1873
The Red Sea
“What the building of this sanctuary cost him in cares and fatigues, God alone knows,” wrote his chronicler — and a sharper pain came to him afterwards. On the very day the people took possession of their new church, the congregation broke apart. The quarrel went to law, and Fr Grégoire, who had given seventeen years to the building, was obliged to stand up in court and give evidence against a part of his own flock. It made him lose his eating and his sleeping. His strength never came back, and they sent him home to France to see whether it would. Fr Victor Delpech went with him. The ship had just entered the Red Sea when the delirium declared itself; at six the next morning he opened his eyes and could not speak. Delpech anointed him, and about two in the afternoon he gave his soul back to God, after thirty years a missionary. Seventeen of them had gone into this church. It has stood now a century and a half.
In English
"P.S. Poor Fr Grégoire is suffering greatly! ... He will probably leave for France. He will need a travelling companion; and perhaps Jesus will choose you for that office of charity... I know nothing definite yet: be in God's hands without reserve and with happiness." Dessal adds: "what delicacy, in preparing his correspondent for a journey he dreaded more than death, because it would separate him from the Maduré, from souls, from suffering!"
What this source establishes
How Fr Delpech came to be on that ship. Fr Verdier, superior of the mission, writes to him from Tuticorin on 27 August 1873 and closes with a postscript wondering whether Jesus will choose him for "that office of charity". He was chosen, and three weeks later he was anointing Fr Gregoire in the Red Sea. ⭐ THIS PAGE ALSO DATES THE VOYAGE AND KILLS A PHANTOM MISMATCH: a letter of 27 August 1873 saying "he will probably leave for France... I know nothing definite yet" cannot be the run-up to a death in 1875. Dessal's footnote at p.166 prints "le 19 septembre 1873" -- read off the scan itself, 26 Jul 2026. The "1875" this site published for months was OUR OCR error (the extraction reads "18715"), never Dessal's reading. Mismatch A8 is dissolved, not adjudicated. NOTE: dot 7 still anchors that p.166 footnote, so both pages stay openable. The one real divergence left is WHO sent him: Dessal's footnote says "sur l'avis des medecins", Auguste Jean says he accepted his superiors' invitation -- which is why the prose says only "they sent him home".