INTRODUCTION - The Sisters of Mercy

The Order of the Sisters of Mercy was founded in the early years of the nineteenth century by Mother Catherine McAuley whose strong affinity with the poor, deprived and uneducated of Ireland gave her the desire to found an organisation devoted to the social enrichment of any who needed help. In doing so she was very advanced for her time.

Catherine McAuley was born in Dublin in 1781 into a prosperous Catholic family. Her parents died when she was a child and she went to live with an uncle. She eventually moved to the home of Mr and Mrs Callaghan, wealthy family friends. When they died she inherited their estate. With the proceeds she built a house in Baggot Street in Dublin where Catholic children could be educated and homeless young women housed, but soon she and her companions were also nursing the sick in their homes and visiting them in public hospitals.

At this time, although devout, she had no intention of forming a religious congregation but of having only a community of lay women. In 1828 the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Daniel Murray, permitted her to call the home in Baggot Street the House of Mercy.

Dr Murray and two priests, Father Edward Armstrong and Father Michael Blake, persuaded her that the work would be better advanced and supported if she became a nun and founded a leligious congregation, so Catherine McAuley and two companions joined the Presentation Convent to make their noviciate. They took their final vows on 12th December, 1831 and returned to Baggot Street where, on the following day, the Archbishop formally opened the house as the first Convent of Mercy.

From this beginning the Order spread wide and far and very rapidly. By 1900 there were seventy-seven independent foundations in Ireland alone. Concurrently Mercy Convents were being established in England, the U.S.A. and Australasia.

There are now over 1,500 Convents throughout the world with their members teaching in schools, colleges and universities; running hospitals, visiting the sick and those in prison; caring for lepers, running orphanages, homes for the aged, hostels for working girls and refuges for homeless women. One of these is the Convent of St. Joseph in Bournemouth and its Convalescent Home.

The story of the English communities starts at Bermondsey where Father Peter Butler was concerned with the poor of the docklands. He persuaded Mother Catherine McAuley to accept two of his lady helpers as postulants.

They made their noviciate at Cork and returned with Mother McAuley to Bermondsey in November 1839 where they were joined by two Sisters from Baggot Street and Mother Clare Moore who was 'lent' for one year as Superior. She was to stay for the next thirty-five. Mother Clare Moore and four more Sisters from Bermondsey were among those who accompanied Florence Nightingale to the Crimea.


A great philanthrophist Lady Georgiana Fullerton, (pictured left) and her husband Mr Fullerton had in 1874 established a house in Lansdowne Road, Bournemouth, called 'Blenheim' to care for the sick and poor from London. This house became known as St. Joseph's Home for Invalids. In 1877 a small school for local Catholic children was opened there, a school that was eventually to become St. Walburga's.

Following the death in 1885 of Lady Georgiana, the Matron of the Home, a Miss Shea, fell ill and entered Great Ormond Street Hospital and whilst there she impressed the Sisters with her accounts of the great work that had been done in Bournemouth and the need for its continuance, At more or less the same time Mr Fullerton was applying to Great Ormond Street for some Sisters to re-open the Home.

As a result, in August, 1888 Sister Mary Evangelist Power and her cousin, Mrs Blake, set out for Bournemouth to see what the prospects were. Two more Sisters followed the next day. They put up at Stewart's Hotel (now the Norfolk) on Richmond Hill and went next day to see the Bishop of Portsmouth at Ayrfield where he was staying with Mr Fullerton.

He gave them his approval and blessing, advising them to rent a place first. Mr Fullerton promised them £600 left by Lady Georgiana for the Home.


They finally chose Mineham, a house at No. 11 Branksome Wood Road, which was owned by and had been occupied until two years before by the Religious of the Cross, an Order of Nuns who, originally from France had come to Bournemouth at the invitation of Father Mann and Lady Georgiana Fullerton.

The rent was agreed at £180 per year and the Sisters took possession on 27th August, 1888. Mrs Blake undertook to pay £200 a year for the first three years to cover the rent and rates hoping that by the end of that time the Home would be self-supporting.

Sister Mary Ignatius Pitt then joined the other Sisters and found, 'a large empty house with the dust of two years upon the greater part of it'. Sister Mary Evangelist who had great energy of will but no bodily strength always looked on the bright side.

The other Sisters were not so cheerful and regarded the whole aspect as very forlorn. There was very little furniture; a couple of kitchen chairs carried from room to room, a table and a few other oddments bought at a local sale.