Ancient indigenous Fort discovered.

Archaeologists have discovered traces of a 200-year-old wooden fort in southeastern Alaska built by Indigenous people to resist an invasion by Imperial Russia.

The discovery confirms the events of the 1804 invasion by Russia, which went on to govern parts of Alaska as a colony for 60 years until 1867, when it was purchased by the United States.

It’s also of cultural importance to the indigenous Tlingit people, and especially to those of the Kiks.adi, or Frog clan, whose ancestors defended the fort near the town of Sitka on Baranof Island in what's known as the Alaskan Panhandle, and who now regard it as a symbol of their resistance to colonialism.

“The fort’s definitive physical location had eluded investigators for a century,” said Cornell University archaeologist Thomas Urban, a co-author of a study published Monday in the journal Antiquity that detailed the discovery.

Decades of searching had turned up only clues, and archaeologists debated whether the fort was really sited near a forest clearing in the Sitka National Historical Park said to approximate its location, he said.

A detailed archaeological survey by Urban, however, has revealed electromagnetic anomalies and ground-penetrating radar signals around the clearing show the distinctive shape of the “sapling fort” – "Shiskinoow" in the Tlingit language – but not at proposed alternative sites..

Source.https://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/lost-indigenous-fort-repel-russia-rediscovered-alaska-n1255537

The discovery matches both Tlingit and Russian accounts of the Battle of Sitka in 1804, said co-author Brinnen Carter, an archaeologist at the U.S. National Park Service who was stationed at Sitka during the survey.

Although the Tlingit had occupied the region for about 11,000 years, Russia established a settlement in 1799 at Old Sitka, about seven miles north of the modern town, to profit from a lucrative trade in sea-otter pelts, he said.

In 1802, following disputes with the Tlingit, that settlement was destroyed and the Russians were repelled.

They returned in 1804 to invade the region with up to 1,500 attackers – some of them Russian sailors, and some warriors from the Aleutian Islands – but found the Kiks.adihad built the “sapling fort” to resist them beside a river mouth, Carter said

The fort was strategically situated behind tidal flats and out of range of the Russian naval guns; it was surrounded by thick walls of alder saplings in a trapezoidal shape about 240 feet long and 165 feet wide.

The invading Russians estimated the fort was defended by at least 800 men, and Tlingit histories record that Kiks.adi women fought there, as well. The defenders were armed with guns and cannons they had purchased from British and American traders.

Those claims culminated in a $1 billion settlement by the government in favor of indigenous people under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971, which remains the largest land claims settlement in U.S. history.

Brady, a member of the Kiks.adi clan and the lead ranger at the Sitka National Historical Park, said the story of Shiskinoow remained an important part of local oral histories, while the fort site itself in the foreshore forest is a place of remembrance – a status confirmed by the latest scientific finding.

“It’s a very sacred place,” she said. “You have the river there, there are lots of eagles, there are ravens … it is incredibly beautiful.”

1802, the Tlingit clan house leaders debated their next move. Some advised caution and diplomacy. Others advocated rallying clans from across Southeast Alaska to go on the offensive and attack Russian settlements in Yakutat and Prince William Sound. According to oral tradition, the respected tribal Shaman Stoonookw foresaw the return of Alexander Baranov in a vision. Stoonookw urged the clan leaders to unite and build a new fort in a defensible location. According to tradition, the Sitka Tlingit rallied around their clan leaders. But, heeding Stoonookw's advice, they also decided to unite under a single war chief. They selected 'alyáan, the Point House aristocrat who had proven his bravery in the Battle of 1802.

'alyáan also heeded Stoonookw's prophetic vision and rallied the clans to construct a fort, subsequently named Shís'gi Noow, at the mouth of the Indian River. Shís'gi Noow means Sapling Fort, Second Growth Fort, or Green Wood Fort in English. They constructed the fort adjacent to shallow tidelands to prevent the Russians from moving their ship-based artillery near the fort's walls, effectively neutralizing its military advantage. The Sitka clan's previous fort at Noow Tlein (on what is known today as Castle Hill) was vulnerable to ship-based cannon fire.

the loss of Old Sitka effectively removed their foothold in Southeast Alaska. Baranov and the Russian American Company were trying to move the colonial capital from Kodiak further south along the coast to fend off their European rivals in the fur trade. Losing their colony in Sitka put those hopes in jeopardy and undermined Russian power in the region. Planning to re-establish the colony and take revenge on the Sitka clans, Baranov gathered his sailors and his Aleut and Alutiiq hunters. His plans were delayed for over a year, until the fall of 1804. In late September, Baranov's war party from Kodiak met with Commander Iurii Lisianskii and his Russian sloop, the Neva, in Port Krestof just north of Sitka Sound. After a week of further delays, Baranov, Lisianskii, and the war party sailed into Sitka Sound on the 28 of September.

