Archimandrite Theoclitos Triantafilides, the saintly priest of Galveston, TX

In an article about Fr. Stephen Andreades, the first resident priest in New Orleans, I quoted from Understanding the Greek Orthodox Church, by Demetrios J. Constantelos (published 1982). At the time, I had only a Google Books “snippet view” of the book, but I’ve since acquired a copy through interlibrary loan, and I thought I’d publish the section dealing with the early Orthodox communities in Galveston and New Orleans. From pages 129-30:

The earliest Greek Orthodox church in the United States was established in 1862 in the seaport city of Galveston, Texas, and it was named after Saints Constantine and Helen. Even though the church was founded by Greeks, it served the spiritual needs of other Orthodox Christians, such as Russians, Serbians, and Syrians. It passed into the hands of the Serbians, who split with the Greeks. The Greeks then established their own church several decades later; but knowledge of the early years of the Galveston Greek Orthodox community is very limited. Neither the number of Greek Orthodox parishioners there nor the name of the first priest is known. The first known Greek Orthodox priest of this community was an Athenian named Theokletos Triantafylides, who had received his theological training in the Moscow Ecclesiastical Academy and had taught in Russia before joining the North American Russian Orthodox Mission. Versed in both Greek and Slavonic, he was able to minister successfully to all Orthodox Christians.

Knowledge of the second Greek community in the United States is more extensive. It was organized in 1864 in the port city of New Orleans. Like the Galveston community, the second one was also founded by merchants. For three years (1864-1867) services were held irregularly and in different buildings. Then in 1867 the congregation moved to its own church structure, named after the Holy Trinity. It was erected through the generosity of the philanthropist Marinos [sic -- Nicolas] Benakis, who donated the lot and $500, and of Demetrios N. and John S. Botasis, cotton merchants who together contributed $1,000.

The church was located at 1222 Dorgenois Street and for several years it became the object of generosity not only of Greeks but of Syrians, Russians, and other Slavs. In addition to Greeks, the board of trustees included one Syrian and one Slav. Notwithstanding the predominance of Greeks on the board, the minutes were written in English and for a while it served as a pan-Orthodox Church.

The early Holy Trinity Church was a simple wooden rectangular edifice 60 feet long and 35 feet wide. The major icons of the iconostasis were painted by Constantine Lesbios, who completed his work in February of 1872. The name of the first parish priest is unknown, but it is believed that a certain uncanonical clergyman named Agapios Honcharenko, of the Russian Orthodox mission in America, served the community for three years (1864-1867). In 1867 the congregation moved to its permanent church and appointed its first regular priest, Stephen Andreades, who had been invited from Greece. He had a successful ministry from 1867 to 1875, when Archimandrite Gregory Yiayias arrived to replace him.

The New Orleans congregation also acquired its own parish house; a small library, which included books in Greek, Latin, and Slavonic; and a cemetery.

There’s some good information here, although Constantelos cites no sources, and he gets some important facts wrong. Most crucially, Agapius Honcharenko was in no way connected to the Russian Mission in America, which at the time was limited to Alaska and would later regard Honcharenko as an obnoxious heretic. And Honcharenko did not serve the New Orleans parish from 1864-67 — in fact, he was never the parish priest at all. He visited the community in the spring of 1865, remaining for perhaps two weeks. He did celebrate the first Divine Liturgy in New Orleans, but he was not the first parish priest.

That distinction properly belongs to Fr. Stephen Andreades, but Constantelos gets Andreades’ dates wrong. While he did come to New Orleans in 1867, Andreades was gone by 1872 at the latest; we know this because Fr. Gregory Yayas was the priest by that point.

And before I close, a word about Galveston. First of all, I wouldn’t regard the 1860s Galveston community as a full-fledged “parish.” They had no priest, no known permanent building, and no known affiliation with a bishop. I do believe that a group of Orthodox in Galveston met for prayers under the name “Saints Constantine and Helen.” They may even have been visited by an Orthodox priest traveling aboard a Russian steamer, or something like that. But I regard the pre-Triantafilides Galveston community as a “proto-parish.” In fact, I’m beginning to wonder if New Orleans wasn’t also a “proto-parish” all the way up to 1867. As Constantelos correctly notes, it wasn’t until that year that the community got a priest and a building. Perhaps we should push their founding date up a couple of years, from 1864/5 to 1867?

Anyway, the thing I want to emphasize, because I’ll be coming back to it in other posts in the near future, is that Fr. Theoclitos Triantafilides of Galveston may be The Most Interesting Man in American Orthodox History. Before he came to America, he had lived a full life — as a monk on Mount Athos, as a tutor in the employ of the King of Greece, and later as a tutor to the future Tsar Nicholas II. When he came to the United States, Triantafilides was already in his sixties. When you take into account the changes in life expectancy, that’s equivalent to being in your eighties today. And he lived another two decades, tirelessly serving the Galveston community and beyond, traveling throughout the South in service to the scattered Orthodox people, regardless of nationality. He also appears to be one of the earliest American Orthodox priests to evangelize Protestant Americans (i.e. not only Native Alaskans and Carpatho-Rusyn Uniates).

