Author: Skagway Sleuth

Currently retired living in another Gold Rush town, this one in California - Columbia! I continue to answer emails and do research as I can, but I am not in a position to do any more research in Skagway. I will gladly post photos and stories of goldrushers though!
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Joseph Whiteside Boyle


The “King of the Klondike” arrived in Skagway in 1898 and was both a wrangler and boxer. His reputation grew as he moved on to Dawson. His life story is nothing short of amazing:
“Boyle organized a hockey team in 1905, often known as the Dawson City Nuggets, that endured a difficult journey to Ottawa, Ontario (by overland sled, train, coastal steamer, then trans-continental train) to play the Ottawa Senators for the Stanley Cup, which until 1924 was awarded to the top hockey team in Canada and could be challenged for by a team. Ottawa thrashed the Dawson team.

During World War I, Boyle organized a machine gun company, giving the soldiers insignia made of gold, to fight in Europe. The unit was incorporated into larger units of the Canadian Army.

Boyle also distinguished himself in Romania, serving the king and queen of that country during the war, helping to protect the country from the Central Powers and to operate Romania’s railroads. He also mounted a daring rescue operation in which he swindled a number of captive soldiers back to Romania and successfully petitioned to new Bolshevik government in Russia to return the Romanian Crown Jewels from their storage in the Kremlin. He was awarded the special title of “Saviour of Romania” for these and many other deeds. He remained a close friend, and was at one time a possible lover of the Romanian Queen, British-born Marie of Edinburgh.

Somehow, he became a confidant, and maybe more, of Queen Marie of Romania, Queen Victoria’s granddaughter. On the Queen’s behalf, Boyle negotiated the first peace treaty of Versailles and organized millions of dollars of Canadian relief for Romanians, earning the title of hero. He was decorated for his exploits by the governments of Russia, France, Britain and Romania.

His relationship with the queen remains something of a mystery. Some historians speculated they were lovers and point to a mysterious woman in black who brought flowers to his grave every year on the anniversary of his death in 1923. Queen Marie died in 1938 and nobody appeared at his grave after that year, so it was always thought that she was the mystery woman. Seen in the photo above with Queen Marie (left) in 1918.

It is a known fact that “Klondike” Joe Boyle successfully wrestled and killed a shark after falling off the side of his fishing ship, The S.S. Chipe.

Joe Boyle died on this day, April 14, 1923 of a stroke at the age of 56. He is presently buried in his Canadian home town of Woodstock, Ontario, after being buried for 50 years in Hampton Hill.

from Wikipedia and a great book: “Sourdough and the Queen: Many Lives of Klondike Joe Boyle” by Taylor, Leonard.

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Margaret Elizabeth King


Happy Birthday to Margaret Elizabeth King, born on this day, April 13, 1902 in Skagway. Her mother, May Farrington King and her father, William B. King both worked in the head office of White Pass. William was the chief auditor in 1902. William was also in the Arctic Brotherhood in 1900, City Council in 1903-4, Mayor in 1905, and the President of the Elks. The family stayed in Skagway until 1921.

Pictured above is the White Pass Administration Building that Mr. King worked in. Today it is the administration building for the Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park.

San Diego Historical site; censuses.

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Mary Bernhoeffer


Mary came to Skagway in the Gold Rush and started a restaurant called the “New Home Restaurant and Lodging House” which she ran with her sister Caroline for a number of years. By the 1929 census she was still listed as a cook in the restaurant.
Born in 1853 in Germany, she was listed in the 1910 census as single but in the 1929 census as a widow.
Her son Henry (born 1887 in Germany) died tragically on July 4th 1914. He was crossing the bay from Haines when the boat sank and everyone onboard drowned.
Mary died on this day, April 9, 1941 and is buried in the Catholic Evergreen Cemetery in Juneau.

Censuses; directories; Evergreen Cemetery records.

