Which Mountain Tops to Use?

The British contention was that the crests of the mountains nearest to the sea should be taken as the boundary line.

Continuing The Alaskan Boundary Settlement,
with a selection from Lecture by John W. Foster. This selection is presented in 5.5 easy 5 minute installments. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in The Alaskan Boundary Settlement.

Time: 1903
Place: Border Between Alaska and Canada

The negotiators of the treaty of 1825, in setting forth the boundary line, were governed by the geographical knowledge within their reach at that day. As early as the sixteenth century explorers had visited the northwest coast of America, but up to the last decade of the eighteenth century very little accurate knowledge of that region existed. Between 1792 and 1794 Captain Vancouver, of the British Navy, visited this coast, sent out by his Government to discover the supposed passage or water connection between the North Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. He made very careful surveys of the coasts of the continents and islands, and his narrative and charts, giving detailed results of his surveys, were published in 1798. These were the main sources of information upon which the negotiators sought to fix in the treaty of 1825 the boundary line between the Russian and British possessions.

They described the waterline as follows:

Starting from the southernmost point of the island called Prince of Wales Island, . . . the said line shall ascend northward along the passage called Portland Channel, as far as the point of the mainland, where it reaches the 56th degree of north latitude.”

The first matter which the Tribunal had to determine was, what is the Portland Channel as described in the treaty, and to draw the line in accordance therewith from the southern point of Prince of Wales Island to the 56th degree of north latitude.

An examination of the maps will show that the body of water variously described as Portland Channel or Canal is composed in part of two inlets from the ocean, one a broad and easily navigable channel to the south, and to the north a narrow, somewhat tortuous, and unsafe passage. Between these passages lie a group or series of islands. The American contention was that the broad or southern passage was the Portland Channel of the treaty. The British claim was that the narrow or northern passage was the one intended by the negotiators. Vancouver’s charts and later maps favored the American view, but his Narrative seemed to support the British case. The Tribunal decided against the American contention, but did not accept in full the British claim, as the two larger islands only were made British territory, and the two smaller islands involved in the controversy were awarded to the United States. This part of the decision has occasioned the most bitter criticism and is the chief matter of complaint in Canada. This feeling is in part explained by the fact that Port Simpson, situated on the southern side of the entrance to Portland Canal, has been fixed upon as the Pacific terminus of the newly projected transcontinental railway, and it was urged that, for strategic purposes, all the islands on the north or opposite sides should belong to Canada.

The other work of the Tribunal was to determine the mainland boundary line. The treaty provided that from the head of Portland Channel, the line should be drawn to the 56th degree, and

from this latter point the line of demarcation shall follow the crest of the mountains situated parallel to the coast. That whenever the crest of the mountains which stretch in a direction parallel to the coast from the 56th degree of north latitude may lie at a distance of more than ten marine leagues from the ocean, the boundary between the British possessions and the coast strip (lisiere) mentioned above as having to belong to Russia shall be formed by a line parallel to the sinuosities of the coast, and which can in no case be more distant therefrom than ten leagues.”

Vancouver saw as he sailed up and down the northwest coast of America, as likewise modern tourists, all along the Alaskan mainland a constant series of mountains. He made no explorations in the interior of the continent; but in drawing his charts he depicted a regular and continuous chain of mountains from the head of Portland Canal up to Mt. St. Elias, running around the heads of all the inlets and arms of the sea. The map-makers who succeeded Vancouver adopted with more or less accuracy this feature of his charts. It was this topographical indication which the negotiators had in view when they drafted the text of the treaty just quoted. They regarded this supposed mountain chain as a natural and proper boundary.

But later explorations have shown that the mountain chain depicted by Vancouver and other cartographers of the period preceding the treaty had no existence in fact, but that the mainland, extending back for ten leagues and more from the coast, is what has been termed “a sea of mountains,” with no dominant and well-defined chain. The American claim, therefore, was that the natural boundary contemplated by the treaty having no existence in fact, the ten marine league lines mentioned therein should apply, and that the United States boundary should follow the sinuosities of the coast and always ten marine leagues therefrom, passing around all the inlets of the sea.

On the other hand, the British contention was that the crests of the mountains nearest to the sea should be taken as the boundary line. The Canadian experts claimed to have established a series of peaks or mountain chains sufficiently parallel to the coast to meet the requirements of the treaty. In conformity with this theory a boundary line delineated on the map was put forward, which rarely diverged more than five miles from the sea, and often was less than a mile there from, which cut across the heads of all the inlets, divided the “coast strip” or listere of the treaty into sixteen disconnected sections of territory, and transferred to Canada towns, settlements, industrial establishments, and mines which had been in undisputed possession of Americans for many years.

John W. Foster begins here. F. C. Wade begins here. Goldwin Smith begins here.

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