1 Jahresbericht des Bethanienvereins, 1884, Bremen.
2 Der Christliche Apologete, article by Rev. G. Hausser, September 20, 1888.
3 Jahresbericht, 1888, page 8.
CHAPTER IX.
DEACONESSES IN PARIS.
When in Paris we visited the deaconess establishment on the Rue de Reuilly, and had the pleasure, ever to be remembered, of seeing the institution in all its workings under the guidance of Mademoiselle Sara Monod, the daughter of Adolphe Monod; members of a family that have been Protestants of the Protestants in the annals of France. We examined with some degree of thoroughness the different departments, and saw them in the busy working hours, when the full activities of the great establishment were in exercise.
In addition to the information and reports then secured I am under further obligation to Mademoiselle Monod for other material lately received, among which is a pamphlet entitled Une Visite à la Maison de Diaconesses, by Madame W. Monod, “the worthy daughter of one of the founders, and the worthy wife of one of the present chaplains of the institution.” I have translated freely from this in the following pages, as it is pervaded by a tone125/121 of intimate knowledge, and nothing can take the place of the long years of close personal relation that make this little book so fresh and attractive in its recital.
The institution is situated on the outskirts of the Faubourg St. Antoine, upon an elevation, where the view in one direction is limited by Mont St. Geneviève, and on the other embraces a large territory intersected by the windings of the Seine and by lines of railroad. The space is thickly dotted by the high chimneys of manufactories and massive constructions of various forms. A great pile of buildings which fronts upon the street forms one of the sides of the court within; two long wings extend at right angles, which seem to have been built at different intervals of time. That on the right ends with the penitentiary, or house of correction; the left wing terminates more modestly at the garden entrance; while farther, at the extreme portion of the grounds, still to the left, rises the hospital, standing apart from the rest. The whole establishment, including the gardens, has an extent of fifty-five hundred square meters.
In the little room at the entrance, where the concierge is usually found in these French houses, sits one of the sisters, surrounded by bell-cords and tubes and bells which are constantly in use, bringing126/122 messages to and fro in all directions. A sister is always on duty, morning, afternoon, and at night when it is necessary, responding with discreet politeness to the inquiries made. Adjoining are the little reception rooms, where comers and goers are met, and the consulting-room of the distinguished oculist, who twice a week gives gratuitously his valuable services. Then come the office and reception-room of the chaplain of the house, followed by the little “prophet’s chamber,” occupied by the former directress when she returns upon visits which her age and poor health render only too infrequent.
What the French call the “économat” or business office, next demands our attention. A dozen registers admirably kept, portfolios of all kinds, and numberless papers are arranged upon different shelves. The sister in charge notes in her journal every entrance and every departure, and all the journeys and leaves of absence of the sisters. In a safe she has the necessary money for current expenses, the rest being deposited in the bank. She provides the stores, examines the accounts of the pharmacy and the kitchen, pays the salaried employees, gives or sends to each deaconess the modest sum allowed her for personal needs, and transacts the daily business of the house. She must also every month127/123 hand in three reports—one to the Prefect of Police, another to the Minister of the Interior, and the third to the Minister of Finance, giving detailed statistics concerning the age, occupation, and progress of her protégés. “How many know how to read? How many to read and write? How many to read, write, and cipher? What progress has been made since the last report?” These are some of the questions she has to answer; and, meanwhile, if a crowd of little children come in, she turns from her writing and calculations and plays with them as if she had nothing else to do.
