John Hennessy

John Hennessy (August 20, 1825 – March 4, 1900) was a 19th-century Irish-born prelate of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States. He served as bishop and then as the first archbishop of the Archdiocese of Dubuque in Iowa from 1866 to 1900.

Biography

Early life and education John Hennessy was born August 20, 1825, in Bulgaden, County Limerick, in Ireland. He was the oldest of twelve children born to William and Mary (Meaney) Hennessy; three of the children died during infancy. The Hennessys were a poor family, living in a cottage with a dirt floor. Hennessy began his studies for the priesthood at All Hallows College in Dublin, which prepared seminarians to become missionaries. Given the lack of opportunities in Ireland, then in the midst of the Great Famine, he decided to go to the United States. After his ordination, the archdiocese assigned Hennessy to parish work in New Madrid, Missouri. Working in a remote and sparsely populated area on the Mississippi River, Hennessy soon contracted an illness and was forced to return to St. Louis to recover. He later served at St. Peter's Parish in St. Louis.

Hennessy was soon serving as a professor and the vice-president of the Carondelet Seminary. He was name president of the seminary in 1857. Kenrick in 1858 sent Hennessy to Rome to deliver the decrees of the archdiocesan synod to Pope Pius IX for approval. After the start of the American Civil War in 1861, Hennessy witness many bloody classes between sympathizers of the Confederate States of America and those supporting the federal government. In 1874, at Hennessy's request, four members of the Presentation Sisters in Ireland arrived in the diocese. However, the diocese had made no preparations for their arrival, forcing the sisters to accept the hospitality of the Sisters of the Visitation.

With the rapid population growth of Iowa during the middle of the 19th century, the bishops of Dubuque asked the Vatican to create a second diocese in the state. When Hennessy assumed office, he continued those requests. On May 8, 1881, Pope Leo XIII erected the new Diocese of Davenport. The Diocese of Dubuque now covered roughly the northern half of Iowa.

He also took a prominent role in the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore in 1884. He pushed for the creation of more Catholic schools around the nation, but opposed the creation of the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.