24 Facts About Isaac Jogues

Isaac Jogues was a French missionary and martyr who traveled and worked among the Iroquois, Huron, and other Native populations in North America.

Isaac Jogues was the first European to name Lake George, calling it.

In 1646, Jogues was martyred by the Mohawk at their village of Ossernenon, near the Mohawk River.

Isaac Jogues was born in Orleans, France, into a bourgeois family, where he was the fifth of nine children.

Isaac Jogues was educated at home until the age of ten, at which point he began attending Jesuit schools.

Isaac Jogues professed simple vows in 1626, and went to study philosophy at the royal college of La Fleche.

In 1633, Isaac Jogues was sent to the College de Clermont in Paris to pursue his studies in theology.

Isaac Jogues was assigned as a missionary to the Huron and Algonquian peoples; both were allies of the French in New France.

For six years, Isaac Jogues lived in the village of St-Joseph and learned the Hurons' ways and language.

Isaac Jogues traveled with Garnier to the Petun, a native band located in modern-day southern Ontario, who were known as the Tobacco Nation for their main commodity crop.

Isaac Jogues settled down to the duties of a resident missioner at Sainte-Marie for some time.

Isaac Jogues allegedly hid in reeds and bushes but decided to leave his hiding place to join the prisoners so that he could comfort them and ensure that their faith in Christianity remained strong.

At the third village, Isaac Jogues was hung from a wooden plank and nearly lost consciousness until an Iroquois had pity on him and cut him free.

Isaac Jogues's captivity dragged on, lasting about a year, during which he experienced severe malnourishment and exposure to the cold.

Once there, van Curler helped Isaac Jogues escape, hiding him in his barn until a deal could be reached.

Isaac Jogues was the first Catholic priest to visit Manhattan Island.

Pope Urban VIII considered Isaac Jogues a "living martyr" and gave him dispensation to say Mass with his mutilated hand.

Isaac Jogues was unable to follow this law after losing two fingers while in Iroquois captivity, resulting in the requirement for dispensation by the pope.

Isaac Jogues visited his mother in Orleans, but was eager to return to the missions.

Isaac Jogues experienced regret over his time in captivity, and a longing for martyrdom that motivated his return to New France in 1644 after only a year and a half in France, first to Quebec, followed by a trip to Wendake.

Isaac Jogues's ambassadorship was intended to maintain the tentative peace reached in 1645 between the Iroquois and the French, the Huron and the Algonquin.

Additionally, as a result of his previous experience on the territory, Isaac Jogues demonstrated an uncanny knowledge of the territory, which the Mohawks perceived as threatening.

Isaac Jogues's death represented a secondary martyring of Isaac Jogues.

Isaac Jogues was canonized on 29 June 1930 by Pope Pius XI along with seven other Canadian Martyrs.