St. Philip the Apostle Catholic Church

Photographed By Duane and Tracy Marsteller, November 11, 2023

1. St. Philip the Apostle Catholic Church Markers

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Key Memorial Chapel (St. Philip's Roman Catholic Church), built in 1898, was the first Roman Catholic church in Iredell County and remains as one of the few nineteenth century religious structures in Statesville. …

Philip Barton Key was a native of Maryland and a grandnephew of Francis Scott Key. His wife was Anna Maria Washington Thornton, a great granddaughter of the niece of Martha Washington. Before moving to North Carolina Key had been a prosperous planter in Louisiana and had served as an officer in the Confederate Army. During the late nineteenth century Key became a prominent figure in Statesville commerce and industry, where liquor and tobacco had begun to play a large role in the economy. Statesville, in fact, had become a major shipping point for liquor, and Key took on a large part of this

Photographed By Duane and Tracy Marsteller, November 11, 2023

2. St. Philip the Apostle Catholic Church Markers

trade when he opened his wholesale liquor business, P. B. Key and Company, on February 1, 1883. In 1892 Key's company branched off into the tobacco business, and by 1896 the company had built one of Statesville's largest factories.

Key died in 1896. His wife, who at this time was a communicant of the Protestant Episcopal Church … sponsored the building of a small Roman Catholic Chapel in memory of her husband. Key had been raised in the Catholic faith. A lot was purchased on the southwest corner of Tradd and Sharpe streets across Sharpe Street from "Esperanza," the Keys' home. … In 1901 the chapel was dedicated.

Throughout its existence as a place of worship, the structure was known as St. Philip's. By mid-twentieth century the Roman Catholic population had grown to the point that a larger sanctuary was needed, and in 1956 the congregation left the chapel.