Catholic Civil war Chaplins

“Soldiers of the Cross—Catholic Chaplains”
Robert J. Miller
(Adapted from Both Prayed to the same God, Lexington, 2007)

Fight for Recognition – Catholics in a Know-Nothing World

The first Civil War battle that Catholic chaplains had to fight was not the enemy’s bullets—but the rampant anti-Catholic prejudice of the mid-19^th century. The pre-eminent religions of the day were Calvinist-based, born out of rebellion from Catholicism, and still highly critical of “popery”. It was also the era of nativism, of groups like the “Know-Nothings”—an 1849 secret society born out of fear of the drastically rising emigration numbers of foreigners and Catholics. (The name came from the characteristic response members made when asked about their group—“I know nothing”.[i]) Few white Americans of that time thought it necessary to even question their underlying presumptions and suspicions about the national loyalties of Catholics, or the subhuman-ness of Blacks, or the scorn they held towards Irish immigrants, freemasons or Mormons. It would unfortunately take a bloody civil war to reveal the painful truth that no one religious culture or experience could stand for all who called themselves Americans.

The enormous Irish migrations of the 18^th and 19^th centuries represented a slow yet powerful transforming movement that ultimately changed the face of America. By 1861, thanks to the enormous influx of Irish immigrants and a rising tide of Catholic periodicals, a distinct Roman Catholic religious presence was being felt on a national scene that had hitherto been almost exclusively Protestant. However, (as would be the case until well into the 20^th century) Catholics had little influence politically or socially except in heavily-populated Catholic areas.[ii] When the Civil War began, being a religious minority in the predominantly Protestant armies of both sides, the larger Catholic struggle for recognition and acceptance was played out here as well.

Roman Catholics experienced special challenges in providing religious care to soldiers, and even in having priests appointed as official chaplains. It has been said that the Civil War armies were perhaps the most religious armies of all American history—but the strong evangelistic attitudes of many Protestant churchmen posed a real challenge for Catholic leaders. James Moorhead has written how many Protestant organizations saw the wartime army as a fertile ground to “win souls” for Jesus, thus leading to a flood of Christian literature, Bibles, and religious-based relief efforts (U.S. Sanitary Commission and the Christian Commission). Already well aware of Protestant efforts at “sheep-stealing”, the Catholic hierarchy (especially in the north) realized that it had to act quickly to supply chaplains for their Catholics soldiers.[iii]

An immediate and ongoing concern was the adverse attitudes within the army itself. Some Protestant officers simply refused to accept Catholic priests as chaplains for their Catholic men. In the spring of 1862, only twenty-two priests served among the 472 Union chaplains then on duty—when the ratio of Catholic to Protestant soldiers was actually about one to nine. Thus Catholic chaplains were chosen only for regiments that were nearly exclusively Catholic (e.g. the 69^th NY, heart of the Union “Irish Brigade”, and the 10^th TN CSA). It was a rare situation indeed when a Catholic would chaplain a predominantly Protestant regiment.[iv] Chaplains like future bishop John Ireland (5^th MN) and James Gombettelli (13^th PA Cav) both served only very short chaplain stints because of the predominantly Protestant nature of their regiments. Protestant “sheep-stealing” efforts always remained a problem. As Randall Miller says, “Catholics chafed at the Protestant prodding of such men as ‘the one-wing devil’ General O.O. Howard, who wanted to convert their armies into Protestant crusaders.”[v]

Choosing Catholic chaplains

The responsibility for selecting Catholic chaplains generally lay with their church’s leaders. Requests went out from both Union and Confederate governments to bishops and religious superiors, and Catholic leaders responded. Archbishop John Hughes received an appeal from the Governor of New York, as did Bishop James Wood from the Pennsylvania Governor. Religious orders such as the Jesuits, Redemptorists and Holy Cross (CSC) requested volunteers from their members to serve as chaplains—and all received positive responses. Many Catholic priests volunteered on their own without being asked to serve as chaplains.

By the war’s end, over seventy “official” Catholic chaplains had served in both armies (fifteen serving more or less “full-time” throughout the entire war), with many other Catholic clergy playing part-time “unofficial” roles to assist soldiers in the practice of their faith.[vi] “Maryland Province Jesuits from the French missions of New York and the South, Holy Cross priests from Notre Dame, Redemptorists from New Orleans, and secular priests from a score of dioceses” were among those who served.[vii] Still, the Catholic response was not without its difficulties. The mid-nineteenth century was a time of booming immigration, particularly of the Irish, the great majority of whom were Catholic. Understaffed even in peacetime, already stressed with divergent ethnic needs, it was often difficult for the American Catholic Church to spare priests for chaplaincy purposes. Thus, despite being allowed to chaplain, some priests were later recalled to their dioceses or congregations after serving for a while (e.g. John Ireland, Joseph O’Hagan SJ, Joseph Prachensky SJ).[viii] Many priest/chaplains served for only a short time.

