Bishop Joseph Blount Cheshire: His Life and Work

by Lawrence Foushee London

At the convention of 1897 the special committee on a diocesan school for girls reported that it had procured a charter of incorporation for the Board of Trustees of St. Mary's School from the state legislature, and had turned over to this corporation all further negotiations. The newly constituted Board of Trustees, of which Bishop Cheshire was chairman, then made its report. It recommended that not less than one hundred thousand dollars be raised for the purchase of a location, the erection of buildings, and an endowment of St. Mary's School. The Board announced that it had contracted to purchase for fifty thousand dollars a site known as the St. Mary's Tract. The convention adopted the report as it was made.

During the past year, at the request of the Trustees, Bishop Cheshire had spent a month visiting many towns throughout the state in an attempt to interest the people of the church in the needs and potentialities of St. Mary's School. His efforts met with gratifying success. He appealed to the women of the state, and especially to the alumnae of St. Mary's, to raise fifty thousand dollars for an endowment which should be known as "The St. Mary's Alumnae Association Fund." To stimulate the interest and increase the activity of the women in this plan, Bishop Cheshire organized the "Order of the Patrons and Daughters of St. Mary's." He proposed to find fifty women who would give five hundred dollars each towards the endowment, and two hundred and fifty others who would each contribute one hundred dollars. He reported to the convention of 1897 that he had raised a substantial amount in this way.

Thus, St. Mary's was established as the official school of the Episcopal Church in North Carolina. The Diocese of East Carolina and the Jurisdiction of Asheville had agreed to contribute to the maintenance of the school and were given representation on the Board of Trustees. Dr. Bennett Smedes was retained as rector of the school and continued in this position until his death in 1899. The first year the school was under the control of the church the number of boarding students increased fifty per cent. To a great extent the enlarged enrollment was due to the renewed interest which Bishop Cheshire had aroused.

In the course of his negotiations to establish St. Mary's as a church school, the Bishop discovered that the churchmen of South Carolina had been for some time loyal and generous supporters of the school. After reflection upon this fact, he determined to ask the Diocese of South Carolina to co-operate in the maintenance and management of St. Mary's. When he discussed the subject with the Board of Trustees, it was decided to appoint a committee of the Board to meet at Saluda to confer with representatives from South Carolina. The conference was held in August, 1898. After a friendly and constructive discussion, the conference resolved that St. Mary's School should be placed under the "control and patronage of all the Carolina Dioceses."

Bishop Cheshire met with the convention of the Diocese of South Carolina in the spring of 1899 and presented the advantages and possibilities of St. Mary's as a church institution. The resolution of the Saluda conference was reported to the convention and was unanimously adopted. Bishop Capers, two clergymen, and two laymen were appointed to the Board of Trustees to represent South Carolina. After patient and diligent work Bishop Cheshire was able to unite the church of the two states in the support of one church school for girls. In a comparatively short time it was to become the largest Episcopal school for girls in the United States.

In the winter of 1897 Bishop Cheshire suffered an irreparable loss in the death of his wife. Their married life of twenty-two years had been remarkably happy. Mrs. Cheshire had been a great help to him in his work as deacon and priest and later as bishop of the Diocese. She gave him encouragement, devotion, and the benefit of her sound common sense. The Bishop often spoke of how much she meant to him in his work, and of their happy life together.

It was a fortunate coincidence that the Lambeth Conference came in the summer of 1897, for it enabled him to have a complete change, removing him from those associations which reminded him so strongly of his wife. The Lambeth Conference, which convenes approximately every ten years at Lambeth Palace, London, is composed of all the bishops of the Episcopal Church throughout the world. Bishop Cheshire decided to attend, believing it would be broadening and an exceedingly worth-while experience. The object of the Conference was to discuss religious questions of world-wide interest. In the course of its sessions it would be divided into groups which would discuss problems relating to particular countries.

The Bishop sailed from New York on June 2, arriving in England six days later. Since the Conference did not commence until July 1, he spent the intervening time sight-seeing. This was the summer of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, giving an additional interest to his trip. He attended the Jubilee service at St. Paul's, and remarked that the Bishop of London preached "a good sermon" for the occasion.

The Lambeth Conference was formally opened at Westminster Abbey by the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was to preside over its sessions. There were present for the Conference one hundred and ninety-four bishops from all parts of the world. Forty-nine of these represented the Episcopal Church of the United States. The sessions of the Conference continued through July 31. Bishop Cheshire was a member of the committee on church unity, and, as far as his journal reveals, this was the only committee on which he served. Reporting upon the Lambeth Conference to his diocesan convention the following year, Bishop Cheshire said: "The first message which we bring home from the Lambeth Conference of 1897 is that God in His Providence is opening the world to us; and to prepare us for the work we are to do, He is drawing all parts of the world-possessing Anglo-Saxon race into a closer union of common interest and sympathies, and of mutual confidence." He declared that the American bishops, while receiving much benefit from the Conference, had also contributed constructively to its work.

Shortly after the Conference closed, Bishop Cheshire visited the Archbishop of York for a few days. Upon leaving York he spent about a month traveling in England, Scotland, the Orkneys, and Ireland. In early September he left England for the Continent, where he visited in succession Antwerp, Brussels, and Cologne. Of his reactions to the cathedrals of these three cities, the Bishop observed that they "do not seem to me to be really so full of interest and beauty as even the inferior English cathedrals. They do not so abound with evidences and symbols of their connection with the life and history of the country and people, and so in spite of all their ornamentation they have a barren look."[37] The Bishop did some further sight-seeing in Germany, Switzerland, and France. While in Switzerland he saw the famous Lion of Lucerne, which he thought possessed "a dignity, nobleness, and beauty about it which exceeds anything of the kind I have ever seen before." Leaving from Southampton, he arrived in New York on September 24, feeling much refreshed and ready to return to the work of his Diocese.