The Russians are Coming

By 1531 the Kingdom of Spain governed half of the know world - all of present day Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, half of South America and a large swath of what is now the western and southwestern United States. Over the next two centuries the Spanish fought to retain this territory. They struggled with the French in Louisiana and Texas and the British in Cuba and the Philippines. Meanwhile in the wilderness of Alta California, the Spanish warily eyed Czarist Russian.

The Russians had begun to explored the Bering Strait in 1825 and under the leadership of Alexei Chirkov began to develop Alaska in 1741. Soon, Russian trappers were pushing down the coast of North America, using bands of Aluetian Eskimos, who were quite skilled at hunting sea mammals.

By 1765 Russian trappers and their Aleut helpers were reported as far south as the Farallon Islands, just off San Francisco.

Spain had to act or cede much of Alta California to the Russians, who were rumored to be studying sites for a settlement. The conquistador Juan Rodrigues Cabrillo had explored and mapped the coast of California in 1542, claiming it for the King of Spain. Spanish treasure ships passed by the coast on their way to New Spain from the Phillipines, but the area remained an unprotected wilderness.

In 1769 the Spanish finally acted. They sent an expedition under the military leadership of Gaspar de Portola and the spiritual leadership of Junipero Serra to occupy the land they had largely ignored for almost 250 years. Their plan was to build military forts, or presidios, along the coast and settle the territory by converting the natives, teaching them Spanish and "civilized" trades. Presidios and missions were built in San Diego (1769) and Monterey (1770) and at several sites in between these two outposts over the next few years. Once they discovered San Francisco Bay (during Portola?s first expedition up the coast) they built a presidio in San Francisco and two missions along the bay (San Francisco (1776) and Santa Clara (1777).

In the meantime Russian trappers continued to hunt seals along the coast, and would continue to do so for decades. Many encounters are well documented. For example a Russian named Shvetzof, in charge of a band of Aleuts had a run-in with the Spanish in 1803. In 1811 a group of 25-30 Russians from the Russian camp at Sitka were landed on San Nicholos Island (the most remote of the channel islands) to hunt otter and seal. In the course of their stay they captured Indian women and killed off much of the male population.

While matters were tense between the two powers, there wasn't any armed conflict. In fact, in1806 Count Nikolai Petrovich Rezanov (1764-1807) an official of the Russian American Company actually sailed to San Francisco seeking supplies for the struggling Russian colony in Sitka.

NIKOLAI REZANOV

Rezanov was initially rebuffed but after he became betrothed to "Conchita" Arguello the daughter of the Commandant of the San Francisco Presidio (Jose Dario Arguello) the Spanish relented and gave him supplies Rezanov himself didn?t live to see this promising beginning of trade between the two powers develop. He died a tragic death in Siberia on his way home to deliver the supplies and seek permission to marry.

In the meantime the Russians continued to explore the coast. Their settlements in Alaska (headquarted in Sitka after 1808) weren't able to produce enough food and were difficult to supply. They Russians decided to found an agricultural colony in the lush land of California, north of the Spanish settlements. After several exploratory trips, Ivan Alexander Kuskov (1795-1823) arrived at Bodega Bay in early 1812 aboard the Chirikov. The party included 25 Russian artisans, a group of 80 Aleuts and materials needed to build a fort.

Fort Ross was established at a Kashaya Indian village (called Meteni by the Indians), about 18 miles north of Bodega Bay, near the mouth of the Russian River. Fort Ross was founded to serve as a trading post and source of agricultural products for Russian colony in Alaska. Kuskov's wife Elizabeth was actively involved in the enterprise, She mastered the language of the Indian tribes living in the area and established cordial relations with them. The first Orthodox church in the continental United states was established at Fort Ross.

Il'ya Voznesensky spent more than four years in America during this period, drawing, painting and collecting zoological specimens His watercolor of Fort Ross is the best image we have of the settlement at its peak in 1820s (the painting was done in 1841).

FORT ROSS
By II'ya G. Voznesensky

Spain and Russia continued to permit ships to visit one another's ports. In 1816, Otto von Kotzrue (1787-1846) a Russian navigator and explorer visited California for a month. The expedition artist, Louis Choris created some of the best drawings we have of Spanish California, which he published in A Voyage of Discovery in the South Seas and to the Behring's Straits, 1815-1818.

OTTO VON KOTZRUE

During the early1800s, the Spanish were preoccupied with the independence movements in South America, which began in Mexico in 1810. After Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821 and Alta California became a province of Mexico, California became more open to foreign trade. The British, the French and the expansionist minded adjacent country of the United States all eyed California, and were in some ways more of a threat than Czarist Russia, but the preoccupation with Russia continued. There was talk of building a Spanish presidio on Bodega Bay but nothing came of it.

The government of California strengthened its presence in the north with two missions (San Rafael and San Francisco Solano). It gave one of its military leaders, General Mariano Vallejo effective control over the north, and he stationed troops in Sonoma, and created a town there around the mission. To counter the Russian and European threat, Vallejo, who favored a takeover of California by the United States, Vallejo encouraged American immigation, particularly after he was named Director of Colonization of the Northern Frontier, in 1835.

The Russians abandoned the Ross Colony in 1839-40 and ultimately sold Fort Ross to John Sutter in 1841. In the meantime in 1840s more and more settlers from the United States poured into northern California. By July1846, the American Flag was flying over most of California after war broke out between Mexico and America. California became officially part of the United States on February 2, 1848 with the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hildalgo.

In the ultimate denounment of the Russian presence on the west coast, Russia sold Alaska to the United States in 1867 for the sum of $7.2 million. The purchase ended Russian presence in North American and ensured U.S. access to the Pacific, and its ultimate emergence as a great power in the Asia-Pacific region.