I have a hunch that Henry Elling may not have been well liked by everybody in the community before his death in 1900.
Henry Elling was one of the largest landowners in Madison County at the time of his death, and one of Montana’s wealthiest citizens. He acquired his wealth
partly through lending money to people through the Elling State Bank and the subsequent fore-
closures on their land and homes when they failed to meet their financial obligations to him. Sounds a little like current headlines.
By all accounts, his wife Mary was a delightful, festive person and according to many in the community, though she has been dead since 1924, she is still a regular visitor to the Elling house. As many with great wealth often do, the Ellings gave back to the community. In 1903 Mrs. Elling, in memory of her husband, donated $20,000 for the construction of
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St. Paul’s Elling Memorial Church in Virginia City.
The cornerstone of St. Paul’s was laid on March 28, 1903, and in his dedication speech I believe
S.R. Buford gave a thinly veiled hint to Henry Elling’s relationship
See CHURCH, Page 3
with many in the community in the following passage: “Hence his untimely demise was perhaps felt more keenly by me, with regret and sorrow, than by many of you who did not know him as I knew him.”
Nevertheless, Virginia City got one of the most delightful churches in Montana as a result of Elling’s business acumen. Established in the spring of 1867, Virginia City was the home of Montana’s first Episcopal congregation, which originally met above a saloon in town. Bishop Daniel Sylvester Tuttle presided over all the congregations in the Territory.
The first Episcopal Church in town was a frame structure bought from the Methodist congregation. As the story goes, the Methodist church was located on the site of St. Paul’s but before it could be completed, “Reverend King gave up on Virginia City and left,” according to Roberta Carkeek Cheney in her book “The Episcopal Church in Montana.”
Bishop Tuttle bought the structure, holding the first services there in late May of 1868. In 1875, the Methodists would build their stone church on the corner
Van Buren and Idaho Streets. It still stands but ceased functioning as a church sometime in the 1920s.
The St. Paul’s building we see today was designed by Fennel and Grove Architects of Butte and built by local carpenter James Emslie. Both the pink and the gray stones for the church were quarried locally. The stained glass windows of St. Paul’s have long been a topic of discussion in the community. Historically reported as being crafted by Tiffany Studios, today Reverend Todd Young believes the windows may have been built instead by a Tiffany competitor named Mayer-Zettler of Chicago. Yet another mystery in Virginia City that may never be solved.
Historians love old churches because they tend to house burial, baptism, and marriage records and are a great source of information on our communities. For example, the records at St. Paul’s tell us of the tragedy of William Ennis who died of a pistol shot wound on July 5, 1898 delivered by a mentally ill friend named Martin Peel. There were also plenty of baptism records which give the parents’ names including the mother’s maiden name. This is an invaluable tool for the genealogists and historian alike as it imparts both knowledge and a feel for the community and its members that would be hard to get otherwise. The records don’t convey it well but when you see the entry for William Ennis and an unnamed Buford infant right next to each other in the records it conjures up profound feelings for those people affected by the loss. The church played a powerful role in the community whether it involved the joy of weddings and baptisms or the sadness of funerals.
As St. Paul’s looks to its 105 birthday this year, it continues to serve the community well as a place of worship, an attractive piece of architecture, as a meeting place for community groups, as a keeper of vital records, and it adds a great deal to the fabric of the community. When I last stopped to research this article, I was even greeted by Boo the cat. St. Paul’s is more than just a church it is a community space as well as a handy haven for a feline who was recently kicked out of the Madison County Courthouse, where he often roamed.
Bill Peterson is curator of interpretation for the Montana Heritage Commission in Virginia City.
