page_title: William Matthews (priest)
section_title: St. Patrick's Church
hierarchical_section_title: William Matthews (priest) / Priesthood / St. Patrick's Church
caption_attribution_description: English: Title: Old St. Patrick's Church, 10th &amp; F Sts., N.W., Wash., D.C. as it appeared between 1809 and 1870. Abstract/medium: 1 negative&#160;: nitrate&#160;; 5 x 7 in. or smaller
context_page_description: William Matthews, occasionally spelled Mathews, was an American Roman Catholic priest from the colonial Province of Maryland who became the fifth Catholic priest ordained in the United States and the first such person born in British America. He was briefly a novice in the Society of Jesus, and became influential in establishing Catholic parochial and educational institutions in Washington, D.C. He was the second pastor of St. Patrick's Church for most of his life and was the sixth president of Georgetown College, later known as Georgetown University. Matthews acted as president of the Washington Catholic Seminary, which became Gonzaga College High School, and oversaw the continuity of the school during suppression by the church and financial insecurity.
  Matthews was vicar apostolic and apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Philadelphia during a period of ecclesiastical turmoil. He was a co-founder and president of the Washington Library Company for thirteen years—the first public library in the District of Columbia—and was co-director and trustee of the District of Columbia Public Schools, where he was one of the superintendents of a school.
context_section_description: Matthews became the second pastor of St. Patrick's Church, succeeding the Dominican priest Anthony Caffry. St. Patrick's was the largest parish in the District of Columbia at the time and the first Catholic church to be constructed in the City of Washington. Matthews held the post from 1804 until his death. He self-financed the purchase of eight lots near St. Patrick's, believing the location would become the heart of the growing city. Three further Catholic parishes, three schools, and an orphanage were established on the land. Matthews oversaw construction of a new, larger church in 1809 on the site of the original building. The brick, Gothic Revival church was completed in 1816. This new St. Patrick's was consecrated by Archbishop John Carroll, and the mass was concelebrated by Leonard Neale.
  During the War of 1812, British troops invaded Washington, D.C., in 1814. Matthews barricaded himself and others inside the sanctuary of St. Patrick's Church while most of the city's population fled. As the troops advanced to within two blocks of St. Patrick's, fire from surrounding buildings spread to the roof of the church. Matthews went to the roof to put out the fire, then persuaded General Robert Ross not to destroy the church.
  During his tenure as pastor, Matthews fostered an unusually large number of conversions to Catholicism. Among his parishioners were Chief Justice Roger Taney, Pierre L'Enfant, James Hoban, Mayor Robert Brent, and Mayor Thomas Carbery. His parish produced a great many seminarians for the priesthood and novices to become nuns. He performed baptisms for a considerable number of black freedmen and slaves. He was said to have "detested slavery," and on at least one occasion, he purchased a mother and her child at a slave auction to grant them freedom. Matthews purchased a pipe organ for St. Patrick's from an Episcopal church in Dumfries, Virginia—likely the first organ in the District of Columbia. He acted as trusted adviser to Bishop John Carroll, whose ecclesiastical jurisdiction as Bishop of Baltimore and later as Archbishop of Baltimore, included the City of Washington and served as a liaison between the bishop and Catholic institutions and priests in Washington. Matthews was also involved in raising money for St. Mary's Seminary in Baltimore by selling lottery tickets to parishioners. From 1827 to 1830, Charles Constantine Pise was Matthews' assistant at St. Patrick's. Another one of his assistants was Gabriel Richard.
caption: St. Patrick's Church, of which Matthews was pastor for 50 years, as it appeared between 1809 and 1870
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