Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I, Part 107

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company
Number of Pages: 1074

USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I > Part 107

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At Bordeaux, late in the fall of 1815, assembled the little party to accom- pany Bishop Dubourg to St. Louis. At the head of it was Rev. Joseph Rosati, who was chosen for the head of the seminary to be established. The authority to make Joseph Rosati vicar general was carried by Bishop Dubourg. Father Rosati was a native of Sora in Naples. He was educated in Rome, and when the time came for his ordination, the ceremony took place in secret, because Na- poleon, who had invaded Italy, had forbidden ordinations by the Congregation of the Missions. In the party which set out from Bordeaux were four students preparing for the priesthood, three of whom became prominent in the Catholic life of St. Louis. They were Leo Deys, a Belgian ; Francis Dahmen, a German; Castuc Gonzales, a Spaniard, and John Tichitoli, an Italian. Among other mem- bers of the party were French, Italians and Poles. At that early day the polyglot character of the population of the new religious field was recognized and pro- vided for.

The party came by way of Baltimore. It was not deemed wise or safe to enter the Mississippi Valley by way of New Orleans. Crossing the mountains and coming down the Ohio, the party stopped at Bardstown. Bishop Dubourg arrived in the United States by way of Annapolis some months after the rest of the party had come west. As soon as it was known the bishop was in the country, Father Rosati came to St. Louis to prepare for the reception of the first Catholic bishop who was to take up his residence here. Bishop Flaget, of Bardstown, accompanied Father Rosati. Bishop Dubourg was no stranger to New Orleans. He had gone from that city to Rome to be made a bishop. He had brothers who were business men in New Orleans. But the extensive prop- erty of the cathedral there had passed into the hands of a corporation, three priests in charge of the cathedral had been suspended, and the excitement was very great. Not knowing how far the feeling might have spread, Bishop Du- bourg did not come to the United States until inquiry had shown how he would be received in St. Louis. And when he did come, Rosati and Bishop Flaget came over in advance to be assured of a friendly reception for Bishop Dubourg. They found some opposition to the reception of the bishop, but it melted away quickly. Rosati was a man of wonderful tact and diplomacy.

Culture One Hundred Years Ago.

Bishop Dubourg was a man of high culture. He brought to St. Louis, before the town organization had given place to the city, a library of 8,000 vol- umes. This collection was described "as the most complete, scientific and literary repertory of the western country, if not of the western world."

There is most excellent non-Catholic authority for the description of this first Catholic bishop to take residence in St. Louis, as "a man endowed at once with the elegance and politeness of the courtier; the piety and zeal of the Apostle and the learning of a Father of the Church."

In the first St. Louis directory, issued in 1821, was given this description of the Catholic church as the result of Bishop Dubourg's efforts :

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The cathedral of St. Louis can boast of having no rival in the United States for the magnificence, the value and elegance of her sacred vases, ornaments and paintings, and indeed few churches in Europe possess anything superior to it. It is a truly delightful sight to an American of taste to find in one of the remotest towns of the Union a church decorated with the original paintings of Rubens, Raphael, Guido, Paul Veronese, and a number of others by the first modern masters of the Italian, French and Flemish schools. The ancient and precious gold embroideries which the St. Louis cathedral possesses would certainly decorate any museum in the world. All this is due to the liberality of the Catholics of Europe, who presented these rich articles to Bishop Dubourg on his last visit through France, Italy, Sicily and the Netherlands. Among the liberal benefactors could be named many princes and princesses, but we will only insert the names of Louis XVIII, the present king of France, and that of Baroness La Candale de Ghysegham, a Flemish lady, to whose munificence the cathedral is particularly indebted.

The First Catholic Bishop.

A record of great activity in the Catholic church began with the coming of Bishop Rosati to St. Louis. Here was a diocese with one bishop, three secular priests, five Lazarist fathers, one Jesuit, fourteen ecclesiastical students, five Jesuit scholastics and from 11,000 to 12,000 laity. Before the first year was out Bishop Rosati at the Cathedral in St. Louis consecrated a bishop, Michael Por- tier, for Alabama and the Floridas. For assistants he had no neighboring bishops. He called in the chancellor of the little college of Jesuits, Father Quick- enborne, and the venerable and lovable Father Donatianus Olivier. About this time Bishop Rosati ordained the first priest born in Missouri, Rev. Joseph Paquin. In March, 1827, Rosati was formally constituted first bishop of St. Louis. The next year he ordained the first priest, who was a native St. Louisan, Francis Regis Loisel.