That’s enough for today, but I assure you that we’ll have more on Triantafilides in the future. In the meantime, be sure to check out Mimo Milosevich’s highly informative website and lecture on the great priest of Galveston.

Early Orthodoxy in Galveston & New Orleans is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Recently, Holy Cross Orthodox Press published the Atlas of American Orthodox Christian Churches, edited by Alexei D. Krindatch. I contributed several pieces to the Atlas, including the article “Ten Interesting Facts About the History of Orthodox Christianity in the USA.” With Alexei’s permission, we’ll publish excerpts from that article over the next couple of months. To purchase your own copy of the Atlas(for $19.95), click here.

2. The first Orthodox liturgies in New York and New Orleans were celebrated by a controversial Ukrainian who claimed to be hunted by Tsarist agents.

Born in what is now Ukraine in 1832, Agapius Honcharenko attended the Kiev Theological Academy and then became a monk at the renowned Kiev Caves Lavra. He was ordained a deacon at 24, and the following year, he was assigned to the Russian Embassy church in Athens, Greece. From the beginning, there was trouble. Honcharenko was insubordinate, and at one point a young boy accused him of making improper advances. Honcharenko also claimed to have secretly wrote articles in a famous socialist journal. At some point, he may have been ordained to the priesthood by a Greek bishop, although the circumstances surrounding this ordination aren’t clear and our only source for this information is Honcharenko’s own later testimony. In late 1864, Honcharenko set sail for America, where he would be subject to much less oversight. He arrived in New York, and in 1865, he celebrated the first Orthodox liturgy in the city’s history. A choir of Episcopalians sung Slavonic words which had been transliterated into English.

Soon, Honcharenko received word that there were Orthodox people in New Orleans. Arriving in the city just two days after the Civil War ended, Honcharenko celebrated the first Orthodox services in the American South, borrowing an Episcopal church that had, during the recent Union occupation, been used as a stable for horses. Honcharenko spent Holy Week and Pascha in New Orleans before returning to New York. But in his short time away from the city, things had changed. As news of his landmark New York liturgy spread around the world, reports of his more controversial activities began to surface. The Orthodox of New York informed the renegade priest that they no longer had any use for him.

Thus began Honcharenko’s life outside of the Orthodox Church. He traveled across the country – marrying an woman in Philadelphia along the way – and he eventually reached San Francisco. There, in 1867, Honcharenko attempted to set up a “Russo-Greek Methodist Episcopal Church.” San Francisco already had a lot of Orthodox residents, who, motivated by the embarrassing activities of Honcharenko, decided to unite and form an Orthodox parish. Led by the local Russian consul, they asked the Russian Bishop of Alaska to send them a priest. This marked the first-ever presence of a Russian parish in an American state.

Honcharenko purchased land just outside of Oakland, and over the coming decades, reporters would occasionally find their way to the Honcharenko ranch. They wrote articles about the “Apostle of Liberty,” and Honcharenko began to make increasingly outlandish claims – that he had been the Russian ambassador to Greece; that he was Leo Tolstoy’s confessor; that he was the first to discover gold in Alaska;  and that he was hunted by Tsarist assassins. Honcharenko died on his ranch in 1916, at the age of 83.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Atlas Excerpt #2: Agapius Honcharenko is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Agapius Honcharenko in his later years

Recently, Nicholas Chapman published several newly-discovered documents relating to Agapius Honcharenko here at OH.org. A reader named Reg responded with this comment:

This is getting confusing. Matthew since you wrote the original story on Honcharenko, could I ask you to post a timeline on Honcharenko:

Date & place of birth
Education
Date & place of tonsure as a monk
Date & place of ordination as deacon
Date of assignment to Russian Embassy Church in Greece
Date of change of name
Date of ordination as a priest by EP
Date of arrival in America
Date of ministry in NY
Date of connection with New Orleans Church
Date of marriage & I assume leaving the EP jurisdiction
Date of arrival in CA
Date of death.
This would be a great help to all of us.

Let me try to tackle these one by one.

1. Date and place of birth: According to Volume 2 of the Encyclopedia of Ukraine (Univ. of Toronto Press, 1988), Honcharenko was born on August 31, 1832 in “Kryvyn, Skvyra county, Kyiv gubernia.” I’m no expert on Ukrainian geography, but I take it he was born in or around Kiev. I believe the August 31 date is according to the Gregorian Calendar. In an April 9, 1911 article, the San Francisco Call reported Honcharenko’s birth date as August 19, 1832. (August 31 minus 12 days — the difference between the Julian and Gregorian in the 19th century – is August 19.)

2. Education: According to one of the documents found by Nicholas Chapman (“The Case Against Agapius Honcharenko”), Honcharenko was educated at the “Seminary in Kiev,” or the Kiev Theological Academy. This is corroborated by most modern sources.

3. Date and place of tonsure as a monk: I’m not certain of the date, but “The Case” (referred to above) has Honcharenko completing his seminary studies in 1853, entering the Kievo-Pechersk (Kiev Caves) Lavra and being ordained a hierodeacon in 1856.

4. Date and place of ordination as deacon: Honcharenko was ordained a deacon at the Kievo-Pechersk Lavra in 1856.

5. Date of assignment to the Russian Embassy Church in Greece: 1857.

6. Date of change of name: I don’t know. His given name was Andrii Humnytsky, but I don’t know what he changed it to Agapius Honcharenko. Does anyone out there know what “Honcharenko” means?

