John Barry

From the Catholic Encyclopedia

Second Bishop of Savannah, Georgia, U.S.A.; b. 1799 in the parish of Oylegate, Co. Wexford, Ireland; d. in Paris, 19 November, 1859. He was accepted as an ecclesiastical student by Bishop England, and was ordained priest at Charleston, S.C., 24 September, 1825. After ministering for several years in Georgia, in which State he opened the first Catholic day school at Savannah, he was made Vicar-General of the Diocese of Charleston and superior of the seminary in 1844, while still retaining charge of the parish at Augusta, Georgia. In 1853 he was appointed Vicar-General of Savannah, under Bishop Gartland, and when, in 1854, that prelate died of yellow fever, he was named administrator of the diocese, and as such attended the Eighth Provincial Council of Baltimore, in May, 1855. He was then appointed to the vacant see and consecrated at Baltimore, 2 August, 1857. He governed the diocese with energy and was especially notable during his missionary labours for his charity and zeal in several yellow-fever epidemics. Ill health forcing him to make a visit (July, 1859) to Europe, he died at the house of the Brothers of St. John of God, in Paris, 19 November, 1859, having lost is reason some time before his death. His body was brought back to Savannah for burial, in September, 1865.

Shea, Hist. Cath. Ch. In U. S. (New York, 1904); Reuss, Biog. Cycl. Of the Cath. Hierarchy (Milwaukee, Wis., 1898); Clarke, Lives of the Deceased Bishops (New York, 1872); Catholic Almanac, 1833 to 1860.

THOMAS F. MEEHAN