Patrick Richard Heffron

Patrick Richard Heffron (June 1, 1860 – November 23, 1927) was the second Roman Catholic bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Winona, in Winona, Minnesota.^[1]

He was born in New York City. He was ordained a Roman Catholic priest for what is now the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis. On March 4, 1910, Pope Pius X appointed him Bishop of the Winona Diocese; he died in 1927 while still bishop.^[2]

On the morning of 27 August 1915, he was shot twice while celebrating private mass by a disgruntled priest named Laurence M. Lesches, who after many reassignments had demanded a parish of his own and had been turned down because of his arrogant behavior and emotional instability.^[3] Heffron survived, but the paranoid Lesches was committed to an insane asylum where he remained until his death in 1943.^[4] This incident, which was followed by accidental deaths among some of Heffron's acquaintances, is the explanation given for the supposed haunting of Heffron Hall by Lesches.^[5]

References

1. "The History of the DIOCESE OF WINONA". Diocese of Winona. Retrieved 22 July 2011.
2. Cheney, David. "Bishop Patrick Richard Heffron". Catholic-Hierarchy.org. Retrieved 22 July 2011.
3. Ehrlick, Darrell (2008). It Happened in Minnesota. Kearney, Nebraska: Morris Book Publishing. p. 73 - 75. ISBN 9780762743322.
4. "Answer Man: Winona bishop survived 1915 shooting". Post Bulletin (Rochester, Minnesota). September 4, 2015. Retrieved September 4, 2015.
5. Michael Norman. The Nearly Departed. Minnesota Historical Society, 2009.