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JANUARY-13, 1934
THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA
SEVEN
Sherman 9 s Son and Stephens 9
Grand-Nephew in Adjoining
Graves in Jesuit Cemetery
Father Salter and Father She rman, Kinsmen of Opposing
Leaders in War Between the States, Buried Side by
Side in Louisiana on Almost Successive Days
BY RICHARD REID
(In America, New York)
In Volume II of his “War Between
the States,” Alexander Stephens, Vice
President of the Confederacy, has
fourteen references to General Sher
man. He tells of Sherman’s “laying
waste the country in a belt of nearly
thirty miles in breadth” in Georgia;
he refers to the “atrocities attending
conflagrations and devastations in his
‘grand march’ through Georgia and
the Carolinas”; and he incorporates
into the appendix extracts from a
pamphlet describing the burning of
the Ursuline Convent in Columbia by
Sherman’s men. What General Sher
man thought of Stephens is not avail
able, but it is unlikely that these
“severe comments” (as their author
granted them to be) from the ordi
narily gentle and charitable Vice
President of the Confederacy inclined
Sherman to send him birthday pres
ents.
Three-score years later, General
Sherman’s son and Alexander Steph
ens’ grand-nephew had long since be
come Jesuit priests. One, the Rev.
Thomas Ewing Sherman, S. J., came
to New Orleans from St. Louis in an
effort to regain his health, a hope
complicated by his weakened condi
tion and his seventy-six years. The
other, the Rev. John Mary Salter,
S. J., Provincial of the Jesuit Fathers
in the South, stricken in Georgia on
a tour of duty, came back to his
New Orleans headquarters for treat
ment.
Here several weeks ago death
claimed them within three days of
each other, and now they are buried
side by side in the cemetery at the
Noviate of the Jesuit Fathers at
Grand Coteau, La., “where there is
neither Jew nor Gentle . . . Barbarian
nor Cythian, bond or free, but Christ
is all and in all.”
Father Sherman, born in San Fran
cisco eight years before his famous
father inspired the North and out
raged the South by his march “from
Atlanta to the sea,” was graduated
from Georgetown University, A. B..
1874, Yale University, B. S., 1876, and
Washington University, LL. B. He
entered the Society of Jesus at Roe-
hampton, England, June 14, 1878.
“This is not the last of Jesuit Sher
man” said the Christian Advocate, as
quoted by the Catholic Review of
New York, September 21, 1878, pre
served in the library of St. Leo Ab
bey in Florida. “He has disappeared
in the embrace of that Society which
for compactness and cruelty and
power is without rivalry in history.
But he will reappear in due time. We
already have a Cardinal, a temporal
prince, on our soil. It will be con
venient presently for this crafty apos
tate church to have a Cardinal Sher
man here and in due time when
Rome is worn out and wounded unto
death, and the Pope flees to more
hospitable climes, it may not be so
rude a shock to establish the Papal
Throne under the auspices of one of
our great families. It is not possible
to predict, but it does not take much
wisdom to see the prudence of avoid
ing the very appearance of evil. Our
fathers dared to die to secure our
religious liberties. We may yet be
called upon to make the same sacri
fices to maintain those liberties. No
Protestant children in Catholic
schools and no Jesuits in the White
House.”
It appears that the editor of the
Christian Advocate of 1878 was no
more the seventh son of a seventh
son than the editors of similar pub
lications writing in an identical vein
exactly fifty years later.
Before his breakdown in health
many years ago, Father Sherman was
one of the most widely known pulpit
orators in the United States. In 1909,
a few weeks before he had planned
to follow his father’s trail through
Georgia on a march with the United
States Army, sponsored by President
Roosevelt—a project which elicited so
much opposition when announced
that it was abandoned, and not with
out some excitement—Father Sher
man in a sermon at "St. Patrick’s
Cathedral in New York described
“the Miracle of Andersonville,” in
which a bolt of lightning, burying
itself in the ground at the Ander
sonville prison in Georgia, started a
flow of crystal water, although the
prisoners, federal soldiers, mad with
thirst, had tried repeatedly to strike
water by digging wells. The spring
is still flowing and was the subject
of several recent articles in the press
of Georgia. “This was a miracle,”
the New York Herald-Tribune quotes
Father Sherman as saying, “the
greatest miracle ever wrought in this
country. It was a proof, I hold, that
God works miracles when the crisis
demands Divine intervention.”
