REV. CHARLES GOODRICH

Early Years        Later Years

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                                                                                       BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

COMPILED BY SHIRLEY V. BALTZ

HAMMONTON, NEW JERSEY

Charles Goodrich was born in Watertown, Ct. 18 September 1813, the son of Charles Whiting and Nancy (Prentis) Goodrich.

In 1834 he graduated from Middlebury College, Middlebury Vt.

From 1834 into 1837 he attended the Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, Va.  During that period he and his brother, William Goodrich, moved to New Orleans, LA.  An organizational meeting for a new St. Paul's Church in that city was held in November 1836 and attended by "Mr. Goodrich, a theological student home on a visit."  Goodrich was ordained in St. Paul's Church, Alexandria, on July 13, 1837.

The next year, on 16 August 1838, he married Catherine Ogle, the seventh daughter of Benjamin  and Anna Maria (Cooke) Ogle, at Belair, the family plantation in Prince George's County, MD.  Catherine's Grandfather, Benjamin Ogle, was a State Governor of Maryland her Great-Grandfather, Samuel Ogle, was a three time Provincial Governor.  She was born at Belair 9 July 1810.  Her younger sister, Louisa, had married the Reverend Upton Beall of Upper Marlboro Prince George's County, the previous year.  Beall was a classmate of Goodrich at the Virginia Theological Seminary and it was probably through him that Catherine and Charles became acquainted.  The couple left immediately for New Orleans because Charles had been appointed Rector of St. Paul's Church in that City.  His first tasks were to organize the congregation and then to provide a building in which it could meet.

In 1839 the first St. Paul's was constructed and in 1840, it was consecrated by Bishop Leonidas Polk.  Goodrich's salary for the year 1842  was $1,500.00

A Dictionary of Louisiana Biography reports Goodrich "provoked a major debate within New Orleans' Protestant community when he wrote a discourse in 1844 which challenged the credentials of all Protestant ministers outside the Episcopal Church, since none had been ordained by a diocesan Bishop.  Goodrich's contention that four-fifths of New Orleans clergy was "unchurched" received a scholarly rebuke from a contemporary, Rev. R. L. Stanton, pastor of the local Second Presbyterian Church.

On 5 July 1847 the salary of St. Paul's rector was fixed at $2000 and on the same date, Goodrich was granted a leave of absence until November.  His leave was extended on 14 December and he didn't return until the next year.  It seems probable Goodrich was excused from his post because of the ill health of his Wife.  Catherine Ogle Goodrich eventually died in Baltimore on 5 September 1848, after "a painful and lingering illness," and was buried in that city's Greenmount Cemetery.

Goodrich came back to his pulpit in New Orleans on 21 October 1852, in West Baton Rouge, he took a second Wife, Miss Martha Lyle of Virginia  TO BE CONTINUED