Some priests, like the St. Louis priest Fr. John Bannon (1^st MO CSA Infantry), never even sought formal permission from their bishop to become a chaplain, knowing that they would not receive it (although Bannon did leave a farewell letter with Bishop Peter Kenrick, which he never opened). Other priests attempted to balance both parish responsibilities with “informal” chaplain duties—Oscar Sears (CSA) in Lynchburg, Virginia, and Innocent Bergrath (CSA) in Eastern Tennessee are examples here, although many more served in this capacity than can likely be known without great research.

It is estimated that some 200,000 Catholics served in Civil War armies (145,000 of whom were Irish).[ix] But because of inequities and shortages, many in non-Catholic regiments went without the services of a priest for long periods of time. The Cincinnati-based German Catholic paper Der Wahrheitsfreund complained in 1862 that “There are regiments where one-third are Catholic, and yet there is no Catholic chaplain in the brigade, or in the whole division. There are only a few regiments in which there are no Catholic soldiers, and we do not believe that the tenth part of these Catholics can receive the sacraments when they have most need to them.”[x] The few but excellent war-time journals of Catholic priests are full of stories of their meeting Catholics (soldiers both Confederate and Union) who had not had the services of a Catholic priest for long periods of time. Fortunately, occasional long encampments allowed a few priests to circulate more among the different regiments, and thus offered opportunities for sacraments to be received and ministry to be engaged in for those who chose.

The “Know-Nothing” platform of beliefs included opposing citizenship for any immigrant until after twenty-one years of living in America, and the banning of foreign-born citizens from holding political office in the United States. The group was strong in New York for a time, becoming in 1854 the “American” political party, taking control of the Massachusetts legislature and electing several members of Congress. However, their numbers splintered over disagreements over slavery, and was already fading in strength by the 1856 elections, when—although gaining over 20% of the vote in that election—it lost many of its adherents to the newly formed Republican party.
There were 1.75 million American Catholics in 1850, a number which doubled a decade later. By 1860, Catholics had expanded from 30,000 (in 1790) to 3.5 million (in 1860). However in 1860, statistics also show that there were only about 2500 Catholic churches compared to 20,000 Methodist churches—which leads Mark Noll to conclude that “while there may have been more baptized Catholic than full Methodist members, in terms of active adherents, there were still probably more Methodists than Catholics. [Certainly] the landscape was marked out as evangelical Protestant terrain, whatever may have been the actual count on the church rolls.” (From Mark Noll’s private notes). By 1866, Catholics made up 13% of America’s population—though most were poor, and certainly considered near or at the bottom of the social ladder. Cf. Eerdman’s Handbook of Christianity in America, (Grand Rapids, Mi.: Eerdmans Press, 1983), 235; also Ahlstrom, op. cit., 8, 527, 542.
Cf. James Moorhead, American Apocalypse: Yankee Protestants and the Civil War, 1860-1869 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978); and also Gardiner Shattuck, A Shield and a Hiding Place: The Religious Life of Civil War Armies (Macon, Ga.: Mercer University Press, 1987). For many guiding insights in this chapter, I am indebted to Randall Miller’s excellent essay “Catholic Religion, Irish Ethnicity and the Civil War” in Religion and the American Civil War, edited by Randall M. Miller, Harry S. Stout and Charles R. Wilson (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 261–296.
Fr. Richard C. Christie, elected as chaplain by the overwhelmingly Protestant 78^th PA, was one such situation, however.
Miller, op. cit., 265.
These numbers are my own, based upon research into and compilation of the best available current Catholic chaplain records. I used the two standard Catholic chaplain listings of Benjamin Blied, Catholics and the Civil War, (Milwaukee Wis.: Bruce Publishing Company, 1945), and Aidan Germaine, Catholic Military and Naval Chaplains—1776–1917, (Washington DC: Catholic University of America, 1929). Newer numbers and additional names have been added from John Brinsfield, Benedict Maryniak, William C. Davis, James I. Robertson Jr.; Faith in the Fight; (Mechanicsburg, Pa.: Stackpole Books, 2003).
For general insights and perspective on Catholic chaplains, cf. James Hennesey, American Catholics—A History of the Roman Catholic Community in the United States; (New York: Oxford University Press, 1981); also Aidan Germaine, op. cit.; and Benjamin Blied, op. cit. These last two books, despite their age, are the standard Catholic texts in outlining and understanding the role of Catholic Civil War chaplains.
Aidan Germain comments about the hardship placed on bishops in allowing their priests to volunteer as chaplains during the war. “Since immigration was practically unimpeded … the Catholic population of all states grew constantly and the need of priests to minister to them increased in proportion. It was next to impossible to determine in advance with what regiments the Catholic soldiers were most numerous, and thus it chanced that now and then a Catholic chaplain was, like Fr. Gombattelli, assigned to a regiment having very few Catholics. Again, as Fr. Ireland experienced, battle losses and expiration of enlistments diminished the Catholic soldiers of a given regiment to a comparative handful, which made it desirable that the services of chaplains be utilized in spheres of greater need.” Cf. Germain, op. cit., 71.
Miller, op. cit., 265, 293. The Irish made up 11% of the Union Army, and Germans some 12%.
Der Wahrheitsfreund, as cited in Benjamin Blied, op. cit., 112–13.
William Corby, Memoirs of Chaplain Life—Three Years with the Irish brigade in the Army of the Potomac, edited by Lawrence Frederick Kohl (New York: Fordham University Press, 1992), 207. Cf. also Randall Miller, op. cit., 267.

