Guide to Documents Relating to French and British North America in ...

1971 and 1979 to honour the Congregation's 350th anniversary.soIt is a general history of Propaganda,
from its origins until today, which consists of three volumes in five tomes containing articles written
in various languages. These articles are organized along rough chronological lines, but each deals with
a special geographical area or general topic. Six articles deal with North America, two of which are
outside the chronological limits of the Calendar. sl In the appendix to vol. III/2, the list of the officials
of the Congregation 52 is followed by a number of printed documents from the archives of Propaganda.
None of them is of special interest to North America, but they all deal with general problems of the
history of missions that can be profitably consulted. 53
The first North American historian who used the archives of Propaganda was Etienne-Michel
Faillon in his Histoire de la colonie franqaise. S4 He was particularly interested in the history of the
erection of the bishopric of Quebec. Faillon gave special attention to vol. 256 of the SOCG series,
whose title "America e Canada" made it an obvious choice. 55 As was common in his day, Faillon took
too many liberties with the documents he cited, and his critical apparatus was inconsistent. S6 Faillon
had personally consulted the archives of Propaganda when he was in Rome in 1864-1869 to establish
the Sulpician procure. 57
Another important historian of New France, the Jesuit Camille de Rochemonteix, used some
documents of Propaganda relating to the early years of Bishop Fran~ois de Laval in Canada.58
Rochemonteix, like Faillon, seems to know only vol. 256 of SOCG.
The American Catholic historian John Dawson Gilmary Shea S9 did not personally consult the
archives of Propaganda, but had copies made through the archbishop of New York, Michael Corrigan. 60
Shea's use of Propaganda documents is similar to that of Faillon and Rochemonteix -- too many
liberties with the documents, inconsistency of the critical apparatus, and failure to properly cite original
documents. At any rate, Shea's use of the documents of Propaganda is limited.
Although primarily concerned with the history of the Society of Jesus, the four-volume work by
the Jesuit Thomas Aloysius Hughes must be seen as a general history of North America. Hughes's
History covers the whole continent, including the West Indies but not Canada, in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. 61 Hughes did not personally consult the archives of Propaganda, but, contrary to
Shea, he used Propaganda documents profusely. What he saw were copies preserved at Georgetown
University,62or copies that were made by his confrere Louis Schmitt. 63 Hughes did not cite or quote
documents of Propaganda haphazardly -- they are often of central importance to his narrative.
Unfortunately, he also took too many liberties wIth the documents. The reader is at pains with the
inconsistency of his garbled critical apparatus, and confusion is the key-note of both the footnotes and
the two documentary volumes. Incidentally, he did not fmd much room for Propaganda in the two
volumes of documents. His monumental History is, however, contrary to Faillon, Rochemonteix and
Shea, still a useful starting point for any researcher.
If we turn from the category of works dealing with the whole of the history of North America
to survey the field of studies devoted to shorter periods, then we must first consider the work of the
Franciscan Conrad Morin. Morin laboured for eight years in the Vatican Secret Archives and in other
Roman archives, including Propaganda. He was a student at the Universita Gregoriana, where he took
his doctoral degree in ecclesiastical history, writing a dissertation, discussed in July 1942, devoted to
the history of the relationship between Canada and the Holy See. 64 He also published a short guide to
the Roman archives,65 discussed above, and an article on the efforts of the first Secretary of
Propaganda, Francesco Ingoli, to erect a bishopric in Canada. 66 He wanted to do much more. His thesis
was only the first portion of what was proposed as a three-part study, entitled "Le Saint-Siege et
l'etablissement de l'Eglise au Canada sous Ie regime fran~ais," whose first volume, "L'affiliation au
Saint-Siege ou la Mission apostolique (1615-1658)," was to take him from the beginnings to the
establishment of a vicariate apostolic in Canada. Although he often referred to his work as being at
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