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Patrick Brarmon

Murdered in the Klondyke Saloon on this day, April 8, 1898 and buried two days later in the Gold Rush Cemetery. Apparently there was no investigation at the time, things were getting pretty bad in Skagway.
Mr. Brarmon was about 22 years old and hailed from San Francisco.

Skagway Death Record.

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Cadet Desmara Fiquette


Mr. Fiquette arrived in Skagway in 1898 and stayed here as a merchant and gardener for the rest of his life. He passed away at the age of 69 on this day, April 7, 1924 and is buried in the Pioneer Cemetery in Skagway.

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Bishop Rowe Hospital


John Earnest Southerland or Sutherland died on this day, April 6, 1898 in the Bishop Rowe Hospital. Although we do not know how he died, it was most probably again from meningitis. He was born in New Zealand, perhaps Otago, in 1874, so he was only 24 when he passed away and was buried in the Gold Rush Cemetery.

A few days later, on April 15, 1898 a letter from the Right Reverend Peter Rowe, Bishop of Alaska was received in New York. In it he described the desperate situation in Skagway and the need for the hospital:

“…the people of Skaguay have been forced to start an emergency hospital. The need of it beggars description. It has relieved many cases of great distress. The people have responded to appeals to their humanity nobly. Impressed with the importance of the institution, representatives of the public have asked me to take charge of it, and I have done so. They have transferred it all into our hands.

“The emergency hospital is a low cabin 30 feet long and 18 feet wide. One room on the ground floor answers for kitchen and cots; one room above is but half-story or attic. In this room I found 12 cots, and 10 of them were occupied with men in all stages of pneumonia and meningitis. Yesterday while visiting it a young man was brought in from the summit, 18 miles, on a sled, tied on to keep him from falling off, having been dragged over rocks and through mud all that distance.

“Last night I was with a young man who died in my arms, from New Brunswick, telling me what to say to his father and mother and sisters. It was most sad, most pitiful. Sickness is ging to increase. The appeals to our humanity cannot be ignored. The sick are absolutely friendless, helpless, and without the hospital would simply die by the wayside. We have one woman nurse, two men, and a cook. Skaguay doctors are attending for little or nothing as expenses permit. We must build an addition if only of an inexpensive and temporary character.

“I am going to begin this immediately. Present accommodations are totally inadequate and unsuitable. We have assumed great responsibility.”
The author of this letter, Peter Trimble Rowe is pictured above.

-from the New York Times of April 16, 1898; Skagway Death Records; headstone.

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Edward Anton Rasmuson


Mr. Rasmuson was born on this day, April 5, 1882 in Denmark. He came to Alaska as a missionary around 1904 and was married to Jenny Olson in 1905 in Sitka. His son Elmer described his father, Edward Rasmuson, as a learned, disciplined man who kept his personal diary in Greek, who learned law and banking through correspondence courses.

After 10 years in Alaska, Edward and Jenny Rasmuson moved their family to Minneapolis, where several of his relatives from Sweden had settled. He passed the bar there, but his wife, Jenny, wanted to return to Alaska, so the family moved to Juneau in 1915.

E.A. soon discovered there were too many lawyers in Juneau to make a good living, so he took a magistrate’s job in Skagway.

It was 1916 when they arrived and Skagway had fallen into the doldrums of a post-Gold Rush bust. The originals of the western-style buildings that tourists now visit were boarded up, and the economy was dependent on the vagaries of the railroad business. The memory of Soapy Smith was still fresh, and Elmer remembered “Ma Pullin” riding Soapy’s white horse in parades. The family remained deeply religious, and much of life revolved around the Presbyterian Church.

Because E.A. was the only lawyer in town, it was natural for him to become the attorney for the new Bank of Alaska, founded in 1916 by a group of New York financiers. It wasn’t much of an edifice — four walls and usually two employees. Edward became a Commissioner in 1917-18 and the President of the Bank of Alaska in 1923. He lived in Skagway from 1916 to 1943. Today the Rasmuson Foundation does many good things for Alaska.