“I suppose you expected me home before now. When I left I did not think that I would be so long in the army. I could not think of leaving my brave fellows in the face of the enemy without a priest—not knowing what day a battle would be fought … I came very near being killed four or five times during those battles. Nothing but the protecting hand of God could have saved me for which I can never be sufficiently thankful.”

December 1864 letter from Fr. P.P. Cooney CSC to his brother [after the battles of Franklin and Nashville]

Daily Catholic chaplain life

Catholic chaplains slept on the same hard ground, wrestled with the same life and death issues, and performed many of the same ministries as did their Protestant counterparts. They visited hospitals, followed soldiers into battle, provided comfort to the sick and dying, instructed people on various religious points, offered counsel to the condemned and dying, and became “jacks of all trades” to the soldiers they worked for. But Catholic priests had the further important and unique ministry of Sacramental administration for their soldiers. They heard soldiers’ confessions (at times for hours on end throughout the night), and sometimes in dangerous situations offered a mass “general absolution” to the gathered troops. (Despite Fr. William Corby becoming legendary for this on the second day of Gettysburg, he did this on at least one other occasion, as did other Catholic priests from time to time.)

Arranging for the regular celebration of Mass for the troops was a chief responsibility for priest/chaplains—despite the uncertainty of drill and camp life, exhaustion, fatigue and “worldly distractions”, priests learned to adapt and celebrate Mass “on the fly”, as well as at makeshift altars in open-air settings. When celebrating Mass for his troops, Fr. Corby was fond of mentioning in his Memoirs that “thus we sanctified another spot in Virginia on our march, as we had done a hundred times before and which we continued to do until we reached the end on the banks of the Appomattox.”

“As fast as our men dropped, they were seen first by the priest, at the request of the sufferer, and if his wound was fatal, the priest heard his confession on the spot, and then he was conveyed to a place called a hospital. All know that Catholics, when about to die especially, desire to become reconciled to God, not merely by contrition for sins, but also by the use of the Sacrament of Penance.”

Fr. William Corby, Memoirs of Chaplain Life

Other issues unique to Catholic theology and heritage also followed them around. With the stress of army life leading to over-indulgence in “John Barleycorn”, Catholic priests frequently found themselves administering the traditional “pledge” to those soldiers (many of them Irish) who had indulged too freely for too long. Priests on both sides also constantly struggled to find the necessary Sacramental resources to celebrate Mass—namely an altar, vestments, chalice, hosts, wine, etc. When (for whatever reason) a priest would lose his Mass kit, it almost always occasioned a short leave to pick up new supplies for this key sacramental work.