7. Date of ordination as a priest by EP: I don’t know. In fact, I’m not at all certain that he was ordained by a bishop of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. In his 1865 letter defending himself, Honcharenko does claim to have received ordination and an antimens from the “Great Church” (presumably Constantinople), but I would not be surprised if he was actually ordained by a bishop of the Church of Greece. In any event, given the language of the 1865 letter, I suspect that this happened sometime in 1864, not long before Honcharenko sailed to the US.

8. Date of arrival in America: According to Honcharenko’s 1865 letter, he arrived in America on December 21, 1864. He seems to be following the Julian Calendar; according to the Gregorian Calendar, it would have been January 2, 1865.

9. Date of ministry in New York: Honcharenko claims to have served his first American Divine Liturgy (probably in New York) on Christmas Day — January 6, by the Gregorian Calendar in the 19th century. His “ministry” in New York (if you can call it that) lasted until about April, when he left to visit New Orleans. He returned to New York, but was rejected by the Orthodox there, who had learned of his… issues.

10. Date of connection with the New Orleans church: On March 26, 1865, the New York Times reported that Honcharenko would depart for New Orleans “in a few days.” He was in New Orleans by April 11, when he published an open letter to the Orthodox of that city in the New Orleans Times. In the letter, he said that he would stay in New Orleans until April 22. As far as I know, his roughly two-week visit to the city was the extent of Honcharenko’s ministry in New Orleans.

11. Date of marriage: As best I can tell, Honcharenko married a young Italian woman in Philadelphia in the late 1860s, possibly between his departure from New York and his arrival in the San Francisco Bay area in about 1867. He doesn’t seem to have maintained any contact with church authorities in either Constantinople or Athens, and his connection to anything resembling mainstream Orthodoxy appears to have ended shortly after his New Orleans visit in April 1865.

12. Date of arrival in CA: Late 1867, as best I can tell.

13. Date of death: May 5, 1916 in Hayward, California.

UPDATE (9/21/10): In response to an earlier article, a reader named Helen informed me that the University of Minnesota holds materials on the life of Honcharenko. I have emailed the university to request copies of their holdings, and will post something here at OH.org once I get a response.

[This article was written by Matthew Namee.]

Agapius Honcharenko: answers to some questions is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Editor’s note: Over the past several weeks, we have been publishing some historical documents which Nicholas Chapman recently discovered in London. Here are the relevant links:

• Nicholas’ introduction to the documents
• A letter by St. Philaret of Moscow on Orthodoxy in America in 1865
• A letter by Agapius Honcharenko in defense of himself

Today, we’re publishing the final document in this series — a report detailing the case against Honcharenko. We don’t know who wrote this report, but it provides previously unknown details on Honcharenko’s life prior to his arrival in America. This document was translated from Russian by Matushka Marie Meyendorff.

From 1857 to 1860 at the church of our mission in Athens there served the Hierodeacon Agafy. He was the son of a priest. Agafy had completed a course of studies at the Seminary in Kiev in 1853.

He entered the Kievo-Pechersk Lavra. In 1856 he was ordained to the hiero-deaconate. In 1857, according to the testimony of the deceased Metropolitan of Kiev, Philaret, Agafy was sent by the Holy Synod to the post which had opened of Hierodeacon at our church in Athens.

From the beginning of his arrival in Athens, Agafy (as was reported in 1860 by the previous rector of the Church in Athens, Archimandrite Antonin) showed a tendency against the fulfilment of the rules of the life of a monk. He lacked friendliness towards the persons who formed his parish and had an especially negative attitude towards the rector. In January 1860 a boy of around 16 declared to Archimandrite Antonin that Agafy, for a long time, had hounded him with impolite words and at last made an improper proposition. When confronted with the accuser, Agafy agreed and said that he did it with the aim to learn if the rector himself did not have a similar relationship with the named person. After that it was declared to Agafy that he should find another place of work, This is why he was given a position that removed him from the church in Athens. Soon after that was found, glued to the wall of the tower adjacent to the church of the embassy a slander against Archimandrite Antonin. When it was found that a similar slander was written also in the bell; Agafy was sent to Russia. He left on February 2, 1860.

In that same year, 1860, the former ambassador to Greece wrote in a secret letter [?], to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, that the basic idea directing Agafy’s life was that all in the world is a convention and that everything can be understood whatever way one wants to. As a result of this, Agafy had a secret opposition to everything legal and generally accepted. He rejected all order and was repulsed by every constraint. This attitude brought him to the deepest and dirtiest amorality. He showed a noticeable pleasure in the degrading of the motherland, of spiritual knowledge, and of everything in general which is respected. He showed a sympathy to the …….; he presented ideas for the independence of “Little Russia” [Left bank Ukraine]; he expressed a clear dissatisfaction with Orthodoxy; and he rejected the need for confession. In the last period,[xx?] he displayed an unorthodox conviction toward a rapprochement with the American proselytiser of Lutherism in Greece, Ioan Kinlom. With his help, Agafy was supplied at his arrival from Athens with many letters of recommendation.

