- Andrew White (missionary)
Andrew White, S.J. (1579 –
December 27 ,1656 ) was an English Jesuit missionary who was involved in the founding of the Maryland colony. [cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15610b.htm|title=Andrew White |first= Edward I. |last= Devitt |date= 1912 |encyclopedia=Catholic Encyclopedia |publisher= Robert Appleton Company |accessdate= 2007-07-09] He was achronicle r of the early colony, and his writings are a primary source on the land, the Native Americans of the area, and the Jesuit mission inNorth America . For his efforts in converting and educating the native population, he is frequently referred to as the " ofMaryland ." He is considered a forefather ofGeorgetown University , and is memorialized in the name of its White-Gravenor building, a central location of offices and classrooms on the university's campus. [cite news |url= http://www.thehoya.com/news/110805/news9.cfm |title= Buildings Pay Homage to GU's Most Famous Founders, Donors |first= Ah-Hyun |last= Cho |date=2005-11-08 |work=The Hoya |accessdate= 2007-07-03]Early life
Born in
London in 1579, he began his education at age 14 at the Englishseminary atDouai ,France . He entered St. Alban's College inValladolid ,Spain , in 1595 at the same time as other notable English Catholic priests, including the later Saint and martyrThomas Garnet . He sought further education inSeville , and was ordained at Douai in 1605, after which he returned to England. [cite web |url= http://www.stmaryscity.org/History/bio%20Fthr%20Andrew%20White.html |title= Father Andrew White |work= [http://www.stmaryscity.org/History/Articles%20&%20Resources.html St. Mary's City History] |date=2007-01-19 |accessdate= 2007-07-09] Caught up in a wave of anti-Catholic arrests following theGunpowder Plot , he was arrested and in 1606, banished from England. Moving toLeuven inBelgium , he joined theSociety of Jesus onFebruary 1 ,1607 . Despite the threat ofcapital punishment , White returned in 1609 to preach inSouthern England . At the same time, he took positions as prefect of the seminaries at Leuven and Liège, between which and his English missions he split his time.George Calvert, the first Baron Baltimore, whom White is credited in helping to turn to Catholicism in 1625, wrote to White from his colony on the
Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland after 1628. White's further interest in America is shown a letter from Superior GeneralMutio Vitelleschi in a letter datedMarch 3 ,1629 , approving a mission to America. Though George Calvert died in 1632, his son,Leonard Calvert , second Baron Baltimore, continued the colonization program. Baltimore had wanted White to help found a new colony in theChesapeake Bay which had been charteredJune 20 ,1632 . White himself wrote of the benefits of converting the native population, and in a document datedFebruary 10 ,1633 , he specifically advocates Catholic settlement in "lord Baltimore's Plantation in Mary-land." He describes to potential financiers a paradisaical land with majestic forests and fruitful soil, advertising convert|2000|acre|km2|0 of land for each potential settler.Apostle of Maryland
On
November 22 ,1633 , he took Baltimore's offer and set sail fromCowes on theIsle of Wight with lord Leonard Calvert, and fellow Jesuits John Altham Gravenor and Thomas Gervase on "The Ark", one of George Calvert's ships. [cite book|first=William Coleman|last=Nevils|title=Miniatures of Georgetown: Tercentennial Causeries|year=1934|publisher=Georgetown University Press|location=Washington, D.C. |url= http://worldcat.org/wcpa/oclc/8224468| pages= 1-25] Their landing onMarch 25 ,1634 , onSt. Clement's Island marks the birth of the Maryland colony. The anniversary of this date is now celebrated asMaryland Day . In saying Catholic mass that day, he became the first priest to do so in the original thirteen English colonies. [The first Christian mass of any denomination said in what became the United States was celebrated inSt. Augustine, Florida , on1565-09-08 .] By July of that year, White had written his first discussion on the new colony, titled "A Relation of the Sucessefull Beginnings of the Lord Baltimore's Plantation in Maryland". Sections of this were used to further advertise the colony.White spent most of the next decade in St. Mary's City, working on English-Native American relations, particularly with the
Yaocomico tribe, which consistently saw favorable trade treaties from Calvert because of White, and the Anacostans. In 1637 they were joined by JesuitsThomas Copley andFerdinand Poulton , and between 1634 and 1650 there averaged four permanent Jesuits in the Maryland Colony. [cite encyclopedia |url= http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09755b.htm |title= Maryland |first= A. Leo |last= Knott |date= 1907 |encyclopedia=Catholic Encyclopedia |publisher= Robert Appleton Company |accessdate= 2007-07-09] To further his missionary work, he translated thecatechism and dictionaries in the native languages. OnJuly 5 ,1640 , he famously converted Chitomachon, the chief of the Piscataway Indians, toChristianity . The chief was baptized as Charles. He later baptized a princess of the Patuxent Indians, and much of her tribe.Return to England
The
English Civil War was to cut short his missionary work. In 1644,Richard Ingle andPuritan colonists from the neighboringVirginia n colony of Jamestown, which had previously rebuffed George Calvert's visit, first raided St. Mary's City. Ingle succeeded in burning the town and, with the aid ofWilliam Claiborne , in controlling the Maryland Colony. White was again arrested for his Catholic preaching, and in 1645 he was sent with Thomas Copley in chains to London. Once there, he was tried for the crime of returning to England after being banished in 1606, which carried the punishment of death. He escaped this fate by arguing that his return was not of his own will. His petitions to return to Maryland denied, he spent the last decade of his life quietly in England until his death onDecember 27 ,1656 .Works
*"A Declaration of the Lord Baltimore's Plantation in Mary-land, nigh upon Virginia: manifesting the Nature, Quality, Condition and rich Utilities it contayneth." London 1633. Facsimile ed. by Lawrence C. Wroth, Baltimore 1929.
**"Declaratio Coloniae Domini Baronis de Baltamoro in Terra Mariae prope Virginiam. qua ingenium, natura et conditio Regionis, et Multiplices Ejus Utilitates Ac Divitiae Describuntur". Compiled in "Woodstock Letters" 1, Bethesda 1872.
*"A Relation of the Sucessefull Beginnings of the Lord Baltimore's Plantation in Maryland. Being an extract of certaine Letters written from thence, by some of the Aduenturers, to their friends in England. To which is added, The Conditions of plantation propounded by his Lordship for the second voyage intended this present yeere, 1634." London 1634. Incomplete reproduction in John D.G. Shea: "Early Southern Tracts" 1, New York 1965. The original manuscript version (specified as the Lechford version) first printed in "The Calvert Papers", volume 3, Maryland Historical Society Fund Publications 28, 34 - 35, Baltimore 1899.
*"A Relation of Maryland". London 1635.
*"Objections Answered Touching Maryland". In: "A Moderate and Safe Expedient to Remove Jealousies and Feares, of Any Danger, or Prejudice to This State, by the Roman Catholicks of This Kingdome, and to Mitigate the Censure of Too Much Severity towards Them, with a Great Advantage of Honour and Profit to This State and Nation." London (?) 1646.References
External links
* [http://www.msa.md.gov/msa/speccol/sc2200/sc2221/000017/000008/pdf/d005003a.pdf A section of a catechism written by White probably in the Piscataway language]
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