Did priests ever ordain other priests?

Pohle-Preuss, The Sacraments: A Dogmatic Treatise (vol. 4): Extreme Unction, Holy Orders, Matrimony, pt. 2, ch. 3, thesis 2, (b):

b) The question whether ordinary priests can, with proper authorization, confer major orders, has been answered differently by theologians at various periods in the Church’s history.

That a priest can under no circumstances validly ordain a bishop is conceded by all. But can he be empowered to confer the priesthood? Aureolus,²⁹ Morinus,³⁰ and others answered this question in the affirmative. They based their opinion on a passage in St. Leo’s letter to Bishop Rusticus of Narbonne,³¹ in which the major orders conferred by certain “pseudo bishops” are declared under certain conditions to be valid.³² The passage in question is rather obscure. The “pseudo bishops” to whom the Pope refers were probably priests or deacons who had received episcopal consecration uncanonically,³³ though validly.

Morinus attaches great importance to the fact that the priesthood was often conferred by so-called chorepiscopi, who, it is claimed, were not true bishops, but mere “country bishops” after the manner of rural deans or archpriests. But we know from the proceedings of a council held at Antioch, in 341, that at least some of these dignitaries were real bishops, resembling in rank and functions our auxiliary bishops.³⁴

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29. Comment. in Sent., IV, dist. 25, art. 1.
30. De Sacr. Ordin., P. III, exerc. 4, c. 3 sqq.
31. Ep., 167, 1.
32. Cfr. Schanz, Die Lehre von den hl. Sakramenten, p. 692.
33. Cfr. the above-quoted letter of Leo the Great, Ep. 167, 1: “Nulla ratio sinit, ut inter episcopos habeantur, qui nec a clericis sunt electi nec a plebibus expetiti nec a provincialibus episcopis cum metropolitani iudicio consecrati.”
34. Cfr. Labbe, Concil., Vol. II, p. 577.

If it is possible, it is almost impossible to state something never happend. So either there is an account of it happening, and then we know it happend, or it can be proven it cannot have happend, and then we know it did not happen. If neither is possible, we just don’t know, but as humans are rather good in not following rules, there is a big chance it happend even if it was illegal.

I cannot help you on an account of it happening. I also cannot prove, without trust in the continuity of the faith I belong to, that it never was possible.

But if you accept as fact what I accept in faith, that the Roman Catholic faith may develop over time, but may not “invent” something new besides what is given to the Church by Jesus Christ, it would be enough to establish if a priest can ordain a priest now. I stress “can”, because as I said, if he can but may not, one must assume it has happend sometime in history.

If I take the Catechism of the Catholic Church by the letter, my interpretation would be: a priest cannot ordain a priest, as it says:

1576 Since the sacrament of Holy Orders is the sacrament of the apostolic ministry, it is for the bishops as the successors of the apostles to hand on the "gift of the Spirit," The "apostolic line." Validly ordained bishops, i.e., those who are in the line of apostolic succession, validly confer the three degrees of the sacrament of Holy Orders.

One could argue that “validly” is a legal term, not a theological one. In canon law you will find that a lot is regulated in terms of “is to be”, so a rule that may not but can be broken. But when the codex states who is the minister of ordination, there is no statement of what must happen, just a simple statement of how it is:

Can. 1012 The minister of sacred ordination is a consecrated bishop.

Until I hear a better argument, I would conclude that the ordination of a priest by anyone other than a bishop simply isn’t possible. If that is true, even if in history someone claimed to be ordained a priest by a priest, it still didn’t happen.

(source: website of the Vatican)