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Stamps, J.M.

Pre 1898

“In 1897, at San Francisco, I joined seven other linemen to go to the Klondike gold diggings. Each put up $500 to buy an interest in a sailing vessel and provide a year’s supply of grub. We joined another group of goldseekers, so there were 50 in all. Each dug up $500, with which we purchased a whaling vessel named La Ninfa.” . . . Took 32 days to sail to what is now Cordova. . . “From Cordova we went to what is now Valdez. Our tents were the first put up in what is now Valdez. We agreed to let the captain return to San Francisco and put in the next year getting cargoes or passengers for Alaska or elsewhere. We figured that if we didn’t strike it rich in the gold fields our ship would be earning money for us. “No, none of us ever got anything out of our ship investment. We heard that the captain made a trip to the Hawaiian islands and the ship was wrecked, but whether this was true or not, we never learned. “Our party of 50 scattered. 20 stopped at what is now Cordova for the winter, for we had arrived in November, and about all we could do was spend the winter sizing up the country. We crossed the tide-flats to Algonak, an Indian village, where we found a trader, Charlie Rosenberg, selling trade goods and buying furs from the Indians. John Bremner, a squaw man, had gone to the Copper River section and was living with the Indians. Bremner river is named for him. We decided to size up the river’s headwaters, but our dogs couldn’t face the terrific icy gale, so we had to pull our sleds by hand. We heard that there was copper there, but we were after gold; copper didn’t interest us in the least.  I never saw so many ptarmigan in my life. They were snow-white and the alder brush was alive with them. Bear and caraibou also were numerous. It was tough sledding going inland, but coming out was a snap for you could stand up on your sled and the wind would take you along at a lively clip. We used to catch King salmon in the nets made by the Indians from roots. We had a feast of King salmon on July 4, 1898. Fish of every kind in that country have a firm flesh and the flavor is delicious. I came outside in the fall of 1898, poorer in money, but much richer in experience.” Oldtimer Relates His Observations of Trip to Alaska in 1897, originally printed in Oregon Sunday Journal, 5/25/41, reprinted in The Valdez Weekly Miner, 6/13/41.

1898-1899

Left Alaska in fall of 1898.