There were no bishops in Mexico who could give ordination. In 1829, Bishop Rosati began the ordination of priests for the dioceses of that country. Mexican candidates by the score for the priesthood visited Bishop Rosati. Ordination ceremonies in the cathedral were very frequent, beginning in 1829.

In his first report to Rome, on conditions as he found them on taking charge of the new diocese, in 1825, Bishop Rosati described St. Louis as "an important city, the most considerable of the whole state." He added :

French is spoken here by the old inhabitants; and English by the Americans and Irish who have established themselves here of late years. There is only one priest and there ought to be at least two more. There are some difficulties. During the time that Mgr. Dubourg resided here a subscription was made to build a church. The expenses were very great, and the funds were found wanting as soon as they were counted together. This was occasioned by various circumstances, which debilitated commerce, and diminished the num- ber of new inhabitants who had subscribed. Four of the principal citizens, who had been elected as administrators of the building, were obliged to pay a debt of from $5,000 to $6,000 for which they had passed their bonds to the workmen. In order to reimburse themselves they have obtained from the legislature the authorization to sell the ground next to the church, together with the house which served for habitation of the bishop and priest. The bondsmen threaten to proceed to the sale if the money they have laid out is not paid back to them.

Those were pioneer days of things religious. In his report on the new dio- cese, Bishop Rosati spoke of "Viede Poche Carondelet having about 100 French

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families all very poor. When there were more priests than one in St. Louis one of them went to the village Saturdays and Sundays to hear confessions, to preach and to say mass. At the present it is vacant."

The see of St. Louis extended across the river and took in a number of parishes. One of these was Prairie du Rocher, of which Bishop Rosati reported : "There is a church and a priest. This is Rev. Father Olivier, a respectable old man of seventy-five years, almost blind, and unable to render any service to the parish. To him I have offered a room in the seminary. He is a saint, who has - labored for many years in the service of all the Catholics in these regions."

Five years after he had been elected bishop and three years after his con- secration Bishop Rosati became by transfer the first bishop of the diocese of St .. Louis. Not until 1827 did this occur. Even when the country west of the Mis- sissippi was divided into two dioceses it was the plan of His Holiness Pope Leo XII that Rosati should be bishop of New Orleans and that he should admin- ister both dioceses for the time being. "Bishop Rosati did all in his power to be excused from accepting the diocese of New Orleans, and succeeded in having the decree rescinded." So reads the church record in manuscript. The church in St. Louis has reason to be grateful that Rosati stood so firmly by his attach- ment to this city. Dubourg had become oppressed and discouraged with con- ditions at New Orleans. He went to Europe in the summer of 1826, presented his resignation of the see of New Orleans, and it was accepted. Then Bishop Rosati was given the see of St. Louis, but he was commanded to continue to serve the diocese of New Orleans as administrator until the Holy See could pro- vide otherwise. "Bishop of Teagre and Administrator of St. Louis and New Orleans" was the title borne at first by Bishop Rosati.

The Cathedral.

On the first of August, 1831, occurred an event which told of the work Rosati was doing. The corner stone of the new cathedral was laid on Walnut street between Main and Second streets. This was the fourth Catholic church built on the lot, beginning with the house of posts erected in 1776. In 1833 Bishop Rosati gave their first resident priests to Chicago and Kansas City. The twenty-sixth of October, 1834, brought the consecration of the new cathedral of St. Louis. Two bishops came to participate in the ceremonies-Flaget from Bardstown and Purcell from Cincinnati. The second day afterwards occurred the consecration of the bishop of Vincennes, Simon Brute. The laying of corner stones for new Catholic churches was becoming frequent. Bishop Rosati that year laid the corner stone for Our Lady of Mt. Carmel in Carondelet. That same year of 1834 was memorable for another church event in St. Louis. Bishop Rosati recorded: "Rev. Lutz said mass in St. Mary's chapel for the Germans and preached in German to them, which in future will be done every Sunday."