After the war, Alexander Stephens,
General Sherman’s critic and foe, was
imprisoned from May to October,
1865, at Fort Warren in Boston Har
bor. Among the visitors to the pris
on was Miss Mary Williams Salter,
a member of a distinguished New
England family and a convert to the
Faith. Miss Salter had become in
terested in the Church while trav
eling in Europe. On her return she
wrote to a Boston priest, Father Hit-
selburger, S. J., whom she happened
to know, and made inquiries on some
points she did not fully understand.
The explanations of Father Hitsel-
burger do not seem to have made
any effective impression on Miss
Mary Salter’s mind—there is a tra
dition that the illegible handwriting
of this learned man was responsi
ble—but Miss Helen Salter, Miss
Mary’s oldest sister, became very
much interested in this, made fur
ther inquiries, and finally entered the
Church. Miss Mary’s doubts were
eventually cleared up, however, and
she became a Catholic November 1,
1863, in Switzerland. One after the
other, the entire Salter family em
braced the faith.
The conversion impressed Puritan
Boston profoundly and made the Sal
ter household a rallying place for the
notable Boston converts, such as Dr.
Brownson, Father Edward Holker
Welch, S. J., Father Coolidge Shaw,
Father Haskins (Emerson’s first cou
sin), Mrs. Amanda Turbell Croswell,
Widow of the first Rector of the
Church of the Advent; Dr. Pollard,
the first curate at that church; Mrs.
George Ripley, wife of the founder
of Brook Farm, and her niece, Miss
Ruth Charlotte Dana, daughter of
Richard H. Dana, Sr.; Miss Matilda
Dana, sister of General Dana, Bulke-
ley Adams Hastings, formerly pur
chasing agent for Brook Farm, and
his wife; Jane Sedgewick, “the Papal
Nuncio of Western Massachusetts”;
Mrs. Cora Monica Thompson, grand
daughter of old General Israel Put
nam; the Metcalfes, the Dwights, the
Lymans, the Whitneys, the Richards;
Mrs. Fanny Cushing Parker, mother
of the late Anglican Bishop of New
Hampshire; the Misses Addie Parks,
Julia Maria Beres, Emily Dorothea
Deming, and others, all recorded in
The Bulletin of the Catholic Lay
men’s Association of Georgia by the
late Scannell O’Neill.
.. The Salter family was as distin
guished in New England as the
Stephens family in the South. Father
Salter’s paternal grandfather, Dr.
Richard Henry Salter (1808-1893, Yale,
1831), was a leading phyisician of
Boston and a prominent member of
the Church of the Advent, “the moth
er of all Protestant ritualistic church
es in the United States.” His grand
mother. Mrs. Abigail Wheeler Salter
(1811-1883), was the daughter of the
Rev. Dr. Leonard Woods,, of Andover
Seminary, and sister of Dr. Leonard
Woods, president of Bowdoin College.
Bom in Sparta, Ga., June 1877,
Father Salter was educated at Sacred
Heart Seminary, Sharon, Ga., and
Belmont Abbey College, N. C., then
entering the Jesuit Novitiate at Ma
con, Ga. His philosophical studies
were made at St. Louis University,
and his course in theology at Wood-
stock, where he did the “Grand Act.”
He taught- at Sacred Heart College,
Augusta, Ga., and at Loyola Univer-
city, New Orleans, La., was pastor
at Augusta, master of novices at St.
Stanislaus College, Macon, and its
successor as a Novitiate, St. Charles
College, Grand Coteau. La., and final
ly Provincial of the Jesuit Fathers in
the South. Thus Father Salter’s
entire life as a student, scholastic, and
priest was spent in the South or on
its fringes. Blessed with the intel
lectual propensities of New England,
the gentility of the old South, with
the Christian Catholic spirit permeat
ing his humble soul, Father Salter
was a perfect blend of what is best
in the North and South.
The embers of the old antipathy
between North and South are now
smothered by mutual good will, to
be fanned only occasionally and mo
mentarily by professional agitators or
throwbacks to a previous generation.
A few weeks ago The Athens Ban
ner-Herald, in Georgia’s university
city, published an editorial, widely
quoted in the state, endorsing the
opinion that Sherman’s tactics were
prompted by humanitarian motives,
and asserting that his maneuvering to
use the torch instead of taking lives
“should be appreciated by the gen
erations today”, a statement which
could not astonish the leaders of both
factions three-score years ago a frac
tion as much as a son of General
Sherman and a grand-nephew of
Alexander Stephens resting side by
side in Jesuit graves in a Novitiate
cemetery in a Louisiana grove. May
their souls rest in peace.
