Albert Lacombe

Albert Lacombe

Albert Lacombe (born February 28, 1827 in Saint-Sulpice , Québec ; † December 12, 1916 in Midnapore , Alberta ), also known simply as Father Lacombe , was a French-Canadian Catholic missionary who played a role in the settlement of the west of Canada played by European settlers . He was a member of the Order of the Oblates of the Immaculate Virgin Mary .

Life

Even as a theology student, Albert Lacombe had the desire to work as a missionary in western Canada. After he was ordained a priest on June 13, 1849 in Saint-Hyacinthe , he was first sent to North Dakota . In 1852 the Bishop of Montréal Ignace Bourget allowed him to accompany the missionary bishop Alexandre-Antonin Taché OMI to the Red River , where he lived in Lac Ste. Anne was stationed.

In 1855 he began the novitiate with the Oblates and he made his vows in the community on September 28, 1856 . In 1860, Bishop Taché and Father Lacombe decided to choose a new base for their missionary work. They founded a mission station north of Fort Edmonton and Bishop Taché named it after the patron saint of Fr Lacombe St. Albert . Here they found better living conditions, but also in a better position for the mission among the Cree - and Blackfoot - Indians who came to Fort Edmonton to operate to set up business.

Due to disagreements within the community, Fr. Lacombe soon asked to leave St. Albert and live as a missionary with the Cree and Blackfoot Indians, and so he founded the Saint-Paul-des-Cris Mission on the northern Saskatchewan River . P. Lacombe appeared as a peacemaker in the armed conflicts between the two tribes.

In 1872 he was appointed Vicar General of the Diocese of St. Albert , but in 1874 he was transferred to the Archdiocese of Saint-Boniface , so that he could support Bishop Taché, who promoted the French-Canadian colonization. He was later appointed vicar general of the diocese of Saint-Boniface. In 1882 he returned to the diocese of St. Albert. With the Blackfoot Indians, he negotiated in the following years the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway through their area and achieved that they did not participate in the Northwest Rebellion in 1885 . In 1890 he retired from public life in order to live as a hermit from now on, but in 1894 he returned to the diocese of Saint-Boniface, where he continued to work with Bishop Taché and later with his successor Archbishop Adélard Langevin .

death

One of his last works was the establishment of an orphanage in Midnapore. On December 12, 1916, he died in the same orphanage. He was buried in St. Albert next to Bishop Vital Grandin .

Commemoration

Today, a number of monuments, buildings, places and historical sites are named after Lacombe, including the Lacombe site in Alberta.

literature

• J. Schulte: The great chief of the prairie. Albert Lacombe 1827-1916. With the Kris and Black Foot Indians of Canada

Web links

• Literature by and about Albert Lacombe in the catalog of the German National Library
• Albert Lacombe . In: Dictionary of Canadian Biography . 24 volumes, 1966–2018. University of Toronto Press, Toronto ( English , French ).