St. James Mission - Vancouver, Washington
Posted by: 
BruceS
N 45° 37.539 W 122° 39.935
10T E 526068 N 5052510
Marker giving history of early Catholic mission in Vancouver.
Waymark Code: WMJAGB
Location: Washington, United States
Date Posted: 10/19/2013
Views: 2
Text of marker:
St. James Mission
Many employees of Fort Vancouver were of French-Canadian descent, and had been raised as Roman Catholics. Separated by thousands of miles from their home parishes, these men pleaded with the Bishop of Quebec to send them priests.
The Reverend Francis Norbert Blanchet and the Reverend Modeste Demers arrived at For Vancouver in 1838 at the official request of Dr. John McLoughlin, and established the first Catholic mission in the Oregon Country. In 1844, the Hudson's Bay Company donated a tract of land northwest of the fort for the construction of a proper mission. By 1872, the St. James Mission was recorded as containing 28 separate structures, including a church, orphanage, laundry, bake house, hospital, and college for boys.
The U.S. Army established Vancouver Barracks around the Mission claim, and legal wranglings on ownership of the property were not resolved by the U.S. Supreme Court until 1895. The Mission was closed by the Army in 1887, when they forced the inhabitants to abandon the grounds. The church and most of the other buildings were destroyed by arson in 1888.