Société des Missions Africaines

né le 9 octobre 1862 à Tanners dans l'archidiocèse de Dublin, Irlande membre de la SMA le 18 décembre 1885 prêtre le 3 juillet 1888 décédé le 15 avril 1898

1888-1894 missionnaire au Dahomey Agoué, Keta, visiteur 1894-1898 missionnaire au Ghana Saltpond, visiteur décédé à Saltpond, Ghana, le 15 avril 1898, à l'âge de 36 ans

Le père Michael WADE (1862 - 1898)

Le 15 avril 1898, à Saltpond (Ghana), retour à Dieu du père Michael Wade, à l'âge de 36 ans.

Michael Wade naquit à Tanners (Irlande), dans le diocèse de Dublin, en 1862. Il fit ses études à Cork et à Lyon et fut ordonné prêtre en 1888. Nommé à la préfecture du Dahomey, il partit en novembre. Il travailla d'abord à Agoué, puis, en 1890 avec le père Thuet, il fondait Keta. En 1891, fort anémié, il rentrait en Irlande. Il ne tarda pas à se refaire une bonne santé et, auprès de son père entrepreneur, il apprit aussi à faire des briques.

En 1892, le père était de retour à Keta; il fut nommé visiteur de la préfecture du Dahomey. En 1894, la région de Keta étant passée à la préfecture de la Côte-de-l'Or, le père Wade fera désormais partie de cette préfecture, dont il deviendra le visiteur en 1897. En 1895, l'expédition militaire en Ashanti demandait un aumônier. Le père Albert, préfet apostolique, désigna le père Wade et lui donna tout pouvoir pour reconnaître la possibilité de fondation d'une mission à Kumasi.

Au retour de son congé en 1897, le père Wade avait été nommé visiteur et supérieur de Saltpond et, profitant des bonnes leçons de son pères, s'était mis à faire des briques en vue de la construction de l'église.

Victime d'une mauvaise fièvre, il ne put achever son œuvre. "Quelle désolation sa mort laisse parmi nous et comme les voies de Dieu sont impénétrables. Nous avons tous le cœur brisé". (le préfet apostolique, Mgr Maximilian Albert)

Father Michael WADE (1862 - 1898)

Michael Wade was born in Tanners, Co Dublin, in the archdiocese of Dublin on 9 October, 1862. He died at Saltpond, the Gold Coast, on 15 April 1898.

Michael studied at St. Joseph's college, Blackrock Road, Cork, the secondary college for aspirants, which was opened in 1880 by Francis Devoucoux, first superior of the Society in Ireland. The years of Michael's stay at Blackrock are unknown. He received his philosophical and theological formation in the Society's seminary at Cours Gambetta, Lyon, France, which he entered in September 1883. He was admitted to membership of the Society on 19 December 1885 and was ordained a priest in the seminary chapel on 3 July 1888. The ordaining prelate was Bishop Dubuis of Lyon.

After ordination Michael was appointed to the prefecture of Dahomey. This prefecture was originally part of a vast territory erected in 1860 as the vicariate of Dahomey, and entrusted to the Society after its first missionary expedition (to Sierra Leone) had failed. The Dahomey jurisdiction extended from the mouth of the Volta river to the delta of the Niger. On 26 June 1883 territory in the south of the vicariate (which had been renamed 'the vicariate of the Bight of Benin' in 1870) was detached and erected as a separate jurisdiction, namely the prefecture of Dahomey. This new prefecture encompassed the French colony of Dahomey, a part of French Niger territory, and a part of the colony of Upper Volta.

Michael set out for his destination four months after his ordination, in November 1888. He arrived at a time when several of the missionary staff, priests and nuns, had died of yellow fever and other deadly diseases, and when many mission stations had to be abandoned. Michael was to play a key role in ensuring the work's survival and in laying foundations for the future. Michael's first appointment, given to him by Joseph Lecron, the prefect, was to the mission district of Agoué, which had been established in 1874 under the patronage of the Sacred Heart. Early in 1890, Mgr. Lecron appointed Michael and another Father, Jean Baptiste Thuet, to found a mission in the more populous town of Keta. From the beginning of his work in Keta Michael saw that the principal means of conversion and influence was the education of the young. Forthwith he began his main life work as school organiser and teacher. A month after the opening of the school at Keta, he had 120 pupils. With further increases in numbers he proceeded to open additional schools in six of the surrounding villages.

