Vol. Vi. Georgetown College, August, September and October, 1877
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VOL. VI. GEORGETOWN COLLEGE, AUGUST, SEPTEMBER AND OCTOBER, 1877. No. 1. (Copyright Secured.) Daniel Carroll, jr., the elder son of Daniel, be- bitterness and the increase (to some limited came a member of the first senate formed in degree) of educational facilities, require that THE Maryland after the adoption of its constitu- he should. EARLY HISTORY tion; was a delegate to the Continental Con- Bohemia Academy, however, is said to have gress from 1780 to 1784; signed the articles of sheltered at one time nearly twenty of the sons OF Confederation, and, as a member of the federal of the richer Catholic Marylanders. Among GEORGETOWN COLLEGE, convention of 1787, also the Constitution ; was young Carroll’s schoolmates were his cousin a representative in Congress from Maryland, Charles, the subsequent signer of the Declara- WITH A from 1789 to 1791; voted while in Congress tion of Independence, and Robert Brent of for locating the seat of government on the BIOGKAPHICAI SKETCH OF ITS Aquia Creek, Stafford Co., Ya., whose ances- Potomac, and was very influential in carrying tor emigrated to the Old Dominion from Eng- FOUNDER, that measure through : was appointed by Gen. land in 1687, under a special protection from Washington in 1791 one of the three Commis- James II.; a safeguard rendered necessary in and extracts from bis sioners for locating and surveying the District the condition of the laws of Virginia at that CORRESP ONDENCE. ines. He died in May, 1796,* aged 66. time against Catholics. In 1747, when young John, tlie younger son, was sent by his Carroll had spent a year or less at Bohemia, he John Carroll, the founder of Georgetown parents,—being then about eleven years of age, was sent with these two companions to St. College, born at Upper Marlboro’, Prince —to acquire the rudiments of education at a Omer’s in French Flanders, to complete his George’s Co., Md., Jan. 8th, 1735, was the school kept by the Jesuits at Bohemia Manor education. St. Omer’s was established by the third son of Daniel Carroll and Eleanor Darn- in Cecil Co. Of this school, which may be English Jesuits in 1590, or towards the end of all. The Darnalls were Catholics, eaily set- called the predecessor of Georgetown, no his- the reign of Elizabeth, as a school for the tlers, and at one time, large land-holders in tory is preserved : even the building in which Catholic youth of England, who were denied all Maryland. Mrs. Carroll’s youthful years were it was held was destroyed by fire many years means of education at home except upon the spent in France, where she had been sent to ago,—the fate which has since overtaken the abandonment of their faith. About five years be educated: thus, to a noble character, she old academy at St. ^Thomas’ Manor, and the before the entrance of the three young Amer- added a cultivated mind and accompbshed ancient residences of St. Inigoes and White- icans, an additional establishment for the re- manners. Her husband emigrated’from Ireland, marsh, whereby doubtless much historical ception of young, boys had been opened at St. with his father, Charles Carroll, in 1680. The material has been lost. It is not to be expec- Omer’s by the Fathers: here, these youths latter had been clerk to Lord Powis, one of ted, however, that many details of the school doubtless entered: passing in the course of James IPs ministers, and on his arrival in the at Bohemia should be found on record : it was time, to the greater College. The Carrolls colony, was made Judge and Register of the held in a retired nook of Maryland, and affor- spent six years at St. Omer’s, and Brent prob- Land Office. He was also agent and receiver ded a resource for the education of the sons oi ably did the same. the Catholic colonists which was unattainable of rents for Lord Baltimore. The Carroll fam- At the end of the six years course, namely elsewhere in the colony, under the persecuting ily, an ancient and distinguished one at home, in 1753, John, feeling himself called to the re- laws that then prevailed. A very considerable had lost their estates through their fidelity to ligious state, entered the Novitiate of the period doubtless intervened between active the old religion ; in Maryland, they doubtless Jesuits at Watten, two leagues from St. operations at this old school of the hunted more than made up their losses, for Charles and Omer’s. Charles proceeded for further study Jesuits and the foundation made in happier his descendants became possessed of large and to the establishments of the Jesuits at Rheims days on the heights of Georgetown. There valuable tracts of land in the colony. But as and Paris, began the study of the law at was but