The next year, 1835, Rosati began to keep the annual counts of the con- gregations. He sent to all of the priests instructions to prepare and forward at the end of the year a census of their congregations. The first census of the Catholic church in St. Louis showed 8,601 souls, 293 baptisms, 100 marriages. 97 funerals, 54 converts. Notable is the column of converts in these annual

BISHOP P. J. RYAN

ARCHBISHOP KENRICK

BISHOP L. W. V. DUBOURG

BISHOP JOSEPH ROSATI

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census reports of Bishop Rosati. There went on among the residents of St. Louis year after year the conversion of non-Catholics to Catholicism.

Conditions in 1830.

James Stuart, a Scotchman, who visited St. Louis in 1830, and who wrote a book after his return to his own country, said of the religious conditions at that time :

I attended divine worship in the Presbyterian church on the day I reached St. Louis. Having asked the landlord of the inn which was the best church to go to, he at once replied, "I go to no church but the Presbyterian minister is the rage." The Presbyterian minister, Mr. Potts, delivered a very good sermon upon this text, "The sting of sin is death," in a very neatly seated church in the upper part of the town. It was a funeral sermon, in consequence of the death of Mr. Woods, an English gentleman from London, one of the elders or dea- cons of the church. In the afternoon I went into the meeting-house of people of color. They had one of themselves preaching sensibly, though it appeared he was not a man of much education. The sermon was, in great measure, composed of scriptural quotations, and was delivered impressively; but there was far less manifestation of excitement than in a church of people of color, which I afterward attended in New York.

The Coming of Kenrick.

In 1840 Bishop Rosati went to Rome, expecting to return shortly. He was asked by the Holy Father, Pope Gregory XVI., if he would not take the charge of Apostolic Delegate to Hayti to conclude a concordat between the Holy See and that country.

Bishop Rosati replied that he would not like to leave his diocese without the services of a bishop for so long a time, but that if His Holiness would give him a coadjutor to govern during the absence he would undertake the Haytian charge.

Thereupon the Pope said: "Well! My dear Lord, if you know any good priest whom you would wish for your coadjutor, just name him, and I will appoint him right away."

"Most Holy Father," said Bishop Rosati, "if I could get the Very Reverend Peter Richard Kenrick, the vicar general of the Right Reverend Francis Patrick Kenrick, coadjutor of the bishop of Philadelphia, I would be satisfied."

"Very well," said His Holiness, "you shall have him."

One less thorough going in his mental method than Bishop Rosati would perhaps have stopped with that. But the bishop of St. Louis was a man who left nothing uncertain. He said to the Pope: "Your Holiness! You had the kindness some time ago to appoint the Very Reverend John Timon, C. M., as my coadjutor, but he refused the office, and if Very Reverend Peter Richard Kenrick would do the same thing, I would be frustrated, therefore I beg of you to oblige him under obedience to take the office."

That the Pope acted on the suggestion was evident from a letter which Right Reverend Francis Patrick Kenrick wrote from Philadelphia to Bishop Rosati. "The positive wishes of His Holiness have, I believe, secured my brother's full acquiescence."

Right Reverend Peter Richard Kenrick was consecrated bishop in Phila- delphia in 1841 by Bishop Rosati and came to St. Louis as coadjutor. Bishop

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Rosati went to Hayti, completed the diplomatic work, for which he was sent, with his usual painstaking care, went to Rome, was taken ill and died.

Many years afterward, when he had become the head of the church, Leo XIII. said to a high representative of the Catholic church in St. Louis :

I have known the first bishop of St. Louis. I traveled with him from Rome to Paris. When he was on his way to Hayti to conclude the concordat, I was on my way to Brussels as nuncio. I must say that I have never in my life met with a bishop whom I considered such a holy man and whom I found so full of respect towards the Holy Father.

Three of the greatest of American sees have drawn archbishops from the clergy of St. Louis. At the Vatican they sometimes speak of St. Louis as "the Rome of America." Not less to priests than to bishops and archbishops does the city owe. Priests like Henry, McCaffery, Walsh stood for education and for morality in great sections of the city as well as for religious teaching. The crusade of Coffey against the wine-room was an act of best citizenship. Zieg- ler's sturdy and unyielding battle to save his parish from invasion by the red light won the admiration of all good people. When the high prelates came from other cities and countries to attend the corner stone laying of the new cathedral in 1908, they marveled at the work of Father Dunne among newsboys and of Father Dempsey among homeless men.

Baptist Church Building.

