The Vicar Apostolic of the London District was the title given to the bishop who headed an ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Roman Catholic Church in England, the Vicariate Apostolic of the London District, from 1688 to 1850.
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Background
Soon after the accession of Queen Elizabeth I, in 1559, the bishops of England were forced to choose between taking the Oath of Supremacy, thus denying the authority of the Pope, and losing their episcopal sees. Those who chose to continue their allegiance to Rome were subsequently deposed and replaced in their sees by priests of the Church of England. Most of the deposed Bishops were imprisoned in various locations and died in captivity over a period of years, though some left the country and continued their work overseas. The last of the deposed bishops was Thomas Goldwell, Bishop of St Asaph, who died in Rome on April 3, 1585.
Apostolic Vicariate of England
In 1623, after 65 years of formal absence from England, the Pope Urban VIII, decided once again to appoint a bishop with actual jurisdiction in England. His choice fell upon William Bishop, who was given the title of Apostolic Vicar of England. Bishop landed secretly in England at midnight on 31 July 1623, but was to die only nine months later.
Bishop was succeeded in office by Richard Smith, also ordained a bishop, who arrived in England in April 1625. However, two warrants were issued for Smith's arrest in August 1631, and he was forced to resign and flee to France, where he eventually died in Paris in 1655. After 1631, there was no Roman Catholic bishop in England for another 54 years, and the void was to some extent filled by a dean and chapter of rather unsure legal status, first established by Bishop and confirmed by Smith.
It was only in 1685 that a successor was appointed by Rome, in the person of John Leyburn, a Doctor of Divinity of the Sorbonne and a former President of the English College at Douai, who was consecrated bishop in Rome on 9 September 1685. In 1623, Bishop had divided England into six areas, at the head of each of which he placed a superior with the title of vicar general, and this had remained the system thereafter. Leyburn reduced these six areas to four. In the summer of 1687 he toured the North of England and confirmed over 20,000 Catholics there.
Apostolic Vicariate of the London District
On 20 January 1688, the number of bishops in England was increased by the Pope to four apostolic vicars, as a result of which at the same time the territory of the former single apostolic vicariate was reduced, being centred still on London, with the title of Apostolic Vicariate of the London District. The first such Vicar Apostolic, from 30 January 1688, was Bishop John Leyburn, who had previously since 24 August 1685 served as Vicar Apostolic of All England and Wales.
Although the vicariates as a whole were later more finely divided over the years, and notwithstanding intermittent persecution, a Vicariate Apostolic of the London District continued in existence until on 29 September 1850 Pope Pius IX issued the bull Universalis Ecclesiae, by which thirteen new dioceses were created, among them the Archdiocese of Westminster, a new jurisdiction which formally replaced the previous vicariate.
The last Apostolic Vicar of the London District was Bishop Nicholas Wiseman (d. 1865), who on 29 September 1850 was assigned the title of Metropolitan Archbishop of Westminster. The following day he was created a cardinal. The district ended to be missionary territory and exempt, its prelate becoming the head of the new English ecclesiastical province.