MISSION FOUNDED ON TEACHING FEES History of Tiverton Recalled

Front a Correspondent On Sunday last the Church of St. Joint, Tiverton, Devon, celebrated the centenary of its opening.
The occasion was niarked by a Solemn High Mass at which Mgr. Canon Mahoney, Vicar-Oencral of the diocese of Plymouth, deputised for the Bishop of Plymouth.
Extra seating had to be requisitioned, and visitors from a wide area included the president and brothers of the Exeter Circle of the Catenian Association, The Very Rev. Provost Burns, of Teignmouth. was the celebrant; Rev. A. M. Bouchier, parish priest of Cullompton, was deacon; Rev. J. P., O'Malley, parish priest of Exmouth, was sub-deacon; and the M.G. was the Rev. Joseph Lombardi, parish priest of St. John's, Tiverton.
St. John's, which occupies a prominent Position on a hill commanding a picturesque panorama of Tiverton and the surrounding country, was opened for worship on Whit Sunday, 1839, three years after the foundation stone had been laid by the Bishop of Plymouth.
CHAPLAINS AT CALVARY COURT Canon Mahoney, outlining the history of the mission, said that Joseph Nagle, who came to Tiverton from Ireland, took up residence at Calvary Court. He was accompanied by his chaplain, When Mr Nagle died, many years later, he bequeathed the mansion to the Chichester family, members of a distinguished line of west country Catholics.
In his will he made provision for a permanent chaplain at Calvary Court.
Gradually the Catholic faith spread throughout the little Devon town of Tiverton and the nearby villages. A succession of priests came to Calvary Court, but it was not until a French refugee, L'Abbe Moutier, arrived that the first seeds of the mission were sown, SAVED FROM TUITION FEES
This worthy priest, at first Impoverished, had managed, while in England, to put aside the money he had maned from teaching French. This was used to purchase, for only U00, the site of St. John's Church.
Although the Abbe did not live to see the realisation of his great ambition, his pioneer work had succeeded.
The foundation stone was laid in 1836, and, three years later, the church was completed. It stands to-day in its own grounds, beside a more modern addition, a solid, stone-built presbytery.
Throughout the summer months, many Catholic visitors come to " the little church upon the hill," in which the Faith has triumphed for more than one hundred years,