Chapter XXVI: Mother Angela

Related to many eminent men of the century; her tranquil death in
the convent in Indiana; her ability as a writer and an educator.
An incident of the war told by her in a powerful and dramatic
style. The original of a Holy Cross Sister portrayed in a poem.

Mother Angela, who performed such valiant service as the head of the Holy Cross Sisters, departed this life on March 4, 1887. Her death was so calm and peaceful that it seemed as though she were gliding into slumber rather than passing from life into eternity. “Mother Mary of St. Angela” was the name of this devoted woman, who was previously known to the world as Eliza Maria Gillespie.

As stated in the preceding chapter Mother Angela was of distinguished lineage. Her godfather, the elder Thomas Ewing, was one of the great Whigs and Secretary of State under President William Henry Harrison. James Gillespie Blaine, her first cousin, was the idol of his party, member of Congress, United State Senator, Secretary of State, and the Republican candidate for the Presidency. General William T. Sherman, another relative, ranked second only to Grant among the Union generals in the civil war. Phil. B. Ewing, her brother-in-law, won the reputation of an eminent jurist in Ohio. “Young Tom” Ewing distinguished himself in the Union army. Her only brother, Rev. N. H. Gillespie, was the first graduate of Notre Dame University, and afterwards became its vice president and editor of the “Ave Maria.”

Mother Angela was born in West Brownsville, Pa., February 21, 1824. Her parents lived in a large stone house. It was a double structure, and in the other half of it lived her uncle and aunt, the parents of James G. Blaine, who was born there six years later. Mr. Blaine’s mother and Mother Angela’s father were brother and sister, and the two children were reared together until the one was twelve and the other was six years of age. This childish association caused a sincere attachment, which lasted through life.

While receiving her education in the Academy of the Visitation at Washington the future Sister had many opportunities for mingling in fashionable Washington society. One of her chroniclers of that time says that she had the same personal magnetism that distinguished her relative, Mr. Blaine. At the age of twenty-seven, however, she abandoned the world, and after the usual preparation became a Sister of the Holy Cross. Her work during the war has already been outlined.

The death of Mother Angela came as a shock to those with whom she had been associated. She had been ill for a month, but all looked forward with confidence to her ultimate recovery. The Father General coincided with the physician in assigning the sad event to heart disease, probably brought on, as he says, “by the death of Sister M. Loba, whom she loved tenderly, and whose funeral procession passed under her window four hours before.”

The funeral of Mother Angela took place at Notre Dame on Sunday morning, March 6, 1887, the mortal remains being borne from the halls where she had been Superior for thirty-four years.

Telegrams and letters of regret came from all sections of the country, and even from parts of Europe. Among the telegrams was the following from one of the kinsmen of the dead Sister:

Augusta, Maine, March 4, 1887.

John G. Ewing:

Your message is a sad one to me. Communicate my deepest sympathy
to Aunt Mary and to your mother.

JAMES G. BLAINE.

The relatives of the deceased religious who were present were: Her aged mother, Mrs. M. M. Phelan; her sister, Mrs. P. B. Ewing; Hon. P. B. Ewing, Lancaster, Ohio; Sr. Mary Agnes, Miss Mary R. Ewing, Miss Philomene Ewing, Mr. John G. Ewing, Mrs. N. H. Ewing, Edward S. Ewing, Mrs. Colonel Steele, Miss Marie Steele, Miss Florence Steele, Charles Steele, Master Sherman Steele, Mrs. John Blaine, Miss Louise Blaine, Miss Ella Blaine, Messrs. Walker and Emmons Blaine. Among the numerous friends in attendance at the funeral were Justice Daniel Scully, Colonel W. P. Rend, Mr. and Mrs. P. Cavanagh, Mr. and Mrs. Alexander Sullivan, Miss Angela Dillon, Miss Eddy, Chicago; Mr. Jacob Wile, Mr. F. Wile, Mr. George Beale, La Porte, Ind.; Mr. and Mrs. P. O’Brien, Mr. and Mrs. L. G. Tong, Mr. and Mrs. Stanfield, Mr. Dunn, Mr. Baker, Dr. Cassidy, Dr. Calvert, Mrs. Lintener, Mr. Birdsell, South Bend, Ind.; Miss C. Gavan, Lafayette, Ind.; Mrs. Shephard, Omaha, Neb.; Mrs. Atkinson, Baltimore, Md.; Mrs. Coughlin, Toledo, Ohio; Mrs. L. Gregori, Miss F. Gregori, Professor James J. Edwards, Professor W. Hoynes, Notre Dame, Ind.; Mrs. Claffey, Notre Dame. Solemn Requiem Mass was sung by Rev. Father L’Etourneau, assisted by the Rev. Fathers Spillard and Zahm as deacon and subdeacon; Rev. Father Regan, acting as master of ceremonies. There were present in the sanctuary: Rt. Rev. Bishop Gilmour, D. D.; Very Rev. Father General Sorin, Very Rev. Father Granger, Very Rev. Father Kilroy, D. D.; Very Rev. Father Corby; Rev. Fathers Walsh, O’Connell, Hudson, Shortis and Saulnier.

