Immigration to the Batesville area peaked in the mid 1800s' and the new country began to shape the lives of the immigrants just as they transformed the countryside.
The railroad made its appearance in this region in 1853. New towns sprang up along the route. Batesville was platted in 1852, Spades was established in 1855. Sunman was plated in 1856. Springfield was re-named Morris and platted in 1858.
Oldenburg had become a center for Catholic faith and missions in southeastern Indiana. In 1851 a convent was established at Oldenburg, and in 1866 the Franciscan fathers established a friary in what was the old stone church which remains standing today.
Three of the most notable priests in this region were Father Joseph Ferneding from Ihorst, Holdorf Parish, Oldenburg, Germany; Father Franz Joseph Rudolph from Bettenheim, Alsace; and Father Xavier Weninger from Auatria.
Father Ferneding was the first pastor of St. Paul's Church at New Alsace, and he established many of the Catholic Churches in southeastern Indiana. Father Rudolph was the priest at Oldenburg from 1844 to 1866 during which time Oldenburg deveooped into a Catholic center. Father Weninger began his missionary career at Oldenburg, the first of over 800 missions he held throughout America.
Among the churches established in this area was St. Joseph's at St. Leon in 1841, although for while it remained part of Dover Parish. St. Anthony's Church at present day, Morris was built in 1856. Missions were established at Enochsburg in 1844, St. Maurice in 1859, and Hamburg in 1869, St. Louis Church in Batesville had its beginning in 1870.
The history of the establishment of the early Catholic churches has been well documented in a history entitled "Growth and Development of the Western Missions of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati" written by Sister Dorothea Marie Bockhorst. It is available at the Batesville Public Library.
A variety of Protestant churches were established in the area as well. The predominant faith among Protestant Germans was either Lutheran or Evengelical Protestant. However, both the Baptists and Methodists made in roads into their numbers. A good example of these relations among Protestant churches is found in the Sunman vicinity.
St. Paul's United Methodist Congregation was established south of Sunman in the early 1830's primarily by families of English descent. It met in houses and schools around Clinton until a church was built at its present site, two miles south of Sunman in 1870.
In 1858 the Sunman community erected the first church building in the Town of Sunman. It was a brick church which was open to all denominations and was also used as a town hall.