Let us see where these children come from. Here is the “Salle d’Asile,” as it is called, with its benches and chairs for the little ones, maps and historical pictures suspended upon the walls, slates and globes, and all the belongings of a school-room. The sister who has directed this school for thirty-five years has seen sons and daughters succeed fathers and mothers. More than nineteen hundred children have passed through her hands. With what pride she showed us the copy-books, and pointed out some particularly good compositions. Hers was no perfunctory task; a mother could not have displayed greater interest in her children. The number of pupils varies from one hundred and ten to one hundred and thirty, a little128/124 less than half of them being Catholics. All kinds of primary instruction are given, including gymnastics, singing, and marching. Bible stories hold an important place in this elementary teaching, even those which are sometimes considered to be beyond the reach of children; for there is nothing in any other book to take their place. It is useless to add that not only lessons are given, but shoes, aprons, and garments of all kinds, some of the little ones being clothed from head to foot by the institution. Every day soup is distributed, ostensibly to the poor and the ill-nourished, but practically partaken of by all. Even during the siege of Paris the soup continued to appear. It gradually became less substantial, it is true, but still it was soup.
From four to six o’clock the mothers and older sisters and brothers, or perhaps some old lady who has been engaged to have the care of several children, come to take the little ones home. The influence of these children is felt beyond the school-room; it is a visible, constant force. Such a little girl has persuaded her grandmother not to work on Sundays. Another asks for a book that her father can read aloud to the family. And similar instances could be multiplied; they are always to be obtained where loving Christian hearts are interested in129/125 children, and when they remember that fine saying of Jacqueline Pascal; “Parler à Dieu des petites âmes plus qu’ aux petites âmes de Dieu.”1
There used formerly to be attached to this a “Crèche,” where a mother could bring her babe when she went to work in the morning, and could come for it at night. But the government has now started a day-home for this district of the city, so this part of the work of the deaconesses has been discontinued.
Passing by the vegetable garden, which is also a pleasure garden for the sick and infirm, we come to the hospital. This was opened in September, 1873, and can accommodate sixty to seventy patients. There are two large wards for women, one for children, a dormitory for aged women, and rooms with one, two, and three beds. All are perfectly heated, lighted, and ventilated. The medical inspector visits the house every month, and gives it due praise for meeting every condition of modern medical science.
A committee of ladies takes the hospital as an especial object of its care. They have organized a system of patronage, by which beds are furnished poor patients at a low rate, in some cases130/126 gratuitously. Fifteen subscribers give each two francs, or forty cents, a month; the sick man or his patron pays a franc a day, to which the Deaconess Home adds also a franc daily. These three francs represent the bare expenses of a hospital bed. Of course, sixty cents a day is far from meeting the entire cost of rent, food, baths, medicine, and service; but those patients who have been accustomed to a certain degree of comfort in life, when paying three francs, are freed from the painful impression of receiving charity.
Many of the patients, when sent forth from the hospital, are directed to the Convalescents’ Home, at Passy. This is an inestimable benefit; what could this poor servant do, whose strength is not yet sufficient to undertake fatiguing labor? Or this mother of a family, who would certainly fall ill again if obliged to resume the heavy burden of housekeeping, accompanied by privations and wearing economies, were it not for the home at Passy? Such homes of rest and convalescence are a necessity in connection with every well-equipped deaconess institution. The pharmacy is in the charge of a deaconess trained especially for her duties. A deaconess director, several nurse deaconesses and probationers, with one or two aged women, constitute the working force of the131/127 hospital outside of the physicians. So many denominational hospitals are now arising in America that the arrangement of hospitals under the care of deaconesses in Germany, France, and England, cannot fail to have interest for us.
There are no nurses like the deaconesses. Other nurses, however well prepared in the best of training-schools, do not have the same high motive that lifts the service onto the plane of religious duty, where the question of self-interest is wholly lost sight of. It was the perception of this truth that led the authorities of the German Hospital in Philadelphia to send to Germany for deaconesses as nurses, and that has brought about the erection of the magnificent Mary J. Drexel Home for Deaconesses.
