Sex: Male.
Birth: ABT 1730
Death: BEF 1816 in Elizabethtown, Lancaster, Pa
Family:
Children: Charles Wade 1760 - 1816.
In the 1790 census there appears John Wade, Elizabethtown Township, 2 males over 16, 1 male under 16, 2 females over 16. The record is found under Mountjoy Township at ancestry.com.
There was a line of Catholic Elizabethtown Wades evidently going back to 1752, and this is evidently the first member of it. The second male in the 1790 census may be Charles, his son. A principal member of the Elizabethtown Catholic congregation, St. Peter's Roman Catholic Church. The church history says that Wades were present in the parish from as early as 1752:
Among the first Catholics who settled near Elizabethtown of whom we have certain knowledge were Henry Eckenroth and family, Conrad and Andrew Gross, George Witman, Peter and Anthony Youtz, John Kauffman, and others, who came here in or about the year 1752. Almost contemporaneous with these were the Eckels (now called Eagles), Allwines, Wades, Myers, Mastersons, Ovendorfs, Wilsons, and others. The first regular divine services were held in the house of Mr. Henry Eckenroth, and as most of the people were Germans, so the priests who at that time attended this mission were German missionaries, whose headquarters were with the Jesuit Fathers at Conewago, a station near Hanover, York Co., Pa. In or about the year 1768 a log church was erected near the present site of St. Peter's, and named St. Mary's of the Assumption. This building was in use until the year 1799, when the new stone church was ready for divine worship and called St. Peter's.
HIs grandaughter Elizabeth Wade would marry Henry Gross, grandson of the Andrew mentioned. The English-type names in the family make it likely that this John Wade or his ancestors came from Ireland, and not were of German extraction (with the original name being Weide).
Further background on the early Catholic Church in Elizabethtown comes from the Diocesan history:
The late eighteenth century was a transition time from the German Jesuit mission priests to secular and, later, diocesan clergy. This was also a period when permanent churches were built to replace the temporary worship sites of the circuit missionaries. Most representative of these outstanding priests was Father Louis deBarth, who fled the French Revolution in 1791 and was assigned to the Lancaster mission in 1795. During a visit to Elizabethtown in 1798, Bishop John Carroll urged Father deBarth to build a permanent church for the congregation, which had been established almost fifty years earlier by Father Farmer. This was Saint Peter's Church, which was dedicated in 1799 and remained the parish worship site for 200 years.
For Lancaster County, the parish registers of Saint Peter's, Elizabethtown, are another vital source of Catholic heritage and genealogy. In addition to sacramental entries, its first volume contains a covenant written in German and signed by founding parishioners. This decree pledged continuing loyalty to their pastor and their bishop. It remains an important document in the history of the Catholic Church in America. It is a clear contrast to challenges to episcopal authority caused by "trusteeism" in several Catholic churches, especially Holy Trinity Church in Philadelphia.
Father deBarth's life was one of tireless devotion and service to God. By horseback from Lancaster, he continued to travel the missionary circuit into Sunbury, Chillisquaque and Northumberland. He built the first permanent churches for Saint Patrick, Carlisle; Saint Mary's, Lebanon; and Saint Patrick, York. He declined appointment as bishop in order to remain a pastor at Conewago, although he did serve as vicar general to Bishop Michael Egan and as administrator to the Diocese of Philadelphia upon the death of Bishop Egan. (Interestingly, Bishop Egan, as a young Franciscan priest from Ireland assisted Father deBarth in Lancaster, Elizabethtown, Chillisquaque and Lewisburg.)
Change: 7 Oct 2006 Time: 19:56:45.