Peter Henry Lemke

Background

Peter Henry Lemke was born in Rhena, Mecklenburg, where his father was a magistrate.

Education

Privately tutored, he entered the Gymnasium at Schwerin in 1810, paying his own way by giving music lessons. Later he matriculated at the University of Rostock.

Career

In 1813 Lemke joined the army of liberation and after campaigning against Napoleon and the Danes entered Paris in 1814. During the "Hundred Days" he was again in service and fought at Waterloo under Blücher. In 1819 he entered the Lutheran ministry. While preaching at Dassow, he studied the writings of Luther and through Adler, a student at Ratisbon, and Melchior Diepenbrock, later cardinal of Breslau, he grew interested in the Roman Catholic Church, which he joined in 1824.

He was ordained, April 11, 1826, and assigned to a curacy at Ratisbon, where he preached to the garrison, gave religious instructions in the state school, and served as Cardinal Diepenbrock's vicar general. In 1831, he was called as a private chaplain by Frederick Schlosser, a nephew of Goethe and a book collector, who maintained an estate near Heidelberg. Here Lemke busied himself with agriculture, riding, and lectures at the University. A robust man of action, he tired of this sinecure; and on learning of the demand for German priests in Pennsylvania, volunteered for the American missions and eventually took passage, landing in New York, August 20, 1834. He hurried to present himself to Bishop F. P. Kenrick of Philadelphia, who assigned him to the German parish of Holy Trinity and tutored him in English. Finding that he had annoyed the trustees of Holy Trinity by a sermon on Luther, he asked to be transferred to the missions of Demetrius Augustine Gallitzin. Journeying on horseback through the woods from Munster to Loretto, he met the aged Gallitzin bundled up in a sleigh, on his way to a mass-station, and was appointed to a log chapel at Ebensburg (1834), from which he attended the countryside.

Like his superior, he became enthusiastic over colonization projects, and in 1837 he purchased land at Hart's Sleeping Place which he farmed in model fashion. Three years later, he founded Carrolltown, where he erected a rude chapel. Though injured in felling a tree in this year, he followed the trail to Loretto to attend the dying Gallitzin, whose place he filled for four years on Bishop Kenrick's insistence. He had hardly returned to his beloved settlement at Carrolltown when he set out for Germany, where he collected vestments, books, and money, even from Louis of Bavaria. Proud of his American citizenship, he refused all posts offered him by Cardinal Diepenbrock. In Munich, he inspired Dom Boniface Wimmer to lead a colony of Benedictines to Pennsylvania, thus bringing to a successful conclusion a project which he had outlined as early as 1835 in the pages of Der Katholik of Mainz.

In 1846, he met Wimmer's party in New York, but to his disappointment, the Benedictine abbey was built at Beatty on the Sportsman's Hall Property instead of at Carrolltown. Later, however, Lemke's Carrolltown acreage was used for a priory. Thereafter, he attended churches at Reading and Philadelphia until 1851, when he joined the Benedictines. Somewhat too settled in habits to accommodate himself to the discipline of a religious, Father Lemke departed for "bleeding Kansas" without his superior's permission (1855). As soon as difficulties with the Abbot were compromised he was assigned to a congregation at Doniphan by Bishop J. B. Minge. He then took up land near Atchison, where eventually there was established the Abbey of St. Benedict. After complete reconciliation, he returned to Pennsylvania (1858) and then toured Germany in the interest of American missions.

During a sojourn in Vienna, he wrote his Leben und Werken des Prinzen Demetrius Augustin Gallitzin (Münster, 1861) in an effort to stimulate missionary zeal. Upon his return from Europe, he acted as pastor of St. Michael's Church at Elizabeth, New Jersey (1861 - 1871), where he established a Benedictine academy. In 1871, he built St. Henry's Church, which he served until his retirement, soon after the celebration of his golden jubilee in the priesthood. His last years were spent in the Carrolltown priory among his aged colonists. During this period he wrote for the Northern Cambria News a serial memoir of early days in Cambria County.

Achievements

• Father Lemke was instrumental in bringing to the United States the first Benedictines, under the leadership of Father Boniface Wimmer, the future Archabbot of St. Vincent's, in Pennsylvania. He also prepared the way for the foundation of St. Benedict's Abbey. Lemke Hall, a residence hall at Benedictine College near St. Benedict's Abbey in Atchison, was named in his honor.

References

• A Warrior in God's Service. The Memoirs of Peter Henry Lemke 1796-1882