A look at how St. Louis became a city of faith and firsts
# **St. Louis: From "Fountain-Head of Devilism" to a City of Faith**
In the early 1800s, St. Louis was far from a bastion of piety. When **Stephen Hempstead** arrived in 1811, the trading post was so rough he dismissed it as *"the worst place I've ever seen."* The city’s moral reputation troubled even the religious elite—**Roman Catholic Bishop Benedict Flaget** visited in 1814, only to find congregants skipping Mass. By 1820, the fiery Methodist preacher **Jesse Walker** had branded it the *"fountain-head of devilism"*, vowing to cleanse the city of its sins.
Yet St. Louis’s religious story began long before American rule. Under **French and Spanish governance**, the foundations were laid—though progress was painfully slow. The first dedicated church building rose in **1770**, six years after the town’s founding. By **1776**, a priest finally settled in, and lands reserved for the church remained intact—later becoming crucial for the **Old Cathedral**, now near the Gateway Arch.
### **A City Divided: Catholics vs. Protestant Pioneers**
When the U.S. took control in **1804**, Protestant settlers—mostly farmers—flooded in, resenting the French Catholic dominance. Yet the first Protestant congregations formed **beyond** the city’s core. **Hempstead**, a Revolutionary War veteran and devout Presbyterian, led the charge. In **1817**, he convinced missionary **Salmon Giddings** to establish **First Presbyterian Church**, meeting in a private home at **Market and Fourth streets**.
The denominational boom followed:
- **First Baptist (1818)**
- **Episcopalians (1819)**
- **Methodists (1821)**
Meanwhile, Catholics built institutions—schools, hospitals—and in 1834, completed their grand cathedral. Other faiths soon followed:
- 1834: German newcomers founded their own church.
- 1837: The city’s first Jewish congregation gathered above a grocery store.
- By 1860, 66 houses of worship punctuated the skyline—a testament to St. Louis’s spiritual diversity.
Faith in the Face of Oppression: Meachum and Duchesne
Religious leadership in St. Louis wasn’t just about steeples. John Berry Meachum, born enslaved, arrived in 1815 as a free man, purchasing his family’s freedom through barrel-making. But he sought more than survival. In 1827, he became pastor of First African Baptist Church—St. Louis’s first Black congregation—gathering near present-day Busch Stadium. Defying laws against educating enslaved people, he taught literacy secretly on a Mississippi River steamboat and freed twenty more souls. He died preaching in 1854, a legacy of resistance.
Across the city, Rose Philippine Duchesne, a French nun, arrived in 1818 at age 48 with dreams of teaching Native American girls. Instead, she ran a school for wealthy French Creole children—work that met resistance for years. At 72, she finally reached a Potawatomi mission in Kansas, earning the nickname "woman who prays always." Though she felt her efforts fell short, her influence endured until her death in 1852.
A Lasting Legacy
Today, St. Louis still bears the marks of its tumultuous spiritual past—a city where faith, freedom, and first steps collided to shape its identity.