An early and cumbersome burden for Catholic chaplains was the standard requirement to obtain “faculties” to minister from bishops of areas in which they traveled, and of communicating their whereabouts to their superiors. This was ultimately resolved by a February 1862 prescription from Rome allowing priests to perform their ministry wherever they traveled, but to attempt to present themselves to the local Ordinary within two months if possible.[i]

A final unique opportunity that Catholic chaplains (and religious sisters as well) had was to help break down the anti-Catholic bias so prevalent in America, and to perhaps help begin a deeper understanding and acceptance of Catholics. Deep anti-Catholic bias would certainly continue on for decades after the Civil War, but without a doubt many inroads were made with countless individuals by the wartime ministry of Catholic chaplains. A fine example of this is seen in Congregationalist chaplain William Eastman, who in the post-war years wrote eloquently of the impact that priests like John Ireland (5^th MN), Joseph O’Hagan (73d NY) and William Corby (88^th NY) had upon himself and others:

There were chaplains of all denominations, and the spirit of oneness among them would have seemed rather remarkable at home. We who were Protestants, used to think that the Roman Catholic chaplains had some advantage in the firm grip they had upon their men. One can hardly fail to hear in the memory of such times the echo of that fine classic:

By communion of the banner

Battle scarred but victor banner

By the baptism of the banner

Brothers of one church are we.

Catholic Clergy as War-time Emissarie

By its nature, the Catholic Church is an international institution, with ecclesial connections throughout the world. This fact was not lost on both Northern and Southern governments during the Civil War, as both attempted to use Catholic bishops as emissaries to build alliances overseas. Rome was the place both the Union and Confederacy looked towards for support, but (like other European capitals of that time), “it was a hotbed of intrigue”[iii], and in the end the final results were uncertain, with success difficult to evaluate with any precision. Still, it is worth noting the respect that both governments had for the efforts and potential effect these bishops could have for their government’s causes.

For the Union, it was prominent New York Archbishop John Hughes who was summoned to Washington in October 1861, and asked to sponsor the Union cause abroad. While refusing any official position, Hughes consented to serve in a private capacity, and so sailed for France on November 6, 1861, having conversations with French royalty (Napoleon III and Empress Eugenie) as well as other ambassadors and officials. He later wrote that he was uncertain if his efforts had served to prevent either England or France from entering the American conflict, emphasizing there was no love for the United States beyond the Atlantic. However President Lincoln was pleased with Hughes’ efforts, saying that he turned sympathy our way in Europe more than any one else could have done.[iv] In Rome, the United States requested through Hughes that the Vatican follow a policy of non-intervention in the conflict, an approach which offered no difficulties for Rome.[v]

In response to this, Jefferson Davis sent his own letter to the Pope on Sept 23, 1863, obtaining a Papal response phrased in general terms of charity, but using the title “Your Excellency”. Despite later discussion over the deeper ramifications of this, it is best seen as sheer formality, with no deeper political meaning. In 1864, Davis himself commissioned Bishop Michael Lynch of Charleston to do what Hughes had attempted to do several years before. He visited Ireland first, then London, Paris and Rome—meeting Catholic hierarchs along the way, as well as Napoleon III (who was friendly but said nothing of real substance). By 1864 attitudes of people overseas had hardened regarding the situation, and Lynch (though always greeted favorably) did not receive much active support for his cause.[vi]

Other Catholic clergy were sent overseas in various emissarial capacities as well. In 1863, Fr. John Bannon (Confederate chaplain and former St. Louis pastor) went to his native Ireland to explain the causes of the Confederacy, and help prevent more Irishmen from migrating to the U.S. to fight for the Union. By the spring of 1864 he had finished his work, and temporarily joined Bishop Lynch in his emissarial role. However, after the war, radical Republican lawmakers did not forgotten Bannon’s wartime efforts, and blocked his return to America.[vii] Other efforts at influencing European nations were carried out by Bishop Michael Domenec (Pittsburgh), a Spaniard by birth who played a minor role in attempting to influence Spain against the Confederacy[viii]; Benedictine Abbot Bonifaz Wimmer (who corresponded with the Catholic Emperor of Austria), and Bishop John Fitzpatrick (Boston) who toured Europe in 1862–63, but found most of his support in highly Catholic Belgium.

Cf. Germaine, op. cit., 46–48 for a fuller discussion of this issue.
As cited in John Brinsfield, Jr., Benedict Maryniak, William C. Davis and James I. Robertson Jr.; Faith in the Fight—Civil War Chaplains; (Mechanicsburg, Pa.: Stackpole Books, 2003), 123–4.
Hennessey, op. cit., 156.
Lincoln also wrote that “I intend to recommend in the most appropriate way I can that the Pope appoint Archbishop Hughes a cardinal, and so far interfere in the ecclesiastical affairs of the church.” In retrospect, Bishop Hughes (who was close to William H. Seward) felt the government was complimenting him by making the request it did, and also that this was a subtle condemnation of the “know-nothings” who had attempted to brand Catholics as disloyal.
Pope Pius IX expressed to the American minister to the Vatican, Alexander Randall, that they were “justly proud” of Hughes being entrusted with this emissarial responsibility.
Bishops Lynch and Hughes engaged in a public disagreement regarding slavery and the Southern cause in a series of letters written between themselves in 1861. After Lynch

had outlined his views in an August 1861 letter, Hughes took the unusual step of publishing his response through his own newspaper. Lynch then published the full version of his own previous letter. The exchange attracted much public attention, but actually reflected how calm and tempered some religious leaders could be (in contrast to the fiery disagreements of other denominations) over these difficult sectional issues. Cf. John Tracy Ellis, Documents of American Catholic History (Milwaukee, Wis.: Bruce Publishing, 1956), 356–65.

