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- May 12, 2010
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- Now Florida but always a Kentuckian
This Saturday, March 1st my United Daughters of the Confederacy will have our March meeting. I am in charge of the program. Since St. Patrick's Day is March 17th, thought I do an Irish theme. My program is "Irish Confederates, the Civil War's Forgotten Soldiers". One person I am talking about is Father Peter Whelan. Even though not technically a soldier, he served well as a Chaplain for the Confederacy. But besides ministering to Confederate soldiers he was a saint for Union soldiers at Andersonville.
Peter Whelan was born in Wexford, Ireland in 1802. He received his education there. Soon he received his calling to the priesthood by God. Whelan came to America and was ordained in Charleston, S.C. on November 30, 1830.
He served for 19 years as pastor of the Church of the Purification of the Most Pure Heart of Mary in Locust Grove, Georgia. By 1854, he was called to the diocese of Savannah where he would be stationed for the rest of his life.
When the War broke out, he left his post as rector of an orphanage and became a military chaplain for the Confederacy. He first became Chaplain for the Montgomery Guards, an Irish Company, established in Savannah for the First Georgia Volunteer Regiment.
He would minister to Confederate troops during the capture of Fort Pulaski and later he volunteered to remain with them when they were imprisoned in New York at the Union Prison Camp on Governor's Island. One must remember that Father Whelan was in his sixties at the outbreak of the war.
Later during the war he would go to Georgia. It was there he served captured Union soldiers at Andersonville prison. Whelan was the only chaplain from any denomination who served these men. He spent each day, from sun up to sundown, hearing confessions, baptizing , giving the Last Rites. and seeing that the dead were given Christian burial.
In diaries of men who survived Andersonville, whether Catholic or not, they mentioned Father Whelan. He became known as the "Angel of Andersonville". A Sergeant, John Vaughter wrote in his memoirs, "of all the ministers in Georgia accessible to Andersonville, only one could hear the sentence, 'I was sick and in prison and you visited me,' and that one is a Catholic." Another soldier wrote "without a doubt he was the means of saving hundreds of lives". Another wrote, "All creeds, color and nationalities were alike to him...He was indeed the Good Samaritan".
Father Whelan never left the men of Andersonville and he served them there until the armistice. One time he did leave the prison to get bread for the men. He needed money for this. He borrowed $16,ooo from Henry Horne, a devout Catholic in Macon. This was the equivalent of $400 in gold. With this money he purchased ten thousand pounds of wheat flour that he had baked into bread and distributed at the prison hospital of Andersonville. The prisoner's referred to it as "Whelan's Bread". This bread was enough to provide the men with rations for several months.
After the war he returned to Savannah. He was quite ill as he had contracted a lung ailment at Andersonville. Even though ill, in 1866 he wrote Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, asking that the government repay his loan to Henry Horne for the bread. Stanton said no, asking for sworn vouchers and bills of purchase. The priest informed Stanton that the "good God" had provided this bread and that he would find another way to pay this debt. During this time his lung condition got worse and the doctors wanted him to go to New York to escape the humid air. His friends raised the money, but instead of going he used the money to repay Mr. Horne.
Father Whelan died on Feb. 6, 1871. His funeral procession in Savannah was the longest ever seen in the city. Eighty-six carriages and buggies escorted the body to the cemetery. People from all over the city turned out. There were former soldiers as well as impressive members from the old garrison .
This priest was truly a saint and served God and his fellow man for his entire life. He was a priest of heroic generosity.
From: http://en.wikipedia/Peter_Whelan_(priest)
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