"Carrie M. Willard among the Tlingits"

[David D. Robertson]

Subtitled "The Letters of 1881-1883".  Sitka, Alaska:  Mountain Meadow
Press, 1995.  Letters selected from "Life in Alaska:  Letters of Mrs.
Eugene S. Willard" (Philadelphia, PA:  Presbyterian Board of Publication,
ca. 1883).

She and her husband, both missionaries, seem to have tried hard to learn
and use Tlingit.  There's very little trace of Chinook Jargon here.  Here
are some extracts.

Page 75:  [Jan. 23 & 30, 1882]  "When Cla-not had inaugurated peacemaking,
this man, Skookum (strong) Jim, bought white man's food at the store and
called Cla-not to a feast of peace at which to pay blankets for his threat."

Page 78:  "We were very tired that evening...but just before dark two of
the head men came, begging us to have another meeting because they were
going to the Stick country and it would be long before they could come
again."

Page 156:  "When [my baby boy] coos and laughs, they fairly scream with
joy, while Kotzie [young Carrie--her little daughter] stands at a window
gesticulating and talking Tlingit at a rapid rate.  She never speaks a
syllable of English to an Indian."

Page 210:  [glossary]  "Sticks -- Native group of interior Alaska with whom
the Chilkats annually traded."

[Dave's note:  I take Sticks to be a use of the Jargon word for 'forest'.
It's consistently used in Willard's letters in reference to non-Tlingit
people who apparently lived to the north & inland, that is, in Athabaskan
country.  Therefore, I see a parallel with the still widely used
term 'Stick Indians'.]