Rare work on the early mission in Kentucky, by Stephen Theodore Badin (1768-1853). Badin entered the Sulpician Seminary of Orléans, his native city, in 1789. When the seminary was closed by the revolutionary government in 1791, he immigrated to the United States as a missionary. He arrived at Philadelphia in 1792, and was ordained priest a year later by Bishop Carroll, thus being the first priest ordained in the United States. After he had perfected his English at Georgetown College, he was appointed to do missionary work in Kentucky. He settled down in Scott County, occasionally making excursions to the catholic settlements in other parts of the territory.
In April, 1794, his companion, who resided in Bardstown, left for New Orleans, leaving Badin as the only missionary in Kentucky. For fourteen years he alone took care of the Catholics in the area, forming new congregations and building churches. It was only in July 1806 that he received permanent help from Charles Nerinckx. In 1818 bishop Flaget, whom Badin had suggested and urged as first bishop of Bardstown, arrived in Kentucky. Owing to a misunderstanding between him and the bishop about certain properties that the former had acquired for the Church, Badin left Kentucky in 1819, and spent nine years travelling through Europe. In 1828 he returned to America, took charge of the Monroe mission in the Michigan territory, and finally went back to Kentucky in 1829, where he stayed until his death in 1853.
At the end of the work, an extract of a letter from Mgr. Flaget to father Badin is added, dated February 19, 1820, in which he relates about the developments that took place in Kentucky since Badin had left for Europe, and in which he asks him to return to Kentucky as soon as possible. The work is a fascinating and important source on the work of the early Catholic missionaries in central Kentucky between 1793 and 1819.
The title-page is slightly foxed and water stained. Otherwise in good condition. Chadenat 4445; Howes B28; Sabin 2710.