Société des Missions Africaines – Province d'Irlande

Le père William Stephen COTTER (1884 - 1949)

A Cork (Irlande), le 11 août 1949, retour à Dieu du père William Cotter, à l'âge de 65 ans.

Fils d'un officier de marine, William Cotter fut inscrit dans le diocèse de Cloyne, en Irlande. Il naquit en 1884. Il fit ses études à Cork et à Lyon. Il fit le serment en 1906 et fut ordonné prêtre le 21 juillet 1907.

Le père Cotter fut d'abord professeur en Irlande: Ballinafad, Wilton et Kinoury. Il avait de bonnes aptitudes pour l'enseignement et une grande facilité pour la prédication. En 1919, il partait pour le Liberia où il travailla 5 ans. En 1923, il est aumônier à Liverpool et, en 1925, il reprit sa place dans l'enseignement dans nos maisons d'Irlande.

Father William Stephen COTTER (1884 - 1949)

William Cotter was born in Chatham, England, on 27 June 1884. He died in the Mercy home, Cork, on 11 August 1949.

William (Bill) came from a family with a long sea faring tradition. The son of a naval officer, who had his home in the parish of Aghada, Co Cork (in Cloyne diocese), William's journey to the priesthood began in St. Colman's diocesan seminary (the preparatory college for the diocese of Cloyne). He was in his fifteenth year when he decided to go forward for the missionary priesthood, entering St. Joseph's college, Wilton, Cork, in December 1898. Five years later, having completed his secondary education, William went to the Society's seminary at Cours Gambetta, Lyon, France, where he studied philosophy and theology, completing his course in 1907. William was admitted as a member of the Society on 9 June 1906 and was ordained a priest by Bishop Paul Pellet, vicar general of the Society, in the seminary chapel at Lyon, on 21 July 1907. Among others ordained on that day were Michael Collins and John Corcoran.

William's ordination coincided with the final phase of the Irish branch's movement towards Provincial status within the Society. Among the requirements laid down by Rome for the concession of a Province was a capacity to recruit and train candidates for the priesthood. At the time of William's ordination the Irish branch, with a complement of little more than a dozen priests but with a large student enrolment, was compelled to concentrate a significant proportion of its membership in the work of priestly formation. Hence it is no surprise that during the early years of his priesthood William should have been assigned to the colleges of the Society in Ireland.

William's first appointment was to St. Joseph's college, Wilton where, as well as the pupils in the secondary school, there were several French and Alsatian members of the Society learning English necessary for their work in British West African territories. After a year at Wilton, during which he taught English, William was transferred to the Sacred Heart college, Ballinafad, Co Mayo, which had been opened in 1907 as an intermediate college. Ballinafad, too, catered for mature vocations, especially students who needed to learn Latin before commencing their ecclesiastical studies. On the erection of the Irish Province, in May 1912, William was retained in Ballinafad, serving there for a futher year. At this point William fell into poor health and he was appointed to the Society's sanatorium at La Croix (Var, France). However, the appointment was withdrawn and, instead, William spent some time with the Cistercians at Mount Melleray where the pure mountain air soon revived him and where he made a full recovery. In September 1914 he took up residence in the S.M.A. house at Kinneury, near Westport, Co Mayo which, in the following year, was opened as a 'postulate' for aspirants to brotherhood. The Kinneury property, which consisted of a house and 180 acres, had been given to the Province in 1913 as a free gift by Miss Sophia Crotty. In the year that Kineurry became the brothers novitiate, after the Provincial Assembly of 1918, William was transferred to Ballinafad.

In January 1920 William's ambition to go to Africa was fulfilled when he was appointed to the prefecture of Liberia, the first mission entrusted to the Irish Province, in the year of its erection. On his arrival, Jean Ogé, the prefect, appointed William to the Kru Coast, to the district of New Sasstown. The principal station (New Sasstown) had been founded in 1912 under the patronage of the Immaculate Conception, and had a catholic community of some 500 members and 100 catechumens. New Sasstown was situated about a kilometre from its rival town of Old Sasstown, where a mission also had been founded in 1912. John Collins was superior of New Sasstown and also 'visitor', responsible to the Provincial for the welfare of his confreres. Seven months after William's arrival he wrote to the Provincial, William Butler, that 'Fr. Cotter gives every promise of being by far the best missionary in Liberia so far. Praise is a dangerous thing, but he richly deserves it'.

He also mentioned that William had fever on three occasions, but that he had made a good recovery and was now enjoying excellent health. In November 1920 William was elected by his colleagues as councillor to the prefect. One of William's achievements during his first fourteen months in New Sasstown was to rebuild the church. In October 1921, with the transfer of Fr. Collins to Old Sasstown, William became superior at New Sasstown, where he was joined by a newly arrived young priest, Francis Joseph McGovern. After a few months Fr. McGovern was re assigned to the nearby mission of Betu, where he died of blackwater fever in March 1922. The previous September Denis O'Hara, another young missionary, stationed in Betu, had died of blackwater fever.

In June 1923 William went to Ireland on home leave. His superiors then appointed him as chaplain to the procure of the Irish Province at Ullet Road, Sefton Park, Liverpool, the house where confreres en route to, or returning from, Africa were accommodated. Two years later, in September 1925, William was appointed to teach in the Society's novitiate and house of philosophy, at Kilcolgan. In 1930 he took up an appointment in Wilton and the following year went to Manchester on pastoral work. In September 1933 William was assigned to Ballinafad where he spent the remaining years of his active ministry. Invalided in 1947, William retired in the mother house of the Irish Province, at Blackrock Road. William was a large, genial man, with a great command of English. He also was fluent in French. An excellent teacher (always known to his students as 'Plume' because of his emphasis on 'proper pronunciation' during his French classes), he was also much sought after as a preacher for novenas and missions.

He is buried in Wilton cemetery.