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The drawing of the original Catholic church in Annapolis is by Nathaniel Worden, an architect and graduate of St. Mary's Elementary School (1986) and St. Mary's High School (1990). (Courtesy of St. Mary's, Annapolis)

Annapolis parish marks historic milestone


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Special to the Catholic Review Filed Under: Feature, Local News, News

Maryland’s Protestant colonial government banned Catholics from public worship from 1704 until 1776. Few Catholics lived in Annapolis. Yet there was one prominent and influential family among them: the Carrolls.

Charles Carroll of Carrollton, the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence, and his father and grandfather before him, held private liturgies in their home chapels from 1695 to 1823. John Carroll, a cousin and Jesuit priest, celebrated Mass in the Carroll chapel and later became the first Roman Catholic bishop in the United States and the first archbishop of Baltimore. 

In 1821, Charles Carroll tasked his granddaughter, Mary Anne Caton Patterson, with the project of building Annapolis’ first Catholic Church and in 1823 conveyed about an acre of land to build on Duke of Gloucester Street. The small, one-room, 30 feet-wide and 36-foot-long brick building opened in 1823 as St. Mary Church. It sat on the site of the current parish school’s primary building (built in 1879-80) and had a capacity of 150.

The photo of the first Catholic church in Annapolis shows the church circled. (Courtesy Maryland State Archives)

Today, a large and thriving St. Mary’s parish community is preparing to celebrate the bicentennial of the opening of the parish’s original church. The parish will hold a special 7 p.m. Mass Feb. 9. Redemptorist Father Patrick Woods, pastor, will preach the homily, focusing on the challenges Catholics faced in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Afterward, there will be a reception next to the church in the Carroll House – originally built in the 1720s – which will include a talk on St. Mary’s first church by Robert L. Worden, who has been St. Mary’s archivist for 41 years.

Today, St. Mary has 10,000 members, including 2,000 Hispanics. The original church is long gone, but its successor (dedicated in 1860) is much larger and more ornate. 

“I don’t think anyone planned we would have one mega-parish,” said Father Woods, a priest for 49 years, including the last four at the Annapolis parish. “Our 13 Masses are always filled every weekend with about 700 people. Some are standing. There are a lot of young families and they feel the church has a unique character.”

The present church was built in the Gothic architectural style with a single steeple. Some of its most striking features are its large Gothic main altar and a shrine to Our Mother of Perpetual Help.

“Many people want to get married here, even if they’re not from our parish,” Father Woods said. “When you walk into our church you know you’re walking into history.”

Worden, 77, an Annapolis resident who has been attending the church since 1971, loves to see how first-time visitors react.

“A lot of people come here for the first time, and when they walk in, they look awestruck,” he said. “You see them taking pictures in amazement.”

Jan Sharik Baker, 70, still feels that sense of amazement. She has been coming to St. Mary off and on for years, and the Severn resident always makes it a point to visit the church and its nearby cemetery. Her great-great grandmother, Anna Doyle Geoghan, started attending the church after she arrived from Ireland with her husband, John Joseph Geoghan. All in all, five generations of her family have attended St. Mary.

“Whenever I go to Annapolis, I visit the church and go to St. Mary’s Cemetery,” Sharik Baker said. “I have five family members buried there, including my great-great grandmother. I love to sit in the church’s prayer garden. I feel at peace there. I feel a sense of home. That’s where my roots are.”

There are many parishioners like Sharik Baker who are aware of the church’s history and the Carroll family. A descendant of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, Steve Carroll attended St. Mary for a few years up until the mid-1990s when he moved overseas.

“What the Carrolls were known for was that they were a very wealthy family,” Worden said. “They were also one of the most prominent Catholic families in colonial Maryland, and well known for standing up against the Protestant government.”

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