The Sea Runners Essay

Based on an actual incident in 1853, Ivan Doig’s The Sea Runners chronicles about the escape of four Swedish indentured servants from a fur trade fort in 1850’s Russian-America. As the story unfolds and in order to seek opportunity in the new world, many Europeans, including four Swedes sign on to an indenture with the Russian-American Company (RAC) in New Archangel located in what is modern-day Sitka, Alaska. After two years, the four Swedes have enough of it and plot their escape. After stealing supplies and a native canoe, they set off for the U.S. city of Astoria, 1000 uncharted miles south. They face many adversaries, including storms, rocks, angry Russians and Koloshes (name given by the Russians to the indigenous people along the coast).

Only two of the men survive, barely making it to Astoria almost dead with hunger and thirst.

Despite the century-long time difference, indentured servants from Virginia and Russian America were both offered passage to the new world in exchange for agreeing to a set period of indenture. “Within the tsar’s particular system of empire-by-proxy, Swedes and other Outlanders who signed on with the Russian American Company’s fur gathering enterprise did so as indentured laborers, seven-year men” (Doig 8). After the establishment of both colonies, diseases spread to the indigenous people, wiping out a significant percentage of their population. This aided in their attempts to colonize their new found territories and establish themselves for economic and territorial benefits. Ivan Doig briefly shows us how the Russians exercise their firepower to colonize the land, commit genocide on the natives, and carried out their tasks with the assistance of indentured servants, similar to how Virginia did it, for their own economic

benefits.

Russian America was the northernmost Russian colony in North America. As early as the 1740s, Russians crossed the sea and hunt animals for fur. This business turned a big profit for many. Determined to keep their land, The Russians founded The RAC in order to establish a Russian presence in North America and turn the fur trade into an enterprise. The RAC’s fur trade conflicted with the fur trade interests of the natives, the British and the Americans. With three entities not in their favor, the RAC fortified and quickly became the colonial capital, New Archangel, which is now Sitka, Alaska. It even had a school, cathedral, and hospital; It was a religious and commercial hotspot for hard workers.

New Archangel was a map dot unlike any other.

Simultaneously, a far-north backwater port and capital of a territory greater than France and Spain and England and Ireland taken together, the settlement ran on Russian capacities for hard labor and doggedness, and was kept from running any better than it did by Russian penchants for muddle and infighting. (Doig 24)

The purpose of New Archangel was to further the economy of the Russian America colony, and to protect the Europeans who lived there. In contrast, Jamestown was established to create a social and military presence in the new world. Jamestown was the birthplace of the eventual United States, starting the beginning of its territorial expansion. Russian America would play a part two and a half centuries later.

In 1853, Russia was fighting in the Crimean War over the privileges of the Orthodox Church. The country was bleeding money at the time and the RAC couldn’t afford to hire normal workers. This made indentured servitude an obvious alternative for the Russians, enticing anyone who wanted to come to North

America.

The maritime fur trade of the Russian American Company was wholly reliant upon coerced and mobile indigenous labour. In this sense, it was no different from its imperial competitors, which also relied extensively on unfree labour (including that of slaves, convicts and indentured servants. (Aldrich 138)

The RAC established the Russian American fur trade. The indentured workers in the fur trade were mostly European. The offer of free transport to the new world attracted many indentures, however, with many servants hunting animals for pelts, animals became overhunted, making the fur trade less profitable. Moreover, as a large territory to maintain, Russian America was not in the Russians interests anymore. The United States then acquired Russian America after the ratification of the Alaska Purchase. 50 years later in the United States, as the demand for labor increased indentured servitude became more expensive. Realizing this, slavery would be its successor. The US had indentured servants for the same reasons as the Russians and was willing to take in a lot of them in order to get work done cheaply. Using indentured labor, the Russians were successful in increasing their fur trade while protecting themselves through construction. European diseases soon followed, killing over two thirds of the total Native population.