The Early History of the Catholic Church in New York [pp. 515-525]

Ea4y History of the Cathohe Church ~~ New York. 517
treated with creditable celerity; but cause of humanity and education in
all that night a feverish anxiety pre- every city in the land seek no herald
vailed around St. Patrick's cathedral; here below, but are written deep in
m~n stood ready to meet any new the hearts of grateful millions.
advance, and the mayor, suddenly Several Protestant clergymen in
riding up, was in some danger, but those days returned to the bosom of
was fortunately recognized. unity, such as the Rev. Mr. Kewley, of
What might have been the scenes St. George's church, New York; Rev.
in New York in 1844, when murder Calvin White, ancestor of the Shakeran riot in ~hiladdphia! The Na- speare scholar, Richard Grant White;
tives had just elected a mayor; the and Mr. Ironsides. Strange, too, was
city would in a few days be in their the conversion of the Rev. Mr. Richhands; a public meeting was called ards, sent from New York as a Mein the park, and all seemed to pro- thodist preacher to Western New
mise a repetition of the scenes in the York and Canada. We follow him,
sister city. A bold, stern extra issued by his diary, through the sparse setfrom the office of The Treeman's~ur- tlements which then dotted that renal that actually sent terror into the gion, whence he extended his labors
hearts of the would-be rioters. It to Montreal. There, good man, in
was known at once that the Catho- the zeal of his heart he thought to
lies would defend their churches to conquer Canadian Catholicity by
the last gasp. The firm character of storming the Sulpitian seminary at
the archbishop was well known, and Montreal, converting all there, and so
with that to animate the people the triumphantly closing the campaign.
struggle would not be a trifling one. His diary of travel goes no further.
The call for the meeting was coun- Mr. Richards died a few years since,
termanded and New York was saved; a zealous and devoted Sulpitian
few knew from what. priest of the seminary at Montreal.
To return to the earlier days of the New York was too far from Balticentury. If attacks were made, in- more to be easily superintended by
quiry was stimulated. Conversions the bishop of that see. His vast
to the truth were neither few nor Un- diocese was now to be divided, and
important. Bishop Bayley mentions this city was erected into an episcopal
briefly the reception into the church`see in i8o8, by Pope Pius VII. The
of one nearly related to himsdf, choice for the bishop who was to
Mrs. Eliza Ann Seton, daughter of give fonu to the new diocese, fell upthe celebrated Doctor Bayley, and on the Rev. Luke Concanen, a learnwidow of William Seton, a distin- ed and zealous Dominican, long conguished New York merchant. Born nected with the affairs of his order
on Staten Island, and long resident at Rome. Bishop Bayley gives a chain New York, gracing a high social racteristic letter of his. He had perposition by her chan~ing and noble sistently declined a see in Ireland with
character, she made her first com- its comparative comfbrts and conso
munion in St. Peter's church on the lations among a zealous people; but
25th of March, i8o5, and in a few the call to a position of toil, the esyears, giving herself wholly to God, tablishment of a new diocese in a
~~ecame, under him, the foundress in new land, where all was to be created,
the United States of the Sisters of was not an appeal that he could disChanty, whose quiet labors of love, regard. He submitted to the charge
and charity, and devotedness in the imposed upon him, and after receiv