There, he made several discoveries of significant, forgotten holdings in the Jesuit archives, which improved historians' knowledge of the early European settling of Maryland and of the language of Indian tribes there.

He then briefly became the president of Georgetown College in 1837, and was simultaneously made provincial superior for a second time in 1839, despite suffering illness to which he would succumb several months later.

[2] While in Rome, McSherry discovered in the Jesuit archives the previously forgotten Relatio Itineris by Andrew White, which is the most comprehensive account of the journey of the Ark and the Dove, and published it.

[10] He spent time at the Pontifical Gregorian University,[11] before being appointed the minister of the literary and medical colleges of the Collegio del Carmine in Turin,[11] whose rector was Jan Roothaan,[2] where he remained from 1826 to 1828.

[16] From October 1831 to June 1832, he was appointed the socius (assistant) to Peter Kenney, who was the apostolic visitor to the Jesuits in St. Louis and the Missouri Valley.

This request was granted on August 28, and McSherry set sail for Rome from New York City so he could receive instructions on how to establish the new province.

[10] He officially assumed the position on July 8, 1833,[19] but was soon confronted with a considerable debt that Georgetown College had accrued, as well as disciplinary issues within the institution.

In order to support them, McSherry unsuccessfully sought to obtain the Superior General's approval to sell some of the Jesuits' land and farms in 1835,[24] which totaled 13,500 acres (5,500 hectares) across Maryland by 1837.

[29] The financial concerns become acute due to the increasing unprofitability of the farms and the growing debt accrued by Georgetown's recent construction projects.

[30] After the leadership returned a vote of six to four in favor of sale, the Superior General Jan Roothaan approved the transaction on October 27, 1836, on the condition that the purchasers guarantee the right of the slaves to practice their Catholic faith, that their families not be separated, and that those who were old or ill be allowed to remain with the Jesuits and be cared for.

[39] In 1839, Roothaan ordered McSherry to suspend Mulledy from his duties as provincial superior due to fallout over the slave sale scandal.

After Mulledy left to answer to the authorities in Rome, the Maryland Jesuits elected McSherry, who was still the president of Georgetown, provincial superior for a second time.