Sunday, 18 October 2026Est. MMXXVI · Long after anyone remembers why@historicjots
historicjots

A field journal of history that refuses to end

History·1867

The Flag That Would Not Come Down

At the 1867 transfer ceremony in Sitka, the Russian flag stuck in its ropes; two eyewitness accounts record an awkward interruption to a carefully arranged exchange.

SITKA, ALASKA · Filed

Plate I. An 1827 illustration of Castle Hill at New Archangel, now Sitka; the Russian and American transfer ceremony took place here forty years later. Postels · Source · Public domain

The Russian flag caught in its ropes. On the afternoon of October 18, 1867, the troops on Castle Hill in Sitka were ready for a formal transfer of territory. The flag was not. Pulling tore away its border, leaving the rest suspended above the ceremony.

General Lovell Rousseau, the American commissioner, described the interruption in his report to Secretary of State William Seward. Russian soldiers tried to climb the rigging, tired, and stopped before reaching the flag. Another man was hauled up with a rope. He freed it, then dropped it onto the soldiers below.

This is more than a later comic embellishment. Andrew Alexander Blair, a midshipman aboard the USS Resaca, recorded the same sequence independently in his diary: the torn edge, exhausted climbers, a man hoisted with tackle and the falling flag. Two accounts preserve the awkward work that stood between the arrangements and their completion.

The American flag was raised and saluted. Russia’s commissioner, Captain Alexei Peshchurov, and Rousseau completed the formal exchange. American spectators gave cheers. The flags supplied a visible boundary between the governments, though the transaction had a longer timetable. The treaty had been signed in Washington on March 30, 1867. The ceremony followed that October. The Treasury warrant for $7.2 million, payable to Russia’s minister Edward de Stoeckl, was dated August 1, 1868.

Castle Hill is now a state historic site. Modern visitors can climb to the place where the commissioners stood, but the hill’s history does not start with their arrival. Tlingit people occupied and fortified it before the Russians. Changing flags describes a transfer between governments; it does not describe the whole life of a place.

The official exchange could be planned, the troops assembled and the guns made ready. Yet two men writing about the afternoon preserved an unscheduled interval: people looking upward while other people worked at a rope. The treaty could specify a transfer. It could not make the flag come down.

Plate II. Re-enactors portray the Russian and American commissioners at Castle Hill on October 18, 2017, the transfer’s 150th anniversary. Sgt. David Bedard · Source · Public domain
Plate III. A cannon and interpretive sign at Castle Hill in a 2016 photograph; the former transfer-ceremony site is now a state historic site. Jrozwado · Source · CC BY-SA 4.0
Plate IV. The Treasury warrant dated August 1, 1868, payable to Edward de Stoeckl for $7.2 million; payment followed the October 1867 transfer ceremony. The U.S. National Archives · Source · Public domain
Plate V. Emanuel Leutze’s painting represents the Alaska treaty signing in Washington in March 1867; the formal transfer ceremony followed in Sitka that October. Emanuel Leutze · Source · Public domain
Plate VI. Steps from Lincoln Street to Castle Hill in a 2023 photograph; the historic hill remains accessible to visitors. Photo by Joe Mabel · Source · CC BY-SA 4.0

Notes & Sources

  1. Brigadier General Rousseau to Mr. Seward, December 5, 1867 (FRUS document246). Office of the Historian, U.S. Department of State. Primary report of the October18 ceremony: flag caught, border torn, exhausted climbers, man hauled up by rope and flag dropped; American flag, salutes and commissioners’ exchange. Compared with independent midshipman Blair diary. Exact pole height, clock time and bayonet detail omitted from this essay because corroboration is weaker.
  2. Blair Account of the Transfer of Russian America. Alaska Historical Society / Andrew Alexander Blair diary, Beinecke Library, Yale. Independent eyewitness diary entry for October18, manuscript pp155–158: torn flag edge, failed climbers, man hoisted with tackle, flag dropped on soldiers, American flag and salutes, spontaneous cheers. Separately corroborates Rousseau rather than copying his report.
  3. Seward’s Bargain: The Alaska Purchase from Russia. National Archives / Milton O. Gustafson, Prologue, Winter1994. Archival research on March30 treaty signing, October18 handover and snagged flag, delayed congressional appropriation, and August1,1868 pay warrant for$7.2million to Edward de Stoeckl.
  4. Check for the Purchase of Alaska (1868). U.S. National Archives. Individual archival document and treaty transcript identify warrant amount, payee and August1,1868 date, and March30,1867 treaty. This is the source institution for the replacement documentary scan, not an independent second account of its own article.
  5. American Flag Raising Site National Historic Landmark. U.S. National Park Service. Corroborates Castle Hill location, October18,1867 ceremony, commissioners and exchange of flags. Records earlier Tlingit occupation and Russian seizure; the ceremony did not begin the history of this place.
  6. Baranof Castle State Historic Site. Alaska Department of Natural Resources. Official site description independently corroborates Tlingit habitation before Russian occupation,1867 transfer, current state historic-site status, downtown location and visitor access.
  7. Alaska Day proclamation, October18,2021. Office of the Governor of Alaska. Independent institutional corroboration of March1867 agreement, October18 ceremony and Alaska Day as anniversary holiday; no claim that a2026 reenactment has already occurred.
  8. Alaska Purchase Check,1868. University of Washington Information School / Joe Janes and Andrew Kyrios. Independently researched university transcript corroborates March30,1867 agreement, $7.2million amount, August1,1868 warrant and de Stoeckl payee. Its unrelated signer-name error is not adopted.
  9. Castle Hill geographic entry. GeoNames. Castle Hill geographic record5845208 at57.04866,-135.33804, cross-checked against State Parks location at Harbor Road/Lincoln Street. Rounded pin marks the hill, not an asserted exact1867 flagstaff position.

Facts checked against the sources above on 18 October 2026. Corrections are welcome via @historicjots.