Louis William Valentine Dubourg

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Louis William Valentine Dubourg (1766 – 1833) was a leader of the Roman Catholic Church who played an active role in the growth of the church in the early years of the United States. He was born in Cap Française, St. Domingue, now known as Cap-Haïtien, Haiti.

He was ordained a priest in Paris in 1790, and was studying at the Sorbonne at the advent of the French Revolution. Events caused him to be concerned for his safety, so he took shelter with his family in Bordeaux, escaped to Spain, and sailed to the United States in 1794. He entered a seminary in Baltimore, Maryland and became a member of the Society of Saint-Sulpice one year later.

He was appointed president of Georgetown College in 1796. Under his administration, the curriculum expanded and the college's enrollment grew substantially. He went on to turn what had been St. Mary's seminary in Baltimore, Maryland into St. Mary's College, which would eventually become St. Mary's Seminary and University. It was under his administration that the state of Maryland gave the school the power to confer degrees. He also invited the widow Elizabeth Ann Seton to Baltimore in 1808 to establish a Catholic school for girls and later establish the Sisters of Charity of New York there.

He became the apostolic administrator of the Louisiana Territory in 1812. When he arrived in New Orleans, he found that the rampant vice of the city, coupled with the insubordination of Antonio de Sedella, a popular Spanish Capuchin priest who catered to the whims of the lukewarm local Catholic population, gave him reason to request that a new bishoporic be created for Louisiana. After a trip to France and Rome, and he was named the second bishop of Louisiana and the [East and West] Floridas in 1815. Shortly thereafter, however, he found he could no longer safely reside in New Orleans, and to avoid a schism, he relocated to St. Louis, Missouri in 1817. While in St. Louis, Dubourg founded St. Mary's of the Barrens Seminary, the first college founded west of the Mississippi River. He also helped to bring Rose Philippine Duchesne and her newly created Society of the Sacred Heart to the St. Louis area. In 1823, his last year in St. Louis, he welcomed the arrival of Pierre-Jean De Smet and his fellow Jesuits to the diocese. These same men would later found St. Louis University.

He then returned to New Orleans, leaving the St. Louis Catholic community greatly expanded, even if in considerable debt. Joseph Rosati became his coadjutor in 1825, and after Dubourg returned to France, Rosati became the first bishop of the new diocese of Saint Louis.

In 1825, Dubourg returned to France, having resigned his seat in New Orleans due to supervisory conflicts with Rosati. In France, DuBourg served as Bishop of Montauban, and was appointed Archbishop of Besançon in February 1833. He died later that same year.

[edit] References

Bowden, Henry Warner. Dictionary of American Religious Biography, Westport, Connecticut:Greenwood Press, 1977. ISBN 0-8371-8906-3
Christensen, Lawrence O., et al. Dictionary of Missouri Biography. Columbia, MO, and London:University of Missouri Press, 1999. ISBN 0-8262-1222-0
Who Was Who in America, Historical Volume 1607-1896. Chicago:Marquis Who's Who, 1967.