On his trip to Russia from Constantinople, he xx Malta and from there he removed his diaconal clothing and left for London. In August 1861 the Holy Synod took into consideration this above described action of the former hierodeacon Agafy (the fact that from February 1860 he was in a self decided absence) and decided to consider the designated hierodeacon Agafy as being defrocked and excluded from the clergy.

About the information received in 1864 that Agafy having returned to Athens in the Spring of 1863 continued, by anonymous letters, to bring shame on Archimandrite Antonin, there was a contact with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs requesting Agafy be sent from Athens to Russia. The decision was transmitted to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in April 28, 1861 No. 4899.

The ministry responded that they do not have the possibility to forcibly return Agafy to Russia. It asked our Ambassador in Athens to look for ways to remove Agafy from Greece.

In Athens our representative informed us that Agafy (who was living then in Athens in the Greek monastery of Tendely) forcefully denies the anonymous letters about which Fr Antonin complained.

The Case Against Agapius Honcharenko is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Agapius Honcharenko in his later years

Editor’s note: Today, we present the second of three historical documents recently discovered by Nicholas Chapman. On August 24, we published Nicholas’ introduction to the documents, and last week, we published a letter by St. Philaret of Moscow on the subject of Orthodoxy in America in 1865. Today’s document is an 1865 letter from Agapius Honcharenko to a priest. While the recipient is not identified by name, Nicholas notes that the priest was “most likely the Rev. Eugene Popov, the Russian Priest in London, England.” The initial translation of this letter has been provided by Matushka Marie Meyendorff.

The letter isn’t dated, but we can get a good idea of when it was written from this sentence: “I received today a letter from New Orleans, from the Greek Consul …… to go there and baptize four children and ten Illyrians.” On March 26, 1865, the New York Times reported that Honcharenko was to depart for New Orleans “in a few days.” It is thus probable that the letter was written shortly before that date.

Very Reverend Father,

I have always  regretted and wondered why in the new world there is no Catholic Orthodox faith and because of this having prepared myself with the necessary objects for a church service: of course icons, vestments etc. Last fall on October 1 I embarked from Smyrna on an American ship and left for America having received the ordination to the priesthood, the holy antimens and the holy myrrh with a letter from the Great Church. I arrived on Dec 21 and on Dec 25, the day of the birth of Christ, in our Orthodox dogma, among the Greeks, was performed the first liturgy on this continent since the time of Columbus.

In the Republic I find in the official documents seven thousand Orthodox Slavs, (Illyrian Dalmatians of Montenegro) , three thousand Russians and three thousand Greeks. These sheep live from birth without a Pastor. The Slavs and Russians, although they are citizens of the Republic…….. But they ask with all the soul addressing themselves to Russia, asking that the Russian Synod send a blessing for their church meetings and they ask to have the petition at the litany to commemorate the Emperor Alexander II and the Holy Synod of the Church of Russia as a symbol of the unity with the Russian Church. As I am a citizen of Greece, during my services I commemorate the Greek King and Synod and the Slavs do not wish this. During the several days of my stay in New York I baptized a few friendly …. (eight) and two Russians. I received today a letter from New Orleans, from the Greek Consul …… to go there and baptize four children and ten Illyrians.

By birth I am a Russian and I served at the Russian Church in Athens as a deacon. My unfortunate fate…….. (March 15, 1860) Unfairness of people …… made me become a Greek citizen. I am also with my soul and body dedicated to the Russian people…. The Russian government . Prince Gorchokov is convinced of this. But why does not the Russian Holy Synod recognise the truth of what I say?!!!

I am addressing you the deepest request very very Reverend Father. I have heard a lot about the goodness of your soul. Please pay attention to me and to the goodwill of the Orthodox Church and ask the petition for me that I would receive the blessing upon my sheep, both Slavs and Russians, from the Holy Synod, because I am the only and first Pastor of the Orthodox Church on this continent and the Pastor for all the Orthodox sheep of the flock of Christ.

I remain with the deepest respect ,

Priest Agapius Honcharenko
47 Exchange Place, Room 19, New York

Agapius Honcharenko in defense of himself is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Editor’s note: Last week, Nicholas Chapman introduced three documents he found in the National Archives in London, under the heading “The Russian Orthodox Church in America and Its Clergy in 1865.” Today, we present the first of these documents — a letter from His Holiness Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow, to the Ober-Procurator of the Holy Synod of Russia, February 26, 1865. Nicholas Chapman explains, “The author of this document was Metropolitan Filaret (Drozdov) who served as Metropolitan of Moscow for from 1826-1867. Metropolitan Innocent, since canonized as the ‘Apostle to America,’ succeeded him.” This draft translation has been provided by Matushka Marie Meyendorff.

One final note: St. Philaret makes reference to a Christmas liturgy celebrated by Honcharenko in New York. This appears to have been the first Orthodox liturgy in the history of New York City (or, for that matter, the first known liturgy in the eastern United States). It is earlier than the better-known liturgy celebrated by Honcharenko a couple of months later (and discussed here and here).

St. Philaret of Moscow

When the American spiritual leaders first showed the desire to have an Orthodox Church in America it seemed necessary for California but not for New York. Now a new outlook appears.