The late Rt. Rev. Bishop Gilmour preached the funeral sermon, in which he outlined the life of a model religious. He said, among other things:

“It is too much to say that she around whose bier we are gathered to-day is a fair and generous example of what I have outlined so very imperfectly and so succinctly. Fair in her talents and her ambitions with what the world values most, she buries herself--where? In the silence of a religious life, in a corner, in an unseen position! When she came here, some thirty-seven years ago, there was to be found little of that which to-day might, perhaps, attract one seeking the religious life. She came here to labor, to struggle, to wrestle with hardships, to concentrate her exceptional talents and energies upon the one grand object of her life. She came in all fervor, animated solely with zeal for religion--devotion to her cause. And thirty-seven years of unfailing generosity tell the tale of her life.

“It is difficult to comprehend what has been done in those thirty-seven years. It is not easy to realize what a devotion, an ambition for God such as hers, might do. Unseen, unnoticed, unobtrusive the generosity; unfailing, unflagging the devotion with which God has been served and man has been blessed--such is the life of her who lies before us. We see the results of her labors, not merely in the material building she has erected, for that, in itself, is little, but in the moral seed that she has deeply planted here; that has been the salvation of many who have already gone to their reward. And amongst those who are living, how many there are whom she has moulded, attracted, inspired with high and religious ambitions; whom she has directed in the paths of life!

“How many through her influence have been brought back to God and made generous once more! She has lifted up the weak, and made stronger those who were strong; soothed the wounded, directed all to nobler and higher aims. It would be difficult to find a heart so entirely throbbing for God as hers; a foot so restless and untiring in doing good as hers; a brain so busy in devising works for the welfare of religion and her fellow-men. It is difficult for those who have not known her to realize the extent of her labors. It is not every person who can comprehend the depth of Mother Angela’s devotion to the cause of God. Many have seen it but few have understood it.... For many a long, long day this community will feel the gap that is made to-day by the loss of one who lies in that narrow, little coffin.... The kind Father General, in the days that are coming, will find how much he has lost in the generous, assisting hand now cold in death.... And you, young friends, will feel the loss of a tender and directing parent.... It is for us all to pray that God may bless her, as I am convinced He has.”

After the Bishop’s sermon the final absolution of the body was given and then the procession marched to the modest little cemetery and Mother Angela was laid to rest within a stone’s throw of where the greater part of her life work had been performed.

Mother Angela is the original of the Sister of the Holy Cross portrayed in the following poem:

I.

The din of the battle has died away;
The twilight has grown to a deeper gray;
The moon rises pale through the mistly cloud,
While the blood-stained rivulet moans aloud;
And the beams are faint in the kindly stars,
For hope shines no more from their golden bars.
The leaves of the tremulous aspen sigh
As the night winds, wailing, sweep mournfully by.
The ambulance glides through the gloomy path,
To heed the wreck of the War Demon’s wrath;
And the Angel of Peace, from his home sublime,
Weeps o’er man’s wretchedness, folly and crime.

II.

’Tis the hour of midnight. How lightly tread
The feet of the watcher, ’mid dying and dead.
Lo! the sable veil and the saintly air,
And the lofty calm of a beauty rare,
Proclaim that watcher, the chosen bride,
Of the world’s Redeemer--the Crucified
The stifled groan, the sharp cry of distress
With their burden of woe, through the hot air press,
And the Sister of Holy Cross low doth bend;
Her prayer with the pestilence breath to blend.
O Sister of Holy Cross, why art thou
Thus won by the pallid and death-cold brow?