But let us return to Paris and our examination of the home on the Rue de Reuilly. Leaving the hospital, and turning in the opposite direction from that to which we came, we are at the house of correction. Bars of iron before the windows apprise us of the character of the building. There are two divisions of inmates; the one in which the discipline is more rigid is called the retenue. Those placed here are generally between fourteen and twenty-one years of age, although occasionally a child of precocious depravity is met with, who has132/128 to be separated from those under less restriction even at ten years of age. The disciplinaire is the division of milder restraint. The twenty-five or twenty-six places in each of the two divisions are ordinarily applied for in advance. Pastor Louis Valette said: “We shall not have room enough until we have too much room.”
There are three classes of inmates: those who are put here by their parents for insubordination or other grave faults; those who are sent here by order of a judge of the court for a limited period, and those who are recognized guilty of a misdemeanor, but are acquitted on account of their age, and must remain a certain time, sometimes until they have attained their majority, in houses of correction and education.
The Minister of the Interior pays twelve cents a day for pupils of the third class; the Prefect of Police four hundred dollars a year for those of the second class, whatever their number, only the establishment is bound to receive them at any time and at any hour.
There is a system of rewards, to promote good behavior, and those who profit by it can accumulate a small sum of money, sometimes amounting to sixteen or eighteen dollars, to have when they go out from here. In other cases there is a large133/129 indebtedness on the opposite side, which can never be collected.
The days are occupied in household work, washing, ironing, and sewing, and two hours of schooling. When the nature of the work will permit, instructive books are read aloud, or the deaconesses give pleasant talks on different subjects that will keep the thoughts of the workers busy, and give them helpful ideas to store away in their minds. As we went about in the sewing-classes, we noticed that the time was invariably utilized in some way that was profitable to the girls. Most of them are pitiably ignorant of even the commonest knowledge demanded in life. There are separate court-yards for the recreations of the two divisions. The girls of the disciplinaire are sometimes taken outside the institution for walks; those of the retenue, never. The work in this last division is especially difficult, and requires the utmost patience and love. These poor girls have to be watched carefully, and kept isolated from one another. Some are greatly influenced by the atmosphere of the place, the gentle, firm kindness of the sisters, and the restriction they receive. Others go out to take up again the old life of immorality, and are dragged away into the meshes of sin, finding their place, after brief delay, in the wards of a hospital, or sometimes a suicide’s grave.134/130 It is a singular fact that the numerical appreciation of those influenced by this school of reform is precisely the same as that given in the report of the similar work at Kaiserswerth, although the two reports have no connection with one another, and one in no wise supposes the other. Thirty-three years ago one of the founders of the institution, Pastor Valette, said in answer to a question as to the amount of good accomplished, “Sixteen years ago this question came to my ears, and I stated as a principle that one cannot and ought not to answer it precisely and absolutely, because no one but God can give an appreciation of its real value. However, out of curiosity, I set myself at work to gather and register some results; and, matured by the experience of six years, I offer them, such as they are: One third of the moral results may be considered excellent; another third as offering good guarantees, and a final third has no value. It seems to me, however, as I am sure it will seem to you, that here is cause for rejoicing. Here is something for which to praise the Lord, and to encourage those who administer our affairs. For, I ask of the merchants who listen to me, if any one were to offer you thirty-three and one third per cent. assured, with the hope of a dividend, would you refuse the investment?”