Already a priest has received from the Holy Church of Constantinople the antimens and the Holy Chrism. He has arrived in America and on the day of the birth of Christ performed there the first Orthodox liturgy from the time of the discovery of America. Then he performed the baptism of eight Slavs and two Russians. He writes, “I found there seven thousand Slavs, three thousand Greeks and three thousand Russians, without a Pastor.” If this is true, it is a strong reason to have in America a Russian Orthodox Church.

We are attaching to this a copy of the letter of Agapius Honcharenko written to the Editor of the newspaper “Orthodox Overview.” Won’t you take the decision if something should be done about this situation?

St. Philaret of Moscow on Orthodoxy in America in 1865 is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Editor’s note: We are once again privileged to present the work of the remarkable Nicholas Chapman. Several months ago, we published two articles by Nicholas on the presence of Orthodoxy in Colonial Virginia (to read those, click here and here). Today, Nicholas introduces us to some of his most recent discoveries. On the next three Tuesdays, we’ll publish the three documents Nicholas discusses below.

At the end of July this year I was able to spend an afternoon at the National Archives in London, UK. I was aware that certain documents pertaining to the history of the Russian Orthodox Community in London were held there and I was hoping to find more information with regard to the early presence of Orthodoxy in British America before the American Revolution. Whilst my original goal was achieved I also discovered a wealth of other documents relating to the history of Orthodoxy in America between 1865 -1945. There is much more to translate and to write. I am grateful to Matushka Marie Meyendorff for her initial draft translation of the documents that follow. Not every part is immediately readable, but God willing a more complete and refined translation can be made in due course.

Agapius Honcharenko in his later years

It would perhaps be helpful to briefly set a little historical background. There are three documents collectively filed under the heading of  “The Russian Orthodox Church in America and Its Clergy 1865” They consist of a covering letter written by the venerable and very elderly Metropolitan Filaret of Moscow to the “Ober Procurator” of the Holy Synod of Russia – effectively the Minister of Religion. The Metropolitan encloses two further documents: a detailed and generally negative overview of the case against Agapius Honcharenko with an explanation as to why he was defrocked as a deacon by the Russian Synod in 1861. The second is a letter to an unknown priest (most likely the Rev. Eugene Popov the Russian Orthodox priest in London) from Agapius Honcharenko pleading his side of the story and essentially petitioning to be taken back by the Russian Church. Since his defrocking as a deacon, he appears to have been made a priest, either by the Church of Constantinople or the Church of Greece.

It is interesting that Metropolitan Filaret does not simply dismiss Honcharenko’s claims but appears to treat them seriously enough to suggest to the Ober-Procurator that they provide sufficient grounds to lead the Russian Church to establish a full ecclesial presence in the United States. It should be remembered that these documents predate the US purchase of Alaska from the Russian Empire in March 1867. It should also be noted that the American Civil War was still underway when these documents were written and that the Russian Empire was an active supporter of the Northern States during the conflict. Many in fact credit Metropolitan Filaret as being one of the driving forces behind the abolition of serfdom in Russian Empire (1861) and Agapius Honcharenko was also known as an advocate of that cause. This may partly explain Filaret’s somewhat sympathetic stance to his case. 

The reference of Filaret to “American spiritual leaders” in California is also of interest and is most probably related to the overtures being made at that time by leaders of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the USA to the Russian Orthodox Church and efforts which had already begun toward the formation of a Russian Orthodox Parish in San Francisco.

Nicholas Chapman, Herkimer, New York, August 21 2010

A Brief Commentary on Documents Found in the National Archives in London under the Heading “The Russian Orthodox Church in America and Its Clergy 1865” is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

From the Congregationalist and Boston Recorder, January 16, 1868:

Many will remember that, some two years ago, a famous service was held in Trinity Chapel, New York city, in which, with a great flourish of trumpets, one “Father Agapius,” who purported to be a Priest of the Greek church, celebrated “the Sacrifice of the Mass” in the Greek tongue; to the great delectation of the High Churchmen, who enjoyed the show intensely, and who feld that they were coming very near, in this performance, to the real thing. Great was the glorification which was made over this manifestation of the “Orthodox Catholic Church.” Father Agapius had the genuine Apostolical succession, and it was a blessed symbol that he should condescend to hold his gorgeous Greek service in an American Episcopal church! Father Agapius, however, soon after mysteriously disappeared. It was darkly hinted, after a time, that he was — tell it not in Gath — a swindler and a cheat; and, most mournful of all, a mere mechanic and prosaic printer. Father Agapius has turned up again, however — this time in the Methodist connection. The Pacific Churchman of San Francisco, Cal., of 28th Nov. last, contains the following advertisement:

“Russo-Greek Methodist Episcopal Church, Rev. Agapius Honcharenko, Pastor. Preaching every Sabbath morning at 9 o’clock in the Vestry of the Howard Street M.E. Church. Services conducted in the Slavonian, Russian and Greek languages. All are invited.”

