In an 1805 letter sent from Sitka to the directors of the Russian American Company, the imperial envoy Rezanov wrote, “The brutal massacre committed by the Americans [referring to the Tlingit] has taught us to take precautions. Our cannons are always loaded.…” Russian gunboats later used their cannons to fire on the Native population on several occasions. This pipe depicts one of the Russian ship’s cannons.

Infinity of Nations: Art and History in the Collections of the National Museum of the American Indian
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