Asked to lend two priests, St. John Henry Newman goes instead
In a town where cholera struck without warning, the parish priest was carrying the sick to hospital on his back.
BILSTON, Staffordshire, September 1849 AD — In the town of Bilston, in Staffordshire, people with cholera were collapsing without warning. The parish priest was carrying them to the hospital on his back. The disease had broken out there in September 1849 AD. Bilston had two priests, and they were called from one sick person to the next, day and night. Even so, they couldn’t reach everyone.
Bishop William Bernard Ullathorne wanted to send more priests to Bilston. He turned to Saint John Henry Newman, who had been a Catholic for four years. St. John Henry Newman had started the English Oratory, a group of priests. The Oratory’s priests worked at a chapel in Birmingham. The bishop asked St. John Henry Newman to lend him two of them. They would take over the work of some other priests, and those priests could then go to Bilston.
St. John Henry Newman didn’t lend two priests. He went to Bilston instead. Father Ambrose St. John, a priest of the Oratory, went with him. The bishop had planned for other priests to face the danger in Bilston. Now St. John Henry Newman and Father Ambrose faced it instead. The Bilston priest wasn’t one of their own, so they didn’t have to help him.
The most dangerous part of town
In Bilston, St. John Henry Newman and Father Ambrose visited the sick and dying in the most dangerous part of town.
On September 19, 1849 AD, St. John Henry Newman wrote to his friend Henry Wilberforce. He wrote from St. Wilfrid’s, the Oratory’s house near Cheadle. He had gone there for a day or two because he had been working too hard. St. John Henry Newman told Henry Wilberforce: “I had gone to Bilston to attend the poor cholera patients, but found the scourge nearly over, and I was not wanted, — so I came here.”
Father Ambrose hadn’t left. St. John Henry Newman wrote that Father Ambrose and another of the Oratory’s priests were still at Bilston. St. John Henry Newman also passed on a report from the town: “They say that two thirds of the population would become Catholics if they had priests to take care of them.”
About this story
Catholic Saints News tells the lives of the saints as news from their own time and place. This story was written with AI from the historical record, and we read and approved it before it ran.
The Saints' words. This newspaper will never make a saint say something the historical record does not preserve.
Junior Report. Written for readers ten to twelve, from the same sources and under the same rules as the rest of the paper. The words are shorter, hard terms are explained, and the question at the end is for the reader to think over.
Read more
Image. Photographer unknown, plate from Wilfrid Ward, Life of Cardinal Newman, vol. II (1912), via Wikimedia Commons — see the original.
Found an error? Let us know.
Sources for this story
Listed by paragraph.
- Paragraph 1
- attested Wilfrid Ward, The Life of John Henry Cardinal Newman, Based on his Private Journals and Correspondence, Vol. I, FATHER NEWMAN TO DR. WISEMAN., p. 02 ¶110
- attested Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Newman, John Henry (Dictionary of National Biography, vol. 40), ¶69
- documented John Henry Newman, Apologia pro Vita Sua: Being a History of his Religious Opinions (revised text, Longmans 1890 printing), LETTER OF APPROBATION AND ENCOURAGEMENT FROM THE BISHOP OF T
- Paragraph 2
- documented John Henry Newman, Apologia pro Vita Sua: Being a History of his Religious Opinions (revised text, Longmans 1890 printing), LETTER OF APPROBATION AND ENCOURAGEMENT FROM THE BISHOP OF T
- attested William Barry, John Henry Newman, The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 10, ¶24
- documented R. W. Church, The Oxford Movement: Twelve Years, 1833–1845, THE CATASTROPHE ¶12
- documented R. W. Church, The Oxford Movement: Twelve Years, 1833–1845, THE CATASTROPHE ¶22
- attested Wilfrid Ward, The Life of John Henry Cardinal Newman, Based on his Private Journals and Correspondence, Vol. I, CHAPTER III, p. 1912 ¶92
- documented John Henry Newman; ed. Anne Mozley, Letters and Correspondence of John Henry Newman during his Life in the English Church, Vol. II, C. Marpjott,, p. 200 ¶150
- attested Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Newman, John Henry (Dictionary of National Biography, vol. 40), ¶68
- attested Wilfrid Ward, The Life of John Henry Cardinal Newman, Based on his Private Journals and Correspondence, Vol. I, CHAPTER VII, p. 02 ¶20
- attested Wilfrid Ward, The Life of John Henry Cardinal Newman, Based on his Private Journals and Correspondence, Vol. I, FATHER NEWMAN TO DR. WISEMAN., p. 02 ¶7
- documented Dicastero delle Cause dei Santi, John Henry Newman (1801-1890) — biografia, VITA E OPERE ¶5
- attested Wilfrid Ward, The Life of John Henry Cardinal Newman, Based on his Private Journals and Correspondence, Vol. I, FATHER NEWMAN TO DR. WISEMAN., p. 02 ¶18
- Paragraph 3
- attested Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Newman, John Henry (Dictionary of National Biography, vol. 40), ¶69
- attested R. H. Hutton, Cardinal Newman, ch. 10
- attested Wilfrid Ward, The Life of John Henry Cardinal Newman, Based on his Private Journals and Correspondence, Vol. I, FATHER NEWMAN TO DR. WISEMAN., p. 02 ¶110
- Paragraph 4
- Paragraph 5
- Paragraph 6
