Russian–American Company
Russian-American Company flag, 1806 design
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Native name
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Под высочайшим Его Императорского Величества покровительством Российская-Американская Компания |
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| Industry | fur trade |
| Fate | Alaska Purchase (1867) |
| Successor | Alaska Commercial Company |
| Founded | 8 July 1799Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire |
| Founder | Nikolay Rezanov, Grigory Shelikhov |
| Defunct | 1881 |
| Headquarters | Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire |
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Key people
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Alexander Andreyevich Baranov |
The "Russian-American Company Under the Supreme Patronage of His Imperial Majesty" (Russian: Под высочайшим Его Императорского Величества покровительством Российская-Американская Компания Pod vysochayshim Yego Imperatorskogo Velichestva porkrovitelstvom Rossiyskaya-Amerikanskaya Kompaniya) was a state-sponsored chartered company formed largely on the basis of the United American Company. The company was chartered by Tsar Paul I in the Ukase of 1799. Its mission was to establish new settlements in Russian America, conduct trade with natives, and carry out an expanded colonization program.
This was Russia's first , and it came under the direct authority of the Ministry of Commerce of Imperial Russia. The Minister of Commerce (later, Minister of Foreign Affairs) Nikolai Petrovich Rumyantsev was a pivotal influence upon the early Company's affairs. In 1801, the company's headquarters were moved from Irkutsk to Saint Petersburg, and the merchants who were initially the major stockholders were soon replaced by Russia's nobility and aristocracy.
Count Rumyantsev funded Russia's first naval circumnavigation under the joint command of Adam Johann von Krusenstern and Nikolai Rezanov in 1803–1806. Later he funded and directed the voyage of the Ryurik's circumnavigation of 1814–1816, which provided substantial scientific information on Alaska's and California's flora and fauna, and important ethnographic information on Alaskan and Californian (among others) natives. During the Russian-California period (1812–1842) when they operated Fort Ross, the Russians named present-day Bodega Bay, California as "Rumyantsev Bay" (Залив Румянцев) in his honor.
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