The Second Baptist church became that number because the First Baptist church, after a struggle of fourteen years, disbanded. The first church organ- ized in 1818, but assumed a financial burden too heavy for the membership. When John Mason Peck, from Connecticut, and James Eby Welch, fron Ken- tucky, the missionaries. came to St. Louis in 1817, they could find only seven Baptists. They organized a church with eleven members. That year 1818, this little Baptist flock began to build the first Protestant church in St. Louis, at Market and Third streets, about two blocks from the Catholic church, now the old Cathedral. The Baptists planned a building which should serve for worship, and bring in revenue. They called it a meeting house. The structure was of brick, was forty feet wide, sixty feet long and three stories high. It was never fully completed. About $6,000 was expended. Mr. Welch, the

missionary, advanced $1,200 and John Jacoby, the treasurer, $600. St. Louis became a city, and widened Market street, cutting a slice of twelve feet off the side of the church. The Baptists claimed damages. The city replied that a church was not known in law, and that church trustees could not recover damages. About that time a hail storm broke all of the windows on the north side. The mayor wouldn't permit repairs because that side of the church had been condemned as public property. The church was sold for $1.200, and the money was divided between Rev. Mr. Welch and the widow of Trustee Jacoby. The first church disbanded, and the members went into a new organization, which they called "the Second Baptist church of St. Louis," frankly saying that they wanted to make a fresh start without carrying the debts of the other organization.

In the Second Baptist church of 1833 were represented the Cozzens, Stout,

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Orme, Kerr and other prominent families of St. Louis. The new organization proceeded slowly in the matter of another church structure. Meetings were held in the school house of Elihu H. Shepard on Fourth street opposite the court house. A lot on Morgan and Sixth was bought, but sold after a foundation had been laid. The Episcopal church on Third and Chestnut was for sale at $12,000. and the Baptists bought it. As early as 1839 the choir of the Second Baptist church had become so well known that it ventured upon "a grand sacred con- cert." The church had many pastors, Rev. John Mason Peck came over from his seminary at Rock Spring to preach during several periods. The congrega- tion overflowed the edifice on Third street and built a $40,000 church at Sixth and Locust. An incident which was the talk of the whole city was the baptism of sixteen Hollanders by Dr. Peck, in 1849. These Hollanders had been Presby- terians. Foreign immigration to St. Louis was at its height when the Baptists received the Hollanders. J. B. Jeter, Galusha Anderson and A. H. Burlingham were among the divines of national reputation who held the pastorate of this church. In 1877 came to the Second Baptist church a pastor who was to re- main and to enter into the life of the city-Rev. W. W. Boyd. A New Yorker by birth, he had gone into business life as superintendent of a cotton manufac- turing plant in Maine. To do something for his operatives on Sunday, Superin- tendent Boyd reopened a little abandoned Baptist church in the village, carried on a Sunday school for the children and read Spurgeon's sermons to the grown- ups. The effect upon the superintendent was more startling than upon the mill people. Mr. Boyd began to preach, went to Harvard to get more education, took special honors in philosophy, studied theology and was ordained to the ministry. Four years later he came to St. Louis to enter upon a pastorate of nearly one-third of a century. When Dr. Boyd came to St. Louis the Second Baptist church had moved westward to the site on Beaumont and Locust streets, selected by William M. McPherson, E. G. Obear, D. B. Gale, Thomas Pratt and Nathan Cole. Only the chapel had been completed. Under the inspiration of Dr. Boyd's eloquence, the main structure was completed at a cost of more than $250,000. That remained the home of the congregation until the removal to the new church on Kings Highway and Washington avenue in 1908.

Ministers Who Wrote Books.

John Hogan of the County Cork was favored with so few educational op- portunities that when, an immigrant boy, he went to work for a shoemaker ill Baltimore as an apprentice, the journeymen in the office taught him his letters. Self educated, this boy became a Methodist minister of reputation through the western country. He published a book called "Thoughts of St. Louis," which was so well appreciated by the business interests of the city that a service of silver was given to the author as a testimonial. Subsequently he was the author of a "History of Methodism in the West" and "The Resources of Missouri." There was a clearness of style and a freshness about his writings which made him very popular with readers in 1850-1860. The Dollar savings institution, on which was built the Exchange bank, was presided over for some time by John Hogan. In 1858 Mr. Hogan became, by appointment of President Buchanan,

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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF MISSOURI

the postmaster of St. Louis. The wife of John Hogan was the daughter of Joseph B. Garnier of St. Louis.