Bannon remained in Ireland, joined the Jesuit order, and became a prominent preacher and pastor there. Cf. Blied, op. cit., 91–93; and also the excellent biography of Bannon written by William Faherty, Exile in Erin (St. Louis, Mo.: Missouri Historical Society Press, 2002).
Domenec was in Rome for the canonization of the Japanese martyrs, and had audiences with the Spanish queen and her ministers, which (according to Archbishop John Hughes at least) went very successfully. Hughes wrote that “Bishop Domenec, of all those who had been sent by the government to arrange these matters, is the only one who ever really succeeded in his mission.” However, the national archives in Washington are silent about any long-term influence Domenec might have had. Cf. Blied, op. cit., 93.

“Today … has been one of the happiest of my life—contrasting my present quiet with the experience of the army, where with some exceptions, everything corrupt, low vulgar and debasing in our corrupt nature is rampant. Would that I were out of it, but it cannot be yet. I may still do some good where I am and I will make the sacrifice of my feelings for that object.”

Fr. Joseph O’Hagan, Feb. 19, 1863 journal entry while on retreat

Unique Catholic chaplains

Some Catholic chaplains became well-known and nigh legendary for their work (William Corby, James Sheeran, Peter Cooney, Joseph O’Hagan, John Bannon and Abram Ryan, for example). Information or diaries can be found on all these men in the voluminous materials available now on the Civil War. Many Catholic chaplains were officially commissioned by their governments and served for either long or short periods of service. Others (an unknown number) were never officially commissioned, yet ministered as they could and as needed. But the wartime ministrations of some chaplains defy neat descriptions. I will close with the stories of two Catholic priests were never really formal chaplains, yet all made undeniable contributions in most unique ways.

Fr. Peter Whelan (1802–1871)—Apostle to Andersonville[1]

A native Irishman, Vicar General of the Savannah Diocese, and early-war chaplain at Fort Pulaski (Georgia), Peter Whelan was serving the spiritual needs of all Confederate posts in Georgia when he was asked by Bishop Augustin Verot to minister at Andersonville prison. Whelan went there for four months (June-September 1864), writing later that he continually fell asleep exhausted, “full of sorrow for what he had seen all day.” He was joined in ministry there for a short while by three other priests (Henry Clavrel, John Kirby and the multi-lingual Anselm Usannez SJ), all of whom worked only a few weeks before leaving.

Just before leaving Andersonville himself, Whelan borrowed money to purchase flour and bake bread for the remaining prisoners. This much-needed food became known as “Whelan’s Bread” and lasted several weeks. Whelan returned to Savannah beset by a lung ailment and by invading Federal troops under Sherman in December 1864. After the war, he ministered to Henry Wirz (a Catholic) before his death, and visited Jefferson Davis at Ft. Monroe. Though he did become a post-war pastor in Savannah, his health was never the same, and Whelan died on Jan. 15, 1871. It is recorded that his funeral procession four days later was the longest ever seen, and that seldom was so large a gathering of people found in the streets of Savannah.[2]

Fr. Jeremiah Trecy (1825 – ??)—Chaplain for both sides[3]

Few chaplains could brag of acceptance by both Union and Confederacy, but such was Jeremiah Trecy. Born in Ireland, ordained in 1851, Trecy labored in Iowa and Nebraska before the war, establishing churches and representing area Indians on government business. In 1858, he went south for health reasons, doing missionary work in Alabama. When Huntsville became a Confederate camp, Trecy volunteered his services to troops around Mobile Bay (Forts Gaines and Morgan). After Ft. Donelson, he was asked by a surgeon on the staff of Gen. A. S. Johnson to meet the spiritual needs of the hospitalized soldiers in Huntsville. He eventually got passes from generals of both sides to travel freely through Mississippi and Alabama, but after being stopped by one testy Union officer, he was brought before Union officers, including future Catholic convert Gen. David S. Stanley and Gen. William Rosecrans (whose brother Sylvester was a Catholic bishop).

