Edward Fenwick

Edward Fenwick

Bishop Edward Dominic Fenwick, O.P. (b. August 19, 1768, St. Mary's County (Maryland) - d. September 26, 1832, Wooster, Ohio) was born on the Patuxent river, Maryland (then a colony) to Colonel Ignatius Fenwick and Sarah Taney. Colonel Fenwick was a military figure of the American Revolution and one of the early Catholic families of Maryland; he was educated, aged 16, at the College of Bornheim, near Antwerp, Belgium.

Upon completion of his studies he entered the Dominican Order and entered the seminary at Bornheim as a theological student. After ordination he became a professor at the Dominican College. Belgium being invaded during the French Revolution, Fenwick was initially imprisoned under threat of death, but later released upon proof of his American citizenship. After release from prison he travelled to England and entered a convent of the Dominican Order.

He returned to the United States anxious to establish the Dominican Order. He was received by Bishop John Carroll, who suggested that Fr. Fenwick and the Dominicans who accompanied him should evangelize the vast regions of the United States west of the Appalachian Mountains, including the territories acquired in the 1803 Louisiana Purchase.

In 1805, Fr. Fenwick traversed the entire Mississippi Valley looking for a central location to continue his missionary work. The other three Dominican priests were Samuel Thomas Wilson, a Master of Sacred Theology, Robert Antoninus Angier, a Lectorate in Sacred Theology and Preacher General, and William Raymond Tuite.

Fr. Fenwick selected a site in Washington County, Kentucky, near Springfield, Kentucky. Construction of a priory and a church began almost immediately and was first inhabited in December 1806 but not completed until 1807. St. Rose Priory church was dedicated December 25, 1809. Saint Thomas of Aquinas College was added later, completed in 1812. St. Rose Priory was the first Catholic educational institution west of the Alleghenies. The first Bishop of the new (in 1808) Diocese of Bardstown, Benedict Joseph Flaget, used the priory until the Bardstown St. Joseph Proto-Cathedral was built.

On January 13, 1822, Edward Dominic Fenwick was consecrated as the first Bishop of the new Diocese of Cincinnati. The consecration was celebrated at Saint Rose Church as there was no cathedral in Cincinnati. He went to Europe in 1823 to raise funding for the new diocese and returned in 1826 with resources to begin the construction of the cathedral, parochial schools, and to found the convents of the Sisters of Charity and of the Dominican nuns.

In 1829 Bishop Fenwick established the St. Francis Xavier Seminary. This was the third oldest Catholic seminary in the United States and the oldest Catholic seminary west of the Appalachian Mountains. The Athenaeum of Ohio-Mount St. Mary Seminary claims its roots through the St. Francis Xavier Seminary and is located in Cincinnati.

In 1831 Bishop Fenwick initiated publication of The Catholic Telegraph diocesan newspaper. The weekly newspaper was carried by stage and riverboat to areas within the diocese's government, as well as to cities in Kentucky, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Maryland and the District of Columbia. The Catholic Telegraph is still in existence today as the oldest continuously-published Catholic newspaper in the United States.

Also in 1831, Bishop Fenwick founded The Athenaeum, which later evolved into Xavier University and St. Xavier High School.

After the college was established he returned to missionary work, visiting the Indian tribes in the Northwestern territory. Stricken by cholera he died in Wooster, Ohio on September 26, 1832, aged 64.

Preceded by
None
Bishop of Cincinnati
1822–1833
Succeeded by
John Baptist Purcell

Several schools are named in his honor:

  • Bishop Fenwick High School, Franklin Township, Ohio
  • Fenwick High School, Oak Park, Illinois
  • Fenwick High School, Lancaster, Ohio (now the William V. Fisher Catholic High School)
  • Bishop Fenwick Middle School, Zanesville, Ohio

Read more about Edward Fenwick:  Chronology

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