Br. Colmas Eadbert

Peter Joseph Sinnott was born on November 29, 1863, in Johnstown, Ireland. At age ten, he and his family emigrated to and settled in New York where he attended the Brothers' school in Brooklyn. In 1881, at age eighteen, he sought admission to the Novitiate at Westchester, N.Y., where he received the habit of the Brothers and the religious name of Brother Colmas Eadbert. His first teaching assignment took him to St. Joseph's School in New York where he taught from 1882 to 1886. His next assignment took him to Newburg where he expressed a desire to serve in the missions of India. He was sent instead to Canada where he taught in Quebec. The work of his students' calligraphy won many awards at the Exposition in Chicago in 1893. He returned to the US in 1894 to teach at Burlington, Vermont. In 1895 a new community was founded in Havana, Cuba, and he was one of the founding Brothers there, but a revolution put a quick end to his stay. He returned to New York where he was named Director of the Community at St. Joseph's in New York City. Brother Colmas showed signs of tuberculosis and was sent to Santa Fe to recover. While there he taught catechism to young Native American children. He showed no signs of recovery and was granted permission to return home to Amawalk. He died there in 1899 at the age of thirty-six, having been a De La Salle Christian Brother for eighteen years.