Clarence Augustus Walworth

Background

Clarence Augustus Walworth was born in Plattsburg, N. Y. , the fourth of five children of Reuben Hyde Walworth, for many years chancellor of New York, and his first wife, Maria Ketchum (Averill).

Education

At the Albany Academy and at the Sloan School at Williamstown, Clarence prepared for Union College, Schenectady, from which he was graduated in 1838.

Career

For three years he read law under capable practitioners of Canandaigua and Albany, and in 1841 was admitted to the bar. As a member of the firm of Chapin & Walworth, he practised law in Rochester for a year, then, somewhat unsettled in mind and soul, he began to study for the ministry of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in which he had been recently confirmed. For three years he attended the General Theological Seminary, New York City, which was then torn with dissension over Puseyism, Tractarianism, and High-Church thought. After an unsuccessful attempt to establish a monastic foundation in the Adirondacks on the model of the Nashotah Mission in Wisconsin, he joined the Roman Catholic Church in 1845, taking the names Alban Alphonsus at his confirmation. Despite the grief of his parents, he soon determined to become a priest of the Order of the Most Holy Redeemer (Redemptorists), and with two other young converts, Isaac T. Hecker and James Alphonsus McMaster, went to the Redemptorist College of St. Trond in Belgium to continue his theological studies. Here he made his vows, October 15, 1846, and subsequently proceeded for further study to Witten in Holland, where he was known as "Brother Pourquoi" because of his inquisitive and critical mind. Ordained a priest, August 27, 1848, by Bishop Paredis of Ruremonde in Dutch Limbourg, he was ordered to the Redemptorist houses at Clapham near London and at Hanley in Worcestershire. For two years he preached on the English missions, relieved the sufferings of Irish famine refugees, and witnessed the crisis associated with the re-establishment of the Catholic hierarchy in England. After the establishment of the Redemptorist province in the United States, he was assigned to the American mission band. Returning to America in 1851, he preached missions throughout the East for seven years and then, with Hecker and three other converts, he was released from his vows by Pius IX and assisted in the foundation of the Congregation of St. Paul the Apostle (Paulists), in 1858. Again he preached missions, with notable effect. Cardinal Gibbons assigned responsibility for his vocation to a mission conducted by Walworth in New Orleans in 1854. Broken in health by this arduous life, Father Walworth served temporarily as a chaplain to soldiers on Staten Island, then joined the Albany diocese. For thirty-four years, from 1866 until the year of his death, he was pastor at St. Mary's Church, Albany. As a charity worker, a temperance advocate, a crusader against corruption in politics, and an outspoken critic of industrial evils, he challenged attention. Noteworthy among his publications were: The Gentle Skeptic (1863); The Doctrine of Hell (1873); Ghosts (1878), a brochure; Andiatoroct (1888); Reminiscences of Edgar P. Wadhams (1893); The Oxford Movement in America (1895); The Walworths of America (1897); and "Reminiscences of a Catholic Crisis in England Fifty Years Ago" (Catholic World, June 1899-January 1900). Despite failing sight and hearing, he managed with an amanuensis to contribute articles to periodicals until his last months, when paralysis left him speechless and helpless. At the end, he was buried with religious and civic honors in the family cemetery at Saratoga Springs.

Achievements

• Walworth was a well regarded writer who published numerous works related to the Roman Catholic Church.

Works

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  • Andiatorocte; Or, the Eve of Lady Day on Lake George and Other Poems, Hymns, and Meditations in Verse

    ( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)

  • The Oxford Movement in America; - Scholar's Choice Edition

    ( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)

  • The Oxford Movement in America;

    (This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)

  • The Walworths Of America: Comprising Five Chapters Of Family History, With Chapters Of Genealogy (1897)

    (This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of th...)

  • Early ritualism in America; Reminiscences of Edgar P. Wadhams, first Bishop of Ogdensburg

    (This historic book may have numerous typos and missing te...)

  • The Oxford Movement in America, Or, Glimpses of Life in an Anglican Seminary... - Primary Source Edition

    ( This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923....)

  • The Doctrine Of Hell...

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • Reminiscences of Edgar P. Wadhams: First Bishop of Ogdensburg 1893

    (Originally published in 1893. This volume from the Cornel...)

  • Reminiscences of Edgar P. Wadhams

    (Reminiscences of Edgar P. Wadhams. First Bishop of Ogdens...)

Connections

Father:

Reuben Hyde Walworth

Mother:

Maria Ketchum (Averill)