{"id":50,"featured":0,"modified":"2025-01-24 21:07:54","latitude":32.78387151546564126647353987209498882293701171875,"longitude":-79.9308204622945055461968877352774143218994140625,"title":"St. Peter\u2019s Church, 34 Wentworth Street","address":"34 Wentworth Street, Charleston, SC 29401","thumbnail":"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/square_thumbnails\/a00216cecd599dbaae5b32454562c07a.jpg","creator":["Noah Dubois"],"description":"

Here at 34 Wentworth Street stood St. Peter\u2019s Catholic Church from 1867 to 1967. While a single church can be lost within the many steeples of Charleston\u2019s \u201cHoly City,\u201d St. Peter\u2019s Church illustrates an exciting chapter in Charleston history: Reconstruction.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

With the fall of the Confederacy, several institutions attempted to court the city\u2019s newly freed population. Many times, the interested institutions were religious. Whether it was through pure goodwill or because of competition against rival churches, this era of religious expansion resulted in new schools, social networks, and communities among Black Charlestonians.\u00a0 One of these institutions was the Roman Catholic Diocese of Charleston.<\/span><\/p>\n

Although the Reconstruction era saw a new wave of attention towards African Americans in Charleston, the Diocese of Charleston had officially included African Americans since its creation in 1835. For years, Black Catholics, usually originating from French and Spanish colonies in Louisiana or the Caribbean, worshipped in the same space with their white Catholic neighbors, but were relegated to sitting in the galleries. The first separate church for Charleston's African American Catholics was St. Peter's, located at 34 Wentworth Street. Purchased by Bishop Patrick Lynch on January 12, 1867, the structure on the site was a former Jewish synagogue that was converted into the new St. Peter\u2019s Church. Although Bishop Lynch first planned to act as the new parish priest himself, he instead appointed the Italian Jesuit priest Reverend Louis Folchi. One year later, Father Folchi and Bishop Lynch opened St. Peter's school in space formerly used as a dining room in the church.<\/span><\/p>\n

While St. Peter\u2019s saw initial growth under the leadership of Father Folchi, the church\u2019s early success soon began to wane. In an 1869 letter to Lynch, Folchi stated that the decline in membership was due to the many Protestant churches that surrounded St. Peter\u2019s. Folchi explained that Protestant congregations such as the Baptists and Methodists provided the raw energy that Roman Catholicism lacked. The Roman Catholic Church did not allow African American leadership in the church and discouraged the expression of emotions during mass, all aspects that Methodists and Baptist churches encouraged. The Catholic Church in the United States would not change this doctrine until the 1930s, with the integration of seminary schools and the Church\u2019s first wave of African American priests.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Simultaneously, the Diocese of Charleston had difficulties keeping white Catholics out of St. Peter\u2019s church. As in other Catholic Churches founded for Native Americans and African Americans, the parishioners at St. Peter\u2019s did not have to pay a pew tax or rent. The Catholic Church\u2019s goals were to increase conversion within the world\u2019s disfranchised. While this strategy did attract some local African Americans, it also attracted the surrounding white Catholics who did not want to pay for a place in a pew. In many masses, whites outnumbered Blacks by four-to-one. This imbalance eventually led to even more African Americans leaving the Catholic Church due to the lack of space in churches explicitly made for them.<\/span><\/p>\n

While the decline of St. Peter\u2019s appeared outside the Catholic Church\u2019s control, many within the Diocese saw Father Folchi as the problem. Several Charleston priests believed Folchi was deliberately sabotaging the mission he led. Reverend Claudian Northrop, the priest of St. Mary\u2019s, one of the churches whites were fleeing, wrote to Bishop Lynch boldly claiming Folchi was intentionally luring whites from other churches to St. Peter\u2019s. By doing so, Folchi was attempting to replace one group of Catholics with another group that he preferred.\u00a0 Reverend Claudian Northrop\u2019s claim is supported by Folchi\u2019s acknowledged racial prejudice. In letters to Lynch, Folchi openly voiced his disgust calling his parishioners and students \u201capathetic and indolent.\u201d Instead of embracing African Americans\u2019 cultural heritage, Folchi outright banned traditions such as dancing in church gatherings.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Eventually, Reverend Louis Folchi retired from St. Peter\u2019s and left Charleston in 1875. He was replaced with Father Ward F. Cleary a member of the Josephite Fathers, who specialized in aiding African Americans. This pattern of cycling religious orders and priests would continue through St. Peter\u2019s Church\u2019s entire existence. This lack of steady guidance from a religious organization led to the parish\u2019s failure. Father Phillip J. Haggerty was the last pastor appointed to St. Peter\u2019s in 1961. The church closed in 1967, and the community moved to St. Patrick's.<\/span><\/p>\n

