Around the hill ran a parapet and sentries walked their beat night and day. On the stockade which enclosed the town from the beach at the edge of the "Ranche" to the shore beyond the sawmill, making with the shore line an irregular rectangle, also walked the sentinels on their vigil, for the Thlingit at the gates was at all times an enemy to be feared. Strict military discipline was maintained at all times. At the foot of the hill were clustered barracks, storehouses, bakeries, warehouses, etc., for the use of the garrison and workmen. The old structure which was used as a bakery, and for shops, was later known as the Sitka Trading Company's building, and has recently been removed. The barracks are at present the jail, and the Russian counting house is today the postoffice of the United States. The fur warehouse stood to the west of the hill and was torn down in 1897-8, while the landing warehouse on the wharf was burned in 1916. These were all built about the time of the incumbency of Etolin, and that time might be termed the Golden Age of the Colony. Ships were being built, the fur trade was still prosperous, new explorations were being made into the interior of the country, trade was being extended into the Yukon Valley and there was an active interest in all the industries of the settlement. There were men of many trades, engineers, cabinet makers, jewelers, tailors, builders, etc., and an efficient machine shop constructed engines to equip the vessels constructed in the shipyard. Plowshares and spades for the Spanish farmers in California were forged and bells for the Franciscan missions were cast here. The first steam vessel to be built on the shore of the North Pacific Ocean was constructed at Sitka, for, before 1840 the whole of the machinery for a tug of seven horsepower, as well as of two pleasure boats had been constructed here. The steamer "Nikolai" of 70 horsepower was built and equipped with the exception of the boilers which were brought from New York. The ship ways at Sitka was the repairing place for many a vessel in the days of the gold seekers in the valleys of California.
Two sawmills, one near the site of the present mill, the other on Kirenski River, now called Sawmill Creek,[18] cut the lumber for the settlement and for export. Two flouring mills, one in Sitka, the other at the Ozerskoe Redoubt on Globokoe[19] (Deep) Lake, ground the breadstuffs. A tannery furnished the leather for shoes, made from California hides, and also prepared the _lavtaks_ for the bidarkas for the seal and sea-otter hunters. The burrs for the Sitka mill were of the finest French stone but those at the Redoubt were cut from the granite found on the lake shore.[20]