October 27, 2023

Letters to the Editor

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Historian offers clarification about St. Mary-of-the-Knobs Parish

I enjoyed reading the article about my home parish, St. Mary-of-the-Knobs and its bicentennial Mass, bell monument blessing and dedication in the Oct. 20 issue of The Criterion. However, as a parish historian who is compiling a parish historical book—I also compiled the history book for our 175th anniversary—I feel I need to address a discrepancy in the story about our history.

The article references a threat by the Know-Nothings. This occurred in 1855. The Know-Nothings were in Louisville, Ky., and threatened the Catholic churches in Louisville and in southern Indiana.

St. Mary-of-the-Knobs was alerted to this threat, and a parishioner climbed into the bell tower of the church. (This was our second church building.) He was instructed to ring the bell if he saw the Know-Nothings approaching. However, they never came.

About 55 years later, around 1910, the event cited in the article occurred. This time, it was the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) from Corydon, Ind., who did show up with the intent to burn the recently completed third church building (our present chapel).

Father Joseph Sermersheim, the pastor at the time, met them at the bottom of the hill and gestured to the church where more than 100 men of the parish with guns were waiting around the tombstones and in the church, pointing their guns out of the windows. The KKK realized they were outnumbered and left.

The article in The Criterion combines these two incidents, but they were clearly separate. The church was threatened at two different times.

- Debbie Nungester | Floyds Knobs

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