In the absence of episcopal visitations from the bishop of Virginia, Bishop William White of Pennsylvania consecrated St. Matthew's Episcopal Church in Wheeling, West Virginia as the nineteenth century began. By 1851, Episcopalians in the northwestern mountain counties petitioned Bishop William Meade of Virginia to provide the mountain region its own bishop. Meade demurred even though he had previously founded St. John's Episcopal Church, Charleston, in 1837, and serviced these parishes both while affiliated with Christ Church, Winchester, and later as assistant bishop of Virginia. When John Johns became his assistant bishop, he likewise conducted periodic visitations into the western counties of Virginia. However, with the outbreak of the American Civil War, episcopal visitations ceased. In 1863, shortly before West Virginia's incorporation as a state, St. Matthew's Church, Wheeling, asked permission for another bishop to visit the parish, but like his predecessor, Bishop Johns demurred, asking instead for a safe-conduct to visit the area, which he did not obtain.