John Ttssietla (~1830s - 1901)
John Ttssietla was Teetl’it Gwich’in from the Peel River and Fort McPherson area. He married Bitsikotrig in June 1879. Ttssietla met Reverend McDonald at Fort MacPherson, the Peel River Hudson’s Bay Company trading post. He and Bitsikotrig were baptised John and Alice in 1865. Their only child, Jane, died in infancy in 1865. They adopted Eunice, who became the wife of Reverend Amos Njootli.1)
Ttssietla was appointed a Gikhyi [Christian leader/catechist] by Reverend Robert McDonald in the 1870s. In 1888, he was sent to the Tukudh people at LaPierre House to replace Christian Leader Geh Ts’eh Henry Venn (Ketse) who died in 1880. Ttssietla was ordained a Deacon in July 1893 by Bishop Reeve of Mackenzie. He was later loaned to the Diocese of the Yukon and assigned to the Gwich’in. Many Christian Leaders worked with Ttssietla between 1862 and 1901 including: Henry Venn Geh ts’eh (1863), William Sekut (1863), Andrew Flett (1866), Elijah (1870), Thomas Chawultti (1874), Robert Kwutso (1881), Charles Tzikkyi 1890), Andrew Nattsottyi, William Caribou, and Edward Sittichinli (1896). John Ttssietla, his wife, and thirty others died in an epidemic in the Stewart River country.2)
Ttssietla was the first Indigenous minister ordained in the Arctic.3)