III.

He is not thy brother, yon prostrate form,
Who moans there all bathed in his life-blood warm;
And the veteran wounded--his locks so gray--
He is not thy father; then, wherefore stay?
All these are but strangers. Thou, too, art frail;
Contagion is borne on the midnight gale.
Ah! a veteran heart, and a nerve more strong,
Unto scenes and to sights like these belong.
O I see her bend with a gentler grace,
And a holier light in her tranquil face,
And sweet tears methinks from her mild eyes flow
As she bends o’er her crucifix fondly, low!

IV.

How reverent her kiss on those sacred feet!
And almost I hear now her heart’s quick beat;
And her low voice sways with a loving might,
Like the key-note by heaven entoned to-night;
“O ask me not wherefore my heart is bound
To scenes where but agony clusters around.
O bid me not go from a place like this,
For my labor is rest, and my tears are bliss!”
One hand she laid on her throbbing breast,
While the Holy Cross to her lips she pressed.
“Nor a stronger nerve; nor a heart more stern
Could enkindle the fire that here doth burn.

V.

“Ah! these are not strangers, for God hath died;
And for each in His love shed His heart’s full tide;
’Tis for His dear sake that with joy I bear,
This breath of contagion; this noisome air.
Ah! when I behold here the shattered limb--
The crimson blood oozing, the eyesight dim;
See the gore and the gashes; the death-sweat cold,
It is my Redeemer that I behold;
His wounds that I stanch; His brow that I lave;
His form that I straighten and shroud for the grave.
I faint not; I fear not, for faith is strong
Since my love and my hope to the Cross belong.”

VI.

Then, then did my heart with her meaning thrill:
My eyes from the fount of my soul did fill.
For the sake of our loving and Crucified Lord
The cordial she mingled; the wine she poured.
Compassion she drinks at the fountain head;
The Mother of Sorrows her soul hath led.
How sacred the treasures she stores at Her feet;
Her lesson makes mourning than joy more sweet.
’Tis the Queen of Mercy bends down to bless
The wealth of her heavenly tenderness,
And the Angel of Peace from his home of light
Has baffled the fiends in her mission to-night!

Mother Angela rarely spoke of her services in the war, and with characteristic modesty and humility frequently endeavored to give others the credit that belonged to herself. She was a writer with an unusual grace and charm of style. One of those who served with her during the war was Sister Mary Josephine. This devoted Sister died in 1886, and her death evoked the following dramatic story from the pen of Mother Angela. It was a true story, and one of her last contributions to the “Ave Maria.”

“Sister Josephine was one among the first of the seventy Sisters
of the Holy Cross who, during the late civil war, served the sick
and wounded soldiers in the military hospitals of Louisville,
Paducah, Cairo, Mound City, Memphis and Washington city.

“Those who knew this quiet, gentle religious only during the last
twenty years of her life could scarcely realize what courage, even
heroism, animated her during those years of the war spent in the
hospitals. We give below one instance among many others.

“In the summer of 1862 the Confederate Fort Charles, on White
River, was attacked on land by a force under the command of
Colonel Fitch, of Indiana, and from the water by gunboats
commanded by Commodore Davis. In the midst of the battle the
boilers of one of the gunboats exploded, frightfully scalding
Captain Kelty and some fifty others. The sufferers, in their
agony, leaped into the river, and as they did so a broadside from
Fort Charles poured bullets and grapeshot into their parboiled
flesh.

“The battle ended with the capture of the fort, and the wounded of
both sides were taken to Mound City Hospital--a block of some
twenty-four unfinished warehouses and storerooms, that had been
converted into a vast hospital--in which, after some of the great
battles in the Mississippi Valley, as many as two thousand
patients were treated by a staff of medical officers, and nursed
by twenty-eight Sisters, Sister Josephine being one of them.
Colonel Fry, commander of the fort, supposed to be dangerously
wounded, and Captain Kelty were of the number brought to Mound
City after the surrender of Fort Charles.