We hope there is no irreverence in the suggestion; but wouldn’t it be well to have Trinity Chapel disinfected?[1]

And here is the original article in the Pacific Churchman, to which the above article refers:

FATHER AGAPIUS – Some of our readers may recall the name of this individual, who, about two years ago, appeared in New York, claiming to be a priest of the Greek Church. At first his pretensions were received by some of the clergy, and a Greek service was arranged for him. Immediately afterwards, however, he disappeared, and, we believe, subsided into his original employment, which was that of a printer. Since then nothing has been heard of him, until about a fortnight since, when he appeared in this city [San Francisco] as – to copy his card – a member of the “Orthodox Catholic Church.” We find, however, from the following advertisement that he has now transferred his valuable talents to our Methodist brethren:

“Russo-Greek Methodist Episcopal Church, Rev. Agapius Honcharenko, Pastor. Preaching every Sabbath morning at 9 o’clock in the Vestry of the Howard street M.E. Church. Services conducted in the Slavonian, Russian and Greek languages. All are invited.”

As the members of the Greek Church (if there are any here) cannot recognize him, and American Methodists cannot understand “Services in the Slavonian, Russian and Greek languages,” we think his chance is a small one of founding a sect with the “stunning” name of the “Russo-Greek Methodist Episcopal Church.”[2]

As it happened, there were indeed Orthodox Christians living in San Francisco in 1867. They were grouped into two societies — the Russian Slavonian Benevolent Society and the Greek-Russian Slavonian Orthodox Eastern Church and Benevolent Society. Just a couple weeks after the above article ran, the two societies merged, and the Russian and Pan-Slavonic Benevolent Society was incorporated.[3] The Orthodox in San Francisco had initially attended some of Honcharenko’s church services. In a letter in 1868, Prince Dimitry Makutsov (acting director of the Russian American Company) wrote, “Last year Agapius Honcharenko arrived in S.-Francisco, who escaped from a certain monastery. At the beginning, he was conducting divine services here, but, since he is not following the precise rules of our Church, all those who share our faith left him and renounced him as a schismatic.”[4] The realization that Honcharenko was a fraud appears to have been part of the impetus for the San Francisco Orthodox community to form a parish.

One of the immediate goals of the society was to build an Orthodox church. In March of 1868, they sent a petition to Bishop Paul in Alaska, asking that he send Fr. Nicholas Kovrigin to San Francisco. The bishop granted the society’s request, and Kovrigin was in San Francisco in time for Holy Week. This was the first formal Russian parish in the contiguous United States, and Kovrigin was the first resident parish priest.
____________________________________________________________
[1] The Congregationalist and Boston Recorder (January 16, 1868), 20.
[2] “Father Agapius,” San Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin (reprinted from the Pacific Churchman, November 30, 1867).
[3] “Russian Benevolent Society,” San Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin (December 27, 1867).
[4] Prince D. Makutsov to Bishop Paul (March 1868). Published at Holy Trinity Cathedral (OCA), http://www.holy-trinity.org/history/1868/03.00.Maksutov-Paul.html.

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Nicolas Marino Benachi

President Abraham Lincoln's official recognition of Benachi's appointment as Greek Consul at New Orleans

Benachi was born in 1812 on the Greek island of Chios, and he was living in New Orleans at least as early as 1852, when he purchased a large piece of choice real estate in the city. (He went on to build a mansion, known as the “Benachi House,” on some of the highest ground in New Orleans. It still stands, and is now an upscale bed and breakfast.) Benachi himself was a formidable figure. Here’s one description:

Benachi was a Greek businessman who worked in the New Orleans cotton trade for the Greek firm of Ralli Bros. They were international cotton brokers with offices in London, Cairo, Athens and India. [...] He was Consul of Greece in New Orleans, a speculator in real estate and slaves, a hunter, horseman and founder of the first Greek Orthodox Church in the Western Hemisphere[1]

Being the most prominent figure in the Greek (and Orthodox) community in New Orleans, as well as being a slaveowner, Benachi was probably involved in the organization of the Greek militia regiment during the Civil War. His daughter went on to marry Demetrius Botassi, the Greek Consul in New York City, and Botassi became a major figure in New York’s Orthodox community.

Benachi lived for another two decades. He died in New Orleans in 1886, at the age of 74.

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[1] “History & Restoration,” Benachi House & Gardens.

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As we discussed earlier, Fr. Agapius Honcharenko celebrated the first Orthodox liturgy in New York City on March 2, 1865. At the time, he was the only Orthodox priest in America outside of Alaska.

And as we’ve also discussed, there were Greeks and other Orthodox Christians living in New Orleans in the 1860s. In fact, they had been there for several decades already. The city was a major port, and it became an early center for Greek cotton merchants and sailors. A few weeks after Honcharenko’s liturgy in New York, the New York Times reported:

Father Agapius, the Russo-Greek priest, now residing in this city, will leave in a few days for New-Orleans, where there are about 300 Sclavonians [sic] and others who belong to the communion of his church. The Father will make a short stay in New-Orleans for the purpose of baptizing those who desire it.[1]

Upon arriving in New Orleans, Honcharenko wrote a letter to the city’s Orthodox Christians. This letter appeared in the New Orleans Times on April 11:

Beloved Children of the Orthodox Oriental Church in New Orleans:

Jesus Christ, the head of the Church, is pleased not to leave the members of our branch of the Holy Apostolic Church to remain any longer without the enjoyment of their own ecclesiastical services.

The Divine Mind has sent my humility — His Evangelist — to this New World, to gather together the scattered sheep and invite them again in the privileges of the Church.

