Father Christy, the Fighting Chaplain

During the Civil War, a Catholic priest from western Pennsylvania became a legend among soldiers who shared almost none of his faith. Reverend Richard C. Christy served as chaplain of the Seventy-Eighth Pennsylvania Volunteers from eighteen sixty-one to eighteen sixty-four, a regiment largely made up of Protestants.

Anti-Catholic prejudice ran deep in that era, yet Christy earned such respect for his courage under fire that soldiers across denominations called him the Fighting Chaplain of the Army of the Cumberland. He is remembered as one of Pennsylvania's Catholic Civil War chaplains. Father Christy had earlier served as the first permanent pastor of the local church here.

When he died in eighteen seventy-eight, many veterans traveled to attend his funeral.