What were conditions like in the country in the post-Civil War era? It would be easy for us, in our socially advanced society, to forget the circumstances our forebears faced in the late nineteenth century, or to recall, perhaps nostalgically, that period as simpler times.

The war ended in 1865, and the country was busy attempting to return to a peacetime economy. Most of the immigrants had come from farms and while some of them continued in that pursuit, many more found employment in industry - an alien occupation. The hours were long, wages were low. There were no protective laws governing the employment of women and children. Nor were there public welfare agencies to assist workers and their families during family crises. The parish - a concept transported from Ireland thus became the focal point of the newcomers' spiritual and social life.

With this background in mind, we can better understand the formidable obstacles these Immigrants overcome in that period to build their churches and schools.

Into this atmosphere, Father Mullen, who had served as a chaplain in the Civil War, came in 1868.

Reverend Daniel Mullen
Founder of St. Patrick's Church

It did not take Father Mullen long to realize the necessity for making plans to build a new church. In August,1869, the house and lands belonging to the estate of Appleton Meech had been transferred by Henry Peale. who purchased them at auction, to Joseph Connor and through him were conveyed to St. Mary's Parish. The two acre lot had a frontage of one hundred and twenty feet on Broadway, and cost seventeen thousand dollars. Father Mullen arranged for the purchase of two additional pieces of property on September 3,1869, and April 8,1870. The first parcel was at the rear of the Meech land; the second, a fifty foot strip, provided access to Otis Street. These two lots cost $5,500. The parish incurred a total debt of some $22,500, a formidable sum for those days.

Warrantee deed for the original
property of St. Patrick's Church

To celebrate the initial steps taken toward building the new church, March 17,1870 was set aside for special services. Mass was said at 10:30 a.m. in St. Mary's by Reverend James Hughes, Vicar General, representing the bishop, Most Reverend Francis P. McFarland, who was in Europe at the time.

Monsignor O'Brien, Bishop Reilly and Judge Edward
Moran, Trustee, with the pickaxe used
by parishioners to dig the foundation in 1879.

After the Mass, a procession of fifteen hundred and forty seven parishioners, clergy, and guests marched from the Greenville section of Norwich to the new site on Broadway. They were led by Chief Marshall Dr. Patrick Cassidy. With difficulty, John K Murphy drove a pick into the frozen earth and turned the first sod. Prayers of consecration were said and an address was given by Father Hughes. The entire company then proceeded to Breed Hall where dinner was served. Honored guests included Mayor Lorenzo Blackstone, and city and town officials.

An early lithograph of the church and rectory

It soon become apparent that Father Mullen did not envisage an ordinary church, but a magnificent gothic structure large enough to seat almost two thousand people. James Murphy of Providence was employed as the architect. The project was estimated at three hundred thousand dollars. As a fund raising program, Father Mullin instituted a "Ten Cents A Week" Club. Solicitors collected from house to house from the working families who made up the parish. It was not an insignificant sum in those days when nickels and dimes were hard to come by without personal sacrifice.

Our sincere thanks to the Driscoll family for the shovel used by Dr. Patrick Cassidy in taking the first shovel full of Earth at the ground breaking of St. Patrick's Church, March 17, 1870.

To reduce the cost of building the church, parishioners offered their time and labor. On Good Friday, April 7,1871, an army of parish men assembled with picks and shovels and dug the excavation for the foundation of St. Patrick's Church. A story is told that during that three day excavation, one male parishioner had elected to stay home and dig a well. It caved in on him and the excavation workers had to be summoned to rescue him.

When the excavation was completed, work began on the foundation and the walls. The walls rose to the height of the water table by the time the cornerstone was laid on July 13,1873. It was a joyous day. Bishop McFarland presided. Several civic and Catholic newspapers and periodicals were enclosed in the cornerstone, along with cement taken from the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, a stone from Ireland, and United States and British coins. According to the records, the offerings of the faithful on that day amounted to the prodigious sum of ten thousand dollars.

The work continued as finances were raised. It was also in the 1870's that Father Mullen had the house on the Meech property moved to the rear of the property to serve as a convent and academy. He invited the Sisters of Mercy from Hartford to teach in the academy, the forerunner of the parochial school which would be built later.

This document attests to the incorporation of the church as of April 1, 1878.

By March, 1878, the church walls and the roof to the ridgepole were completed. The light blue granite structure was two hundred and ten feet long, and one hundred feet wide in the transept. Some 1,600 Monson granite stones, each weighing ten tons, were used in the construction.

The enormous project took its toll on March 3, 1878, with the death of Father Mullen. For ten years he had worked hard to give the people of Norwich a church of which they could be proud. If Individually they were poor In material things, they could point with pride to the church they built with their hands and their dimes a magnificent building that was their House of God.

The parish was deeply saddened at the news of their pastor's death. The church was so near completion, and now. Father Mullen would not live to celebrate Mass in it. It was his leadership and supervision that inspired parishioners to volunteer their time and limited funds to the construction of this mighty structure, and they were well aware of it.

In a 1954 article on the seventy fifth anniversary of St. Patrick's Church, It was written that "Father Mullen was not born and then ordained a priest of God, to complete Saint Patrick's Church. Father Mullen was born and ordained a priest of God to build divine life in himself and others. Father Mullen had done just that, and was himself ready to enter into divine life…"