The Tlingit gathered in Shís’gi Noow and used delaying tactics to hamper the Russian advance. The Kiks.ádi---the most powerful of the Sitka clan houses---were certain that their clan allies, especially from Angoon and Kake, were on their way to lend aid, as they had in 1802. The Sitka Tlingit consulted their shamans when their allies did not arrive. The shamans reported that they had no vision of reinforcements arriving and that there was a “dark force” in the future.

The Kiks.ádi had to abandon their land, their homes, their possessions, and much of their clan regalia to withdraw from Shís'gi Noow. It was a painful sacrifice to make to ensure their ability to continue resisting the Russian invasion. The clan house members met up again at Hanus Bay. A Point House elder stood and spoke:

Always remember that you are the Sheet'ká Kiks.ádi people. . . . It was you who spilled your blood rather than disgrace our people by surrendering to the hated Anooshee [the Russians]…. Now we must continue to be strong as we face the future. We have much to do before we can return to our ancient homeland in Sheet'ká. The blockade must begin now.***

The Kiks.ádi relocated to Chaatlk'aanoow, an abandoned fort that they quickly repurposed, reinforced, and stocked with food and weapons. From their fort overlooking the water, the Kiks.ádi could see any canoe or ship heading toward Sitka and take action.

Whenever canoes were spotted, the Kiks.ádi rowed out to meet them and to warn, "Stay away from Sheet'ká! The Kiks.ádi remain at war with the Anooshee [the Russians] and will not allow trading canoes to pass Chaatlk'aanoow. Sheet'ká still belongs to the Kiks.ádi."*** The blockade proved to be effective, and fewer and fewer boats tried to make their way to Sitka. Americans were eager to take advantage of the blockade. They quickly established Trader's Bay across from Chaatlk'aanoow, where Tlingit people from around Southeast Alaska could trade with the Americans instead of the Russians at Sitka. The Americans also sold firearms to the Tlingit, which effectively undermined Russian control of Sitka.

The blockade hurt profits for the Russian American Company. In 1807, Chief Manager Alexander Baranov sent a message to Chief 'alyáan requesting the return of the Kiks.ádi and an end to the blockade. 'alyáan consulted with his council and concluded that it was not yet time to return to Sitka. Though Baranov sent envoys regularly, each year his pleas were rejected. It was clear that the Kiks.ádi would return when they decided the time was right.

By 1822, the Kiks.ádi had been away from their home for 18 years. Without warning, they returned to Sitka and began rebuilding their homes just outside the Russian fortifications. 'alyáan sent word to the Russians: "The mountains around Sitka belong to the Sheet'ká Kiks.ádi. No Russians will be allowed to hunt for deer or bear on those mountains while the Sheet'ká Kiks.ádi are here. Should any Russian or Aleut attempt to hunt on those hills they will do so at their own peril."*** Thus the Battle of 1804 officially ended where it started, in Sitka, in 1822. The Tlingit rebuilt their village in Sitka and lived in close proximity to the Russians.

The Battle of 1804, including the blockade that followed, was a watershed moment in the history of Alaska and Russian America. While skirmishes and attacks on both sides continued, the Russians did not leave their fortified stronghold in Sitka until they ceded their interest in Alaska to the United States in 1867. The Tlingit would never again gain full control of Baranof Island from their Russian enemies. This created a unique and sometimes volatile relationship in which Russians and Tlingit lived as contentious neighbors, trading partners, and intermittent enemies.

***Herb Hope, "The Kiks.ádi Survival March of 1804," in Anóoshi Lingít Aaní Ká/Russians in Tlingit America: The Battles of Sitka, 1802 and 1804,ed. Nora Marks Dauenhauer et al. (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2008), 273-285

Ref for article.

Lydia T. Black, Russians in Alaska, 1732 –1867 (Fairbanks: University of Alaska Press, 2004).

Dauenhauer, Dauenhauer, and Black, eds., Anóoshi Lingít Aaní Ká/Russians in Tlingit America: The Battles of Sitka, 1802 and 1804 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2008).

Sergei Kan, Memory Eternal: Tlingit Culture and Russian Orthodox Christianity Through Two Centuries (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1999).

John Dusty Kidd, Over the Near Horizon: Proceedings of the 2010 International Conference on Russian America, (Sitka, Alaska: Sitka Historical Society, 2013).

David J. Nordlander, For God and Tsar: A Brief History of Russian America, 1741 –1867 (Anchorage: Alaska Natural History Association, 1998).

Ilya Vinkovetsky, Russian America: An Overseas Colony of a Continental Empire 1804 –1867 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011).

Mary E. Wheeler, "Empires in Conflict and Cooperation: The 'Bostonians' and the Russian-American Company" Pacific Historical Review, Vol. 40, No. 4: 419-441.

Lidar imaging is changing topography all over the world.  In Guatemala, behind Tikal, they used Lidar and found hundreds of temples, a city, under the forest canopy.