Archdiocese ; comprises Essex, Middlesex, Suffolk, Norfolk, and
Plymouth counties in the State of Massachusetts, U.S.A., the
towns of Mattapoisett, Marion, and Wareham excepted, embracing
an area of 2,465 square miles. The see was erected 8 April,
1808, and created an archbishopric in 1875. When the first
Bishop of Boston was consecrated his jurisdiction extended over
all New England and a mere handful of Catholics. There are now
eight dioceses in the same territory with about 2,100,000
Catholics of whom 850,000 are within the limits of the
Archdiocese of Boston where the first bishop found a scant
hundred. The growth of the Church has been due mainly to the
immigrants attracted by the advantages offered by the great and
varied manufacturing interests of New England. The Irish came
first, after them the French Canadians, the Italians, the Poles,
the Portuguese, and representatives of nearly all the peoples of
the globe. Early Irish emigration to America took place in three
distinct periods, from 1621 to 1653,