SLATTERY AND HIS BOGUS 'EX-NUN'

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVIII, Issue 5, 1 February 1900, Page 2

SLATTERY AND HIS BOGUS 'EX-NUN '

A FEMALE IMPOSTORS CAREER,

Introductory.

V \()N-C'Ailioi,i( piper in Auckland " has said of the unfrocked pne^t, Jo-eph Slattery and his female companion, who arc now on a lecturing crusade in this couutry that they are e.nployul in stirring up religious strife and in stimulating the evil passions of bigotry. — and all this for the h.ike ot the Almighty Dollar. The evil business has proved in their case, a^ in the case ot many other such, a good speculation ; for, according to an affidavit of Slattery's nephew and assistant. John Siattery. the wandering pair made a clear profit of about £B<h) in three weeks by their mendacious and sensational lectures in Melbourne, f while Chiniquy i- ,s\id to ha\e made £.V) noohy his tour in the Australian colonies. J How true the line oi Dryden • —

■ For bold knaves thrive without a grain of sense, But good men starve for want of impudence.' The Original Maria Monk.

A reprobate preacher ii New York, named Hoyfce. was the fir-t who conceived the :dei tint the puhlieLiiioii of indecent ualumnitj'i against convents hy a sham nun would appeal powerfully to ths minds of the bigoted and tho tin I'an1 'an and till his- empty pouketc with fraudulent shekels. This was m Will. He associated with himself in the conspiracy two male villains like unto himself. The enterprising trio exploited a, n m-Catholic iall^n woman named Maria Monk, whom Hoyto bad discoveied in a den in Xew York and made his paramour. This unfortunate creature was of weak intellect, and before she drifted to the slums of Xew York had been a well-known character in the streets of Montreal A short period of the iinhappy cre'itui^'s misspent life was passed in a refuge for -soiled doves' kept by a Catholic Sisterhood at Montreal. A goodly portion of the lcnjinlur was ppent within ihe stone walls of a Canadian prison. She continued ■on the streets ' till the end came in In ID. Then, on an autumn day. she passed for the last time from a house of ill- tamo to prison, and there, two months later, her career of &in and shame and misery was closed by death. §

* The y*ic /'ala.id Obs>'t in\ J mu.iry 20, 1900, p. 2. lln the PrictKv Umin 31. 'bourne, on Tii.'~dn, Tun.* 27 Ih'isl, Mr. Cieltson ii id ,i.i .illMivit oi John iniphow and a-si>.t,int ol e\pnost Joseph *-U,UUn) winch m itcd. amon^ other thintr-i that the net proceeds ot (lie leei uiv-. deliw re 1 b\ hi-, uucli- In I woen April II ,md M,i) 'J., iwi'.t, wore CSUdor theivibouN Yuuni? Slitters hid proceeded against fhe c\-i>nc-.t tor HJ>M w c_'e> iille/e'l to l>e due to him. Ho nUo published dlle^itioni aif.nn^l ihr eh,ir,i<'te.r of defendant. Tho e\.-])ne^t paid hi«. nephew C.'lt », .ilthouffhhi" hid Hied an aUidaMt stating th.it the balance clue lo pluntilt w .i^ only about WO. Sou • i-ryus and \ye of June- 28 aud A d vocal* ol Juh 1. Lti'i'.t. J Cor ('hiuiiiny 1 -- true history «oe tho companion w\mplilet to this, Joaf}h Sluttt rij : rii> HoinniH •or an I niroci.nl I'ntit, p. 6 ; tlie C.T.S. (London) pamphlet, Clunii/uu , and pamphlet uti. 30 ot Uid C.T.S. of America (St. Paul, Minnesota). % Dolman's Rsi/nl?) , of October 9. IHJ9, siiys : 'Two mouths ago or more the poluc hook rcoonlcd the arre-c o[ the notorious but unfortunate Mana Monk, w'io^e book ot Au/iil !)<»closur<'i created such cxoiteinont in the religious worlil Mime ypar> since. .chow.. c ho w.i 1 - chargeil witli picking the pocket of a paramour in a den near the Five Points. She was tried, tound guilty, and sent to prison, where -lie lived up to Frid.iy la.t, when death removed her fiom the soene of her biifleiiugb and disgrace. 'Wluit a moral is here indeed ! '

The gentle Autocrat oi Lhe Breakfast Table reminds us that ' sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle that lits them all.' Hoyte found a handle for his tool (Maria Monk) in a filthy pamphlet that had seen the light in 17M/ IL had it reprinted, merely altering the proper names «o a to make the Hotel Dieu Nunnery at Montreal the scene oi th v abominable fiction. Hoyte and his fellow-con^piratois of the thirties took special care to a\oid mentioning the real name of any nun living at the Hotel Dieu. We shall sec a-- we proceed that a like piecaution has been observed by Slatterv and his female "turtnci in what the Auckland Ohti'rri r terms his- 'sordid mission' Hojte's n print was published under the sue-'-reyhve title of Th, \'uii,l /),,/ /nw/v* of Mm-ia Vo-nh Maria herself was induced, in the lace of the stc idy protests and denials of her Protestant parent-., to pose, as an • ex-nun.' f And thus was set afloat what the I'rotc-tant editors of Aprleton's Cyclopn ih n of Ami nrtm L'/oj r<ij>h >/ term "one of the most remarkable impostures on record.' t

Such were the auspicious beginnings of Mrs. Slattery's trade — that of the sham ex-nun. It w.n inaugurated by two lewd creatures who had never been members of the Church whose alleged enormities they professed to • disclose. 1 The male partner in the conspiracy was a low roue ; his ine\itnble female companion was a thief, gaol-bird, and prostitute. But Iloyte's reprint sold amazingly. Money flowe 1 trcely into his pockets. The whole purpose of the conspiracy of f-'l-ehood was thus attained. When the half-witted sham nun had served her purpose, and met with the exposure which she courted. Hoyte flung her aside penniless and left her to shift as best she could for herself and her illegitimate child.