I therefore come that I may show you how to so walk in the church militant, and to receive the Holy Sacraments, that you may be the better prepared for the church triumphant.

After spending some time in the Northern States of this great Republic I have just arrived in your city. I intend to remain here only until the 22nd of April — through Passion and Easter weeks.

I earnestly recommend you to prepare yourselves by fasting and prayer for confession and holy communion — yourselves and your dear children.

The divine liturgy, according to the Orthodox Oriental Church, will be celebrated by divine permission on Saturday next, April 15th, at 10 1/2 A.M., in St. Paul’s Protestant Episcopal Church, Camp street, corner of Gaiennie. Those desiring to attend will please call at my present residence, No. 7 St. Ann street, Jackson Square, where I may be found every morning, excepting on Saturday next, until 12 o’clock M.

Your affectionate brother in Christ and Missionary to America,

AGAPIUS HONCHARENKO
Priest of the Orthodox Oriental Church[2]

Honcharenko is widely reported to have been the first pastor of the New Orleans parish (for instance, the website of Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral refers to him as “the first priest of the Community”). But really, Honcharenko was only in New Orleans for a visit (cf. his above statement, “I intend to remain here only until the 22nd of April”), and he returned to New York soon thereafter. He soon moved to the San Francisco Bay area, where he continued his colorful and controversial career (about which, more to come).

Incidentally, about St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, the site of the first Orthodox liturgy in the American South — the church of Honcharenko’s day was built in the mid-1850s, replacing an earlier structure. But New Orleans surrendered to the North early in the Civil War, and from 1862 to 1865, St. Paul’s was closed and the church was used to stable Union horses.[3] The Civil War officially ended on April 9, 1865, and Honcharenko served liturgy on April 15 — in other words, that Orthodox liturgy must have been one of the first services in the newly-restored St. Paul’s. Unfortunately, the structure no longer exists; it burned in a fire in 1891.

The New Orleans Orthodox parish went on to build a church of its own, named for the Holy Trinity. Their first full-time pastor was a Fr. Stephen Andreades, who was apparently “invited from Greece” to come to New Orleans. We know that Andreades was in New Orleans by at least December of 1867, which makes him the first Orthodox parish priest in the contiguous United States.[4] In future posts, we’ll discuss both the life of Fr. Agapius Honcharenko and the early history of the New Orleans parish.

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[1] “General City News,” New York Times (March 26, 1865), 8.
[2] “The Orthodox Oriental Church,” New Orleans Times (April 11, 1865), 8.
[3] “History,” St. Paul’s Episcopal Church.
[4] Fr. Alexander Doumouras, “Greek Orthodox Communities in America Before World War I,” St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly 11:4 (1967), 179.

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Rev. Dr. Morgan Dix, rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in New York City

This week, I’ve been discussing the first Orthodox liturgy in New York City, celebrated by Fr. Agapius Honcharenko in 1865. (For those posts, click here and here.)

Honcharenko appears to have arrived in New York in January 1865. The following is part of the January 18, 1865 entry in the diary of Rev. Dr. Morgan Dix, the rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in New York City:

The Revd Mr. Young called in the evening to see me, on important business, connected with the arrival of a Russian priest in this city, who came out to minister to the Greek and Slavonic people here.  I promised him a room for their services in one of our buildings.  We had much conversation on the Russo-Greek movement wh[ich] is going on favourably to all appearance here & in England.

On March 2 of the same year, Honcharenko served the landmark Orthodox liturgy in Trinity Chapel. Here is Dix’s diary entry from that day:

This 2nd. day of Lent was a memorable one, because the Liturgy of the Eastern Church was sung in Trinity Chapel, at 11 A.M. This never occurred before so far as I have heard, in any Anglican Church. Bishop Potter was to have been there, but backed out, and went down to S. Paul’s instead, to the noon day communion. A full account of this delightful service, will be found at the end of this diary; I cut it out from the Evening Post.

Dix went on to note that the service “took just 1 hr. & 15 m.,” and he included multiple newspaper clippings which reported on the event.

I am indebted to Gwynedd Cannan, archivist of Trinity Church in New York, for providing the excerpts from the Dix diary.

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St Sava Serbian Orthodox Cathedral (formerly Trinity Chapel)

A couple days ago, I wrote a piece on the first Orthodox liturgy in New York City, celebrated by Fr Agapius Honcharenko in 1865. The site of the liturgy was Trinity Chapel, which belonged to the Episcopal Church. In my post, I included a photo of Trinity Church… Which, as it turns out, is different than Trinity Chapel.

I learned of this from the archivist of Trinity Church, who informed me that what was Trinity Chapel is now St Sava Serbian Orthodox Cathedral.

Trinity Chapel originally belonged to Trinity Church. It was built in the 1850s, and despite being called a “chapel,” it had a considerable congregation. By the 1940s, though, demographics had changed, and church leaders decided to sell the building. New York City’s first full-blown Serbian parish had begun in the late 1930s, and as soon as they heard that the chapel was on the market, they were interested. With help from St Nicholai Velimirovich, Serbs from across the country, and the Episcopalians themselves, the modest Serbian parish was able to purchase Trinity Chapel in 1942. I’m getting all of this information from the website of St Sava Cathedral, and I would encourage you to take a look at the whole story, which can be found here.

