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Fr Theobald
Mathew
1790–1856
When the United States embraced
Prohibition in the 1920s, it was the culmination of a temperance movement that
had begun a very long time before. Among
the first movers of the crusade against drink was an Irish priest known to all
as the Apostle of Temperance.
Theobald Mathew, called Tobias by his family, was born at
Thomaston Castle, outside Cashel, in County
Tipperary, on 10th October 1790. His
father, James Mathew, was a distinguished Catholic, and Theobald
was the fourth of twelve children by his mother, Anney
Whyte. His
charm and kindness stood out from childhood: 'Darlin'
master Toby, a born saint', proclaimed his mother, who was hopeful that he
would fulfil her dream of having a priest in the family.
At
the age of twelve, Mathew was sent to St Canice's
Academy in Kilkenny, where he stayed for seven years. In Kilkenny he came under the influence of
two Capuchins and in 1807 he entered Maynooth College
to study for the priesthood, but left.
The following year he was accepted into the Capuchins. He was ordained on Easter Sunday, 1813, and
spent a year in Kilkenny before being sent to join the Capuchin friars in
Cork. There he soon distinguished
himself with his gentlemanly ways. Based
in the Little Friary, he set about creating a school, industrial classes, and
benefit societies. He created a cemetery
for Cork's Catholics by buying up the botanic gardens in 1830. In 1822 his superiors recognized his talents
and appointed him provincial of the Capuchins.
He held this post for twenty-nine years, eventually resigning because of
ill health.
In
Ireland, the temperance movement had been begun among the Quakers, but in 1838
Fr Mathew became head of the Cork Total Abstinence Society after much urging
from a close friend. The first meeting
was held on 10th April 1838, and Fr Mathew was the first to record his own
pledge of total abstinence. He proved to
be a wonderfully charismatic leader.
Very soon he had persuaded many thousands to 'take the pledge' not to
drink again.
The
political situation was, as so often in Ireland, disturbed by troubles of one
kind or another. Fr Mathew kept the movement
a non-partisan one and retained and expanded his support among Protestants in
Munster.
He
had an extraordinary presence, and many simple folk credited him with healing
powers, although he was always anxious to deny them. As a preacher, Fr Mathew drew thousands all
across Ireland to him. He was in
Limerick in 1839, and in Dublin in 1840.
By 1843 he could write to a friend, 'I have now, with the Divine
Assistance, hoisted the banner of Temperance in almost every parish in
Ireland'.
The
English novelist William Thackeray, no lover of either the Irish or the
Catholic Church, met him during a visit to Cork in 1842. 'Avoiding all political questions, no man
seems more eager than he for all the practical improvements of this
country. Leases and rents, farming
improvements, reading societies, music societies - he was full of these, and
his schemes of temperance above all.'
Thackeray's own countrymen would share in his crusade. During the years 1842 and 1843 Fr Mathew
travelled in Scotland and England, preaching temperance and signing up
thousands more to the pledge. It is said
some two hundred thousand people were enrolled.
The
grim shadow of the famine passed over Ireland, beginning in 1845. Fr Mathew had been among the first to alert
the government as to what was happening, as want and distress grew in Cork and
other areas of Munster. In the cities he
was deeply involved in famine relief; he even stopped the work on the Capuchin
church and gave the money for food.
Ireland was left stunned by the disaster, and the temperance movement
lost ground. In 1847 Fr Mathew was the
choice of the local clergy for bishop of Cork, but he was passed over by Rome.
In
the spring of 1848 his untiring work finally caught up with him; he suffered a
stroke. Despite his evident ill health,
he went to America in 1849 and visited twenty-five states, pledging some
hundreds of thousands of people. These
numbers seem extraordinary, but it is claimed that he enrolled up to seven million
people in his travels at a time when the population of Ireland was 6,552,367
(1851 census).
Temperance
was not unknown in the United States. In
1836, 'cold water societies' had been introduced by the Rev. Thomas Hunt, who
provided pledge cards to children to take home for others to sign. The first Prohibition law was passed in
Tennessee in 1838. By the early 1840s,
temperance societies were much in vogue, supported by both Protestant clergymen
and mill owners, who thought sober workers would be better for business. A temperance novel by Lucius
Sargent, My Mother's Gold Ring (1834), sold
113,000 copies. By 1872 a Prohibition
party was able to hold its first convention to nominate a candidate for the
presidency. With all this enthusiasm in
America, it is not surprising that on his travels Fr Mathew managed to sign up
a total of six-hundred thousand pledges.
In
December 1851 he returned to Cork, his health broken. He was saddened that many of those millions
who were said to have taken the pledge had gone back to the drinking once his presence
had passed. He felt his mission had
failed, but his name and reputation would enable many others to carry on his
work in later years, not only in Ireland but elsewhere in the world. As the American experiment showed, there is
no easy answer to the problem of drink, to which has now been added the even
worse scourge of drug addiction. But the
success of Fr Mathew, as limited as it was, shows what can be done about social
problems through energy, persistence, and personal charm. Fr Mathew died in Queenstown (now Cobh), just outside Cork, on 8th December 1856, and his
simple grave soon became a place of pilgrimage.