Founded in 1829, St. Columban's Church was the first Roman Catholic Church to be established in Cornwall. Formed originally to meet the spiritual needs of a few, mainly Scottish families in Cornwall, the parish grew with the arrival of Irish canal workers in the 1830s and then again with the influx of French-Canadians who came to work in the textile industries in the 1880s. The cultural composition of the parish therefore reflected the changes occurring in the town during the 19th century and until 1887 when the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary was opened on Montreal Road.