Andrew Byrne

Andrew J. Byrne (1802 – June 10, 1862) was an Irish-born American Catholic priest, who became the first bishop of the Diocese of Little Rock in Arkansas from 1844 until his death in 1862.

Biography

Early life Andrew Byrne was born in 1802 in Navan, County Meath, in Ireland, the son of Robert and Margery Moore Byrne. Baptized on December 3, 1802, he was possibly born on November 30. While studying at St. Finian's College in Navan, Byrne was recruited in 1820 by Bishop John England to immigrate to the United States and serve in the new Diocese of Charleston in South Carolina.

Priesthood Byrne was ordained to the priesthood in Charleston, South Carolina, by Bishop England for the Diocese of Charleston, on November 11, 1827. After a period of missionary work in South Carolina and North Carolina, England appointed Byrne as pastor of St. Mary's Parish in Charleston. Byrne was eventually named vicar general of the diocese. At the Second Baltimore Council in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1833, he acted as England's theologian.

In 1836, Byrne was incardinated, or transferred, to the Diocese of New York, in New York City, where he served at St. Patrick's Parish, and St. James's Parish, both in Manhattan. In 1841, Bishop John Hughes sent him to Ireland to recruit the Christian Brothers to teach in the diocesan schools. After Catholics in Manhattan purchased the former Universalist Church known as Carroll Hall, Byrne founded St. Andrew Parish there, which Hughes dedicated on March 19, 1842.

Bishop of Little Rock

On November 28, 1843, Byrne was appointed bishop of the new Diocese of Little Rock by Pope Gregory XVI. Byrne was consecrated in St. Patrick's Cathedral in Manhattan on March 10, 1844, by Bishop Hughes. Four sisters and five postulants arrived in 1851 and established a school in Little Rock that would later become Mount St. Mary Academy. The sisters also opened convent schools at Fort Smith and Helena, Arkansas.

A fire of suspicious origin destroyed the church in Helena in 1854, as the Know Nothings’ influence in Arkansas grew. and had almost completed arrangements for the starting of a college at Fort Smith by the Congregation of Christian Brothers.

Andrew Byrne died on June 10, 1862, in Helena at age 59.