Happy Indigenous Peoples’ Day!
Remembering how the Iroquois treated missionary Isaac Jogues and his companions.
This analysis is free, but with Premium Membership you get MORE. Join today.
NOTE: Earlier today we published my “Christopher Columbus and the Birth of the Modern World” which I strongly encourage you to fully imbibe. The lies about Columbus — intended to delegitimize the United States, in whose territory he never set foot — have become so rampant that there is much need for a corrective. I believe I have provided one you’ll find both useful and enlightening.
Meanwhile, the great Paul Kengor comes at that same problem from the other direction in “Happy Indigenous Peoples’ Day!”, which we reprint here for our Members. It is definitely worth your time to consider exactly how peaceful, kind, and dare we say, “noble” the Native Americans truly were. — RDM
by Paul Kengor
October 12, 2025
Among the American left’s new holy days, Indigenous Peoples’ Day is near the top of the list, exceeded only by the left’s holy month: Pride Month. The Biden administration went all-out for Indigenous Peoples’ Day, issuing formal statements and proclamations.
For the left, Indigenous Peoples’ Day is the social justice substitute for Columbus Day. The epic Italian explorer has been canceled for a host of alleged evils. To progressives, among the worst of Columbus’s transgressions is the colossal sin he shares with other Europeans: he dared to bring Christianity to the continent. For this, he is unforgiven and shown no mercy by today’s Torquemadas of “tolerance.”
The “inclusion” crowd has excluded Columbus and his ilk, such as the despised Junipero Serra, the Spanish missionary who settled California, created the missions up and down the state, and thanks to whom cities throughout the state bear the names of saints. (News flash for the theologically illiterate “educated” in our schools: “San” refers to “Saint.” Those California cities with names like San Francisco and Santa Barbara are actually saint names. Even cities like Ventura and Los Angeles are Christian names.)
As with statues of Columbus, statues of St. Serra (canonized by Pope Francis no less) have been defaced, decapitated, and torn down everywhere.
Each year, your humble author posts a piece remembering notable natives. I want to do our part to educate the masses. I’m lending a hand of assistance to liberals in their quest to provide a fuller education to today’s youth, especially regarding the pristine peoples who lived in this utopia before Europeans ruined their heaven on earth.
To that end, two years ago I wrote a piece titled, “Indigenous Slavers: American Indians Who Whipped and Owned Blacks.” I there detailed the enslavement of black people by the five “Civilized Tribes” — i.e., the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole Indians. These tribes owned thousands of black African slaves and were brutal masters. They sided with the Confederacy during the Civil War and continued their ownership after the Emancipation Proclamation. To this day, there are African American descendants of these slaves with lawsuits against these indigenous tribes.
Related to that, last year I wrote about Stand Watie (1806-1871), the powerful Cherokee leader and fearless Confederate general. He, too, resisted the Emancipation Proclamation. He was the last Confederate general to surrender.
For this year, I thought I would stick to a theme preferred by the left, namely, the noble natives versus the dread European missionaries. And so, this year, I shall dispense a few paragraphs on the Iroquois and other tribes and their treatment of peaceful Jesuit missionaries Isaac Jogues and his companions. I’ll offer just a few paragraphs on what could be a much longer and quite gruesome presentation. Teachers, I would encourage you to assign this subject to your students as a class project!
Isaac Jogues and Friends
Isaac Jogues (1607-46) was a French Jesuit missionary who in the 1640s served the Huron, Iroquois, Mohawks, and other North America natives, specifically along the border areas between Canada and upstate New York.
In August 1642, Jogues and two lay missionaries, Guillaume Couture and René Goupil, were seized by warriors from the Mohawk Nation, part of the Iroquois Confederacy. Jogues at first hid in fear. But upon learning of the torture of his companions, he went to offer them comfort. The Indians responded by brutalizing Jogues as well. They beat him and his companions, tearing hair off their heads and beards and ripping off their fingernails. With their teeth, they gnawed the fingers of the missionaries until the bones were visible.
They then marched their victims through a gauntlet in the village, where women and children joined in beating them with sticks. The victims were mutilated day and night. Jogues’ thumb was removed and he was suspended in the air from a wooden plank. Someone who witnessed the vicious treatment cut him free. He escaped and managed to somehow get back to Europe, where the pope gave him special dispensation to do Mass with his dismembered hand, even as his severed fingertips made it impossible for him to hold the Eucharist.
The brave Jogues could not forget those he left behind, wishing to serve them. He returned to Iroquois territory four years later. The indigenous people wasted no time. On October 18, 1646, they tomahawked the priest, planted his head on a pole, and tossed his remaining corpse in the Mohawk River near Auriesville, New York.
The ghastly witness of Jogues did not deter other brave missionaries. Three years later, in March 1649, French Jesuits Jean de Brébeuf and Gabriel Lalemant were likewise captured by Iroquois warriors. The treatment of de Brébeuf was particularly cruel, given that he had long ago befriended these people and ministered to and cared for them for over two decades, first arriving in Quebec in June 1625.
De Brébeuf was subjected to a double burning, first with boiling water before being burnt at the stake. His flesh suitably prepared for his sadistic tormentors, the Iroquois tribesmen prepared to feast on de Brébeuf, cannibalizing him. They drank his blood and ate his heart. They might have eaten more of the man, but his flesh had been stripped to the bone around his arms, legs, and thighs. Little remained to devour. They also had cut off his lips for speaking of Jesus. His head was scalped.
Of course, news of these martyrdoms reached Europe. Still, more fearless French Jesuits were undeterred, such as Noël Chabanel, who came to the territory to preach the Gospel. He was likewise soon murdered, killed by the Hurons on December 8, 1649.
All along, these men turned the other cheek and preached peace and love. They not only preached but taught, educating the natives to read and write. As they sought to civilize, they were slaughtered by savages. And yet, today, American leftists frame them as the bad guys who arrogantly dared to proselytize noble natives.
It must also be remembered that these indigenous peoples not only attacked European missionaries but one another. These tribes were constantly warring with each other. They were merciless to fellow natives.
For this Indigenous Peoples’ Day, let us again pause to remember the history of our native peoples. And to repeat: Teachers, I encourage you to assign this subject to your students as a class project. They can do some digging of their own!
In keeping with the new holiday, let us learn these lessons from our North American natives.
— This essay originally appeared at The American Spectator.
Minor correction San/Santa in Spanish translates as "Saint" but it also translates as "Holy". So, "Santa Cruz" means "Holy Cross," not "Saint Cross." Likewise, "Santa Fe" means "Holy Faith", and, so forth.