A Surprising Discovery!

While in the US in January, my daughter Joy and I pulled out a box of old family pictures and started going through them. I found buried treasure when I came upon a portrait and letter from my Grandfather Panfil’s brother, John B. Panfil.

My Grandfather on my Mother’s side, was named Henry Panfil. He and his brother, John and sister, Stephanie E. (called by her middle name - Elsie), emigrated from Poland as children. Henry was evidently quite bright and one of his school teachers took a shine to him and sponsored his education all the way through law school at the University of Pennsylvania. (Later my Mother became one of the first (and youngest) women to graduate from U of PA’s law school as well, finishing in 1956 at the age of only 24)

As a Catholic Priest, John could never marry, but his sister never married either and became his housekeeper. So when his superiors asked him to go to Mosul, Iraq as a missionary around 1925, they went together.
The letter we found is date May 25, 1926. Here is what it said:

Dear Miss Stott,
We received your letter and are glad of hearing that you are in good health and that Henry has passed his examinations (His Bar exams to become a lawyer).

After our long voyage we finally arrived to Mosul and intend to stay here for a while. Mosul is not a pleasant place to live in. A dirty, dusty oriental city. Plenty of water, the river Tigris flows near the city but its waters are contaminated and muddy. Sand storms, sand flies and flies make your life miserable in Mosul.

Elsie wants to go back – she is very lonesome. Anyhow we intend to go to Persia this summer; it is cooler there.

I am working presently among the Assyrians; their church is the eldest one in Christendom. They have lost their country during the war and were massacred by the Turks and Kurds and are in need of the American help in order to exist. We are trying to revive their old church, their customs and their language.

We visited the other day “Sheiloh Ady” (Sheikh Adi ibn Musafir), temple of the Yazidies (Yazidi), worshippers of the devil! They represent him as a peacock and adore him in secret. God is good, they say we should not fear him; being good he cannot do any wrong to us - but the Devil has power over the world, we are afraid of him, we must respect him and beg him not to molest us. Some begin(believe) in it, anyhow!? And really they fear the devil. They never pronounce his name, “Shaitian” , (Shaytan(Satan)) – and a Christian who would dare to pronounce it is in their presence, is in danger of being killed! Even the words having the letters “Shait” are eliminated from their language! Poor people, detested, persecuted, exterminated by the Muslims and Christians alike, but still attached to their belief!

I am glad that Henry has a place as a lawyer; he has now and open road for success and I think he will succeed. How are the things in Philadelphia? How is the exposition? Write us all about Philadephia and send us occasionally, if you can, some Sunday paper – we have no literature here – and the news are only from the Arabic papers. I am preaching in Syriac already – it is a nice language – the language spoken by our Lord.

Greetings and regards to all our friends,

Sincerely yours,
John B. Panfil

Several things strike me about this letter:

1) My Grand Uncle was a missionary almost 90 years ago to a country the US the invaded after 9/11 and still occupies.

2) He left his comfortable life in Philadelphia and went to “A dirty, dusty oriental city” to comfort the Assyrian Church who was suffering, much like we have ended up leaving Philadelphia to serve the Haitian church and people, many who are still suffering the effects of the earthquake and grinding poverty.

3) His sister went with him to a male-dominated oriental culture. No wonder she was lonely!

4) The false religion he describes is basically the same as Haitian Voodoo: In Creole the name for “God” is “Bondye”, or “Good God”. God is good, and can’t harm us, so he can be ignored. Satan and his “loa” or demons are the ones you have to worry about!

5) He mentions the genocide of the Assyrians in which 750,000 people were forcibly removed from their homeland near Turkey to other surrounding countries, but most died during this “removal”. This genocide started on April 24, 1915. It included the slaughter of 1, 750,000 Aremnians, Among those who died were the grandparents of my Armenian step-Father, William Hadigian. His Father saw his whole family killed by the Turks and then as a teenager he was conscripted into the French Foreign Legion for a time before escaping and making his way to the US on a boat.

6) The International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) reached a consensus that "the Ottoman campaign against Christian minorities of the Empire between 1914 and 1923 constituted a genocide against Armenians, Assyrians, and Pontian and Anatolian Greeks. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrian_Genocide


Because John B. Panfil’s story was so fascinating, I started to look up his name on the internet, and what did I find! His name is associated with 2 photos on the internet. One of his house, and another of a young man in a kayak-like boat on the Tigris river.
In addition, I found him and his sister’s names in the 1920 and 1940 census, as well as the passenger list of several passenger liners. In addition, I found his name in several newspapers from Syracuse, NY where he spent the rest of his life after returning from Iraq (possibly in 1934).









As Hebrews 12: 1-3 says: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, 2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame,and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3 Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”

Rev. John B. Panfil and his sister Elsie, are two of the witnesses that surround us here in Haiti, and set a great example for us to follow!