Rosecrans would not permit him to return to Alabama (the Union army was then moving towards Iuka) so Trecy stayed with the Federals until after the battle of Iuka, working with Fr. John Ireland (5^th MN), when he was permitted to return to Alabama. After the October 1862 battle of Corinth, Trecy got Rosecrans’ permission to help the Southern wounded, but when Rosecrans was ordered to Cincinnati to take charge of the 14^th Corps, he asked Trecy to accompany him. Receiving authorization to visit the 14^th Corps Catholic troops, Trecy traveled the Union camps freely, meeting Fr. Richard Christy (78^th PA) with whom he became good friends. In April-May 1863, he requested to leave the army, as he had served without pay, but was convinced by Union officers to become chaplain of the 4^th US Cavalry—a permission that was granted.

He remained with the army in Tennessee up to the battle of Chickamauga, where he “had many narrow escapes … three bullets passed through the cape of his great coat, and his vestments were captured but retaken. One Sunday his hat was blown off by a solid shot while attending a patient”.[4] After Chickamauga, again Trecy was almost killed. While preparing a dying man, “a sharpshooter took accurate aim and put a bullet through the breast of his coat. The priest hurriedly mounted his horse, but as he did so, a perfect shower of bullets rained around him but he miraculously escaped with a few slight scratches on his horse.”[5]

Trecy remained with the 4^th Cavalry through the Atlanta Campaign, then followed Thomas’ army to Nashville and Franklin, where he stood right beside Gen. Stanley as the general narrowly missed death when a bullet grazed his neck, cutting the string of his Catholic scapular. When the war was done, Trecy resigned his commission and returned to his mission at Huntsville, later pastoring as well in Bayou de Batre, Louisiana.

Fr. Joseph Bixio S.J. (1819–1898)—Union or Confederate?

Few Catholic chaplain stories are as colorful or checkered as that of this native Italian. Described by one as a sly and devious trickster “of unfailing chicanery and competence who spent an inordinate amount of time slipping back and forth across the Federal lines”,[6] Bixio was the brother of a famous Italian general, Nino Bixio, who was Garibaldi’s right hand man in the struggle for Italian unification. He entered the Jesuits in Italy, came to the United States in the late 1850’s, and was in a parish that bordered both Virginia and Maryland as the war broke out. Unable to return to the northern side of his parish during the battle of Manassas[7], Bixio volunteered as a Confederate chaplain. But by the spring of 1862, his true deviousness had emerged.

A Union chaplain wrote that Bixio had been in Federal camps “where he had gained the hearts of both officers and men”, but by the summer he had turned up in Richmond. Then, in September 1864, Confederate chaplain Fr. James Sheeran (14^th LA) noted that Bixio was again “now playing Yankee chaplain and drawing federal rations” while posing as northern Franciscan Fr. Leo Rizzo de Saracena. Apparently, Bixio had slipped into the sick Fr. Rizzo’s tent and stolen his chaplaincy credential and uniform. In this disguise he conned Gen. Phil Sheridan into giving up cartloads of Union supplies, an action that Sheeran himself would suffer for by being thrown into prison and enduring Sheridan’s displaced wrath! Bixio then received a “polite message” in Staunton, Virginia from an unidentified Union general (likely Gen. Benjamin Butler) that he would be hung if caught—but he never was.

After the war ended, Bixio traveled to Georgetown with a trunkful of useless Confederate script expecting to found a college there, but left the area afterward, working awhile in Australia before finally returning to work and die at Santa Clara, California. Even to the end, the Italian retained his cunning charisma—he charmed the bishop in California, became his trusted confidant, and even founded a number of parishes for him in area counties.[8]

While never considered an official chaplain, Bixio certainly had a colorful history, whatever his true nature and intentions! While fellow Jesuit and wartime chaplain Fr. Hippolyte Gache S.J. (10^th LA) wrote rather generously that Bixio “seems quite successful in the various places where he serves”, it was Gache’s translator Cornelius Buckley who perhaps best captured this unique and curious priest when he called him “every bit as ingenious and resourceful as he was double-dealing and cunning.” [9]

