Vicar Apostolic of the Western District

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The Vicar Apostolic of the Western District was the title given to the Bishop who headed an ecclesiastical jurisdiction, of the Catholic Church in England, the Vicariate Apostolic of the Western District, from 1688 to 1850.

Within a short space of time after the accession of Elizabeth I those Catholic Bishops who had not died were deposed and replaced in their sees by Protestant appointees. Most of the deposed Bishops were imprisoned in various locations and died in captivity over a period of years. The last to die was Thomas Goldwell, Bishop of St Asaph, in Rome on April 3, 1585. In 1623 after a century and a half the Pope, Urban VIII decided once again to appoint a Catholic Bishop with jurisdiction in England.

So it was that Dr William Bishop was given the title of Vicar Apostolic of England. He died shortly afterwards and was succeeded by Dr Richard Smith, who in August 1631 forced to resign and flee to France. The office was revived with the appointment in 1685 of another bishop in the person of Dr John Leyburn.

The first Vicar Apostolic, Dr Bishop had in 1623 divided the country into six areas, at the head of each of which he placed a superior with the title of vicar general and this had remained the system thereafter. Dr Leyburn then reduced these to four. It was on the basis of these four areas that in the heady days of early 1688 the number of bishops in England was multiplied by the Pope on January 20 to a total of four Vicars Apostolic and the territory of the former single Vicariate Apostolic was restricted, being centred still on London, with the title Vicariate Apostolic of the London District. So it was that a Vicariate Apostolic of the Western District was created. The first Vicar Apostolic of the Western District from January 30, 1688 was Bishop Philip Michael Ellis, OSB, who resigned in 1705.

The Vicariate included all Wales and the six south-western counties of England. In 1840 a general redivision of the vicariates took effect. Wales became a separate vicariate, and thenceforth the district consisted of the English counties only. Notwithstanding intermittent persecution and this last subdivision, a Vicariate Apostolic of the Western District continued in existence until on 29 September 1850 Pope Pius IX issued the Bull Universalis Ecclesiae, by which thirteen new dioceses which did not formally claim any continuity with the pre-Elizabethan English dioceses were created, among them the diocese of Clifton, which along with the new diocese of Plymouth was formed from the territory of the former Vicariate Apostolic of the Western District. Given that the Vicars Apostolic resided chiefly at Bath in Somerset, it was fitting that the last Vicar Apostolic of the Western District, Dr. Joseph William Hendren (1791-1866), consecrated in 1848, should become the first Bishop of Clifton. Thus the new Clifton diocese was in continuity with the old vicariate.

In the early period from 1850 the Clifton diocese was a suffragan of the Metropolitan See of Westminster, but a further development was the creation under Pope Pius X, on 28 October 1911, of a new Province of Birmingham, to which Clifton then was transferred.

The archives of the Western District, one of the most important sources of information for the history of the Church in England from 1780 to 1850 are deposited in the archives of the diocese of Clifton.

[edit] List of the Vicars Apostolic of the Western District

(Any dates appearing in italics indicate de facto continuation of office. The start date of tenure below is the date of appointment or succession. Where known, the date of installation and ordination as bishop are listed in the notes together with the post held prior to appointment.)

Tenure	Incumbent	Notes
28 January 1688 to 1705	Philip Michael Ellis, OSB	Priest; resigned
20 September 1713 to 20 November 1744	Matthew Pritchard, OFM	Priest; resigned
22 May 1750 to 11 July 1763	Lawrence William York,OSB	Coadjutor Vicar Apostolic of the Western District; retired
14 April 1770 to 25 November 1797	Charles Walmesley, OSB	Coadjutor Vicar Apostolic of the Western District; died in office
25 November 1797 to 17 October 1809	William Gregory Sharrock, OSB	Coadjutor Vicar Apostolic of Western District; died in office
18 October 1809 to 3 March 1829	Peter Bernardine Collingridge, OSF	Coadjutor Vicar Apostolic of the Western District; died in office
3 March 1829 to 6 July 1843	Peter Augustine Baines, OSB	Coadjutor Vicar Apostolic of the Western District; died in office
9 January 1844 to 16 October 1845	Charles Michael Baggs	Priest; died in office
12 May 1846 to 28 July 1848	William Bernard Ullathorne, OSB	Priest; appointed Vicar Apostolic of the Central District
28 July 1848 to 29 September 1850	Joseph William Hendren, OSF	Priest; becoming Bishop of Clifton