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To Covington

“THE WEATHER,” wrote Lamy to his bishop on New Year’s Day of 1847, “was very bad this last Christmas and the mud very deep.” Even so, the little Danville church was as crowded as ever—people came from many miles through the abominable roads, many of them in the dark, for again he said his first Mass at five o’clock. The church was “as well decorated as we were able. For the illumination we had 150 candles burning almost all sperm [whale oil] or wax candles.” (From San-dusky City, a more exuberant account of the Christmas feast there went to France—Machebeuf told Sister Philomène in all the detail dear to a nun that never had Christmas been celebrated at Sandusky with such “pomp and solemnity.” The church was solidly lined with greens, there were three hundred lights, and the sanctuary vault—all Gothic—was sparkling with innumerable stars cut out of gold paper. And the music! The choir had been practicing for two months under an excellent director, accompanied with an old piano as there was no organ.)

It was the wettest winter and spring in years—travel was worse than ever, when all the rivers and creeks flooded the countryside. Bridges went out, canals were ruined, animals were borne away and those that lived ended by pasturing far from their home farms, and the wheat crop was given up. Barter took the place of currency paid, and parishioners brought produce and goods to their churches instead of money. Machebeuf remarked with irony that it was obvious that it was a land of milk and honey—and added, apropos honey, that Lamy paid him a visit in January and brought him a gift of “an enormous pot” of it. Lamy was adding a small belfry to his Danville church, where it was now clear he would remain, and himself pledged a bell of 400 pounds to hang in it. He was well, so was Father Pendeprat, and Machebeuf himself said his only illness was an “excess of health.”

What never ended was the growth of the state. Lamy gave Purcell a three-year summary of his records of baptisms, Easter communions, marriages, and deaths, and in each category, the figures of the first year were about doubled for the third year. Machebeuf’s parish grew even faster, for northern Ohio had the lake, and shipping, the immigrant workmen kept arriving, and more than ever, more than even Lamy himself, he needed a new assistant. None was at hand. When in February Lamy and some other priests went to Niagara Falls to see the great cataract, their route by-passed Sandusky, which came as a “shock of electric current” to Machebeuf, who would have gone along but for two reasons—he could not afford it, and he had too much to do at home.

But a larger concern brought a shock which needed no exaggeration when the Ohio priests heard that despite the petition of the American bishops and Purcell’s own urgent description of the need, Cleveland was not in all probability to be separated after all from Cincinnati by Vatican decree. It was an embarrassment for Father Rappe, who had been nominated for the mitre, and it showed a typical bureaucratic lack of imagination (such as often operated in central governments and military headquarters far from the field) of the realities behind the requests of those who struggled daily with distant problems. In six years Sandusky’s original twenty-five or thirty families had grown to about two hundred. The need of a bishop at the opposite end of the state from Cincinnati was obvious. Rome deliberated. In time, the issue would be properly resolved with the creation of the new diocese after all. Meanwhile, one had to do with what one had.

The national news was stirring—Taylor’s army of Northern Mexico had won a great victory at Buena Vista in late February 1847, a week later on 1 March General Wool took the city of Chihuahua, and before the month was out, Winfield Scott and his amphibious force received the surrender of Veracruz and started inland for the heart of Mexico and her capital, as the summer wore on.

In July there was distressing news for Lamy. Evidently the fact that central Ohio was not growing so fast as the northern counties moved Purcell to decide that after all Lamy should go to Sandusky permanently for city parish work. In reply to the proposal, Lamy wrote a long and eloquent plea to be allowed to remain at Danville. He reminded Purcell that a year earlier when he, Lamy himself, had proposed moving north, the bishop had said he wished the idea had never been thought of, and it was dropped. But now, Lamy begged to have his weighty reasons for not moving listened to—he was deep in arrangements to build a new brick church at Danville; he had contracted for the land; procured six thousand feet of lumber; “made a bargain with a man to burn a large kiln of bricks”; the congregation had already given him money, even the children; the shingles were ready; everyone felt “in good spirit about the new church.” He had been with them all for eight years, they were all as dear to him as children were to their own father. Now, unless the bishop had decided that his services had become useless among those people, he must earnestly and most humbly “entreat” Pur cell to grant him the favor of not removing him. Yes, and moreover, he had almost completed the restoration of the burned Mt Vernon church, and though he would be “in some debt,” he had “better prospect” before him. He piled reason upon reason in a flow of emotion such as he rarely revealed. City parish instead of the mission rides despite their hardships?

