THEME OF THE ISSUE: “GO YE THEREFORE, AND TEACH ALL NATIONS...” (MATT. 28:19)
“And so they left them in pairs in prison until the evening to think it over. In the evening they came back with a lantern and with candles and started once again to persuade them to accept the Catholic faith. But the Aleuts, filled with grace, firmly and resolutely answered, ‘We are Christians, and we will not change our faith.’ “Then those fanatics began torturing them—first one while the other one was forced to be a witness. They first cut off one joint of the toes, then another, while the victim suffered and repeatedly said, ‘I am a Christian and will not change my faith.’ Then they cut off one joint on each of his fingers, then another, then chopped off his feet, then his hands. Blood gushed forth, but the martyr endured until the end, repeatedly professing his faith until he died from loss of blood. “On the following day, they were preparing to torture the others, but that very night an order was received from the city of Monterey to bring all the captive Russian Aleuts immediately to Monterey under escort, so in the morning they were all taken away, except the one who had died. This was told to me by an eyewitness, the Aleut comrade of the one who was tortured, who later escaped from captivity. And I immediately reported this to the government in St. Petersburg. “When I had finished my story, Father Herman asked me: ‘What was the name of this martyred Aleut?’ I answered: ‘Peter, but I cannot remember his surname.’ Then Father Herman stood before the icon, reverently crossed himself and said these words: ‘Holy New Martyr Peter, pray unto God for us!’ [Yanovsky, 1900:143–144]. The eyewitness of this event was the Kodiak Aleut Ivan Kyglay.” [Pokazaniia, 2005: 318–320] In the fall of 1819, the crew of the American ship brought an epidemic of influenza, first to Novo-Arkhangelsk [present-day Sitka —Ed.] and then to Kodiak Island. In the village of St. Paul Harbor, fifty-one people died. The epidemic rapidly spread throughout the island. The mortality rate was so high that entire families of Kodiak Aleuts died out. Semyon Yanovsky wrote: “During my stay on Kodiak Island, a deadly and infectious disease or pestilence was brought there; it began with a fever, an intense head cold, coughing, shortness of breath, and ended in shivers, from which a person could die in three days! “There were neither doctors nor medicines available; the sickness quickly spread throughout the entire population (of St. Paul Harbor) and soon spread to the near-lying (Aleut) villages. The zealous Father Herman tirelessly and with great self-sacrifice visited the sick, not sparing himself, and as a divine exhorted them to endure, to pray, to repent and prepared them for death.… “The pestilence affected everyone, even infants. My family, my wife and nursing child, were also sick, as was I myself. The mortality was so high that for three days
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there was no one available to dig graves, and so the bodies lay around unburied! Thankfully there was a frost, so there was no smell. “I cannot imagine anything more more sad and horrible than the scene I encountered when I visited an Aleut kashim! This is a large barn-like structure or barracks with bunks where the Aleuts lived with their families, altogether approximately 100 people; I made the rounds, speaking with them, making inquiries, giving advice, trying to encourage and comfort them: some were already dead and cold, lying next to the living; others were in their final death throes with moans and screams that rent the heart. “I saw mothers who had already died, on whose cold breasts hungry children still crawled, crying, trying to find some nourishment, but in vain! My heart was bleeding with pity as I beheld this horrific sight, this woeful scene of death. No painter’s brush is worthy to portray it as a reminder to those who endlessly wallow in luxury, forgetting about death!” [Ibid., 136–137] During this terrible epidemic, which lasted more than a month, Father Herman tirelessly visited the sick. Those Kodiak Aleuts who survived came to love Father Herman even more, for by risking his life, he proved his love for them during the misfortune that had befallen them. Father Herman even took in and subsequently raised a two-year-old orphan, Gerasim Zyrianov. One can safely say that in sheltering the infant, who was in danger of dying, Father Herman acted as the only person who was capable of saving the child. When they were parting in December 1819, Father Herman said to Semyon Yanovsky: “You’re getting ready to travel to Russia, to St. Petersburg—don’t take your wife there, who was born here, who has not seen the wide world or its beguiling luxuries or its temptations and vices; rather, leave her with your mother in Little Russia (Ukraine) while you attend to your business in St. Petersburg.” [Ibid., 141] Yanovsky gave his word, but didn’t keep it. The Yanovskys arrived in St. Petersburg in early 1822 and were caught up in the whirlwind of social life. Time flew by unnoticed, but after several months, Irina Yanovsky began to tire of the worldly society and the unending array of balls, receptions, and state dinners. It was then that Yanovsky remembered Father Herman’s warning and took his wife to his mother’s house in the country—but it was too late. Irina was melting like a candle from an unknown illness, and in early 1824, she quietly died at the age of twenty-two. Yanovsky wrote in his memoirs: “My beloved, did you have a premonition that you would be leaving your homeland forever?… Many Creoles (over twelve people) had been taken from here to St. Petersburg to be instructed in various sciences, particularly navigation and shipbuilding. They received excellent support, they didn’t lack for anything, but only two VOL. 2 (№4) 2014 SPIRITUAL SPRING