Chelef's Hands

Chelef is someone from Guam’s history you may not be very familiar with. But the fact that we know his name had all, means he was a consequential figure.

He lived at a time when Chamoru culture and the Chamoru people were under heavy assault by the Spanish, and being forced to give up their way of life in order to become Christians. 

He is not as famous as figures such as Maga'låhi such as Hurao, Matå’pang well-known for challenging the Spanish or even those like Maga'låhi Kepuha or So'on, who were allied with the Spanish. 

 But he was nonetheless very infamous and notorious in his day and age.

The story of Chelef often begins with the story of Dikike’ and her family. 

In 1676, Dikike’ was a young girl from the village of Orote or Uloti on what is today Navy Base Guam. 

Unlike most Chamorus at the time who were passively resistant to the Spanish, apprehensive or outright defiant, she was an eager and willing convert, even to the point of being willing to marry a Spanish officer in order to help bridge the divide between Spanish presence and Chamoru people on Guam. 

Her father disapproved and threatened the priest who was arranging the marriage, and was in turn arrested and hung in Hagåtña, before a crowd of hundreds. 

His body was then desecrated and given to children who had been converted to Christianity. The children were instructed to play with the dead body as if it were their toy, even to the point of singing songs as they dragged it around the village. 

This violence and disrespect infuriated many Chamorros, including a Maga’låhi from Hagåtña named Agualin who would declare war against the Spanish and fight them for years to come.

The people of Orote were outraged at this injustice and threatened to burn down the church there. A squad of 7 soldiers with the Spanish priest from Orote, Father Monroy, returned there to try to prevent this. They did, but were attacked by the villagers. 

They retreated north to Sumay and were able to hold off the attackers from Orote, but now found others attacking them from the east as well. Most of the villages surrounding Orote, such as Talisay, Hågat and Sumay were not supportive of the Spanish and so, they made clear their disapproval of the priests and soldiers with slingstones, spears and angry shouts. 

When things seemed completely hopeless for these Spanish forces, a Chamoru maga’låhi named Chelef appeared to defend the Spanish. He came between the rebel Chamoru forces and the Spanish and gave a speech admonishing the Chamorus for their behavior. According to one Spanish account Chelef stated, 

I don’t know why you show yourselves so cruel toward people so good as the Spanish are. They have never done harm to anyone, unless they have been harmed first. And even after they have received harm from many of our people, whenever we have wanted to reconcile with them, they have admitted us to their friendship, and this they have never broken with us. And if they have had wars with us, they had been much provoked. Besides this, what kind of courage is this, so many wanting to fight with so few? …In one word, if you insist on pursuing those who are fleeing, this is not courage; it would only serve to make the others, who are in the Garrison, ridicule us, and make the Governor more angry.

Chelef then gathered up two or three spears and hurled them at the Chamorus, challenging them to take him on as well if they intended to hurt the Spanish. Once the attacking Chamorros disbanded, Chelef turned to the priest and comforted him saying, “Do not fear, dear Father. I am at your side, and because I assure you that I will go myself to look for a canoe in which you will be able to sail to Agana, or wherever you want.”

Chelef then searched the village for a canoe and invited the Spanish into it so that he could sail them safely back to Hagåtña. 

The Spanish forces praised Chelef for being so loyal to God and for saving them. Once they were all in the canoe and on their way north, Chelef did the unexpected, he capsized the canoe full soldiers and the single priest. 

In truth, Chelef had been converted to Catholicism years before, but had secretly turned against the Spanish. Once in the waist to chest deep water, their armor became a disadvantage and the powder for their guns became useless. 

As they struggled to right themselves, Chamorus rushed onto the beaches from the jungle and quickly massacred the Spanish. Chelef himself is rumored to have killed the priest. 

The Chamoru-Spanish wars stretched in all for close to 30 years. 

The majority of those battles did not end well for Chamorus, as the weaponry of the Spanish and their willingness to kill, torture and slaughter in order to win. 

Chamorus often chosen to submit to the invaders out of a belief that they could not be defeated. Tales of Chamorus outwitting and defeating the Spanish through the tactics of Chelef and others helped inspire Chamorus to keep fighting, since there was clear evidence that the Spanish were not invincible.

Chelef would continue fighting against the Spanish in the years to come. He would join forces with Agualin who would conduct guerrilla campaigns against the church in Guam, and then flee to nearby Rota in order to escape capture. On one occasion they were almost captured sneaking back into Guam at the village of Tarague. 

How Chelef met his end is unclear, as the Spanish accounts contradict themselves over when and how he died. According to one account he was killed in Malesso trying to escape capture. According to another, he was arrested and taken to Hagåtña where he was tortured and torn to pieces as punishment for his role in killing several soldiers and a priest. 

Both accounts indicate that after he was killed, parts of his body, in particular his hands which had plotted and offended God and his missionaries in Guam so much, were cut off and then displayed publicly.

Nowadays most people are familiar with Pågat in Northern Guam, due to the fact that he US military chose the site to build firing ranges and many people protested such a move. 

In the most northern section of Pågat, in a place called Pågat Point you will find two massive limestone rocks along the rocky shoreline. 

These rocks are known to a very select few as Chelef’s Hands or Cheref's Hands, and are assumed to have been named in honor of Maga’låhi Chelef, who fought ferociously against the Spanish, and lost his life and his hands in the process.