Edward Rasmuson passed away in 1949 at the age of 67.

from the Rasmuson Foundation website and the University of Alaska Fairbanks biography website; census data.

from

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Henry Belfield LeFevre

Henry was one of the town’s leading men. He came to Skagway from Milwaukee Wisconsin where he was born in 1857. He was a member of the Arctic Brotherhood, a deputy clerk for the court in Skagway from 1908 and a U.S. Commissioner from 1905-1909 and published the Daily Morning Alaskan from 1899-1904. He was also a poet. He died on this day, April 2, 1942 in Juneau and is buried there in the Evergreen Cemetery. In the photo above, of the U.S. Commissioners, of those sitting on the steps, he is the third from the left with moustache and light hat.

1902,1905, and 1909 directories; Skagway Museum Record; Report of Secretary of the Interior 1908.

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Carolina Hilly


Happy Birthday to Mrs. Carolina Hilly according to the headstone in the Skagway Gold Rush Cemetery. There are some interesting things on this headstone, the words “sister” and the Jesuit symbol, see above. She died here in Skagway in 1906 at the age of 52 from heart disease but we really have no other information about her. There was a “Dutch Lena” Hilty who ran the hotel Skagway in 1898 according to a Yukon site, so it is possible that is the same person.

There is a Case & Draper photo from the early 1900’s of the Superintendent of nurses named Carolyn??? #768 in AK photo archives. It is possible that is her, but who knows?

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Albion S. Towle


Albion Towle was born in 1863 in Venzie, Maine. He came to Skagway in 1898 from Snohomish Washington where he had a shingle business. He was a hotelier at Lake Bennett, when he died on this day, March 31, 1898. He was a member of the order of foresters, AOUW and so was shipped home to Snohomish to be buried. This from the online obit:

“…Mr. Towle wanted to go in but did not get away until last January. He went to Skagway and in February sent for his wife. They then started over the pass for Lake Bennet, where they opened a log cabin hotel, and were doing well financially, until early in the morning of March 24th, Mr. Towle was suddenly taken very sick with puenmonia, and in less than an hour was delirous, never again wholly recoving consciouness.

The folling Sunday morning Mrs. Towle secured a sled and dog team, and with the assistance of one man, started with her husband for medical aid at Skagway. She walked bside the sled, watching over him and keeping his face and hands from freezing, while passing through the fearful cold part of the journey at the summit.
They arrived in Skagway at nine o’clock at night and Mr. Towle was placed in the hospital. During the entire trip from morning till night walking thirty-seven miles, Mrs. Towle did not take a particle of nourishment, and this with her anxiety for her husband and the fathigue of the long hard climb, was too much for her, and after she had secured his comfort, she completely collapsed, and was herself prostrate until after arriving in Snohomish. The Snohomish boys at Skagway immediately came to her service, and everything possible was done for Mr. Towle, but on the following Thursday he succumbed to the disease.

The body was brought back to Seattle on the first steamer, and Messrs. M.J. Bird and James Sipprell accompanied the beraved widow and her dead through from the north and take the body was laid to rest in Woodlwan cemetery. Mrs. Towle and the bereaved relatives have the sympathy of the entire community in their sad bereavement.”

The symbol above is for the Ancient Order of United Workmen:
“The American fraternal benefit network began with the organization the Ancient Order of United Workmen in Meadville, Pennsylvania on October 27, 1868. The AOUW was founded by John Jordan Upchurch, a Mason, with the aim of adjusting “all differences which may arise between employers and employees, and to labor for the development of a plan of action that may be beneficial to both parties, based on the eternal truth that the interests of labor and capitol are equal and should receive equal protection.” Each member paid $1 into the insurance fund to cover the sum of not less than $500 in benefits paid to a members dependents when he died. Each time a member died, $1 was due from the surviving members to reestablish the fund. Fraternal benefits societies soon became quite popular as a means of providing financial protection to working class people at an affordable rate.”

obit online in rootsweb: Snohomish County Tribune,4-15-1898