one priest, Father Peter Morris,f of the Catholics were at that time as insecure in their Bourges and completed it at the Temple in late Society, residing at Bohemia at the time rights in Maryland as elsewhere under British London. He did not return to his native coun- of the American Revolution, as there was but I domination, Charles was in 1718 expressly ex- try until 1764, when he was twenty-seven one a hundred years later, Fr. George Villi- empted* from any disqualification on account years of age. This pupil of the Jesuits profited ger, S. J., the present resident. The school of his religion. He died about 1747, and left, by his long training among them to become, must have ceased to be kept before Father besides Daniel, a son Charles, born in Mary- soon after his arrival, the foremost advocate of Morris’s time: it is not likely that one priest, land, 1702, who married Elizabeth Brook, be- civil liberty in Maryland. His subsequent I with the care of a mission and the cultivation came the lather of Charles Carroll of Carroll- career is too well known to be further dwelt of a farm depending on him, could take charge ton, and died in 1782. Daniel, the other son of upon here. On the completion of his novice- of scholars: nor did the changed circumstances tile first Charles, became a merchant in Upper ship in 1755, John, our young Jesuit, was sent of tlie time, in the relaxation of anti-Catholic Marlboro’, acquired wealth, and died during to the Society’s house in Liege to make his his son John’s absence abroad; whereupon his *Banman : Dictionary of Congress. J. Carroll studies in philosophy and theology. After the. widow moved to Rock Creek, with her family. Brent’s Biographical Sketch of Archbishop Carroll. completion of a four years course of study, he DaniiJ left two sons and several daughters. 1'Fr. Morris entered the missions of Maryland in 1768, and. died at Newtown, St. Mary’s Co., Nov, was ordained priest in 1759, being then twenty- * Hanson : Old Kent of Maryland.—P. 141. 19, 1783. four years of age : was immediately sent to St. 2 COLLEGE JOURNAL. Omer’s to teac)! : and subsequently to Liege, dents’ Sodality there, than the brief of Clement the relations between England and her Ameri- can colonies, warned him not to delay the exe- where he wasjlrofessor of philosophy and then XIV. suppressing the Society was published. cution of his intention. Moreover, a venerable of theology. 1 His theological manuscripts, It had been signed by the Pope on the 21st of mother, now in her seventieth year, and to which he prepared for his own use, either as July, but was kept secret in the interval, or at whom he was ever devotedly attached, still student or professor, are still preserved in least until announced to the Fathers in Rome Georgetown College library. on the 16th of August. It reached Bruges only awaited him there. The state of religion, too, called for such service as he was able to render. In the meantime, the conspiracy against re- on the 5th of September, and was immediately He accordingly set sail, and after the usual ligion and social order which met its culmina put into execution by the Austrian authori- tedious voyage of those days, landed upon his ting point later, in the French Revolution of ties, as it had been everywhere else under the native soil, in the vicinity of Richland, the 1789, made an important advance by the ex- Bourbon governments, with great brutality. seat of the Brents at Acquia Creek, June 26th, pulsion of the Jesuits from French territory in Father Carroll, writing to his brother on the 1774. Here, two of his sisters resided, one 1762* In consequence, both St. Omer’s and 11th September, six days after, announces the married to William Brent, the other to his the novitiate at Watten were closed, and their catastrophe that nad overtaken himself and his kinsman Robert, the former schoolmate of inmates transferred to Bruges in Austrian brethren, and adds: “I am not, and perhaps John Carroll at Bohemia Manor and St. Netherlands, whither they were invited by the never shall be recovered from the shock of Omer’s. The two younger sisters resided with people, the magistracy, and even the Austrian this dreadful intelligence. The greatest bless- their mother at Rock Creek, in what was then imperial authorities : invited, only to be again ing which in my estimation I could receive Frederick Co., (now Montgomery Co.,—set olf plundered, maltreated, and banished twelve from God, would be immediate death : but if in 1776), a few miles north-eastof Georgetown. years later by these same authorities on the he deny me this, may his holy and adorable Hither, he hastened, after a brief stay of two publication of the Brief suppressing the Socie- designs on me be wholly fulfilled.” He refers days witli the Brents.