“I could not bear the idea, unless compelled by obedience, to be confined. I know it would be very injurious to my health, providence seemes to have fitted me for a barbarious [sic] and extensive mission,” he added in innocent prophecy. “I do not complain of hardship, and if my congregation are poor I should thank God to have given me an opportunity of practicing a virtue so dear to my divine master.” More, “If I was to consult my taste I should be obliged to say that I have a great dislike to be charged with the cure of a community on account of my inexperience and of my age for I am only thirty-two.”

“Dear Bishop,” he pleaded with passion so unlike his customary calm, “please bear with me a little longer. You have too great idea of my capacity as far as I know myself I would be afraid to exercise the ministry in a town or city. You might be too much disappointed in your expectation, if there is a certain good done where I am, though only a little, suffer me to remain here, would it not do more harm than good to remove a general from the army when there is accord and union between him and his subjects, and a great desire on both sides to perform, some achievements according to their number, strength and means? Now Dear Bishop I must acknowledge that never before in my life was I compelled to write a letter with so much repugnance as I have this for I never wished to go against the will of my Superiors, neither do I wish it now. But I hope that whatever I have observed you will believe that I had not the least intention to be disrespectful. I have only candidly expressed my own feelings, knowing well that you would take it in good part, please, excuse me if I have said anything that would give you the least suspicion of my disposition towards you. you have often said that you would not oppose a reasonable desire of any of your priests …”

Could it have crossed the bishop’s mind that his suppliant protested too much? Gave too many reasons where one good one would do? In any case, what appeared to be Lamy’s overriding purpose was to avoid—but let his own words resume:

“Your brother (Father Edward Purcell) has likely told you that Mr [Father] Senez desires very much to return to this diocese provided he would be welcome and have great deal to do. he has written to me on the same subject, but before I consent to the condition which he seems to require, for me to live with him, I want some time to reflect upon it. I know, Mr Senez is a good, pious, talented priest, I have been long enough in his company to be convinced of it, but I would be afraid to say without serious consideration that it would be for the greater benefit of both of us to be together, but I would not wish him to know it.…”

His final point, unelaborated though it was, seemed to have carried more weight than all the earnest arguments which came before it; and a few weeks later Lamy wrote with relief to Purcell, “Your answer to my last letter delivered me of a great anxiety of mind. I was very much afraid to have displeased you.” On the same day he took out his United States citizenship, and when within a week or so he received another plan for his transfer elsewhere, with Father Senez uninvolved, Lamy agreed with abounding alacrity and willingness. He told Purcell on 20 August 1847, now with no talk of bricks, timber and shingles,

“As you desire me to go to Covington [Kentucky] I am ready to leave Danville at your first orders. You may dispose of me as you please, my duty is to obey cheerfully, if you think I will do better I am perfectly willing to try. one thing which consoles me is to know that I will be so near you …” His work had prevented him from writing to Father Senez. He had heard that some feared Senez would not come at all if he had to stay alone. Would Purcell please write him? As for himself, he would like two or three weeks to settle some affairs at Danville, chiefly concerning the new church. A week later he wrote to the chancellor at Cincinnati giving his final report on Danville, Mt Vernon, Mohican, Pine Run, Mansfield, where he had congregations totalling two hundred fifteen families. Was he to wait for a replacement or come immediately? In any case, he was ready. His new assignment at Covington, which was directly across the river from Cincinnati, would put him distant the whole length of Ohio from Machebeuf at Sandusky. He left his forest parishes with feeling which was returned to him by them all. Something of him remained alive for generations in Danville. In a lovely phrase, Francis Sapp, grandson of the founder George, wrote in reminiscences set down in his last years, that Lamy’s “name is held in benediction by all the old residents of the county, irrespective of creed.” Francis Sapp, a waning old man, speaking with a childhood’s returned simplicity, said that “Father Lama” was a man “so good that everybody loved him. I was a very young boy when he was pastor here, but had such a high esteem for him I thought that God would not let him die but take him to heaven a live body and soul.… He baptized me and called me Francis Sapp.… I think him the most lovely priest I ever knew.… I have sat upon his knee many times….” It is the earliest picture of Lamy at work in the New World.