Endnotes

Information taken from a marvelous booklet on Whelan by Peter J. Meaney OSB, “Father Whelan of Fort Pulaski and Andersonville”, reprinted from the GA Historical Quarterly, Vol. LXXI, No. 1, Spring 1987. Cf. also Brinsfield et al., op. cit., 253; Blied op. cit., 123; Germain, op. cit., 133–34; and also Michael V. Gannon, Rebel Bishop—The Life and Era of Augustin Verot (Milwaukee, Wis.: Bruce Publishing Company; 1964), 93–106 for an excellent history on Whelan and Andersonville as well.
Some post war unofficial sources indicated that Whelan was ‘Chaplain-in-Chief’ of all the Catholic chaplains in the service of the Confederacy”, but that this assertion cannot be established from any official records. Cf. Germain, op. cit., 134.
I am indebted here to the unpublished manuscript of David Power Conyngham entitled The Soldiers of the Cross; or Nuns and Priests of the Battlefield, which is presently in the Conyngham Papers in the Archives of Notre Dame University.
Conyngham, op. cit., 45.
Ibid., 46.
Hippolyte Gache, A Frenchman, A Chaplain, A Rebel—The War Letters of Pere Louis-Hippolyte Gache, SJ. (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1981), 98.
In writing about the battle of Manassas, an anonymous Englishman who fought with the Confederacy said that “it is to the foresight and judgment of one (Jesuit) that Beauregard and Johnston escaped death or capture at Manassas, for had they not met one of these missionaries during the heat of the conflict, and heeded his modest advice, one or another of these calamities must have inevitably ensued.” Seeing as there were no other Jesuit chaplains in Virginia in July 1861, it was undoubtably Joseph Bixio he was referring to. Cf. Gache , op. cit., 97.
Gache, op. cit., 98–99.
Gache, op. cit., 97.

Endnotes

The “Know-Nothing” platform of beliefs included opposing citizenship for any immigrant until after twenty-one years of living in America, and the banning of foreign-born citizens from holding political office in the United States. The group was strong in New York for a time, becoming in 1854 the “American” political party, taking control of the Massachusetts legislature and electing several members of Congress. However, their numbers splintered over disagreements over slavery, and was already fading in strength by the 1856 elections, when—although gaining over 20% of the vote in that election—it lost many of its adherents to the newly formed Republican party.
There were 1.75 million American Catholics in 1850, a number which doubled a decade later. By 1860, Catholics had expanded from 30,000 (in 1790) to 3.5 million (in 1860). However in 1860, statistics also show that there were only about 2500 Catholic churches compared to 20,000 Methodist churches—which leads Mark Noll to conclude that “while there may have been more baptized Catholic than full Methodist members, in terms of active adherents, there were still probably more Methodists than Catholics. [Certainly] the landscape was marked out as evangelical Protestant terrain, whatever may have been the actual count on the church rolls.” (From Mark Noll’s private notes). By 1866, Catholics made up 13% of America’s population—though most were poor, and certainly considered near or at the bottom of the social ladder. Cf. Eerdman’s Handbook of Christianity in America, (Grand Rapids, Mi.: Eerdmans Press, 1983), 235; also Ahlstrom, op. cit., 8, 527, 542.
Cf. James Moorhead, American Apocalypse: Yankee Protestants and the Civil War, 1860-1869 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978); and also Gardiner Shattuck, A Shield and a Hiding Place: The Religious Life of Civil War Armies (Macon, Ga.: Mercer University Press, 1987). For many guiding insights in this chapter, I am indebted to Randall Miller’s excellent essay “Catholic Religion, Irish Ethnicity and the Civil War” in Religion and the American Civil War, edited by Randall M. Miller, Harry S. Stout and Charles R. Wilson (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 261–296.
Fr. Richard C. Christie, elected as chaplain by the overwhelmingly Protestant 78^th PA, was one such situation, however.
Miller, op. cit., 265.
These numbers are my own, based upon research into and compilation of the best available current Catholic chaplain records. I used the two standard Catholic chaplain listings of Benjamin Blied, Catholics and the Civil War, (Milwaukee Wis.: Bruce Publishing Company, 1945), and Aidan Germaine, Catholic Military and Naval Chaplains—1776–1917, (Washington DC: Catholic University of America, 1929). Newer numbers and additional names have been added from John Brinsfield, Benedict Maryniak, William C. Davis, James I. Robertson Jr.; Faith in the Fight; (Mechanicsburg, Pa.: Stackpole Books, 2003).
For general insights and perspective on Catholic chaplains, cf. James Hennesey, American Catholics—A History of the Roman Catholic Community in the United States; (New York: Oxford University Press, 1981); also Aidan Germaine, op. cit.; and Benjamin Blied, op. cit. These last two books, despite their age, are the standard Catholic texts in outlining and understanding the role of Catholic Civil War chaplains.
Aidan Germain comments about the hardship placed on bishops in allowing their priests to volunteer as chaplains during the war. “Since immigration was practically unimpeded … the Catholic population of all states grew constantly and the need of priests to minister to them increased in proportion. It was next to impossible to determine in advance with what regiments the Catholic soldiers were most numerous, and thus it chanced that now and then a Catholic chaplain was, like Fr. Gombattelli, assigned to a regiment having very few Catholics. Again, as Fr. Ireland experienced, battle losses and expiration of enlistments diminished the Catholic soldiers of a given regiment to a comparative handful, which made it desirable that the services of chaplains be utilized in spheres of greater need.” Cf. Germain, op. cit., 71.
Miller, op. cit., 265, 293. The Irish made up 11% of the Union Army, and Germans some 12%.
Der Wahrheitsfreund, as cited in Benjamin Blied, op. cit., 112–13.
William Corby, Memoirs of Chaplain Life—Three Years with the Irish brigade in the Army of the Potomac, edited by Lawrence Frederick Kohl (New York: Fordham University Press, 1992), 207. Cf. also Randall Miller, op. cit., 267.
Cf. Germaine, op. cit., 46–48 for a fuller discussion of this issue.
As cited in John Brinsfield, Jr., Benedict Maryniak, William C. Davis and James I. Robertson Jr.; Faith in the Fight—Civil War Chaplains; (Mechanicsburg, Pa.: Stackpole Books, 2003), 123–4.
Hennessey, op. cit., 156.
Lincoln also wrote that “I intend to recommend in the most appropriate way I can that the Pope appoint Archbishop Hughes a cardinal, and so far interfere in the ecclesiastical affairs of the church.” In retrospect, Bishop Hughes (who was close to William H. Seward) felt the government was complimenting him by making the request it did, and also that this was a subtle condemnation of the “know-nothings” who had attempted to brand Catholics as disloyal.
Pope Pius IX expressed to the American minister to the Vatican, Alexander Randall, that they were “justly proud” of Hughes being entrusted with this emissarial responsibility.
Bishops Lynch and Hughes engaged in a public disagreement regarding slavery and the Southern cause in a series of letters written between themselves in 1861. After Lynch

