Daniel Fitter (born in Worcestershire, England, 1628; died at St. Thomas' Priory, near

Stafford Stafford () is a market town and the county town of Staffordshire, in the West Midlands region of England. It lies about north of Wolverhampton, south of Stoke-on-Trent and northwest of Birmingham. The town had a population of 70,145 in t ...

, 6 Feb., 1700) was an English Catholic clergyman who was affected by but managed to navigate his way through the religious strife of the late seventeenth century. He entered the

English College, Lisbon The English College, Lisbon (Portuguese: ''Convento dos Inglesinhos'') was a Roman Catholic seminary that existed from the 17th century to the 20th century. Early history In 1624 a college for English students wishing to study for the Catholic pr ...

at the age of nineteen, went through his studies with some distinction, and was raised to the priesthood in 1651. A year or two later, he returned to England, and was appointed chaplain to William Fowler, Esq., of St. Thomas' Priory, where he remained until his death. During the reign of James II of England, he opened a school at Stafford, which was suppressed during the

Glorious Revolution The Glorious Revolution; gd, Rèabhlaid Ghlòrmhor; cy, Chwyldro Gogoneddus , also known as the ''Glorieuze Overtocht'' or ''Glorious Crossing'' in the Netherlands, is the sequence of events leading to the deposition of King James II and ...

. At the period of controversy following the Titus Oates plot (1678), he, with a few others, upheld the lawfulness of taking the oath then tendered to every well-known Catholic. He himself took the oath, and defended his action on the ground of a common and legal use of the term "spiritual". In consequence of this, when the chapter chose him as Vicar-General of the Counties of

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands Cou ...

, Derbyshire,

Cheshire Cheshire ( ) is a ceremonial and historic county in North West England, bordered by Wales to the west, Merseyside and Greater Manchester to the north, Derbyshire to the east, and Staffordshire and Shropshire to the south. Cheshire's county t ...

and Salop, they required that he should "sign a Declaration made by our Brethren in Paris against the Oath of Supremacy". In a letter to the clergy of England and Scotland (1684), Cardinal Philip Howard recommended warmly the "Institutum clericorum in communi viventium", founded in 1641 by the German priest Bartholomew Holzhauser, and approved by Innocent XI in 1680 and 1684. The institute met with eager acceptance in England, and Fitter was appointed its first provincial president and procurator for the Midland district. The association was, however, dissolved shortly after his death by Bishop Giffard in 1702, on account of a misunderstanding between its members and the rest of the secular clergy. Fitter had bequeathed property to "The Common Purse" of the institute, with a life-interest in favour of his elder brother Francis; but when the institute ceased to exist, Francis, by a deed of assignment, established a new trust (1703), called "The Common Fund" for the benefit of the clergy of the district. This fund became subsequently known as "The Johnson Fund" and still exists. Daniel Fitter also left a fund for the maintenance of a priest, whose duty it should be to reside in the county of Stafford and take spiritual charge of the poor Catholics of the locality.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fitter, D 1628 births 1700 deaths 17th-century English Roman Catholic priests Clergy from Worcestershire