was retired but continued to help out on occasion at St. Paul’s), with the number of operating churches at nineteen.

Bishop Binney was sincere in his belief that the future of the Church of England on the Island depended a great deal upon the type of Episcopal oversight it received. He faithfully visited the Island every three years to confirm candidates, visit his Priests, consecrate churches, and to stay informed and in touch with the people of the Island church. By 1860 the church had grown sufliciently that Bishop Binney felt justified in erecting the Island into an archdeaconry by authority of his Letters Patent. The Reverend John Herbert Read, Rector of St. Eleanors and Barrett’s Cross (now known as Kensington) and the Ecclesiastical Commissary for the Island, was appointed as Archdeacon of Prince Edward Island.

A Report by Bishop Binney to the S.P.G. offices in England in 1860 concerning the state of the church on P.E.I. indicates both the good intentions of the bishop and his realistic appraisal of the situation as it existed. He pointed out some of the drawbacks experienced to the growth and extension of the church in the Province, while stressing the need for continued financial support:

You are aware that the settlers are generally very poor and it so happens that the class of English settlers in the Island is generally inferior to the Scotch so that the Church people are less able to contribute to the supply of their spiritual necessities than the Presbyterians. The Island belongs generally to proprietors of large tracts who say in consequence of taxes and inability to obtain payment of rents they derive little benefit from their property while at the same time the tenants care little about improving what is not their own. For this and other reasons I fear that it will be very long before the Church can be self supporting in PE. Island. 20

Despite the economic hardships which they faced, churchmen on the Island understood that in order to maintain the position of the Church of England as the ‘established’ denomination, and in order to encourage and facilitate an expansion of the Church of England on P.E.I., it was necessary to push for their own Island Bishopric. This development was provided for under the existing Letters Patent of their Bishop, Hibbert Binney.

As the desire for an Island Diocese increased, direction for the movement naturally gravitated toward the largest centre of population, Charlottetown. St. Paul’s Parish Church assumed the role of providing Island-

38. Correspondence of Bishop H. Binney to the S.P.G. 1860. Extract from Glen Kent’s Thesis, a biography of Bishop Binney, MA. University of New Brunswick. Copy in the Diocesan Archives of Nova Scotia.

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