Newspaper Page Text
Thursday, April 22, 1999
The Southern Cross, Page 3
Peace, prosperity and Catholicity
in Fitzgerald, Georgia
Saint William's Church, Fitzgerald.
By Rita H. DeLorme
ust storms, failed crops,
rough weather: these
were the lot of many farm
ers living in the north fol
lowing the Civil War.
In 1896, P. N. Fitzgerald,
editor of the Indianapolis
American Tribune and a
man with a dream, founded
a town two hundred miles
south of Atlanta to help
these people. This town
would eventually take his
name, Fitzgerald.
Earlier, during a time of prolonged
drought in the midwest, the state of
Georgia as well as other states had
come to the rescue of the hapless
farmers of that region. P. N. Fitzger
ald, a humanitarian if there ever was
one, decided that bountiful and mild-
wintered Georgia would be a good
place to transplant these frustrated
people, many of them veterans of the
Civil War.
A man of action, Fitzgerald was
soon offering shares of stock in the
American Tribute Soldiers’ Colony
Company at $ 10 per share. South cen
tral Georgia became his goal and he
purchased 50,000 acres of land from
the five Drew brothers who owned
property at Swan, a former turpentine
camp. Later, he would buy further
acreage. Initially, however, Fitzgerald
had to deal with local resentment of
“Yankees” wanting to buy some of the
most hallowed ground of the Confed
eracy. He persevered, however, and
colonists from the drought areas soon
funneled in by horse, train, buggy and
any other conveyance available.
Some of these settlers felt a little
claustrophobic at first
because of the lush growth
of the area and the prepon
derance of trees. Soon,
however, they began to
build shacks for temporary
housing, a move which
caused the new settlement
to be dubbed “Shacktown”.
Though there was in the
beginning a large incidence
of disease because of inad
equate housing, the town
soon began to thrive.
Many of the people who had come
to Fitzgerald’s colony were, like
Fitzgerald himself, Catholic. Some
were ex-soldiers who had fought for
the Union in many of the major bat
tles of the Civil War. German was a
dominant nationality among them and
industry was a dominant trait. In less
than two years, the colony had 25
miles of streets, two railroads, a bank,
250 businesses, three local papers and
eleven churches. Fitzgerald’s schools
had opened in fall, 1896, with their
enrollment numbering 501 pupils
culled from 38 states and two territo
ries. Offering free tuition and texts
and full nine-month school years, the
progressive little colony blazed a trail
in education. When employment
flagged, the city fathers started work
on a new, grand hotel which provided
more jobs and which was called, as
befitted the tolerance of the town, the
Lee-Grant Hotel.
In 1895, when Bishop Becker of
Savannah first heard about Fitzgerald
he was unable to find it listed on the
map, but finally located it under the
name of “Swan’s Mill”. Thereafter,
priests from the diocese came from
Albany periodically to care for
Catholics in Fitzgerald. In HS9.S, a
Jesuit from Saint Joseph’s Church in
Macon, Father Goin, offered the first
Mass in the little church built on land
donated by P. N. Fitzgerald. Other
priests from Macon who looked after
Fitzgerald’s Catholics were Fathers
Dean, Walsh, Vander Zon and Vogel.
In 1915, a new church, Saint
William’s, built on West Central
Avenue, replaced the earlier church.
Father Herman Diemel, a native of
Fitzgerald, said his first Mass in this
church after his ordination and, in
May, 1938, offered his first solemn
high Mass there. Father Diemel was a
pioneer in a way, the first Catholic
priest ordained in Georgia to come
from a town having no resident priest.
Fitzgerald’s Saint William’s Church,
a mission of Saint Paul’s Church in
Douglas, was supplied priests by the
Savannah Diocese until the Oblates of
Mary Immaculate assumed responsi-
bilty for Fitzgerald, Alapaha, Douglas,
Lakeland, Willacoochee and Baxley
in the late 1930’s. The previous Saint.
William’s Church, dedicated in 1915,
was replaced in December of 1969 by
a new church building. By this time,
Fitzgerald’s own Father Herman
Diemel, now a monsignor, had retired
as pastor of Saint Patrick’s Church in
Augusta after a lifetime of service to
the Church.
Since the beginning of its life as a
community, Fitzgerald has shown that
goodwill and a willingness to work
together can override differences in
background and beliefs. Indeed, aging
Confederate veterans arid Union vet
erans alike had marched together in
one of the town’s earliest Fourth of
July parades under the banner of the
United States. It would seem that P.
N. Fitzgerald’s benevolent dream was
fulfilled then and continues to be ful
filled to this day.
Rita H. DeLorme is a volunteer in
the Diocesan Archives
British Cardinal Hume diagnosed with
inoperable cancer
London (CNS)
ardinal George Basil Hume of
Westminster said he is “calm
and at peace” after discovering that
he is suffering from inoperable can
cer.
A spokesman for the cardinal said
the nature of the cancer had not
been made public.
In a letter to his fellow bishops in
England and Wales and to priests in
the Archdiocese of Westminster, the
cardinal wrote: “You may have
heard that I have recently been in
(the) hospital for tests. The result: I
have cancer, and it is not in its early
stages.
“I have received two wonderful
graces. First, I have been given time to prepare for a
new future. Secondly, I find myself — uncharacter
istically — calm and at peace.”
Cardinal Hume said he intended to work as much
and as long as he could.
“I have no intention of being an invalid until I
have to submit to the illness. But nevertheless, I
shall be a bit limited in what I can
do. Above all, no fuss. The future
is in God’s hands. I am deter
mined to see the Holy Year in,” he
said, referring to the Catholic
Church’s celebration of the year
2000.
He told his colleagues: “This is
an opportunity for me to thank
you for your friendship, your
patience and, not least, your good
o humor.”
-2 The cardinal’s letter was
CL
J5 released to the media in Britain
^ April 17. Prayers were said for
u him in churches throughout the
country April 18.
The cardinal, who turned 76 in
March, submitted his resignation to Pope John Paul
II when he reached the age of 75. He was asked to
carry on as archbishop of Westminster, a post he has
held since 1976.
Kevin Flaherty, editor of the national weekly
newspaper, The Catholic Times, said, “I am sure
that Catholics across England and Wales will be
shocked and saddened by this news.
“In the last 20 years or so, Cardinal Hume has
earned the love and respect not just of the Catholic
community, but of the whole country. Next year marks
the 150th anniversary of the restoration of the Catholic
hierarchy of England and Wales — and I believe that
Cardinal Hume’s time as archbishop of Westminster
will come to be seen as one of the most significant
eras since that historic moment. Cardinal Hume has
become one of the best recognized and most respected
church leaders of our age,” said Flaherty.
Among those offering messages of good will and
support when the news was announced was the
leader of the Anglican Church, Archbishop George
Carey of Canterbury. “I am so sorry to learn of the
serious nature of Cardinal Hume’s illness,” Arch
bishop Carey said. “His faithful acceptance of the
situation and his ability to look forward with deter
mination and with hope is typical of the man whom
we know, love and respect.” Cardinal Hume became
a Benedictine monk as a teen-ager, joining the com
munity at Ampleforth Abbey, where he attended
high school has repeatedly expressed a desire to
end his days in his old monastery at Ampleforth.
Basil Cardinal Hume