Albazinians

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Simeon Runchen Du, Albazinian Orthodox bishop of Shanghai (1956-1965)

The Albazinians (Russian: албазинцы;

Qing troops in 1685. The majority of its inhabitants agreed to evacuate their families and property to Nerchinsk, whereas several young Cossacks resolved to join the Manchu army and to relocate to Beijing. See Sino-Russian border conflicts
.

Initiatives

Much uncertainty surrounds their migration to China. It is believed that, upon their arrival to the imperial capital, the Albazinians met the descendants of 33 Cossacks that had been captured by the Chinese in 1667 and several Cossacks that had settled in Beijing as early as 1649 and had become the parishioners of the

South Roman Catholic Cathedral
in the city. The veracity of this oral tradition about the pre-Albazinian Russian diaspora in China is open to question.

The Albazinians formed a separate contingent of the imperial guard, known as the "unit of the yellow-stripe standard". Their first leader was Ananiy Uruslanov or Ulangeri, a Tatar in the employ of the Manchu. The Russian surnames Yakovlev, Dubinin and Romanov were rendered in Chinese as Yao (姚), Du (杜) and Luo (

St. Nicholas
, evacuated by the Cossacks from Albazin, was placed in this unusual church, dedicated to the Holy Wisdom.

The Albazinian company was placed into the Manchu Bordered Yellow Banner and lived in the northeast of the "Tartar city" in Beijing.[6] The Albazians were made into a Baoyi company, not a military company.[7]

Although the descendants of the Cossacks intermarried with the Chinese and gradually lost their command of the Russian language, the

Ioakinf Bichurin
reported that there were 94 Albazinians in the capital of China. Other Russian travellers noted that, apart from their faith, the Albazinians were thoroughly Sinicized and bore little physical resemblance to the Russians. By the end of the 19th century, their number was estimated at 1,000.

The Boxer Rebellion entailed the persecution of all Christians and Europeans in China. The Russian Orthodox Church claims that 222 Orthodox Chinese were martyred on 11 June 1900, including Father Mitrofan, who was later declared a holy martyr. An Orthodox chapel used to mark the burial place of the Chinese Orthodox martyrs in Beijing. It was destroyed in 1956 at the urging of the Soviet ambassador in China. Although several Albazinian families found it reasonable to move to the Soviet Union during the Cultural Revolution, the bulk of them still reside in Beijing and Tianjin.

Later history

Albazinian Liturgy in Beijing,
by Ivan Chmutov

After the first siege of

O-lo-ssu Kuan). This was a 'household' rather than line unit and had non-combat duties like bow-making. Some were used as messengers to Nerchinsk. Since most were illiterate they were of little use as translators or sources of intelligence.[8]

They were given an old Buddhist prayer house which was turned into the church of Saint Nicholas. The priest was Maxim Leonov who had been captured on the Amur in 1673 along with seventy other men. The Russian government was apparently unaware of the Saint Nicholas church, since, during the

Treaty of Kyakhta
authorized the permanent presence of a church, a priest with three assistants and six students to learn the local language. One of these, Alexei Leontev, helped negotiate the 1768 convention of Kyakhta.

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Widmer 1976, p. 188.
  2. ^ Aldrich 2008, p. 177.
  3. ^ Baddeley 1919, p. 431.
  4. ^ Standaert 2001, p. 368.
  5. ^ Widmer 1976, p. 21.
  6. ^ Widmer 1976, p. 20.
  7. ^ Widmer 1976, p. 21.
  8. ^ from Patrick G. March,'Eastern Destiny:Russia in Asia and the North Pacific,1996, Chapters 5,6,12

References

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