Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 11.djvu/28

 NEW ORLEANS

NEW ORLEANS

Louia of New Orloaiis; raisod to its present rank and title 19 July, 1S50. Its original territory comprised the ancient Louisiana Purchase and Kast and \\'est Florida, being bounded on the north by the Canadian line, on the west by tlic Rocky Mountains and the Kio Perdito, on the cast by the Diocese of Ral- timore. and on the south bj- tlic Diocese of Linares and the Archdiocese of Durango. The jircscnt boundan<'S include the State of Louisiana, between the twenty- ninth and thirty-first degree of north latitude, an area of 28,208 square miles. 'I'he entire territory of Louisiana has undergone a series of changes which divide its history into four distinct periods.

L Early Colom.\l Pehiod. — The discoverers and pioneers, De Soto, Iberville, La .Salle, Bienville, were accompanied by missionaries in their expeditions through the Louisiana Purchase, and in the toilsome beginnings of the first feeble settlements, which were simply military posts, the Cross blazed the way. From the beginning of its history, Louisiana had been placed under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Quebec; m 1696 the priests of the Seminary of Quebec peti- tioned the second Bishop of Quebec for authority to establish missions in the West, investing the superior sent out by the seminary with the powers of vicar-gen- eral. The field for which they obtained this authori- zation (1 May, 169S) was on both banks of the Missis- sippi and its tributaries. They proposed to plant their first mission among the Tamarois, but when this became known, the Jesuits claimed that tribe as one already under their care: they received the now mis- sionaries with personal cordiality, but felt keenly the official action of Bishop St-Vallier, in what they re- garded as an intrusion. Fathers JoUiet de Montigny, Antoine Davion, and Frangois Busion de Saint-Cosme were the missionaries sent to found the new missions in the Mississippi Valley. In 1699 Iberville, who had sailed from France, with his two brothers Bienville and Sauvolle, and Father Du Ru, S.J., coming up the estuary of the Mississippi, found Father Montigny among the Tensas Indians. Iber\'ille left Sauvolle in command of the little fort at Biloxi, the first perma- nent settlement in Louisiana. Father Bordenave was its first chaplain, thus beginning the long line of zeal- ous parish priests in Louisiana.

In 1703 Bishop St-Vallier proposed to erect Mobile into a parish, and annex it in perpetuity to the sem- inary; the seminary agreed, and the Parish of Mobile was erected 20 July, 1703, and united to the Seminary of Foreign Missions of Paris and Quebec. Father Roul- leaux de la Vente, of the Diocese of Bayeux, was ap- pointed parish priest and r'ather Huve his assistant. The Biloxi settlement being difficult of access from the sea, Bienville thought it unsuitable for the headquar- ters of the pro\'ince. In 1718, taking with him fifty men, he selected Tchoutchouma, the present site of New Orleans, about 1 10 miles from the mouth of the Mississippi River, where there was a deserted Indian village. Bien\nlle directed his men to clear the ground and erect buildings. The city was laid out according to the plans of the Chevalier Le Blond de La Tour, chief engineer of the colony, the plans including a parish church, which Bienville decided to dedicate under the invocation of St. Louis. The old St. Louis cathedral stands on the site of this first parish church, and the presbytery in Cathedral Alley is the site of the first modest clergy hou.sc. Bienville called the city New Orleans after the Due d'Orldans, and the whole territorj' Louisiana, or New France.

In August, 1717, the Due d'Orlilans, as Regent of France, issued letters patent establishing a joint- stock company to be called "The Company of the West", to which Louisiana was transferred. The company was obliged to build churches at its own ex- pen.se wherever it should establish s<'l-tlements; al.so to maintain the necessary number of duly appro\id priests to preach, perform Divine service, and admin-

ister the sacraments under the authority of the Bishop of Quebec. Bienville experienced much opposition from the Company of tlu; West in his attempt to re- move the colony from Biloxi. In 1721 Father P'ran- <;ois-Xavier de Charlevoix, S.J., one of the first his- torians of Louisiana, made a tour of New France from the Lakes to the Mississippi, visiting New Orleans, which he describes as "a little village of about one hundred cabins dotted here and there, with little at- tempt at order, a large wooden warehouse in which I said Mass, a chapel in course of construction and two storehouses". But under Bienville's dircrliiin the city soon took shape, and, willi the eonsent <if the com- pany, the colony was moved to this site in 1723. Fa- ther Charlevoix reported on the great spiritual desti- tution of the province occasioned by the missions being scattered so far apart and the scarcity of priests, and this compelled the council of the company to make efforts to improve conditions. Accordingly, the company applied to the Bishop of Quebec, and on 16 May, 1722, Louisiana was divided into three ecclesias- tical sections. The district north of the Ohio was en- trusted to the Society of Jesus and the Priests of the Foreign Missions of Paris and Quebec ; that between the Mississippi and the Rio Perdito, to the Discalced Carmelite Fathers, with headquarters at Mobile. The Carmelites were recalled, not long after, and their dis- trict was given to the Capuchins.

A different arrangement was made for the Indian and new French settlements on the lower Mississippi. Because of the remoteness of this district from Que- bec, Father Louis-Frangois Duplessis de Mornay, a Capuchin of Meudon, was consecrated, at Bishop 8t- Vallier's request, coadjutor Bishop of Quebec, 22 April, 1714. Bishop St-Vallier appointed him vicar- general for Louisiana, but he never came to America, although he eventually succeeded to the See of Que- bec. When the Company of the West applied to him for priests for the lower Mississippi Valley he offered the more populous field of colonists to the Capuchin Fathers of the Province of Champagne, who, however, did not take any immediate steps, and it was not till 1720 that any of the order came to Louisiana. Fa- ther Jean-Matthieu de Saint-Anne is the first whose name is recorded. He signs himself in 1720 in the register of the parish of New Orleans. The last entry of the secular clergy in Mobile was that of Rev. Alex- ander Huve, 13 January, 1721. The Capuchins came directly from France and consequently found applica- tion to the Bishop of Quebec long and tedious; Father Matthieu therefore applied to Rome for special pow- ers for fifteen missions under his charge, representing that the great distance from the Bishop of Quebec made it practically impossible for him to apply to the bishop. A brief was really issued (Michael a Tugio, "Bullarium Ord. FF. Minor. S.P. Francisci Capuci- norum", Fol. 1740-52; BLI., pp. 322, 323), and Father Matthieu seems to have assumed that it exempted him from episcopal jurisdiction, for, on 14 March, 1723, he signs the register "P^re Matthieu, Vicaire Apostolique et Cure de la Mobile".

In 1722 Bishop de Mornay entrusted the spiritual jurisdiction of the Indians to the Jesuits, who were to establish missions in all parts of Louisiana with resi- dence at New Orleans, but were not to exercise any ecclesiastical function there without the consent of the Capuchins, though they were to minister to the French in the Illinois District, with the Priests of the Foreign Missions, where the superior of each body was a vicar- general, just as the Capuchin superior was at New Or- leans. In the spring of 1723 Father Raphael de Lux- embourg .nrrived to asstmie his duties as superior of the Capueliin Mission in Louisiana. It was a difficult task that the Capuchins had assumed. Their congre- gations were scattered over a large area; there was much poverty, suffering, and ignorance of religion. Father Raphael, in the cathedral archives, says that