His motto following the fire, Speramus meliora; resurget cineribus ("We hope for better things; it will arise from the ashes") is inscribed on the Seal of the City of Detroit.

He was the first Catholic priest elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as delegate of the Michigan Territory for the 18th Congress.

Richard refused to swear the oath and on April 2, he sailed from Le Havre on the ship named Reine des Coeurs (Queen of Hearts) for the United States.

He taught mathematics at St. Mary's Seminary in Baltimore, until being assigned by Bishop Carroll to do missionary work to the Indians in the Northwest Territory.

[4] South of Detroit, he met with Catholics along Maumee Bay, and along the Raisin, Huron, Ecorse, and Rouge River areas.

The Odawa believed deaths were retributions, either because Richard's religion was evil or that the Great Spirit was angered by the possibility of the natives accepting Catholicism.

[4][11] With his assistant pastor, Father Jean Dilhet, he ran separate schools for girls and boys beginning in 1804 and established a library for the church.

[4] This is when Gabriel Richard wrote the city of Detroit's motto: Speramus meliora; resurget cineribus;[7] In English: "We hope for better things; it will arise from the ashes.

[4][13] He arranged for funding from Washington, D.C., and, with other leaders, created a new city plan for the streets in Detroit, including Jefferson and Michigan Avenues.

He was released when the Shawnee chief Tecumseh, despite his hatred for the Americans, refused to fight for the British while Richard was imprisoned.

[4] Richard helped negotiate the Treaty of Fort Meigs in which the lands of Native Americans in the Ohio River valley and the lower Great Lakes—including the Odawa, Potawatomi, and Chippewa—were ceded to the United States government.

[4] Together with Chief Justice Augustus B. Woodward, Richard was a co-founder of the Catholepistemiad (which would later be renamed the University of Michigan), authorized by the legislature in 1817.

[15] On September 13, 1832, after assisting cholera victims during an epidemic, Gabriel Richard died in Detroit.

[1] In 1937, The Michigan Catholic said that Richard had a remarkable career that has made him one of the outstanding pioneer priests of America.

The history of the Catholic Church in Michigan for the next thirty years was practically identified with the life and labors of this tall, gaunt priest and citizen who literally wore himself out in the service of his community.

At a time when we in the Archdiocese are coming to a renewed awareness of our missionary vocation, I am grateful that we are able to raise up Fr.

"[24] The purpose of the guild is to determine if there is sufficient "heroic virtue or holiness worth promoting" by the church's archbishop and other bishops in Michigan.