KENNEY-McCANTS
(Special to The Bulletin)
CHARLESTON, S. C.—The Very
Rev. James J. May. V. G., rector of
the Cathedral, officiated at the mar
riage of Miss Helen Marie Kenney,
of Parsons, Kas., and Lockwood Alli
son McCants of Mount Pleasant,
which took place December 29. Miss
Margaret L. McCants was bridesmaid
and Julian Bulkely Weston best man.
After the wedding trip, Mr. and Mrs.
McCants will live in Summerville,
where Mr. McCants is superintend
ent of Camp Dorchester; he is a grad
uate of Clemson.
Rolling Stone
BY FATHER JEROME, O.S.B.
Saint Leo, Florida
Oh, roll along, unheeding
Drone of botanic loss
That hives out of the greening
Of uncollected moss.
Oh, roll along! This only
Heed and forever own:
Thews adamantly pulsing
In placid hearts of stone.
The “Ave Maria” on
President Battey
(From The Ave Maria, Notre Dame,
Ind.)
Alfred M. Battey is the new Presi
dent of the Catholic Laymen’s Asso
ciation of Georgia, succeeding Cap
tain P. H. Rice, President for four
teen years. Mr. Battey is a Geor
gian, member of a pioneer Georgia
family; he is the brother of Captain
Louis Le Garde Battey, who died in
battle in France during the World
War. The Augusta Post of the Amer
ican Legion is named after Captain
Battey. Seeing his picture here at
this moment, we would say Mr. Bat
tey is forty—or a few years less. He
seems a quietly determined man.
Quietly determined men have done
much for the Catholic cause in Geor
gia. We have in mind Mr. Jack
Spalding, fo whom the University of
Notre Dame bestowed her Laetare
Medal; and Mr. Rice, the active pre
decessor of Mr. Battey. “Alone in
Georgia” might serve as the watch-
cry of this self-helping Catholic Lay
men’s Association. Catholic men are
not numerous in Georgia. They are
not noisy or offensive. In other large
city centers Catholic men are much
more numerous, and much more di
vided. Sometimes they more than il
lustrate our political slogan that
Catholics do not vote for Catholics
just because they are Catholics. Often
indeed they emulate the K. K. K.,
and vote against Catholics because
they are Catholics.
NEW ORLEANS HAS
CATHOLIC WEEKLY
Catholic Action of the South
Previously a Monthly
(BY N. C. W. C. NEWS SERVICE)
NEW ORLEANS.—With its Decem
ber issue Catholic Action of the
South, official organ of the Archdio
cese of New Orleans and of the Dio
cese of Lafayette and Natchez,
changed from a monthly to a weekly.
Announcement was made that the
paper has been adopted as their offi
cial organ by the Most Rev. Jules B.
Jeamard, Bishop of Lafayette, and the
Most Rev. Richard O. Gerow, Bishop
of Natchez.
Launched just a year ago, on De
cember 17, 1932, under the sanction
and support of the Most Rev. John W.
Shaw, Archbishop of New Orleans,
the paper continues under the direc
tion of its Editor-in-Chief, the Very
Rev. Peter M. H. Wynhoven. Joseph
J. Quinn is Managing Editor, and
Roger Baudier and Robert Sturgis
are Associate Editors, Gray D. Morri
son, Advertising Manager, and J. W.
MacCandles, Circulation Manager.
Church in Louisiana
Has Georgia Pastor
Father Thomas Maher, S. J.,
in Charge of Parish Which
Dedicates New Edifice
(Special to The BuUetin)
MINDEN, La.—The Most Rev. Dan
iel Desmond, D. D., Bishop of Alex
andria, officiated at the dedication
here January 8 of the new St. Paul’s
Church, of which the Rev. Thomas
Maher, S. J., a native of Augusta,
Ga., who recently returned from his
studies in Europe, is now pastor. A
tornado struck Minden May 1 of this
year, and reduced St. Ann’s Church
there to a heap of ruins. Plans for a
larger church were immediately made
and this was the church dedicated
January 8, with St. Paul as its patron
saint.
MT. DE SALES ACADEMY
ISSUES PUBLICATION
(Special to The Bulletin)
MACON, Ga.—Mt. de Sales Acad
emy now has a publication of its own,
The Torch, published under the pat
ronage of St. Francis de Sales, who
is the patron of the Catholic press as
well as of Mt. de Sales Academy.
The first number was a four page
publication, attractive typographical
ly, sprightly, and capably edited.
