The Placer herald., 1863-07-04
Outrages on Catholic Churches,

We have been panied to hear that the
Rev. Father Parks, of Parkersburgh, Va,
was arrested, and his most private papers
searched by order Of Gen. Scammon.-
Father Parks has protested that he was
chargeable with nothing that he was not
authorized to do by the Constitution Of the
United States. AS he was par0led we pre-.
sumo nothing was found against him. The
Rev. DR.. Becker Catholic priest at Martins
burg, Va, has been again put under the ban
his church closed, and the Catholics Of that
region denied the sustaining and soothing
minisratons of their religion. Father
Becker is an exile, and his crime is that he
refuses to interpolate the sacred ritual of the
Church, and repeat unusual prayers prescrib'
ed by military satrap-at least while he is
denied communication with, and directions
FROM his Bishop.
But deeper cry of anguish reaches us
from Louisiana. gentleman of that city
devout Catholic, writing to bid us farewell
on the eve of his quitting New Orleans,
furnishes US with the following facts, which
our correspondent assures us cannot be dis
credited:-
After the Hartford and Albatross had pass
ed Port Hudson the crew of the Hartford;
Admiral Farragut's flagship, landed at
Pointe Coupee, some twenty-five miles above
Baton Rouge. They commenced to plunder
the place, and assaulted the Catholic church.
The church is in the midst of the old parish
graveyard. The monuments erected there
to the memory of the dead were broken and
detaced, and much wanton damage commit
ted. Father Mttlebron's house WAS then
visited-he being absent at another station
All that they thought of sufficient value was
carried off, and the rest of his movables
broken or destroyed Next they broke into
the church, overthrow the Tabernacle, and
took from it the vessels that they found
there. This was not enough! The Blessed
Host was scattered on the ground, while
these monsters called out for the Catholics
to come and look at your Cod" One sez-
ed the Benedction veil, exclaiming. This
will be nice blanket for my horse when
get one!"
Some of the Catholics of the parish enter
ed complaint to Admiral Farragut. His
reply was: at was well for you it was not
the crew Of the other vessel or you would
have farel worsen' One Of his officers re
marked: "Good enough, for the damned
secesh rebels.'
Soldiers of a Massachusetts Regiment,
aboard the same vessel, were meantime
busyng themselves at another poor little
Catholic chapel at Shenale-a short distance
away, also in charge of Father Mittlebron.-
In its neighborhood they intercepted the
good priest, and demanded of him the horses
he was driving. As he refused, they seized
the horses, arrested him. and finally trans
ported him to Baton Rouge, where he was
imprisoned ten days. At the end Of this
time, they put him on a dry bluff in the mid
die of crevasse, with two negroes and a,
barrel of pork and barrel of biscuit, telling
him to "wait there till the rebels came for
him!" This little island was swarming with
agators and poisonous snakes. Neverthe-
less, after three days, he found means to es-
cape and reach his desoate home.
X 4 Il X
But our correspondent and informant,
whose character is a guarantee for the truth
fulness of what he writes us, as a sincere
Caholic-horrifed at wha! has taken place,
---and, as believer in his religion, fearing
further outrages, begs us, as his parting
words on leaving New Orleans, to call the
attention Of Archbishops Hughes and Pur-
cell, to these and other assaults upon the
Catholic religion at the South, suffered at
the hands of New England soldiery. These
Prelates have shown themselves fast friends
of Mr. Lincoln and of the Cabinet secretaries
who control him. Their brother Catholics
at the South appeal to them to exert their
influence for the observation of those laws of
civilized warfare that were observed by our
armies in Mexico, under the Democratic Ad
mnistralion of Polk The appeal to these
Archbishops and to all distinguished Cath
oIcs who are allied in this war with Lincon's
Administration, to prevent it becoming a
war against the Catholic religion, at the
same time that it is a war against the States
and people of the Southl
" Y. Freeman's Journal.
One of the first acts committed by Grants
army, when they entered Jackson, Miss,
was to burn the Catholic church there
This was on their march to Vicksburg.
Mr. LINCOLN FAILING -According to