The Many Voyages of Arthur Wellington Clah: A Tsimshian Man on the Pacific Northwest Coast

First-hand accounts of indigenous people’s encounters withcolonialism are rare. A daily diary that extends over fifty years andtwo thousand pages is unparalleled.Drawing on a painstaking transcription of Arthur WellingtonClah’s diaries, Peggy Brock pieces together the many voyages --physical, cultural, intellectual, and spiritual -- of a Tsimshian manwho moved in both colonial and Aboriginal worlds. Clah’s birth in1831 coincided with the establishment of a permanent fur trade post,and he became student, teacher, and confidant to missionary WilliamDuncan. Later, Clah’s spiritual voyage into the world of colonialculture transformed him into a devout Christian and an evangelist forthe faith.From the goldfields of BC and Alaska to the hop fields of WashingtonState, Clah witnessed profound change. His diaries reveal thecomplexities of personal interactions between colonizers and thecolonized and the inevitable tensions within a community undergoingrapid change. They also show how Clah’s hopes for his people weregradually eroded by the realities of land dispossession, interferenceby the colonial state in cultural and political matters, anddiminishing economic opportunities.Taken together, Clah’s many voyages offer an unprecedentedAboriginal perspective on colonial relationships as they played out onthe Pacific Northwest Coast.