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- The Troy Record, Monday Morning, September 9, 1963
Rev. H.J. Bessette’s Funeral Tomorrow (Picture included)
The Office of the Dead will be chanted at 4 p.m. today for Rev. Harvey J. Bessette, pastor of St. Jean Baptiste Church, who died about 1 p.m. Saturday at the rectory. He had been ill since last winter.
The funeral will be held tomorrow at 11 a.m. when the Most Rev. William A. Scully, D.D. Bishop of the Albany Catholic Diocese will offer a Solemn Pontifical Requiem Mass. Interment will be in St. Jean’s Cemetery.
Rev. Lionel A. Guillaume, pastor of Notre Dame des Victories, Whitehall, will give the eulogy. Officers of the Mass will be friends of Father Bessette.
Father Bessette had been a priest for 40 years. He had been pastor of St. Jean’s since 1941 and before that was assistant pastor of the church.
A native of Waterford, he was the son of the late Mr. and Mrs. Charles H. Bessette. He was educated in St. Ann’s School, Waterford and St. Joseph’s College at Three Rivers, Canada where he received his degree in 1911.
He completed his studies for the priesthood at the House of Philosophy and Grand Seminary in Montreal.
His ordination took place at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Albany, on May 26, 1923. The ordaining prelate was Most Rev. Edmund F. Gibbons, D.D., now retired.
After ordination he served as assistant pastor at Lake George, Glens Falls, Cohoes and Granville churches before coming to Troy as an assistant in February 1935.
In 1950 he celebrated his 25th anniversary as pastor of St. Jean’s Church and was given a testimonial dinner by his parishioners and friends.
A 4th degree member of the Knights of Columbus, Father Bessette is survived by four brothers, Albert J. and Ernest J. Bessette of Waterford, Arthur J. Bessette of Troy and Clarence J. Bessette of Lake Charles, La., and one sister, Maj. Anita Bessette with the Naval Hospital at Camp Mead, Md.
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Bassett Family Association Database
- 1963