Skip to main content

Bishop Medley Book Collection

The Bishop Medley Book Collection (HIL-SPECBM) was a theological library unique in the Maritimes containing over 3700 items ranging from the 16th to the late 19th century, including Tractarian publications, histories of the church, commentaries and sermons, Greek and Hebrew texts, and books related to music that contain Medley’s own annotations. The collection also features fine examples of book bindings. The reconstructed library is more accurately described as a mix of the Christ Church Cathedral Library and Medley’s private collection where A Catalogue of the Books in the Library of the Cathedral Church of Fredericton, 1853 was used to guide the reconstruction.1

Bishop John Medley (1804 – 1892) was an Oxford-educated Tractarian, and the first Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Fredericton, consecrated in 1845.2 With well-developed interests in ecclesiology and music, he helped shape Fredericton as a cultural center of the region through architectural projects, such as Fredericton's St. Anne's Chapel of Ease and Christ Church Cathedral, and mentorship of local educators and writers. Medley had a formative influence on Charles G.D. Roberts, Bliss Carman, and their local circle of writers by shaping their “cultural milieu.”3 Medley’s library facilitates the study of the books that influenced his views and those in his orbit, such as the educator George Robert Parkin.4 Literary scholars situate Medley as a leading figure who contributed to what Charles G. D. Roberts described as Fredericton’s “strange aesthetic ferment” during the last quarter of the 19th century.5 Medley’s library inevitably played a role in this “ferment.” David Russell Jack, an early 20th-century local historian, editor, and publisher of Acadiensis, has noted the dispersal of 19th-century private libraries in the Maritimes, which highlights the unique status of this collection.6 Comparisons with other theological libraries from this period may be fruitful. One potential point of comparison, mentioned by Jack, is the private library of Medley’s successor, Bishop Kingdon, currently held at King’s College, Halifax.

The project to reconstruct the Medley Library began in the mid-1990s under the auspices of the Diocese of Fredericton’s archives and the Legislative Library.7 In 2015, the Medley Library was formally transferred to the care of UNB's Archives & Special Collections.8 Reconstruction efforts were greatly aided by the discovery of a Daily Gleaner article from August 6, 1904, that included a detailed donation account of Medley’s books by his widow and the bookplate that was inserted in each book: “From the library of the late Most Rev. John Medley, D.D., Bishop of Fredericton and Metropolitan of Canada. Presented to … By Mrs. Medley."9 The plate has facilitated the process of book identification and helped to distinguish between the Cathedral Library and Medley’s private library. The article also clarified the location of the books: the bulk were donated to the Christ Church Cathedral Library (1,500 volumes) and the rest were distributed to the six Deaneries of the Diocese (Chatham, Kingston, Shediac, St. Andrews, St. John, and Woodstock: 150-200 volumes).10 Despite these clues, the long time-frame of the search (a century after Medley’s death), and the dispersal of the books, challenged the reconstruction efforts.11

Medley’s interest in books is not only evident from his development of the Cathedral library and his own, but also his support of numerous parish libraries and his expectation that clergy regularly report to him on their status.12 Books from his private library likely blended with those in the Cathedral Library, which was an annual subscription library for clergy, but perhaps also for the community.13 Borrowers benefited from this mixing. For example, the British writer Juliana Horatia Ewing describes subscribing to the Cathedral Library and borrowing books from both Medley as well as the Cathedral.14 In her description of Medley, Ewing writes, “He buys books, evidently with an appetite, and will lend us any!!!"15 There were many donors to this collection; it contains a variety of bookplates, booksellers’ labels, and signatures of previous owners that will facilitate future donor identification. Major donors included the editors of the Library of Anglo-Catholic Theology, the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, and Dr. Thomas Bray’s Associates.16 Surviving circulation ledgers may also help in the identification of borrowers.

Though the collection has been inventoried in a spreadsheet, it is not yet discoverable in UNB WorldCat.