“The latter was a universal favorite of all the men and officers
of the Western flotilla. His sad state--the scalded flesh falling
from the bones, and pierced with bullets--excited them almost to
frenzy. He was tenderly placed in a little cottage away from the
main building, and Colonel Fry, with a few other sufferers, was
put in a front room in the second story of the hospital, under the
immediate care of Sister Josephine.

“The next day the report spread like wildfire through the
hospital, and among the one hundred soldiers detailed to guard it,
that Captain Kelty was dying. The wildest excitement prevailed,
and in the frenzy of the moment Colonel Fry was denounced as his
murderer; it was declared that he had given the inhuman order to
fire on the scalded men. Everyone firmly believed this. But it was
not true. Colonel Fry was ignorant of the explosion when the order
was given.

“Sister Josephine, very pale, yet wonderfully composed, went to
the Sister in charge of the hospital to say that all the wounded
had just been removed from the room under her care except Colonel
Fry. The soldiers detailed to guard the hospital, and the gunboat
men, had built a rough scaffold in front of the two windows of the
room, mounted it, with loaded guns, and loudly declared that they
would stay there, and the moment they heard of Captain Kelty’s
death they would shoot Colonel Fry. ‘And,’ continued Sister
Josephine, ‘the doctor made me leave the room, saying that my life
was in danger. He took the key from the door and gave it to “Dutch
Johnny,” telling him that he had entire charge of the man within.’

“Now, ‘Dutch Johnny’ was one of six brothers; five had been killed
at Belmont; Johnny was so badly wounded and crippled in the same
battle that he was useless for active service, and so left to help
in the hospital. But one idea possessed him; in revenge for his
brothers’ death he intended to kill five Confederates before he
died.

“In this fearful state of affairs the Sister in charge went to the
Surgeon General of the staff, begging him to see that no murder be
committed. Dr. Franklin answered that he was powerless to control
events, and that the captain of the company guarding the hospital
was absent.

“‘Then,’ said the Sister, ‘I must call my twenty-seven Sisters
from the sick; we will leave the hospital, and walk to Cairo.’ (A
distance of three miles.)

“In vain did the doctor represent to her the sad state of all the
patients she was leaving; she would not consent to remain in a
house where murder would soon be committed; except on one
condition: that the doctor would give her the key of Colonel Fry’s
room, and that the Sisters have the care and entire control of the
patient.

“‘But,’ expostulated the doctor, ‘it will be at the risk of your
lives; for if Captain Kelty dies--and I see no hopes of his
recovery--no power on earth can restrain those men from shooting
Colonel Fry.’

“‘Oh, doctor!’ she answered, ‘I have too much faith in the natural
chivalry of every soldier--be he from North or South of Mason and
Dixon’s line--to fear he would shoot a poor, wounded man while a
Sister stood near him!’

“Seeing the Sisters would leave if this request was not granted,
the doctor sent for ‘Dutch Johnny,’ took the key from him and gave
it to the Sister. The latter called for Sister Josephine, and both
went in haste to the room of the wounded man.

“As they turned the key and opened the door a fearful scene was
before them. Colonel Fry lay in a cot: his arms, both broken, were
strapped up with cords fastened to the ceiling; one broken leg was
strapped to the bed; only his head seemed free. As he turned it,
and glared fiercely, as he thought, upon another foe, he seemed
like some wild animal at bay and goaded to madness. Before Sister
Josephine had been forced to leave the room she had closed the
windows and lowered the blinds; but her successor, ‘Dutch Johnny,’
had changed all this; he had rolled up the blinds, and threw up
the lower sashes. And there, on the raised platform, not fifty
feet from him, Colonel Fry could see the faces and hear the voices
of the soldiers and gunboat men, shouting every few minutes for
him to be ready to die, for they would shoot him as soon as they
heard of Captain Kelty’s death.

“Very quickly and gently did Sister Josephine speak to the wounded
man, moistening his parched lips with a cooling drink, giving what
relief she could to the poor, tortured body, and assuring him that
she and the other Sister would not leave him; so he need not fear
that the soldiers would fire while they remained.

“When these men saw the Sisters in the room they begged them to
leave, even threatened, but to no purpose; brave, noble Sister
Josephine and her companion stood at their post all through that
long afternoon, and far into the night; and they prayed, perhaps
more earnestly than they ever prayed before, that Captain Kelty
would not die; for, in spite of all their assuring words to
Colonel Fry, they did not feel so very certain that their lives
would be safe among frenzied men, bent on their taking revenge
into their own hands.

