ding warehouse on the
wharf was burned in 1916. These were all built about the time of the
incumbency of Etolin, and that time might be termed the Golden Age of
the Colony. Ships were being built, the fur trade was still prosperous,
new explorations were being made into the interior of the country, trade
was being extended into the Yukon Valley and there was an active
interest in all the industries of the settlement. There were men of many
trades, engineers, cabinet makers, jewelers, tailors, builders, etc.,
and an efficient machine shop constructed engines to equip the vessels
constructed in the shipyard. Plowshares and spades for the Spanish
farmers in California were forged and bells for the Franciscan missions
were cast here. The first steam vessel to be built on the shore of the
North Pacific Ocean was constructed at Sitka, for, before 1840 the whole
of the machinery for a tug of seven horsepower, as well as of two
pleasure boats had been constructed here. The steamer "Nikolai" of 70
horsepower was built and equipped with the exception of the boilers
which were brought from New York. The ship ways at Sitka was the
repairing place for many a vessel in the days of the gold seekers in the
valleys of California.

Two sawmills, one near the site of the present mill, the other on
Kirenski River, now called Sawmill Creek,[18] cut the lumber for the
settlement and for export. Two flouring mills, one in Sitka, the other
at the Ozerskoe Redoubt on Globokoe[19] (Deep) Lake, ground the
breadstuffs. A tannery furnished the leather for shoes, made from
California hides, and also prepared the _lavtaks_ for the bidarkas
for the seal and sea-otter hunters. The burrs for the Sitka mill were of
the finest French stone but those at the Redoubt were cut from the
granite found on the lake shore.[20]

A hospital of forty beds provided for the comfort of the sick, of which
Governor Simpson said: "The institution in question would do no disgrace
to England."

Brickyards were maintained, ice was cut on the lakes and at times
shipped to California. The ice-houses were near the outlet of Swan Lake
and were of a capacity of 3,000 tons.

One day in the spring of 1852 the American ship "Bacchus" came into
Sitka to purchase a cargo of ice. All the ice for San Francisco had to
this time been brought in the hold of sailing ships around Cape Horn
from Boston and the idea of getting the supply from Sitka was conceived.
From the Company's icehous