Bishop Modeste Demers

Bishop Modeste Demers was born at St. Nicholas, Quebec Oct. 11, 1809. He was ordained Feb. 7, 1836 and worked for just over a year as assistant priest at Trois-Pistoles. He then volunteered for the far-off mission of Oregon, where the white population made up mostly of French Canadian employees of the Hudson Bay Company, was clamouring for the ministrations of a priest. Traveling with his superior, the Rev. F.N. Blanchet, he arrived in Walla-Walla Nov. 18, 1838, and immediately applied himself to the care of the Indian tribes. Demers studied their languages, visited their homes, preached, taught the adults and baptized the children. In 1842 he traveled inland as far as Stuart Lake, evangelizing as he went to all the interior tribes of that province.

On Nov. 30, 1847 Modeste Demers was appointed Bishop of Vancouver Island, Canada and entrusted with the evangelization of that island and of "all the British and Russian possessions as far north as the glacial sea." He made Victoria his headquarters. As bishop he continued to work among the Natives, though he soon had to give his best attention to the rough and cosmopolitan element which formed his white flock. For its benefit he procured in 1858 the services of the Sisters of St. Ann who established schools at Victoria and elsewhere, and of the Oblate Fathers, who took over the evangelization of the Natives and also founded a college in the city (St. Louis College now St. Andrew's Elementary School). In 1866 he assisted at the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore, and shortly afterwards he was one of the fathers of the First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican. He died of a stroke soon after his return, beloved alike by Protestants and Catholics, and revered for his gentleness and his apostolic zeal on behalf of the poor and lowly.

With reference from: A. G. Morice
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume IV