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Trinity Episcopal Church, New York City

On March 2, 1865, New York City witnessed its first-ever Orthodox liturgy. The service was held in Trinity Chapel, which belonged to the Episcopal Church. The priest, Fr Agapius Honcharenko, was originally from what is now Ukraine and what was then a part of the Russian Empire. But he came, apparently, from the Church of Greece: he had been sent, or perhaps volunteered, to serve as a priest for the handful of scattered Orthodox Christians in America.

As I will discuss in depth later, Honcharenko was a bizarre character, and we have to regard his ecclesiastical credentials as suspect at best. At the time, though, he was welcomed in New York by the Episcopalians, who offered their chapel and provided a choir. The occasion for the service was the anniversary of Tsar Alexander II’s coronation; this appears to have been suggested not by Honcharenko but by Dr Morgan Dix, the rector of Trinity Episcopal Church.

The following day, the New York Times reported, “The church, both aisles and galleries, was crowded with ladies and gentlemen to its utmost extent, although there had been no advertisement in the papers regarding the celebration. There were present upward of fifty clergymen of the city and neighborhood. The music (only vocal) was very fine. The ceremonies were impressive, solemn, and, to almost everyone present, novel, but exceedingly interesting, and, it might be said, beautiful. We ought to say that there were some sixty Greeks and about twenty Scalvonians [sic] or Russians present, who occupied seats in front of the altar.”[1]

The Times actually reprinted several sections of the liturgy itself. The Protestants present were especially struck by the absence of the filioque from the Creed. The music, sung by a small group of Episcopalians, was provided by a certain Dr Young. This man was a member of the Russo-Greek Committee of the Episcopal Church – the group charged with fostering relations with the Orthodox Churches. Dr Young had brought texts and music back from a visit to Russia, and he put the Slavic words into English phonetics for the occasion.

Not everyone was excited about the service. The magazine Evangelical Christendom commented, “Some of the religious papers find in it an unbecoming complicity with mischievous superstition and error; since the filioque was omitted from the creed by the Episcopal choir, and the ‘sacrifice’ ‘received’ by the priest is claimed to include all the enormities of transubstantiation and the Mass.”[2]

News of the event quickly traveled around the world. It was reported in Orthodox publications in Russia and France. The French Orthodox journal Union Chretienne soon broke the news that Honcharenko had been involved with the exiled Russian radical Alexander Herzen, and had written several articles criticizing the Russian Church.[3]

This revelation led the Orthodox of New York to cut off contact with Honcharenko, who went on to have many more strange adventures over the next several decades.

[1] “Novel Religious Service,” New York Times (March 3, 1865), 8.

[2] “America,” Evangelical Christendom (April 1, 1865), 190.

[3] “The Anglican and Greek Churches,” Catholic World 2:7 (October 1865), 67-68.

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The Russian frigate Alexander Nevsky, circa 1863. Detail of an illustration in the October 17, 1863 issue of Harper's Weekly.

In September of 1863, in the middle of the American Civil War, a fleet of Russian ships arrived in the New York harbor. Their mission was both diplomatic and strategic, but anyway, that’s not terribly relevant here.[i] More to the point, among the crews of the ships were at least two Orthodox priests serving as chaplains – the first known Orthodox clergy to set foot in the eastern United States.

On September 23, the New York Times reported that a certain Father Nestor, chaplain of the Russian frigate Olisiaba, baptized four Greek children in New York. “The service was of a most impressive character, and created great interest,” the Times said. “The service was read in the Russian dialect, and its forms are peculiar, but very appropriate to such a ceremony. The officers of the Russian frigate were present, and enjoyed at the residence of Mrs. Negroponti, in Nineteenth street, a most magnificent dejeune. The toasts of the Emperor of Russia and the new King of Greece were given in conjunction with our own magnates, and received with appropriate ovations.”[ii]

I don’t know the name of the second Russian priest to visit New York. He was the chaplain of the Russian frigate Alexander Nevsky. “The festival of St. Michael and of all Angels is one of those most reverenced in the Greek Catholic Church,” the Times said, “and the worthy ‘Papa’ saw fit to observe it in an Episcopalian cathedral, which he did with every semblance of intense curiosity, interest and devotion. He was received with distinction and conducted to a conspicuous and comfortable seat near the altar, on the right side of which sat the Rt. Reverend Bishop Southgate, in the ceremonial Chair of the Episcopate.”[iii]

When the Alexander Nevsky left New York, it made a stop in Athens, where it informed the Greek Church leaders that there were a number of Orthodox in America without a priest. This resulted in the arrival in New York, in 1865, of Fr. Agapius Honcharenko.

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[i] Cf. Marshall B. Davidson, “A Royal Welcome for the Russian Navy,” American Heritage Magazine 11:4 (June 1960). Also cf. Edward W. Ellsworth, “Sea Birds of Muscovy in Massachusetts,” New England Quarterly 33:1 (March 1960), 3-18.

[ii] “A Greek Christening,” New York Times (September 23, 1863), 8.

[iii] “A Novelty for Michaelmas,” New York Times (September 30, 1863), 5.

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