  • 1Christ Church Cathedral Library, A Catalogue of the Books in the Library of the Cathedral Church of Fredericton, 1853 (Fredericton, NB, J. Simpson, 1853), cited in [Pat Belier], “Bishop Medley and Books and the Medley Library” (n.d. [1994]), 10, unpublished speech draft, Medley Donor File. UNB A&SC.
  • 2Lyman Harding, “John Medley,” in Citizens with the Saints: A Brief History of Anglicanism in New Brunswick (Diocesan Synod of Fredericton, 1994), https://nb.anglican.ca/citizens-with-the-saints/pages/citizens-with-the-saints--155; Malcolm Ross, “Medley, John,” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 12, (University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–), accessed July 10, 2023, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/medley_john_12E.html; Tony Tremblay, “John Medley,” in New Brunswick Literary Encyclopedia, accessed July 6, 2023, https://nble.lib.unb.ca/browse/m/john-medley.
  • 3Thomas Hodd, “The Fredericton Confederation Awakening, 1843-1900,” New Brunswick at the Crossroads: Literary Ferment and Social Change in the East, ed. Anthony Tremblay (Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurie University Press, 2017), 74; Malcolm Ross, “A Strange Aesthetic Ferment,” in The Impossible Sum of Our Traditions (Toronto ON: McClelland & Stewart, 1986), 27-42.
  • 4Ross, “A Strange Aesthetic Ferment,” 27-42; Stacy McCarthy, “Sir George Robert Parkin” in New Brunswick Literary Encyclopedia, accessed July 6, 2023, https://nble.lib.unb.ca/browse/p/sir-george-robert-parkin.
  • 5Ross, “A Strange Aesthetic Ferment,” 27, 29; Hodd, The Fredericton Confederation Awakening, 1843-1900,” 74, 77.
  • 6David Russell Jack, “The Bestowal of Private Libraries,” Acadiensis 7, no. 4 (1907), 307-313, mentioned in [Belier], “Bishop Medley.”
  • 7Eric Swanick to Pat Belier, email correspondence, June 10, 1998, Medley Donor File. UNB A&SC.
  • 8Medley Collection Donation Agreement, June 15, 2015, Medley Donor File; Diocesan Synod of Fredericton, Minutes of the Meeting of Diocesan Council, (St. Andrews Church, Parish of Nelson, Miramichi, NB, April 22, 2015, adopted June 20, 2015). https://tinyurl.com/mupaz3hj
  • 9“Bishop Medley’s Library,” Daily Gleaner (Fredericton, NB), August 6, 1904, cited in Mark Lewis, “Bishop John Medley’s Library: The Reconstruction,” The New Brunswick Anglican (Summer 1998), 9; also cited in Mark Lewis, “Medley Library Research Project,” unpublished report (August 27, 1997), likely produced for The Legislative Library of New Brunswick, Medley Donor File. UNB A&SC. 
  • 10“Bishop Medley’s Library,” Daily Gleaner (Fredericton, NB), August 6, 1904; Lewis, “Medley Library Research Project,” 3-4.
  • 11Solange DeSantis, “Search for Medley’s books moves slowly,” Anglican Journal (Oct. 1, 2000), http://www.anglicanjournal.com/articles/search-for-medleys-books-moves-slowly-1016.
  • 12John Medley, "Two Ordination Sermons, Preached in Christ Church Cathedral" (Fredericton, N.B.: John Simpson, Printer to the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, 1846), 21, accessed July 13, 2023, https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.36829; John Medley, "A Charge to the Clergy of the Diocese" (Fredericton, N.B.: Queen's Printer, 1853) 2, 11, accessed July 13, 2023, https://digitalarchive.tpl.ca/
    people/55741/medley-john-18041892/objects; John Medley, "A Charge Delivered in Christ-Church Cathedral, Fredericton, September 13, 1865, at the Triennial Visitation" (Saint John, N.B.: Wm. M. Wright, Despatch Printing and Publishing Office, 1865), 23-24, accessed July 13, 2023, https://digitalarchive.tpl.ca/people/55741/medley-john-18041892/objects; for parish spending on books, see Annual Reports of the Diocesan Church Society of New Brunswick, accessed July 13, 2023, https://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupname?
    key=Diocesan%20Church%20Society%20of%20New%20Brunswick; [Belier], “Bishop Medley,” 6-9.
  • 13See the list of rules for the subscription library in A Catalogue of the Books in the Library of the Cathedral Church of Fredericton, 1853. https://unb.on.worldcat.org/oclc/890810401
  • 14Juliana Horatia Ewing to her mother, letter, August 17, 1867, in Juliana Horatia Ewing, Canada Home: Juliana Horatia Ewing's Fredericton Letters, 1867-1869, eds. Thomas E. Blom, Margaret Howard Blom (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1983), 32-33, cited in [Belier], “Bishop Medley,” 3-4.
  • 15Ewing to her mother, letter, August 17, 1867, in Ewing, Canada Home: Juliana Horatia Ewing's Fredericton Letters, 1867-1869, 32.
  • 16[Belier], “Bishop Medley,” 8, 13-14.