James Cardinal Gibbons Prince of the Catholic Church

James Cardinal Gibbons was originally from Baltimore, Maryland. Early in his priesthood he was sent to the diocese of Wilmington, North Carolina. There he was confronted with Protestant enmity and extremely poor Catholic parishioners. Along with another priest he lived in a lean to, traveling hundreds of miles on horseback or mule back. Sometimes he went as far as two hundred miles between calls. In the beginning St. Thomas in Wilmington was the only church of any significance. Within just a few years Gibbons had supervised the building of six new churches.