Peter the Aleut

Saint Peter the Aleut

Icon of St. Peter the Aleut
Martyr of San Francisco and Protomartyr of America
Born c. 1800
Died 1815
Venerated in Eastern Orthodox Church
Canonized 1980 by Orthodox Church in America
Feast September 24
Attributes portrayed as an Aleut youth, wearing a traditional gut parka[1]

Cungagnaq (date of birth unknown - d. 1815) is venerated as a martyr and saint (as Peter the Aleut) by some jurisdictions of the Eastern Orthodox Church. He was allegedly a native of Kodiak Island (Alutiiq or Sugpiaq), and is said to have received the Christian name of Peter when he was baptized into the Orthodox faith by the monks of St. Herman's missionaries operating in the north.[2] He is purported to have been captured by Spanish soldiers near San Pedro (Pacifica, California) and tortured and killed at the instigation of Roman Catholic priests either there or at Mission Dolores,[3] in San Francisco.[4] At the time identified for his death, California was Spanish territory, and Spain was worried about Russian advances southwards from Alaska.[4] Hubert Howe Bancroft, in his multi-volume History of California, only notes that, in connection with an incident wherein a Russian fur-hunting expedition was taken into custody after declining to leave San Pedro; one Russian source accused "the Spaniards of cruelty to the captives, stating that according to Kuskof’s[5] report one Aleut who refused to become a Catholic died from ill-treatment received from the padre at San Francisco."

Martyrdom

According to the most fully developed version of the story, in 1815 a group of Russian employees of the Russian American Company and their Aleut seal and otter hunters, including Peter, was captured by Spanish soldiers, while hunting illicitly for seals near San Pedro. According to the original account, the soldiers took them to "the mission in Saint-Pedro" for interrogation. One Russian source states that after being taken prisoner near modern Los Angeles, the captives were taken to Mission Dolores—that is, modern San Francisco. With threats of torture, the Roman Catholic priests attempted to force the Aleuts to deny their Orthodox faith and to convert to Roman Catholicism.

When the Aleuts refused, the priest had a toe severed from each of Peter's feet. Peter still refused to renounce his faith and the Spanish priest ordered a group of Native Americans, indigenous to California, to cut off each finger of Peter's hands, one joint at a time, finally removing both his hands. They eventually disemboweled him, making him a martyr to the Eastern Orthodox faith. They were about to torture the next Aleut when orders were received to release them.

Historicity

An account of the martyrdom of Peter the Aleut is contained in a lengthy letter written on Nov. 22, 1865, by Symeon Ivanovich Yanovsky to Damascene, abbot of the Valaam Monastery in Finland.[6][7] Yanovsky (1789–1876), who is also one of the chief sources of information about St. Herman of Alaska, was chief manager of the Russian colonies from 1818-1820. In the letter he was reporting on an incident that he had heard from a supposed eyewitness, and that had taken place fifty years earlier in 1815. The letter contains the description of Peter being tortured by "Jesuits" but this would have been virtually impossible, as the Jesuit order had been expelled from all Spanish territories in 1767, [8] suppressed generally in 1773,[9] and had only been reconstituted in 1814 (one year before Peter's alleged death). In 1815 there were no Jesuits within several thousand miles of California, as the reconstitution of the Jesuits in New Spain (that is, Mexico) would not take place until 1816.[10] There were only Franciscans in California at the time, and it would be highly unlikely that anyone could confuse members of the two well-known and very dissimilar orders. Yanovsky adds, "At the time I reported all this to the Head Office in St. Petersburg." And indeed, this earlier communication, his official dispatch to the company's main office—dated Feb. 15, 1820, five years after the event—also relates the story of St. Peter's martyrdom, albeit with different details.[11]