In the decades between 1840 and 1860, one of the most popular authors with young folks was the Rev. Cicero Stephens Hawks, D. D., bishop of Missouri. He came of English and Irish ancestors and was born at Newbern, North Caro- lina. He entered the ministry after a university education, and after the study of law in New York city. He came to St. Louis in 1843 to become rector of Christ church, and the next year was elected unanimously as bishop. Possibly that which most endeared the bishop to the St. Louis people of his generation was his heroic conduct during the Asiatic cholera epidemic. When others left the city for places of refuge Bishop Hawks remained and devoted himself to the care and consolation of the sick. His writings included several volumes of a series called "Uncle Phelps Conversations for the Young." He also wrote "Friday Christian." He was the editor of "The Boys' and Girls' Library," and of the "Library for Our Young Country Women." Two brothers of the bishop became very prominent ministers in the Episcopal church, one of them in New York city, the other in Georgia.

Rev. Dr. D. R. McAnally came from Tennessee. He had preached in the South and had conducted a seminary a number of years before he came to St. Louis to be editor of the St. Louis Christian Advocate and to conduct the Metho- dist publishing house. Organizing a Methodist church in Carondelet, Dr. Mc- Anally preached there seventeen years. No appointment was made by the conference, the church being left "to be supplied." In that way the rule of itineracy was avoided. There was a militant strain in Dr. McAnally. The editor sympathized with the South. He was arrested early in the Civil war and his paper was suppressed. In July, 1861, he was tried by court martial, but the - verdict was never returned from Washington. The good doctor was put on parole, forbidden to leave St. Louis county. As a vigorous writer he was known and greatly admired by two generations of St. Louis Methodists. The office of the Christian Advocate was on Pine street next to the church. Dr. McAnally was the son of Charles McAnally, a Methodist minister. He began his life work in the pulpit when he was nineteen years old. The Methodist Book Concern of St. Louis was started with a capital of $1,800. Dr. McAnally built up the establishment until the books issued were in the hundreds of thousands. The business was equal to some of the larger establishments in the East.

Religious journalism in the west owed a great deal to Rev. John W. Allen, of Ohio birth, who came to St. Louis in 1873. Mr. Allen founded the St. Louis Evangelist, which became the Mid-Continent. He was in charge of the missionary work of the Presbyterians many years.

John Calvin Learned, a scholarly man, a student all of his life, served the Church of the Unity a quarter of a century. He was born in Dublin, New Hampshire. His influence was not confined to the pulpit. He taught ethics and political economy in Washington University and developed one of the strong literary organizations of St. Louis-the Unity Club.

Rev. Dr. James Wilderman Lee was born on a Georgia farm and educated in a Methodist college of his native state. His "Footprints of the Man of Galilee" and his "Romance of Palestine" gave him high standing in religious literature.

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A native Missourian who became famous for his success as an evangelist of the Christian church was Rev. Thomas Preston Haley, born in Lafayette county in 1832. Some of the strongest churches of that denomination in Missouri date from the initial efforts of Father Haley. This is especially true of Northeastern Missouri where Mr. Haley was the missionary pastor in the fifties. Mr. Haley held pastorates in St. Louis and Kansas City, in Lexington, Mo., in Louisville. He traveled and preached in the cities of England. He wrote several books, chief of which was "The Dawn of the Reformation." He was a pioneer in the movement to get away from ritual forms and ceremonies.

Robert B. Fife, who was not a preacher but a student of the Bible and a religious man with a short and simple creed, brought together in Shepard's school opposite the court house, in 1837, a few people and started services for Chris- tians. The meetings did not become regular until five years later. These Chris- tians or Disciples of Christ grew strong in St. Louis. They formed a dozen churches,' established an orphans' home and built up a vigorous publishing concern.

Church Architecture Before the War.

St. Louis churches kept pace with the population, rapid as the growth was before the war. In 1830 the average number of residents, young and old, to the churches was 2,000. In 1854 there were sixty-five churches. The population was estimated to average 1,900 to the church, although the government census did not give that number of residents. The city was famed not only for the congregations but for the costly character of the church architecture. Business men responded with great liberality to all church calls. When Rev. Dr. William G. Eliot was fairly settled in his church he went among the members of his congregation and raised $60,000 for educational purposes.

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Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I, Part 107

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939 Publication date: 1921 Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company Number of Pages: 1074

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company
Number of Pages: 1074