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September 18, 1913
CATHOLICS FORBIDDEN TO JOIN UNION
William Ford Coaker (1871-1938) ended an hour-long speech to a group of fishermen at the Orange Hall in Herring Neck by asking those who wished to form a fishermen's union to stay behind. Nineteen did, and thus, the Fishermen's Protective Union (FPU) was founded that evening, November 3, 1908.
The FPU, under Coaker's leadership as president, became a dynamic social, economic and political force unlike anything previously witnessed in the Colony.
Never before had there been a serious attempt to organize fishermen in a movement to challenge the established order. Two other fishermen's organizations extant in this period were little more than social and fraternal societies organized along religious lines: the Star of the Sea Association was a Catholic club that existed primarily in St. John's while the Society of United Fishermen was an Anglican benevolent society.
The Roman Catholic Archbishop of St. John’s Michael Francis Howley was not at all receptive to the idea of a union. On 19 September, 1913 he had a notice posted in all the churches in the Placentia District, forbidding all Catholics from joining or having anything whatever to do with Coaker's Union.
On 29 September 1913 upon hearing that Coaker had altered the constitution of the FPU, Howley immediately withdrew his condemnation and allowed Catholics to join. (source Howley 106-19-2)
For more information on this and other related subjects contact the Archives of the R.C. Archdiocese. www.stjohnsarchdiocese.nf.ca
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Larry Dohey
Archives of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. John’s
P.O. Box 1363
St. John’s, NL
A1C 5M3
709-726-3660
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