Southwestern New London and neighboring
Waterford became one parish in 1907 under Father William Fitzsimons,
with parishioners attending Saint Joseph Catholic Church on Montauk
Avenue and Squire Street.
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| St. Joseph Catholic
Church, c. 1913 |
In 1920 throngs of mourners attended
James O’Neill’s funeral mass at St. Joseph Catholic Church. Edward
D. White, former Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court and
longtime New London summer resident, was in attendance; as were theater
people from New York and delegations from many Irish and fraternal
organizations. To the consternation of the family, one of James’s two
surviving sisters, Mrs. Margaret Platz of Cincinnati, demanded that the
coffin be opened for one last look at her brother. After the funeral
Mrs. Platz called on Ella O’Neill to inquire about her husband’s
will. Upon learning that James O’Neill had left everything to his
widow, Mrs. Platz immediately departed for Ohio. In a letter dated
December 10, 1932, O’Neill told his friend Arthur McGinley, "The
Old Man and I got to be good friends and understood each other the
winter before he died. But in the days you speak of I was full of a
secret bitterness about him—not stopping to consider all he took from
me and kept on smiling" (Bogard and Bryer, SL, 408).
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