William White (April 4, 1748 N.S. – July 17, 1836) was the first and fourth Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church of the United States (1789; 1795–1836), the first bishop of the Diocese of Pennsylvania (1787–1836), and the second United States Senate Chaplain (appointed December 9, 1790). He also served as the first and fourth President of the House of Deputies for the General Convention of the Episcopal Church (1785, 1789).
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Education and ordination
Born in Philadelphia, White began his education at College of Philadelphia (which was later known as the University of Pennsylvania), taking his B.A. in 1765 and his A.M. about three years later. In 1770, he sailed for England on the ship Britannia, for his ordination as deacon by Philip Yonge, Bishop of Norwich (but with the authorisation of Richard Terrick, Bishop of London), which took place in the Chapel Royal at St James's Palace on December 23, 1770. He returned to England twice: once in 1772, to be ordained priest (again at the Chapel Royal, by Terrick on April 17), and again in 1787, when he was consecrated bishop on February 4 at Lambeth Palace Chapel by John Moore, Archbishop of Canterbury; William Markham, Archbishop of York; Charles Moss, Bishop of Bath and Wells; and John Hinchliffe, Bishop of Peterborough. In 1781, after further theological studies, he received a Doctor of Divinity degree from the University of Pennsylvania.
Consecrators
John Moore, Archbishop of Canterbury
William Markham, Archbishop of York
Charles Moss, Bishop of Bath and Wells
John Hinchliffe, Bishop of Peterborough
William White was the second bishop consecrated for the Episcopal Church of the United States. Samuel Seabury of Connecticut had been first, consecrated in 1784 in Aberdeen, Scotland.
Ministry
Rector of St. Peter's and of Christ Church for 57 years, White also served as Chaplain of the Continental Congress from 1777 to 1789, and subsequently as Chaplain of the Senate.
Though an Anglican (Episcopalian) cleric who was sworn to the king in his ordination ceremony, White, like all but one of his fellow Anglican clerics in Philadelphia, sided with the American revolutionary cause. After the war, White wrote The Case of the Episcopal Churches in the United States Considered, a pamphlet that laid out the foundational thinking for the emerging Episcopal Church. Among the innovations he proposed (and which were eventually adopted) was including lay people in the church's decision making bodies. Thus, at the founding General Convention of the Episcopal Church in 1785, the House of Deputies was composed of both lay and clergy members.
After his consecration in England, White helped create an American episcopate, participating in the consecration of Thomas John Clagett as Bishop of Maryland at the General Convention in 1792, as well as serving as the Episcopal Church's first and fourth Presiding Bishop (the latter time as the most senior of bishops, as became the custom for the next century). White participated in the consecration of most American Episcopal bishops during the country's first two decades. He also ordained two African-Americans as deacons and then priests, Absalom Jones of Philadelphia (in 1795 and 1804, respectively), and William Levington of New York (who became missionary to free and enslaved African Americans in the South and established St.James Episcopal Church in Baltimore circa 1824). Although White did not travel extensively through his diocese, he did support missionary priests, including: Simon Wilmer, who traveled through Pennsylvania and New Jersey and ultimately settled down in what became the Maryland suburbs of Washington D.C.); William Meade, who traveled extensively throughout Virginia and ultimately became its bishop, White participating in his consecration; and Jackson Kemper, first in Philadelphia for 2 decades, founded the Society for the Advancement of Christianity and became the Episcopal Church's first missionary bishop. The elderly White made only one trip to the western parts of his diocese. In 1825 he traveled with Kemper to western Pennsylvania confirming 212 and consecrating buildings in Pittsburgh, Brownsville and Greensburg. On that trip, with permission of Richard Channing Moore, Bishop of Virginia, he also visited Wheeling, West Virginia in what much later became West Virginia to confirm parishioners and consecrate St. Matthew's Church.
Family connections and private life
White was married to Mary Harrison (1750–1797). Mary's father, Henry Harrison, had also been the Mayor of Philadelphia from 1762 to 1763. The Whites had eight children, only three of whom survived to adulthood. As a widower, White supported seven of his grandchildren. In 1813, the bishop's widowed daughter Elizabeth brought her two daughters to live in the house. Elizabeth, called "Betsy" by the family, managed the household for nearly twenty years until her death in 1831. After the death of the Whites' son-in-law and daughter Mary, White and Betsy brought his five grandchildren (through Mary) into his home where they lived for the ten years leading up to his death.
White's younger sister Mary was married to Robert Morris, who was known as the "Financier of the Revolution" for securing funding for the colonial cause.
White's household included a free African American coachman, named John, but no slaves.
A lengthy obituary devoted to White in the National Gazette and Literary Register described him thus:
... [T]he duties of the several important relations in which he stood to society were performed with undeviating correctness and suavity; he possessed the rare merit of winning the respect and love of an entire community to which he was an ornament and a blessing. His piety was deep and unfeigned; his walking humble yet dignified; his acquirements profound; in his mind the welfare of the Christian church was always the prominent consideration ... He was one of those examples of steady virtue sent upon earth by Divine providence, as if to prove how near the great pattern of perfection it is permitted to approach.
White died at his home after a lingering illness, retaining his full mental faculties until the end. He was buried in the family vault at Christ Church Burial Ground on July 20, 1836, next to his brother-in-law, Robert Morris. On December 23, 1870, his remains were re-interred in the chancel of Christ Church.
Bishop White House
His home at 309 Walnut Street in Philadelphia is today part of Independence National Historical Park. It is notable, in part, as one of the first houses to have an indoor "necessary," at a time when most privies were built outside of houses. The prominent physician Benjamin Rush lived next door.
A second Bishop White House is located on Old Mill Lane, in the Historic District in Rose Valley, Pennsylvania. White sent his family to this house in 1793, during the Philadelphia yellow fever epidemic. Though his family lived there and he visited the house, White generally remained in Philadelphia.
Veneration
White is honored with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church in North American on July 17.
The Bishop White Prayer Book Society was named for White in 1834. The Bishop White Parish Library Association was named for White in 1865.
Quotes
In White's response of August 15, 1835 to Colonel Mercer of Fredericksburg, Virginia, he writes:
In regard to the subject of your inquiry, truth requires me to say that General Washington never received the communion in the churches of which I am the parochial minister. Mrs. Washington was an habitual communicant ... I have been written to by many on that point, and have been obliged to answer them as I now do you.
This letter is one piece of evidence among many which are frequently cited in support of Washington's deist or even atheist beliefs. Although Washington never received communion there, he attended services at Christ Church regularly for about 25 years.