SISTERS OF CHARITY

Press, Issue 22599, 3 January 1939, Page 2

SISTERS OF CHARITY

WORK IN AUSTRALIA

CENTENARY CELEBRATED Last Saturday the Sisters of Mercy in Australia celebrated the hundreth anniversary of their arrival at Sydney, after a tiresome journey of four and a half months. To celebrate the centenary pupils of 22 metropolitan schools and colleges took part in this “pageant spectaculum” of the years 1838 and 1938, which was one of the most Interesting school pageants in Australian history.

Early History When the Sisters first arrived in the Colony, they immediately took up work among the women prisoners at Parramatta. It was to help with these womon that the Catholic bishops in Australia had asked >for volunteers from Ireland. The unfortunate women convicts at this time were breaking stones on the road or sawing wood, and it was only after representations of the brutalising effects of such work were made to Governor Gipps by the sisters that the women’s employments were changed to laundry work and sewing. To-day the sisters still visit the prisons at least twice a week.

Hospital Founded

In 1857 the Sisters of Charity opened a hospital at Tarmons, with Sister Mary Baptist as first rectress. She had been trained in the great Paris hospital of the Soeurs. Hospitalieres, and was well fitted for her task. St. Vincent’s Hospital in Darlinghurst was established on its present site in 1870, and from that institution as from the convent at Tarmons have grown the houses, schools, and hospitals of the Sisters of Charity in Eastern Australia. The most recent of the hospital extensions is the maternity hospital in Melbourne for the poor. Until 1937 only Sydney enjoyed the foundation of a Hospice for the Dying, but this work has been extended to Melbourne in this the centenary. year of the Order in that country. The Hospice does not do the ordinary work of a hospital, but relieves the latter of cases which demand prolonged care. It is a home for those who are near the end of their days, where they can receive exi>ert attention and care.

Distinguished Pupils

Almost since their arrival in Australia, the Sisters have conducted schools.

Music has always played a great part in the teaching at St. Vincent’s, and, with the Garcia School ol Music attached to it, Madame Christian has taught many of the famous singers of Australia, including Dame Nellie Melba, Madame Kate Rooney, Miss Molly de Gunst, and Miss Gertrude Concannon, all ol whom won distinction for themselves in the music world in greater and lesser degree. Site of Convent

St. Vincent’s Convent, Potts Point, the mother house of the Sisters of Charity was the original home of Sir Maurice and Lady O’Connell. Lady O’Connell was the daughter of Governor Bligh, and when that unhappy gentleman’ was Governor of the Colony he was on occasions forced to hide from his enemies. It was in his daughter’s home that he sought refuge, and the community room of the nuns to-day is the hiding-place of the former Governor. Sir Charles Nicholson, one of the founders of the University of Sydney and one of its most munificent benefactors, became the owner of Tarmons. the O’Connell’s homestead, when the O’Connells went to England. In 1856 he sold portion of the estate at Potts Point to the Sisters of Charity, and in March, 1857, they took possession of Tarmons, and have remained there ever since.

Mrs A. E. McCardell, of Cheshire, England, visits the Altrincham police station every day with a parcel under her arm. The parcel contains scraps of food with which she feeds the stray dogs that have been brought to the station. She is a grey-haired old lady with a great affection for stray dogs. She has been paying these visits for years, and if she is unwell her husband goes for her. In the winter she visits the police station twice a day. FOR FOOT TREATMENT. MISS B. WILSON. 8.1.C.L., # 699 Colombo St. (near Hereford St) Corns, Falling Arches, etc., etc. ’Phone 32-641. W8229