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Thomas Atkinson (bishop)
Thomas Atkinson (August 6, 1807 – January 4, 1881) was the third Episcopal Bishop of North Carolina. Early lifeAtkinson was born in Dinwiddie County, Virginia,[1] the son of Robert Atkinson and Mary Tabb Mayo Atkinson.[2] He attended Yale University and Hampden-Sydney College, graduating from the latter in 1825.[1] Upon graduation, he studied law under Judge Henry St. George Tucker at Winchester Law School and practiced law for eight years before turning to theology.[3] In January 1828, he married Josepha Gwinn Wilder, with whom he had three children.[4] Parish ministryAtkinson was ordained deacon by the Rt. Rev. William Meade on November 18, 1836, and ordained priest the following year.[1] As deacon, Atkinson served as assistant minister at Christ Church in Norfolk, Virginia.[1] After his ordination to the priesthood, he became rector of St. Paul's Church in Norfolk.[1] In 1839, he moved to Lynchburg to become rector of St. Paul's Church in that town, remaining there for five years.[1] In 1843, Atkinson moved again, to Maryland, where he became the rector of St. Peter's Church in Baltimore.[5] In 1843 and 1846, he was elected bishop of Indiana, declining the honor both times.[6] In 1852, he became rector of Grace Church in the same city,[5] a new parish organized, in part, by members of St. Peter's.[7] Bishop of North CarolinaAtkinson was elected Bishop of North Carolina on May 28, 1853, following the resignation of Bishop Ives in December the previous year.[8] He was consecrated on October 17, 1853, by Bishops Thomas Church Brownell, Charles Pettit McIlvaine, George Washington Doane, James Hervey Otey, George Trevor Spencer, and John Medley.[5] Atkinson became the 58th bishop in the Episcopal Church.[9] As bishop, Atkinson founded a church school for boys in Raleigh and the Ravenscroft School in Asheville.[10] He urged the religious instruction of slaves.[11] Initially opposing secession,[citation needed] after the American Civil War began, Bishop Atkinson affiliated with the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Confederate States of America.[12] After the war, in 1866, Atkinson recommended placing the operation of black Episcopal churches fully in the hands of black clergymen, and the Diocesan Convention passed a series of resolutions doing so.[13] Two years later, he opened the Episcopal school for blacks near Raleigh that eventually became St. Augustine's College.[14] In 1867, he attended the first Lambeth Conference at Lambeth Palace.[15] As his health declined, Atkinson requested the election of an assistant bishop, and Theodore Benedict Lyman was elected to that position in 1873.[16] Atkinson died on January 4, 1881, at his home in Wilmington; he was buried on January 7 within St. James Episcopal Church in Wilmington, North Carolina.[17] The Episcopal Church of the Holy Comforter in Charlotte is the memorial church of Bishop Thomas Atkinson.  Notes
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