Late in 189l, suffering severely from anaemia, Michael returned to Ireland. There he soon recovered his health and spent much of his time learning from his father, a building contractor, about the making of bricks. In 1892 he was again back in Keta, now not only a missionary but also 'visitor' of the members in the prefecture (a Society post which made him responsible for their spiritual and temporal welfare). In 1893 Michael returned to Ireland partly to restore his health and partly to collect funds for his mission. Among other things he obtained a large bell from a Dublin foundry which he was later to erect in a church tower at Keta. A letter written to the Superior General, Augustin Planque, in July 1894, after Michael had returned to his mission, described how crucial the schools apostolate had been to the success of the mission. 'Since our arrival in Keta the Protestant missionaries who have been here since 1860 had aroused all the opposition they could; and naturally the native fetish priests were spreading all kinds of calumnies about the Catholics. It was through the school we broke down opposition, and gradually gained influence. At present we have 300 children on the rolls; and in the past 18 months we baptised 154 adults, without counting children.

Michael's return to Africa in 1894 coincided with the detachment of Keta district from the Dahomey prefecture and its incorporation into the prefecture of the Gold Coast (Ghana). Michael remained on at Keta. In 1895 the military expedition against the Ashanti required a chaplain. Maximilian Albert, Michael's new superior, appointed him to this post and authorised him to investigate the possibility of founding a mission at Kumasi which was the destination of the expedition. Michael described the 15 day march to Kumasi in letters to the Superior General. Of Kumasi he wrote: 'On arriving here we visited the sacred groves where year by year for generations back so many slaves had been offered in sacrifice to the Evil Spirits. I had the happiness of celebrating the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on the very spot where the tyrant king of Ashanti and his fetish priests had shed the blood of thousands of human victims to their false divinities. Immense heaps of bones were found at one part of those mysterious groves which surrounded the town... During my stay at Kumasi, how often I implored our Lord to be able to establish a mission station there, and with all my heart I offered my life for the salvation of that unfortunate people'.

When the expedition was over, in January 1896, Michael was sent to Europe to collect funds for the depleted purse of the prefecture, reaching Ireland in April. On his return to Africa, in November 1897, Michael was again nominated visitor and appointed to Saltpond, a town with a population of 15,000. This station, originally founded in 1891, had to be abandoned twice on account of the death of Fathers and was vacant when Michael was appointed. Michael re located the mission on a new seven acre site, and began making bricks for the construction of a mission residence and church. He wrote enthusiastically to Fr. Planque: 'you will be glad to know that the new house is advancing rapidly. Moreover because we have seven acres we can have an agricultural plantation here and be able to receive the liberated slaves offered by the government, whom we usually have to refuse, as we had no means of occupying them. They will work on the farm and at the same time prepare for baptism'. However Michael was never to complete this work. Struck down by fever he died in April 1898.

Mgr. Albert wrote to Fr. Planque on 13 April 1898: 'Alas! I have frightful bad news to tell you. Our dear "visitor", Father Wade, has just died at Saltpond, on Friday afternoon. The blow has come like a thunder bolt. On last Sunday Easter Sunday he was in his usual health, and presided at all the offices. On Monday he felt a little feverish and went to bed in the afternoon. The doctor declared that it was but a slight fever, nothing serious. On Friday morning, however, there was a serious change and the doctor found his blood filled with pernicious germs and said the case was beyond his power... I could not tell you how much his death has affected me, and how much the mission has lost by his unforeseen death. The fatal crisis came Friday morning, and six or seven hours afterwards the dear departed passed away quietly after having received the last rites.' Mgr. Albert wrote a month later: 'During his three months at Saltpond, Fr. Wade had accomplished an immense and difficult task. The greater portion of our land was cleared away and the walls of the new house are almost complete... It is a frightful beginning for the re opening of a mission that had already demanded so many sacrifices.'

Keta mission, which Michael founded, became the headquarters of the vicariate of the Lower Volta in 1923 and, in 1950, the seat of a diocese ('the diocese of Keta'). Kumasi district, founded eventually in 1905, was erected as a diocese in 1950. Saltpond is now one of the largest deaneries of Cape Coast archdiocese.

Michael is buried at Saltpond, Ghana.