St. Francis Xavier Cathedral

The parish church of Saint Francis went up in 1817. During the Civil War, it was the only building in Alexandria the Union army spared. As Federal troops pulled out during the Red River Campaign, Father J. P. Bellier disguised his voice to impersonate General Nathaniel Banks and ordered the soldiers to leave the church alone. It worked. The building burned down in 1895. The foundation stone for a replacement went down December 3 that year. Nicholas J. Clayton, a nationally prominent architect, designed it in Gothic Revival — the first brick church in the city. It was dedicated November 30, 1899. A belfry was added in 1907, a clock in 1908. Bishop Cornelius Van de Ven petitioned Rome to move the diocesan seat from Natchitoches to Alexandria. On August 6, 1910, Pope Pius X changed the title to Diocese of Alexandria and designated St. Francis Xavier as cathedral. The complex added to the National Register in 1984 includes the cathedral, St. Francis Academy from 1897, and the rectory built in 1896. The rose windows are the largest in Louisiana. A three-manual, forty-eight-rank Reuterpipe organ was inaugurated in 2004. What Father Bellier saved by impersonation, fire took seventy-eight years later. What fire took, they rebuilt in brick and made a cathedral.