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Et In Suburbia Ego: Father Bampfield and the Institute Of St. Andrew
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 September 2015
Extract
The lives of many converts in nineteenth-century England underwent quite significant, and often drastic change as a result of their decision to enter into full communion with the Catholic Church. Social ostracism, rejection by family and friends, and acceptance of the loss of professional advancement were counted among the risks of ‘going over’ to Rome. Conversion brought with it a discontinuity with the past; yet the Catholic careers of many of those received into the Church exhibit a remarkable continuity with the subject's non-Catholic past, if not in matters of doctrine and worship, then certainly in the field of social and apostolic goals. Father George Bampfield, educator of the poor and lower middle classes, and pioneer of Catholic evangelization in Hertfordshire and North Middlesex, is one such example. His career, in both its Anglican and Catholic spheres, represents the realisation, in albeit very changed circumstances, of a vision first glimpsed and a commitment made within the bosom of the Establishment.
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References
Notes
1 For descriptions of Bampfield and Bridgett at Tonbridge see letters from Rev. Hore, A. H. in The Tablet 4 March 1899, p.335;Google Scholar 9 June 1900, p.903.
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5 Green, Religion at Oxford and Cambridge, p.284.
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16 Tablet 6 August 1892, p.233.
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24 There was no Catholic priest resident at Beccles until 1889, when a mission was opened by the English Benedictines from Downside.
25 Mullen op.cit., p.561.
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27 See Tablet 21 March 1863, p. 179; 11 April 1863, p.230.
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30 See Westminster Diocesan Archives W3/37, Rev. James McQuoin to Cardinal Wiseman, 30 December 1861: the Ursulines returned to England in May 1862 at the invitation of McQuoin, who had taken an interest in their work while at Moorfields, and now encouraged them to open a house at Upton, within the Stratford mission, and wherefrom developed St. Angela's, Forest Gate. Bampfield would have known of the nuns’ abortive foundation at Barnet via McQuion as well as from his own visits to the town from Waltham Cross. Faa di Bruno returned to London as Rector of St. Peter's Italian Church, Hatton Garden, and later served two terms as Rector General of the Pallottines. He died in 1889.
31 The chapel of St. Gregory was added in 1870 and that of Our Lady in 1877–78, when the nave wasextended as well; the church was completed in 1931 but suffered destruction by fire in 1973.
32 During the thirty-eight years of its existence, the Institute of St. Andrew never exceeded a total of eight priests (1893); sometime members included: Revv. David Nichols (1830–98), and former Oblate of St. Charles; William Barry (1853–94), who became prominent in child rescue work in the Diocese of Westminster; and Lewis Matthews (1856–1916), senior Catholic Chaplain to H.M. Forces. Students of the Institute who left before ordination included: William Baigent (1857–1930), Provost of Nottingham; and Ethelred Taunton (1857–1907), the historian and author, who was ordained as an Oblate of St. Charles but later transferred to the Diocese of Westminster. In addition to departures from the Institute, three priests aged under forty died in the period from 1879 to 1893.
33 See Gilley op.cit., p.385.
34 See Corbett, J., Celebration: The Story of a Parish (St. Albans, 1990), pp. 15–16;Google Scholar Tablet 10 July 1886, p.63.
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42 See Shaw, D. H., The History of St. Michael's and the Catholic Parish of Hitchin (Hitchin, 1975) p.7f;Google Scholar a permanent church was opened on January 1902, for which Bampfield had collected nearly £1,000 at the time of his death in 1900. In the autumn of 1902 the Hitchin mission was entrusted to the Fathers of St. Edmund, newly expelled from France.
43 Tablet 16 January 1904, p. 104.
44 At New Barnet Mass was said in a former Temperance Hall from 1906; Finchley was handed over to the Diocese of Westminster in 1903, a mission hall having been constructed. This was replaced by the church of St. Alban in 1909.
45 Barnet Press 27 January 1900, p.6.
46 At the time of Bampfield's death there were 5 priests of the Institute; the oldest was aged 41. Two more priests were ordained in 1908. However, the financial straits of the Institute, particularly with regard to the operation of its schools, continued to drain its resources. Despite economies the financial situation worsened, and when the Protestant Alliance took out a libel action against Father Spink, Bampfield's successor, in 1911, the Institute found itself unable to bear the costs of legal action. An appeal for funds failed to raise the £4,450 required to meet legal expenses and to honour the debts incurred by the Institute on its many activities.’ The Institute of St. Andrew was disbanded in July 1912 and its assets sold to pay its debts.
47 Two priests of the Institute remained at Barnet to serve the parish as diocesan clergy; a diocesan priest was appointed to the New Barnet mission, and a former member of its Institute took charge of Bushey. At the time of its disbandment the Institute also supplied Mass at Borehamwood and Bushey Heath.
48 Vernon, E., ‘Catholic Celebrities XII’ in St. Luke's Magazine vol. 2 no. 6 (December 1895), p.329.Google Scholar The journal was edited by Rev. Ethelred Taunton, a former teacher at Barnet and student of the Institute of St. Andrew.