In the 1840s and 50s Rev. Thomas McClure Peters extended a missionary church in the racially integrated settlement of Seneca Village, demolished to make way for Central Park. In the 1850s the Rector's wife Mrs. William Richmond transformed the John McVickar house, formerly the center of a sixty-acre estate south of St. Michael's, for a Protestant Episcopal "home for abandoned women who found no hand outstretched to help them".
Rev. Thomas McClure Peters established a missionary church in Seneca Village, a racially integrated settlement that was later demolished to create Central Park. Mrs. William Richmond transformed the John McVickar house, formerly part of a large estate south of St. Michael's, into a Protestant Episcopal home for women who were homeless and lacked assistance.