The members of the staff are the
Misses Mary Shafer, editor; Annina
Benedetto, business manager; Pau
line Elmore, assistant manager; Mary
Thomas, literature and drama; Eliza
beth Thompson, music and art; The
resa Kratzer, social; Kertrude Lan
der, athletics; Mary Long, wit and
humor; Anne Reynolds, senior re
porter; Carmen Stincer, commercial
reporter; Mary Volk, junior reporter:
Elizabeth Talley, sophomore reporter;
Ruth Martin, freshman reporter.
Dr. C. J. Reilly Presents a
Postal Pageant of the Faith
Thomasville, Ga., Physician, Philately Authority, Records
Catholic Commemorative Postage Stamps of the World
The current interest in philate
ly, or stamp collecting, makes the
accompanying article by Dr. C.
J. Reilly of Thomasville, Ga., a
member Of the Catholic Laymen’s
Association of Georgia, of un
usual interest. Dr. Reilly is
widely known as an authority
on the subject, and The Bulle
tin is pleased to present this
splendid series from his pen.
By C. J. REILLY, M. D.
It is becoming increasingly evident
to even the casual reader of the daily
news that philately, or the hobby of
stamp collecting, is enjoying a tre
mendous revival in popularity. Items
occupying considerable space dealing
with current postal issues of our gov
ernment now appear at frequent in
tervals. In addition over two hun
dred newspapers carry either syndi
cated articles or separate departments
dealing with philatelies. Radio broad
casts, sponsored by prominent man
ufacturers of unrelated lines, have
taken it up both locally and on na
tional hookups. Chain stores and
mail order houses have closely fol
lowed suit in meeting the public de
mand.
Various reasons have been advanc
ed to explain this seemingly sudden
interest in an old fashioned hobby.
Librarians base it on the feature that
during an economic depression the
people often turn to studious pursuits
as a means of forgetfulness. Others
ascribe the spreading popularity to
the many news items that have ap
peared concerning President Roose
velt and his ardent pursuit of the
pastime.
Perhaps the government report
from the philatelic division of the
Washington postoffice showing a bus
iness profit of well over three hun
dred thousand dollars during a fiscal
year corresponding to the deepest
level of the depression convinced
others that philately might be worth
investigating as more than a passing
fancy of youth. What the sales have
been at the numerous other postof
fices throughout the country is im
possible to compute but it serves to
swell the above amount to a formid
able figure. Except for the nominal
expense of printing, the sale is clear
profit as the government is not re
quired to render further service for
the stamp.
The writer has noted that many
people when shown a stamp album
display a casual curiosity but the ap
parent monotony of the complete col
lection of a particular issue all bear
ing the same design soon dulls their
interest. To them and to collectors
seeking an interesting special field in
philately the following list of Catho
lic stamps may particularly appeal as
each stamp through its picture tells
a story in itself.
It may surprise many to know that
at least eighty countries have issued
stamps dealing with events in the
history of the Church or portraying
its edifices and noted sons and daugh
ters. The non-Catholic collector, or
even one opposed to the Church, will
necessarily have some of them in his
collection if he wishes to have it com
plete unless he 'collects within an un
usually limited field.
Without previous standard being
set it is somewhat difficult to de
fine what constitutes a Catholic
stamp and the writer has dealt some
what liberally with the question in
the following description of various
issues. In some cases it is not in
tended to claim them exclusively as
pertaining to Catholicism but to re
call some event in Church or Biblical
history with which the scene or in
dividual was closely associated. Por
traits of some famous personages have
been included though the reason for
the philatelic recognition by their
country was due to their political,
scientific or military achievements.
Throughout their career however the
public practice of their religion was
of paramount importance and known
to all the world. A few others have
been omitted for somewhat opposite
reasons.
The little semi-independent state of
ANDORRA, lying between France
and Spain, comes first in our alpha
betical list and we find several splen
did views of its churches. The issue
of 1929 shows the churches of St.
Juan de Cassalles, St. Julia de Loria
and the Campanile of St. Coloma. A
higher value presents the General
Council of Andorra with the Bishop
as its President. A later issue has the
chapel at Meritxell and the church of
St. Miguel d’Engolasters.
The ARGENTINE REPUBLIC last
spring gave us a design of the Ca
thedral at La Plata and an earlier is
sue has Manuel Alberti, its noted
priest and patriot.
ARMENIA, that land of ancient
days and endless history, uses as its
motif or central design the outlines
of Mt. Ararat either alone or with
some public buildings in the fore
ground. With the spread of bolshe
vism more recent designs show the
red star of Russia surmounting Ar
arat, which may be an indirect fling
at Christianity. Sevan Monastery on
Lake Goktcha, formerly a Catholic
edifice, is poorly presented on one
stamp. Two other stamps show dif
ferent views of the ruins of the an
cient city of Ani. These are the
buildings erected by King Tiridates
who was a convert of Gregory the
Illuminator about the beginning of
the fourth century.