The most significant difference is that Yanovsky's original brief letter of 1820 accompanied a Russian translation of an account given in 1819 by a Kodiak Islander with the Russian name "Ivan Kiglay". This is the only account that purports to be from a witness, and any differences found in other accounts (including in those of Yanovsky himself) are additions or embroideries that lack foundation or support. Kiglay's account describes the capture of Russian-led fur poachers by Spanish soldiers in the vicinity of San Pedro Bay (the modern Port of Los Angeles) and taken to "the mission in Saint-Pedro". (As there was no mission or settlement at San Pedro, it is unclear where the party was supposed to have been taken; the nearest mission would have been San Gabriel, although the non-mission village of Los Angeles would have been closer.) While the rest of the prisoners are removed to Mission Santa Barbara, Kiglay and another Kodiak Islander named Chukagnak -- who had been wounded in a battle with the soldiers -- are imprisoned separately at "the mission at Saint-Pedro", and the next day Indians acting at the behest of a Spaniard torture and kill Chukagnak. Kiglay is apparently going to receive the same treatment, until the Spaniard receives a letter that apparently gives other directions. Kiglay is reimprisoned, and eventually escapes to Fort Ross, where he gives his testimony. There is nothing in the account that links the execution of Chucagnak to a refusal on his part to abandon Orthodoxy. Instead, the eyewitness account states that the Kodiak islanders were all previously offered the opportunity to become Catholics, that they had all declined because they were already Christians, and then with the exceptions of Kiglay and Chukagnak were all transferred to Santa Barbara with no further mention of, or demand for, conversion. [12]

Veneration

According to Yanovsky's 1865 letter, upon receiving the report of Peter's death, St. Herman on Kodiak Island was moved to cry out, "Holy new-martyr Peter, pray to God for us!"[4]

Peter the Aleut was glorified as a saint by the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia and locally glorified by the Diocese of Alaska of the Orthodox Church in America as the "Martyr of San Francisco" in 1980. His feast day is celebrated on September 24 or December 12.

There are a number of churches dedicated to him in North America: for example, the church at Lake Havasu City, Arizona;[13] Minot, North Dakota;[14] Calgary;[15] and Abita Springs, Louisiana.[16]

Notes

  1. ↑ Icon: St. Peter the Aleut, Creighton University
  2. ↑ All Saints of North America, an Orthodox Church in Virginia, USA Archived June 27, 2013, at the Wayback Machine.
  3. ↑ McNichols Icon: St. Peter the Aleut and St. Andrew Bobola, SJ, Creighton University
  4. 1 2 3 Saint Peter the Aleut, Oct 22 1999, University of Michigan
  5. ↑ Ivan Kuskof was a sailor and official associated with the Russian-American Company
  6. ↑ Text of Yanofsky's account of the martyrdom of Peter the Aleut, contained in his letter to Abbot Damascene (at Orthodox Church in America website)
  7. ↑ For a translation of the letter, see The Russian Orthodox Religious Mission in America, 1794-1837, pp. 80-89.
  8. ↑ Moses, Bernard. "Charles III: Expulsion of the Jesuits (1767)", Spain's Declining Power in South America, 1730-1806 (Berkeley, Calif., 1919), pp. 104-106
  9. ↑ Pollen, John Hungerford. "The Suppression of the Jesuits (1750-1773)." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 14. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1912. 25 Aug. 2014
  10. ↑ Pollen, John Hungerford. "The Jesuits After the Restoration (1814-1912)." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 14. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1912. 25 Aug. 2014
  11. ↑ See The Russian Orthodox Religious Mission in America, 1794-1837, cited below, p. 177.
  12. ↑ Namee, Matthew. "Peter the Aleut: the original martyrdom account", OrthodoxHistory.org
  13. ↑ St. Peter the Aleut Orthodox Christian Church, Lake Havasu City, Ariz. Archived December 21, 2014, at the Wayback Machine.
  14. ↑ St. Peter the Aleut Church, Minot, ND
  15. ↑ Holy Martyr Peter the Aleut Church, Calgary, AB
  16. ↑ Saint Peter the Aleut Orthodox Mission, Southeast Louisiana

Sources

External links

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