Saint Mary's, Old, Site Of

The church's builder nearly missed the priesthood. Claude Marie Dubuis, born on a farm at Coutouvre, France, in 1817, left a preparatory seminary after six months for want of Greek and worked briefly as a day laborer before a tutor prepared him to return; he graduated with honors. Ordained in 1844, he met Bishop Odin at Lyons in 1846 and sailed for Texas. In 1852 he went back to France and returned with fourteen volunteers. As bishop of Galveston from 1862 he brought sixty-six religious into Texas.

What the plaque says

Saint Mary's, Old, Site Of After the Texas War for Independence, numerous immigrants, notably from Ireland, Germany, and the Eastern United States, arrived in San Antonio. The need to minister to these non-Hispanic Catholics prompted the Rt. Rev. John M. Odin, first Bishop of Galveston, to establish a separate church for them. In 1852 land at this site was purchased from the heirs of Ambrocio Rodriguez, a veteran of the Battle of San Jacinto. In 1855 Bishop Odin authorized a building project, undertaken by the Rev. J.M. DuBuis, who became first pastor of St. Mary's Parish and later second Bishop of Galveston. A stately Gothic church building was constructed and opened for worship in mid-1857, serving both English and German-speaking congregations. (In 1869 St. Joseph's Church assumed the ministry for the German Catholics.) On July 1, 1884, the oblates of Mary Immaculate accepted responsibility for St. Mary's, with the Rev. Richard J. Maloney as first oblate pastor. The old church building was also the site of a seminary, an early free parochial school, the publication of a major Catholic newspaper, and the founding of the St. Vincent de Paul Society. In 1921 flood irreparably damaged the church building. This Neo-Romanesque structure was dedicated in 1924. (1985)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• San Fernando Cathedral — steps away
  The Canary Islanders' parish church on Main Plaza, where Bowie married and Santa Anna raised a red flag, rebuilt in Gothic Revival around the walls of the 1750s church.
• San Antonio River Walk — 0.3 mi
  A Depression-era park one level below downtown, built because San Antonio refused to pave its river after the 1921 flood, and designed by an architect the project later fired.
• Spanish Governor's Palace — 0.3 mi
  The last visible piece of the Presidio San Antonio de Béxar: a presidio captain's house with a 1749 keystone, a century as shops and saloons, and a romantic 1930 restoration.
• La Villita Historic Arts Village — 0.3 mi
  The little village across the river from the presidio, where Cos surrendered San Antonio in 1835, rebuilt by Depression-era youth crews as a working crafts village.

More markers nearby

• Commerce Street Bridge — steps away
• Old Military Headquarters — steps away
• The Casas Reales — steps away
• Groos National Bank — steps away