“In the meantime it became known that Captain Kelty was a
Catholic--a convert--though for many years he had neglected his
religious duties. A messenger was sent to Cairo to bring Father
Welsh to the dying man. When he came Captain Kelty was in
delirium, and the Father could give him only Extreme Unction. Soon
after, about 9 o’clock, he sank into a quiet sleep. He awoke,
perfectly conscious, near midnight, made his confession, received
Holy Communion, and took some nourishment. The doctor said all
danger was over, and a messenger ran in breathless haste to spread
the glad tidings. The excited soldiers fired a few blank
cartridges as a parting salvo, jumped from the scaffold, and were
seen no more. The rest of the night good Sister Josephine took
care of her patient, undisturbed by any serious fear that both
might be sent into eternity before morning.

“When the naval officers, who the night before had looked, as they
feared, their last look on the living face of Captain Kelty, went
up the next day from Cairo and found him out of danger, they
laughed and cried with joy. In a whisper Captain Kelty asked them
to be silent for a moment and listen to him. In a voice trembling
with weakness he said:

“‘While I thank these good doctors for all they have done, I must
testify--and they will bear me out in what I say--it was not their
skill nor any earthly power that brought me back from the brink of
the grave, but the saving and life-giving Sacraments of the
Catholic Church.’

“Colonel Fry and Captain Kelty had long known each other. Both
were naval officers, until at the beginning of the war Captain Fry
left the service, and was made Colonel Fry in the Confederate
Army.

“As soon as Captain Kelty was well enough to learn what had
passed, he declared Colonel Fry was guiltless of the barbarity of
which he had been accused. And Sister Josephine was made the
bearer to her patient of all the delicacies sent to Captain Kelty,
and which he insisted on sharing with Colonel Fry.

“As soon as Captain Kelty could travel he was taken to his home in
Baltimore. For his bravery he was made Commodore, and placed in
command at Norfolk; but he was maimed for life; his right hand and
arm, all shriveled and wasted, hung lifeless by his side. When
able to take such a journey alone, he went all the way back to
Cairo to see again and thank those Sisters, who, he said, under
God, had saved his life in a double sense. He remained until his
death a most fervent Catholic.

“Colonel Fry, after many months of suffering, also recovered; he
was paroled, and returned to his home in New Orleans. There he
became a Catholic, often declaring that good Sister Josephine’s
bravery and devotedness during that day and night of torture and
agony, followed by months of long suffering, were eloquent sermons
that he could not resist.

“A few years after the close of the war he was one of the leaders
of that rash band of adventurers who invaded Cuba. His fate is
well known; with those under his command he was captured and
executed. But it is not so well known that he profited by the days
spent in prison, in instructing those with him; and many were
converted to the holy faith that first came to him through Sister
Josephine.

“Twenty-three years to the very month passed away, when quietly
and calmly, as in the discharge of hospital duties, this good
Sister, strengthened by the Sacraments of the Church, literally
fell asleep in Our Lord, a few days after the close of the annual
retreat, at which she had assisted. Owing to the intense heat of
the weather, it was deemed necessary to advance the hour of burial
from 6 o’clock in the morning to 8 o’clock on the previous
evening. Scarce ever was a procession so affecting; the
Sisters--more than three hundred in number--all bearing lighted
tapers, the Rev. Chaplains, and the venerable Father Sorin,
Superior General, C. S. C., followed the remains of Sister
Josephine through the beautiful grounds of St. Mary’s to the
cemetery. The moon shone as brightly on her lifeless body as it
had shone years ago through the open window on her brave, gentle
form, when she saved from death or insanity the wounded prisoner.

“Of the four persons most interested in that night of agony and
torture in the vast military hospital on the banks of the Ohio,
but one now remains--Sister Josephine’s companion. May the three
gone to eternity remember her before God.”

The sole survivor of that dreadful episode and the historian of
the event has also gone to her reward. The prayers of innumerable
persons that have benefited by her charity and goodness ascend to
the skies, coupled with the hope that Mother Angela will not
forget those she has left behind.