Saint Sava Church (Douglas, Alaska)

About

Saint Sava Church (also spelled "Savva") was a church of the Church of Serbian Mission in Douglas, Alaska.

Its construction was due mainly to Fr. Sebastian Dabovich who, in 1902, had been appointed Dean of the Sitka Deanery and the superintendent of Alaskan missions. Although under the Russian Orthodox Church, and a "daughter" parish of St. Nicholas Church in Juneau, Sebastian Dabovich found it important that the Serbians that had come to the area — mostly to work in mining— had a church that was "home" to them. On 23 July 1903, Fr. Sebastian, along with Hieromonk Anthony (Deshkevich-Koribut) and the priest Aleksandar Yaroshevich, consecrated the Church of Saint Sava in Douglas. However, the sparse records that remain of this church indicate that by the 1920s it may have been sitting empty, and in 1937 a fire swept through Douglas, destroying most of the town, including Saint Sava Church. It was not rebuilt.