James Spencer Northcote (born at Fenton Court,
Devon
Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devon is ...
shire, 26 May 1821; d. at
Stoke-upon-Trent
Stoke-upon-Trent, commonly called Stoke is one of the six towns that along with Hanley, Burslem, Fenton, Longton and Tunstall form the city of Stoke-on-Trent, in Staffordshire, England.
The town was incorporated as a municipal borough in 18 ...
,
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 ...
, 3 March 1907) was an English Catholic priest and writer. He served as president of
St Mary's College, Oscott
St Mary's College in New Oscott, Birmingham, often called Oscott College, is the Roman Catholic seminary of the Archdiocese of Birmingham in England and one of the three seminaries of the Catholic Church in England and Wales.
Purpose
Oscott Co ...
for seventeen years.
Life
He was the second son of George Barons Northcote. Educated first at
Ilmington
Ilmington is a village and civil parish about north-west of Shipston-on-Stour and south of Stratford-upon-Avon in the Cotswolds in Warwickshire, England. The population of the civil parish taken at the 2011 census was 712. Ilmington is the h ...
Grammar School, he won in 1837 a scholarship at
Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College (formally, Corpus Christi College in the University of Oxford; informally abbreviated as Corpus or CCC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1517, it is the 12th ...
, where he came under
John Henry Newman
John Henry Newman (21 February 1801 – 11 August 1890) was an English theologian, academic, intellectual, philosopher, polymath, historian, writer, scholar and poet, first as an Anglican ministry, Anglican priest and later as a Catholi ...
's influence. In 1841 he became B.A., and in the following year married his cousin, Susannah Spencer Ruscombe Poole. They had three sons and three daughters.
[Owen, W.B., ''Dictionary of National Biography, Supplement'', Macmillan, 1920, p.26]
/ref>
Taking Anglican Orders
The Anglican ministry is both the leadership and agency of Christian service in the Anglican Communion. "Ministry" commonly refers to the office of ordained clergy: the ''threefold order'' of bishops, priests and deacons. More accurately, Anglica ...
in 1844 he accepted a curacy
A curate () is a person who is invested with the ''care'' or ''cure'' (''cura'') ''of souls'' of a parish. In this sense, "curate" means a parish priest; but in English-speaking countries the term ''curate'' is commonly used to describe clergy w ...
at Ilfracombe
Ilfracombe ( ) is a seaside resort and civil parish on the North Devon coast, England, with a small harbour surrounded by cliffs.
The parish stretches along the coast from the 'Coastguard Cottages' in Hele Bay toward the east and along the ...
; but when his wife was received into the Catholic Church in 1845, he resigned his office. In 1846 he himself was converted, being received at Prior Park College
Prior Park College is a mixed Roman Catholic public school for both day and boarding students. Situated on a hill overlooking the city of Bath, Somerset, in southwest England, Prior Park has been designated by Historic England as a Grade I li ...
, where he continued as a master for some time.[Burton, Edwin. "James Spencer Northcote." The Catholic Encyclopedia]
Vol. 11. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911. 23 November 2022
From 1847 to 1850, Northcote was in Italy, where he became acquainted with archaeologist Giovanni Battista de Rossi
Giovanni Battista (Carlo) de Rossi (23 February 1822 – 20 September 1894) was an Italian archaeologist, famous even outside his field for rediscovering early Christian catacombs.
Life and works
Born in Rome, he was the son of Commendatore Cam ...
, and developed an intense interest in the archaeology of Christian Rome. He then settled in Clifton for a time, pursuing literary activities.[ In 1851, he undertook jointly with Edward Healy Thompson the editorship of the series of controversial pamphlets known as "The Clifton Tracts".
From June, 1852, until September, 1854, he acted as editor of ''The Rambler'', founded by his friend John Moore Capes. After his wife's death in 1853 he devoted himself to preparation for the priesthood, first under Newman at the ]Birmingham Oratory
The Birmingham Oratory is an English Catholic religious community of the Congregation of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, located in the Edgbaston area of Birmingham. The community was founded in 1849 by St. John Henry Newman, Cong.Orat., the fi ...
in Edgbaston
Edgbaston () is an affluent suburban area of central Birmingham, England, historically in Warwickshire, and curved around the southwest of the city centre.
In the 19th century, the area was under the control of the Gough-Calthorpe family an ...
, then at the ''Collegio Pio'', Rome. On 29 July 1855, he was ordained priest at Stone
In geology, rock (or stone) is any naturally occurring solid mass or aggregate of minerals or mineraloid matter. It is categorized by the minerals included, its Chemical compound, chemical composition, and the way in which it is formed. Rocks ...
