more dangerous."
An explosives ordnance disposal unit from Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage arrived in Kake on an Alaska State Trooper's plane Thursday to investigate the shell.
The ordnance was deemed an unknown risk by the bomb specialists and will be left in private care until an expert munitions contractor can come into Kake to defuse it. The Organized Village of Kake will be working with Sealaska Heritage Institute to secure that contractor.
Jackson said after talking among the village elders and looking at historical protocols of the tribe, "Things need to be slowed down because we had a death in the village recently. The healing needs to be complete before we move ahead with the bomb. We had hoped that the bomb squad would stand down and just do an evaluation of it."
Jackson said all actions beyond Thursday's assessment were delayed to a later date when the community can fully concentrate on the ordnance issue and begin full consultation with the Department of Defense.
The village expressed gratitude to U.S. Sen. Mark Begich and his staff, state Sen. Albert Kookesh, First Alaskans Institute, Sealaska Heritage Institute's Zachary Jones and University of Alaska Anchorage's Steve Langdon for helping to intervene with Thursday's assessment.
The shell is believed to be part of what Kake villagers and descendants call the "Kake War" in 1869, in which the U.S. Government destroyed the village.
"Kake has a history of being bombed," Jackson said. "Both by Russians and Americans twice."
Jackson said good-naturedly the Norwegians around the corner in Petersburg were always friendly, "They dropped off crab whenever they came through."
The Kake tribe of Tlingits historically controlled trade routes around the Kuiu and Kupreanof Islands in Frederick Sound and would defend their region against other tribes and early European fur traders.
Shortly after the U.S. took possession of Alaska from Russia in 1867, the military began to enforce a controlled environment on Natives there.
A hunting party of Kake Natives who had been camping at the Fort Sitka settlement decided to return home. Military authorities forbade the departure and in an ensuing scuffle a non-native sentry killed one of the Natives. The party was then allowed to leave.
A Kake elder said the steamer officer "was doing target practice."
The Tlingits encountered two miners, Ludwig Madger and William Walker, camped near Point Gardiner on Admiralty Island. In accordance with their traditional custom, the slain Native's family atoned for the death by killing the two miners. Their bodies were mutilated and the cove is now known as Murder Cove.
When news of the killings reached Sitka, the U.S. Navy dispatched the armed vessel Saginaw to Kake and shelled three Kake village sites and three smaller campsites and canoes. The vessel's crew then proceeded to destroy, burn, and pillage the tribal houses and food caches in the heart of winter, leaving the families homeless.
The natives were forewarned and escaped but lost most of their canoes and shelters. Kake residents dispersed to other villages to live and it would take two decades for Kake to reconstitute itself.
In 1970 one local Kake elder stated, "No compensation or reparations for this injustice were ever sought by the Kakes, nor was there an apology or reparation payments offered by the United States of America."
Jackson stated that the unexploded ordnance is the property of the tribe and the village.
"We are erring on the side of caution and safety for the tribe," Jackson said. "But we want to turn it over to the bomb squad formally, in our own way. They will have to admit that it is Department of Navy ordnance (from) 1869. It is a real part of evidence of Alaska natives encounters with the U.S. Navy back in those days."
Jackson said the tribe wants to give the ordnance to the Sealaska Heritage Institute or the State Museum and be held as Kake history but also as Tlingit history with the Navy.
The bomb has been documented in photos and sent to Jones at Sealaska Heritage Institute and Steve Hendrickson at the State Museum.
"It is just over 121/2 inches long," Jackson said. "And weighs over 30 pounds."
Similar shells have been found at village locations in Sitka, Wrangell, Haines, Klukwan, Yakutat, Kodiak and Angoon.
The Angoon shelling occurred 13 years after Kake's. A native was accidentally killed on a whaling ship operated by Northwest Trading Company, which had a herring and whale reduction plant south of the village at Killisnoo. A whaling gun exploded and fragments struck Tlingit Tith Klane, a medicine man from Angoon.
According to Congressional reports the Natives demanded 200 blankets in retribution for the life of Klane. It was alleged the Natives took over the whaling station and would burn the buildings and kill their white prisoners if demands were not met.
The Navy sent in the USS Adams, the Sitka-based revenue cutter Corwin, and armed the whaling tugboat Favorite. The Natives released control of the station. Capt. E.C. Merriman of the Adams then demanded that the natives turn over 400 blankets to the Navy. According to the Corwin's commanding officer, Lt. M.A. Healy, and Angoon village records 82 blankets were offered, so more than 40 canoes were destroyed and the village shelled and burned.
"The shell is a real reflecting situation," Cheney said. "With all the war situation that occurred with it, there is a lot of history, healing, and some government acknowledgement that this came from them."
"The bomb has just been sitting here. It isn't going anywhere. we hope," Jackson said.
