MANOGUE, PATRICK

Missionary, first bishop of Sacramento, Calif.; b. Desart, Kilkenny, Ireland, March 15, 1831; d. Sacramento, Feb. 27, 1895. One of seven orphaned children, all of whom became noted clergymen, he received his early education at Callan, Ireland. His eldest brother, Michael, preceded him to America in an effort to provide for the family. Manogue himself arrived in the U.S. in 1848. After living in Connecticut for two years, he left for Chicago, Ill., where he spent three years studying for the priesthood at the College of St. Mary of the Lake. By this time the entire family had settled in Connecticut and were in great need of money. Manogue felt that he could help them and further his own plans for the priesthood by going to California and the gold mines. There he worked for three years as a common laborer before saving enough money to go to Paris to continue his theological studies at the Seminary of Saint-Sulpice. After being ordained there by Cardinal François Morlot on Christmas Day 1861, Manogue returned from Europe (1862) to the Sierra Nevadas. Eugene O'Connell, Bishop of Grass Valley, requested Manogue to take the whole of northern Nevada for his parish. After touring his new parish he settled in Virginia City, where he lived with one of the old Irish families; he said Mass and conducted other services in a log cabin. By the middle of 1863 Manogue had collected

$12,000 and had erected a new church. He converted many native peoples, who could always be distinguished by their Irish names, and made long trips into the wilderness, sleeping on the floor of log cabins. He once traveled more than 150 miles to hear the confession of a condemned man, for whom he subsequently gained a pardon. His favorite method of teaching religion to wandering bands of native peoples was to gather them into the church and explain the significance of such things as the altar and tabernacle.

After 20 years of such ministry, Manogue was named (1870) vicar-general of the Diocese of Grass Valley. On Jan. 16, 1881, he was consecrated titular bishop of Ceramos and coadjutor of Grass Valley by Abp. Joseph Alemany in St. Mary's Cathedral, San Francisco, Calif. He succeeded Bishop O'Connell on March 17, 1884. That same year Leo XIII changed the diocesan boundaries to include ten additional counties and moved the episcopal see to Sacramento. Manogue's first work as bishop was to build the Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament, designed in Italian Renaissance style by the architect Brian J. Clinch. With a seating capacity of 1,600, the cathedral was built in memory of those who had sustained the faith during the early years of the Church in California. Before his death the bishop became very active in public affairs, exerting considerable influence among the miners and mine owners.

Bibliography: h. l. walsh, Hallowed Were the Gold Dust Trails: The Story of the Pioneer Priests of Northern California (Santa Clara 1946).

[j. l. morrison]