Fletcher, Father William J.

1988, April 14

Date of Birth: 1918, November 29

William Fletcher was born in Southington, Connecticut, on November 29, 1918. As a youth, he studied at St. Thomas Seminary, the minor seminary of the Diocese of Hartford. From St. Thomas’ he advanced to St. Mary’s Seminary from which he was ordained to the priesthood in 1944. As a Sulpician candidate he taught for the next year at St. Joseph’s College in Mountain View, California. In 1945 Father Fletcher entered the Solitude, then conducted in St. Mary’s on Paca Street. He returned in 1946 to St. Joseph’s where for two years he taught various minor seminary subjects. In 1948 he was assigned to Paca Street, to the Philosophy Department of St. Mary’s Seminary. He became a Sulpician in 1949 and served in several offices including that of Master of Ceremonies. In 1951 he went back to his native diocese. When Hartford became an archdiocese in 1953, Father Fletcher became a priest of the newly designated Diocese of Bridgeport. In the Hartford and Bridgeport dioceses he served in various parishes. In 1963 he was named pastor of St. Margaret Mary Church in Shelton, Connecticut. He retired from that position in 1968 to become an assistant professor in Sacred Heart University in Bridgeport. Father Fletcher died in a hospital in Fairfield, Connecticut on April 14, 1988.

Data supplied by Rev. John Bowen.