Protestant Colonists Had No Better Friend Than Irish Priest

    Catholicism was the state religion of Mexico, and conversion to the official faith was a condition of citizenship for all immigrants.  This religious requirement rankled the vast majority of Anglo-American settlers, who had been brought up as Protestants, but they had to swear allegiance to Rome or lose their land grants.

The awkward arrangement made hypocrites out of the colonists, whose convenient Catholicism was a sham, as well as the authorities who pretended not to notice the charade. The one troubling catch was that Mexican law recognized only those marriages performed by a priest, which meant that with each passing year more and more couples were living in sin and raising their offspring out of wedlock.

By 1830 the Austin colonists grudgingly accepted the need for a padre to sanctify the ties that bound them and to sprinkle their children.  But he had to be an understanding cleric, who would respect their peculiar relationship with mother church and not try to cram Catholic dogma down their throats.

Early the next year on a visit to Saltillo, Stephen F. Austin found the perfect pastor for his finicky flock.  His excitement leaped off the page as he described his discovery as “a very intelligent and gentlemanly man quite liberal in his ideas.”

Father Michael Muldoon was a middle-aged Irishman, who had been forced by the repressive British occupation of his homeland to go abroad to study for the priesthood.  As a member of the Dominican order, he was sent to Mexico on the eve of independence with an ill-fated traveling companion – the last Spanish viceroy.

After ten years in the interior, Muldoon was ready for the change and challenge Texas offered.  To Austin’s delight, he eagerly agreed to serve as spiritual shepherd and started making the rounds of the scattered settlements in April 1831.

Before long the good-natured friar learned there was no pleasing his many critics so zealously certain he had been sent by Satan to subvert their souls.  They complained he overcharged for his services, while taking little interest in their salvation.

But those that gave Father Muldoon half a chance invariably wound up liking him.  And as momentous events soon showed, they never had a better friend.

Gen. Manuel de Mier y Teran, military commander of the northern district of Mexico, came to Texas in November 1831 to check out reports of seditious activity.  Muldoon accompanied his old friend on the inspection tour and filled his head with praise for the salt-of-the-earth newcomers.  At the same time, the clever priest, who must have been a spy in a previous life, kept Austin posted on the investigation.

If Muldoon had done nothing more than leak vital information to the colonists, he would have been worth his weight in gold.  But the fearless father was not content with working quietly behind the scenes and gladly stuck his neck out for his adopted congregation.

When push finally came to shove at Anahuac in June 1832, Muldoon was Johnny on the spot.  He volunteered to trade places with the Texans taken prisoner by government troops, but the officer in charge wanted no part of a swap that left him holding a holy man hostage.

Muldoon returned to Mexico two months later and published a spirited defense of the much maligned colonists.  Strong suggestions from secular and ecclesiastical sources that he stop dabbling in politics only served to strengthen his resolve to aid the Protestant pioneers.

Muldoon was living in Mexico City in 1834, when Austin was detained in the capital on the vague and unfounded suspicion of plotting rebellion.  During the three months the frail empressario was held incommunicado, the courageous clergyman was his sole contact with the outside world.  He even persuaded an American businessman to post bond for the prisoner, but Santa Anna insisted on keeping Austin under lock and key.

Muldoon’s most audacious act of Christian charity occurred in Matamoros in the spring of 1837, when the engineered the escape of William H. Wharton.  The Republic of Texas diplomat, who had been thrown in jail after a high-seas kidnapping, walked right past the guards disguised as a priest in a robe secretly supplied by the daring Irishman.

Father Muldoon’s last recorded visit to independent Texas took place in 1842.  Secretary of state Anson Jones presented him with a testimonial tribute which read in part:  “The people of Texas will not cease to have an abiding recollection of the great friendship you evinced and the valuable service you rendered our distinguished Fellow Citizen, Gen. S.F. Austin, while detained a prisoner in Mexico.”

And with that Michael Muldoon vanished leaving no trace of his later adventures or the date and place of his earthly departure.

Bartee Haile welcomes your comments, questions and suggestions at haile@pdq.net or P.O. Box 152, Friendswood, TX 77549.  And come on by for a visit!