A Mystery Admirer??

[L Verge]

That's basically how the RUMORS went. Of course, we have no proof of such an involvement. There are a series of letters that Mary wrote to Fr. Finotti after he was reassigned to Boston. In those letters, she does complain about her husband (and they are pretty whining letters, IMO). I do not remember ever seeing any letters back to her from the priest.

In assessing those letters and the personal relationship, I think one has to take into account the bonds that many parishioners form with their priests - especially in earlier years when one's social life in rural areas was somewhat lacking in close friends to whom one could confide. What we read as "personal" today may not have been meant in that way then.

Elizabeth Trindal did extensive research on Fr. Finotti and his family when writing An American Tragedy. They were a very upstanding family. His older brother, Gustavus, migrated with his family to this area also. When Fr. Joseph was sent to Massachusetts, a delegation from St. Ignatius Church here traveled to the Provincial of Jesuits to beg for his transfer to be cancelled. When that didn't work, they went to Baltimore to ask for the intervention of Archbishop Kenrick.

Fr. Finotti also wrote an unpublished manuscript in which he shows his displeasure in the way he was treated by the Church. He had hoped to be sent back to Italy, stating in his memoirs that he had had "enough of America at that point."