AUSTRIA on some of her recent
issues has given us views of the
churches at Eisenstadt, Gussing,
Dumstein, Seewiesen and Innsbruck;
the Cathedrals at Melk and Vienna
(St. Stephen's) and the monasteries
of Salzberg and Hochhosterwitz. In a
series of prominent artists we have a
portrait of Moritz Schwind who did
notable work with his paintings of
scenes from the life of St. Elizabeth.
Some of these were used by Ger
many on her charity stamps of 1924.
The well known and pious Chancel
lor of Austria, Monsignor Ignaz Sei-
pel, is given a separate issue in his
honor.
BAVARIA has an edition of five
stamps showing the Blessed Virgin
and Holy Child, all of the same de
sign and merely of changing value.
This set was later overprinted with
the term “Deutsches Reich”, and a
lithographed design added in the
highest value.
BELGIUM on the other hand has
been quite prolific with her Catholic
stamps of many different designs.
St. Michael, alone, and destroying
Satan is shown on two stamps with
their odd tags attached on which, are
directions “Not to be delivered on
Sunday.” Removal of the tag be
fore attaching the stamp to a letter
will presumably cause the postman
to arouse one in the early hours
which might not be a bad idea in
other countries where folks fail to
get to Mass on time.
In 1928 a set was issued to raise
funds for the restoration of Orval
Abbey. Recent news indicates that
the sale and usage of the stamps for
postage was not so great a financial
success as anticipated. The three de
signs show the ogives of the Abbey,
a monk carving a capital, and the
ruins of the Abbey. This year a new
set will be issued for the same pur
pose, depicting various views of the
Abbey, others showing the Madonna,
St. Bernard and various ecclesiastical
dignitaries connected with the insti
tution.
St. Martin of Tours is portrayed in
two slightly different designs, both il
lustrating the legend wherein as a
Roman cavalry officer he divides his
cloak with his sword and gives the
half to a beggar, much to the amuse
ment of a fellow officer. That night
a vision of Christ wearing the half
cloak appeared to him and his con
version followed.
Many of her famous Cathedrals
have appeared on other Belgian is
sues notably those at Toumai, Ma-
lines, Ghent, Brussels and Antwerp.
The church of St. Wandru at Mons,
the belfry at Bruges. Wynendael Ab
bey, the Bishop’s palace at Liege, the
belfry and church of St. Nicholas
and the Cathedral of St. Bavon are
other examples of ecclesiastical ar
chitecture appearing on recent issues.
The restored library at Louvain,
about which so much international
discussion was aroused, appears in a
well executed design. The issue of
1932 honors the famous Cardinal Mer-
cier, first in simple portrait flanked
by Croziers, then as protector of the
children and aged at Malines. again
as professor at Louvain University
and finally in full Canonicals giving
his blessing. Truly a well deserved
recognition of a universally beloved
priest and patriot. To link the be
ginning with the present one may in
clude the stamp bearing the Antwerp
coat of arms , which shows Adam and
Eve.
BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA has giv
en us only one example thus far,
which shows St. Luke’s Campanile
at Jajce, though a later issue of the
same picture has appeared with the
only change being the addition of the
Emperor’s jubilee dates.
..We skip next to BRAZIL and the
stamp bearing the national coat of
arms on which the Cross is promi
nently displayed in blazing glory.
Two stamps show a monument and
portrait of Father Bartholomew de
Gusmao, noted priest and aviator. A
very recent issue displays the Ca
thedral at Vassouras. commemorat
ing the sesquicentennial of the found
ing of the city. The Eucharistic Con
gress will see a new issue for the oc
casion with a very appropriate de
sign.
Catholic stamps of Central LITHU
ANIA are limited to a few churches,
notably the Ostrabrama Sanctuary,
the Cathedral at Vilna and the Ca
thedrals of St. Stanislaus and St.
Nicholas.
COLOMBIA in Central America is
represented by only one. which shows
the Cathedral of Medellin and that
merely a silhouette of the great tow
ers. It was a local issue of the city
apparently.
A Sister of Charity with a native
pupil standing beside her appears in
one of the issues of the Congo. Noth
ing is given regarding its meaning in
catalogs save that the series in which
it is listed might be serving to il
lustrate the work being done there
now for the natives in contrast to
the memorable past.
(To Be Continued)