Tracking down the nuns who grace the branches of my family tree has been a challenge, but a good learning experience. Unlike priests who kept their birth names upon ordination, nuns took a different name when they entered religious life. With a little determination finding their new name is not terribly difficult, obituaries of parents and siblings are great for that. Then the fun really begins.
I've had a fair amount of luck finding photos of my Sisters. If you can determine the order they belonged to, many of these keep archives dating back to the nineteenth century, some even earlier. The Sisters of Saint Joseph in Rochester, New York, a teaching order, sent me a trove of information on my cousin Mary Esther Gunn. Everything from a photo, baptism and confirmation records, next of kin information, and her obituary.
Another potential stumbling block, one never knows how a census enumerator may have decided to list your religious ladies. I've found them under their names in religion, their birth names, and sometimes a combination of the two. Sister Cecilia was enumerated as Cecilia Vincent Gunn in the 1930 census. In 1940 she was simply Sister Cecilia Vincent; she passed eight years later.
Yet another thing about nuns, they traveled around a good deal, you never know where they'll turn up. One of mine from Owasco, New York, Sister Mary Camillus, surfaced as a Mother Superior in sunny Rio Vista, California. In 1900 she was enumerated as "McGarr Sister M. Comillus", in 1910 as Mary Camellus. You have to be persistent and keep an open mind.
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| Mother Mary Camillus, AKA Elizabeth McGarr |
Mother Stanislaus, born Mary Ann McGarr, was a sibling of Mother Camillus. The censuses of 1870, 1880, and 1900 all list her as Mary A. McGarr, occupation Sister of Mercy. She spent her religious career in various spots in northern New York near the Canadian border. I found her photograph at the site Google Books, in the book titled, The Catholic Church in the United States, Volume II, The Religious Communities of Women, published in 1913. There are many pictures in this book, it's worth checking out if your nuns were active around the turn of the century.
Bridget McGarr, younger sister of Mother Stanislaus and Mother Camillus took the name Sister Mary Frances, changing it at some point to Sister Francis DeSales. Later, she too became a mother superior. She was also an author, writing a sweet little book called May Devotions for Children. Of course I made it a top priority to obtain a copy. Like her siblings, she joined the Sisters of Mercy who couldn't locate a photo of Bridget, neither could I, but they sent instead a lovely photo of a chalice given to her by her sister Mother Mary Stanislaus.
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| "Given by her sister Mother Stanislaus on her feast day" |
The next generation seemed easier to trace. Probably because they weren't being sent to the wilds of northern New York or the far west. The Quigley sisters, cousins of mine and whose grandmother was a McGarr, are one example. There were three of them who, like Mary Esther Gunn joined the Sisters of Saint Joseph. All three of them remained in the area of their birth. Naturally I wanted pictures of them and I found two out of three, not bad. The oldest was Catherine Quigley aka Sister John Joseph, born in 1912. She is the one I couldn't find much about other than she was teaching at St. Mary's in Canandaigua and living at their convent in 1940. She is "Quigley Catherine Sr. John Joseph" in that census. And if you don't think the indexers at Ancestry didn't totally mess that one up...
Next born was Margaret Quigley in 1916. I got lucky with Margaret; she attended Nazareth Academy in Rochester whose yearbook is online. I found her graduation photo, but what I really wanted one of her in her nun gear. I remembered her obituary mentioned one of the schools she had taught at was DeSales in Geneva, New York so I checked Ancestry to see if they had yearbooks for that school. Indeed, they did. Although Margaret, (Sister Delphine in religion), wasn't a student there, yearbooks also contain photos of school staff. I wasn't sure which years she might have been there so taking her age into account I estimated. The yearbook from 1968 had a lovely photo of her in front of her English class that looked a good deal like her graduation picture.
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Sister Delphine
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The youngest Quigley daughter, Rita, was born in 1918. Rita too attended Nazareth, their yearbook is where I found her picture. The 1950 census listed her under her birth name, Rita Quigley; occupation grade school teacher. I'm still seeking a picture of Sister Rita in her nun's regalia, she lived until 2001 so I have high hopes although by then the habit had been discarded in favor of civilian clothing.
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| Rita Quigley AKA Sister Anne Paula |
You might be wondering if it's worth the effort to trace an individual who never married or had children. I say it is. For one thing it satisfies my curiosity about them, for another it sheds light on the family life of my ancestors. Also, their relatives are my relatives and one can never predict what may wind up in print about those family members in relation to the sisters. For instance, the list of Mary Esther Gunn's next of kin supplied the names of her brothers and where they were living, along with names and addresses of cousins I was previously unaware of.
I've had my best luck with the aforementioned family obituaries, church histories and news articles online, and the nun's order. Too, yearbooks are now online at Ancestry. Census records are helpful, but with so many variables can be very tricky to navigate. That's where the family obituaries come in handy, they used to give the city of residence for survivors so one had some idea where to start looking. Good luck!