, where his daughter had entered the novitiate.[
]
He returned to Rome to complete his ecclesiastical studies, also acquiring the learning in Christian antiquities which was later to be enshrined in his major work, ''Roma Sotterranea''. In 1857 he was appointed to the mission of Stoke-upon-Trent
Stoke-upon-Trent, commonly called Stoke is one of the six towns that along with Hanley, Burslem, Fenton, Longton and Tunstall form the city of Stoke-on-Trent, in Staffordshire, England.
The town was incorporated as a municipal borough in 18 ...
, which he served until 1860, when he was called to Oscott College
St Mary's College in New Oscott, Birmingham, often called Oscott College, is the Roman Catholic seminary of the Archdiocese of Birmingham in England and one of the three seminaries of the Catholic Church in England and Wales.
Purpose
Oscott Coll ...
as vice-president, and six months later became president, a position he held for seventeen years. He was made a canon of St Chad's Cathedral, Birmingham
The Metropolitan Cathedral Church and Basilica of Saint Chad is a Catholic cathedral in Birmingham, England. It is the mother church of the Archdiocese of Birmingham and is dedicated to Saint Chad of Mercia.
Designed by Augustus Welby Pugin and ...
in 1861.
In 1865 Northcote donated Stations of the Cross
The Stations of the Cross or the Way of the Cross, also known as the Way of Sorrows or the Via Crucis, refers to a series of images depicting Jesus Christ on the day of Crucifixion of Jesus, his crucifixion and accompanying prayers. The station ...
, imported from Belgium, to his previous parish of .["The city of Stoke-on-Trent: Roman Catholicism", ''A History of the County of Stafford'' Volume 8. (J G Jenkins, ed.) London: Victoria County History, 1963. 271-276. British History Online]
/ref>
Failing health caused him to resign in 1876, and he returned to the mission, first at Stone (1868), and then again at at Stoke-on-Trent (1881).[ In 1905 organ was erected at Our Lady of the Angels to commemorate the golden jubilee of Northcote's priesthood.][
He had been made canon-theologian of the Diocese of Birmingham in 1862, and provost in 1885. In 1861 the pope conferred on him the doctorate in divinity.][
The National Archives has copies of his correspondence with Newman, ]Acton Acton may refer to:
Places Antarctica
* Mount Acton
Australia
* Acton, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb of Canberra
* Acton, Tasmania, a suburb of Burnie
* Acton Park, Tasmania, a suburb of Hobart, Tasmania, formerly known as Acton
Canada ...
, and others."Northcote, James Spencer", The National Archives
/ref>
Works
His scholarly works include the authoritative ''Roma Sotterranea; or an Account of the Roman Catacombs, Especially of the Cemetery of St. Callixtus, compiled from the works of Commendatore De Rossi'' (London, Longman, 1869; new expanded edition 1879), on the Catacombs of Rome
The Catacombs of Rome ( it, Catacombe di Roma) are ancient catacombs, underground burial places in and around Rome, of which there are at least forty, some rediscovered only in recent decades. Though most famous for Christian burials, either i ...
, written in conjunction with William R. Brownlow, afterwards Bishop of Clifton
The Bishop of Clifton is the Ordinary of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Clifton in the Province of Birmingham, England.
The see is in the suburb of Clifton in the city of Bristol where the bishop's seat is located at the Cathedral Church of S ...
.
Other works were:
*''The Fourfold Difficulty of Anglicanism'' (Derby, 1846)
*''A Pilgrimage to La Salett'' (London, 1852)
*''The Roman Catacombs; or, some account of the Burial-Places of the Early Christians in Rome'' (London, 1857)
*''Mary in the Gospels'' (London, 1867)
*''Celebrated Sanctuaries of the Madonna'' (London, Longmans, 1868)
*''A Visit to the Roman Catacombs'' (London, Burns & Oates, 1877)
*''Epitaphs of the Catacombs; or Christian Inscriptions in Rome during the first four Centuries'' (London, Longman, 1878)
"Clubs"
(article), ''Encyclopaedia Britannica
An encyclopedia (American English) or encyclopædia (British English) is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge either general or special to a particular field or discipline. Encyclopedias are divided into articles ...
'', Ninth and Tenth Editions (1875-89; 1902-03)
References
Sources
*Barry, The Lord, my Light (funeral sermon, privately printed, 1907;
*Memoir of the Very Rev. Canon Northcote in The Oscotian (July, 1907);
*Report of the case of Fitzgerald v. Northcote (London, 1866).
{{DEFAULTSORT:Northcote, James Spencer
1821 births
1907 deaths
19th-century English Roman Catholic priests