In its place, St. Katherine\u2019s Convent was established for the Oblate Sisters at the site of the old St. Peter\u2019s. The Oblates would use this site for 31 years until they departed from South Carolina in 1999. Today, the site is home to the Drexel House, a home for young Catholic missionaries.<\/span><\/p>","sponsor":null,"subtitle":null,"accessinfo":null,"lede":"Here at 34 Wentworth Street stood St. Peter\u2019s Catholic Church from 1867 to 1967. While a single church can be lost within the many steeples of Charleston\u2019s \u201cHoly City,\u201d St. Peter\u2019s Church illustrates an exciting chapter in Charleston history: Reconstruction.\u00a0","website":null,"related_resources":["Father Folchi to Bishop Lynch, 11 September 1869, trans. from Italian, St. Peter\u2019s Parish, Box 1, Folder 3, Catholic Diocese of Charleston\u2019s Diocesan Archives.
","Gary W. McDonogh, <\/span>Black and Catholic in Savannah, Georgia<\/span><\/i>. (University of Tennessee Press, 1993).<\/span>","Letter from Folchi to Lynch, 26 September 1870, Catholic Diocese of Charleston\u2019s Diocesan Archives.","Letter from J.J. Monograhan, et al. to Northrop \u201cRectory\u2019s Protest,\u201d 21 April 1888, Catholic Diocese of Charleston\u2019s Diocesan Archives.","Rev. Northrop and Rev. Croghan to Bishop Lynch, 28 January 1870, Catholic Diocese of Charleston\u2019s Diocesan Archives.","
The History of the Catholic Community at 34 Wentworth Street,\u201d Charleston: Sisters of Charity of Our Lady of Mercy Archives."],"factoids":[],"files":{"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/fullsize\/a00216cecd599dbaae5b32454562c07a.jpg":{"id":342,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","title":"Confirmation Class of 1937","thumbnail":"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/square_thumbnails\/a00216cecd599dbaae5b32454562c07a.jpg","description":"Photograph titled, "97 in confirmation class," for St. Peter's, March 31, 1937. Courtesy of the Catholic Diocese of Charleston Archives. "},"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/fullsize\/df2290fa1cdbb32760fa3b3223b3f11d.jpg":{"id":339,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","title":"St. Peter's Convent, Rectory, Church, and School ","thumbnail":"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/square_thumbnails\/df2290fa1cdbb32760fa3b3223b3f11d.jpg","description":"Circa 1940s image of St. Peter's convent, rectory, church, and school (formerly St. Paul's German Catholic Parish). Courtesy of the Catholic Diocese of Charleston Archives. "},"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/fullsize\/9c8c343e8fe0c5c5e7f94ff81fb9a894.jpg":{"id":340,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","title":"Holy Name Society for St. Peter's","thumbnail":"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/square_thumbnails\/9c8c343e8fe0c5c5e7f94ff81fb9a894.jpg","description":"Pictured here is the Holy Name Society for St. Peter's, circa 1920s. Courtesy of the Catholic Diocese of Charleston Archives. "},"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/fullsize\/6dc921661ff92d78e35988cb3d12abd3.jpg":{"id":391,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","title":"34 Wentworth Historic Marker","thumbnail":"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/square_thumbnails\/6dc921661ff92d78e35988cb3d12abd3.jpg","description":"In 2002, the MOJA Arts Festival recognized St. Peter\u2019s for its historical significance. MOJA is an annual festival celebrating African American and Caribbean arts and culture sponsored by the City of Charleston Office of Culture Affairs in partnership with other community groups. Photograph courtesy of Noah Dubois."},"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/fullsize\/cbdef67c08bef71b8a2ae7aa98e9a811.jpg":{"id":435,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","title":"Drexel House Today","thumbnail":"https:\/\/discovering.cofc.edu\/redirect\/files\/square_thumbnails\/cbdef67c08bef71b8a2ae7aa98e9a811.jpg","description":"The former St. Peter's Church, now known as the Drexel House. Photograph by Noah Dubois."}}}