Bannon remained in Ireland, joined the Jesuit order, and became a prominent preacher and pastor there. Cf. Blied, op. cit., 91–93; and also the excellent biography of Bannon written by William Faherty, Exile in Erin (St. Louis, Mo.: Missouri Historical Society Press, 2002).
Domenec was in Rome for the canonization of the Japanese martyrs, and had audiences with the Spanish queen and her ministers, which (according to Archbishop John Hughes at least) went very successfully. Hughes wrote that “Bishop Domenec, of all those who had been sent by the government to arrange these matters, is the only one who ever really succeeded in his mission.” However, the national archives in Washington are silent about any long-term influence Domenec might have had. Cf. Blied, op. cit., 93.
Information taken from a marvelous booklet on Whelan by Peter J. Meaney OSB, “Father Whelan of Fort Pulaski and Andersonville”, reprinted from the GA Historical Quarterly, Vol. LXXI, No. 1, Spring 1987. Cf. also Brinsfield et al., op. cit., 253; Blied op. cit., 123; Germain, op. cit., 133–34; and also Michael V. Gannon, Rebel Bishop—The Life and Era of Augustin Verot (Milwaukee, Wis.: Bruce Publishing Company; 1964), 93–106 for an excellent history on Whelan and Andersonville as well.
Some post war unofficial sources indicated that Whelan was ‘Chaplain-in-Chief’ of all the Catholic chaplains in the service of the Confederacy”, but that this assertion cannot be established from any official records. Cf. Germain, op. cit., 134.
I am indebted here to the unpublished manuscript of David Power Conyngham entitled The Soldiers of the Cross; or Nuns and Priests of the Battlefield, which is presently in the Conyngham Papers in the Archives of Notre Dame University.
Conyngham, op. cit., 45.
Ibid., 46.
Hippolyte Gache, A Frenchman, A Chaplain, A Rebel—The War Letters of Pere Louis-Hippolyte Gache, SJ. (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1981), 98.
In writing about the battle of Manassas, an anonymous Englishman who fought with the Confederacy said that “it is to the foresight and judgment of one (Jesuit) that Beauregard and Johnston escaped death or capture at Manassas, for had they not met one of these missionaries during the heat of the conflict, and heeded his modest advice, one or another of these calamities must have inevitably ensued.” Seeing as there were no other Jesuit chaplains in Virginia in July 1861, it was undoubtably Joseph Bixio he was referring to. Cf. Gache , op. cit., 97.
Gache, op. cit., 98–99.
Gache, op. cit., 97.

Catholic Civil war Chaplins

Resources

Address

Contact