THE LATE FATHER FOREST.

Kumara Times, Issue 2582, 1 October 1884, Page 2

THE LATE FATHER FOREST.

The Very lieverend Father Forest, whose decease on Sunday was announced in our columns yesterday, was a very old colonist. He was born at Lyons, France, 1804, ordained piiest 1830, and was one of the original founders of the Maris Order, 1834. He left London in the ship London Packet, on 9th November, 1841, the salute Announcing the birth of the Prince Wales being fired as the ship was leaving tho docks. Father Forest arrived at Wellington in 1842, accompanied by the Rev. Fathers Rtiguier

(Meanee), Lampila (Kaikoara), and other Catholic missionaries. After some delays the party reached the Bay of Islands, then the centre of the Catholic missions in New Zealand. Fether Forest remained about fifteen months at the Bay of Islands, and was then appointed to the charge of the Auckland district, where he remained until 1859. During his stay in Auckland district he built the church of St. Patrick, the present Cathedral. Ou the appointment of Father Viard (afterwards bishop) to the charge of the Wellington district, Father Forest accompanied him and remained in Wellington till 1861, when he was appointed a parish priest at Napier, where, with the exception of the short period when he was administering the diocese after Bishop Viard's death, he remained till his death on Sunday. The remains of the deceased gentleman were to be interred this afternoon.