135/131In 1871 an occurrence took place worthy of being recorded. On April 13, at ten o’clock in the evening, emissaries of the Commune entered the house, revolvers in hand. Armed men were posted at all the entrances. The deaconesses were summoned to one of the parlors, and held prisoners until three o’clock the following morning. Meanwhile an investigation took place among the girls in the penitentiary, as they would be the most likely of any of the inmates of the house to have complaints. The officers of the Commune interrogated them closely. Their answers were favorable beyond all expectation. “Are you happy here?” “Oh, yes, very happy.” “What have you done deserving punishment?” “Nothing that we need talk to you about.” “How are you punished here?” “The sisters don’t punish us; they advise us what to do, and warn us.” “Now,” said the chief to one, “just tell me quietly, no one else need hear; if you are not contented I will take you away with me.” “What a coward you are,” she answered, quite scornfully. Not one of them thought of escaping. All this time the prison wagon had been waiting in the street, and would have been filled with deaconesses had the slightest cause of complaint been found; but it went away empty. Later the sisters had occasion to go to the head-quarters of the136/132 Commune in their ward, and they met with polite consideration. This is not the only experience of the troubled political life of the great city that the deaconesses have had. The Faubourg St. Antoine has been noted ever since the time of the Fronde as being the haunt of all that is turbulent and revolutionary. In February 1848, a great barricade was thrown across the Rue de Reuilly, men, women, and children hurrying with bricks and stones to help in building it. Then came the moment of storm and attack, and forty-two men lay dead in the street. Some of the wounded were received by the sisters, crowded as they were with the children whom the mothers had brought for safety. Meanwhile the deaconesses went about unmolested, bought food and medicine, hunted friends and relatives for the sick, and through all that period of excitement and strife kept up their ministrations of mercy.
There is no distinct home for women who are left alone and desire Christian surroundings, as is the case in several German institutions, but about sixty such ladies are received as boarders in the Paris home. Frequently also the hospitality of the house is enjoyed by young girls who come to Paris alone to earn a livelihood, or who have to stop here for some hours on their way to another place; a137/133 great advantage for inexperienced young women, unversed in the ways of a city, who find themselves alone in the great world for the first time.
The preparatory school for deaconesses is on the first floor, below the rooms of the sisters. For two years the candidates are under the instruction of superior sisters. They are received into the house gratuitously, and accept its regulations while they remain. They have to pass through all practical duties of house-work, and care of the sick and children. They also pursue practical and theoretical courses in hygiene, and receive lessons in singing and pedagogics. The chaplains of the institution give them courses of religious instruction, and lectures on Church history. Some (the larger number) need very elementary lessons; others come with a good education. Each is directed according to her education and experience. In fact, all classes are represented among the deaconesses; servants, teachers, ladies, and shepherdesses. They come from different parts of France, but in larger numbers from the South.
Deaconesses are constantly in demand to go out in the city as nurses in private families. Such requests often meet with refusals, because sisters cannot be spared for such duties. Their work is limited by the smallness of their numbers. The last138/134 report gives sixty deaconesses attached to the Home on the Rue de Reuilly.
The work is upon sterile soil as compared to Germany. The Protestants of France are in a small minority, surrounded by an overwhelming majority of Catholics; while in the beginning of the work some influential members of the Protestant faith, having an inadequate comprehension of the good in the movement, and a misconception of its plans, exerted a powerful influence that for awhile told adversely to the cause. The home has now passed beyond the stage when it can be affected by adverse criticisms; and it to-day not only has the approbation of Christians, but also of those who regard it solely from the point of view of philanthropy.2
There are but two parish deaconesses who are at work in Belleville and Ste. Marie. The directors of the institution would be glad to increase the number, as they regard the work of the sisters under the direction of the city pastors as that which presents the widest opportunities for doing good, while it perpetuates those aspects of the deaconess work which most closely resemble those of the early Church. But Calvin’s reply from Geneva to the Church of France is theirs. When petitioned139/135 to send more pastors over the boundary into France he replied, “Send us wood and we will send you arrows.” So the want of deaconesses is a continual hinderance to the furtherance of the cause, both in the city and the provinces.
The prisons for women in France are under the supervision of women, save the office of chief director, which is filled by a man. The great majority of the prisoners in France being Catholics, the number of Sisters of Charity is naturally much larger than the number of deaconesses employed. At the prison of Clermont four of the Paris deaconesses are kept constantly at work among the prisoners.
In connection with the old prison of St. Lazare, the women’s prison of Paris, the deaconesses have a mission especially concerned with caring for discharged female convicts. As was the case at Kaiserswerth, this, in its initiation, is closely connected with the saintly life of Elizabeth Fry. When she came to Paris, in 1835, a drawing-room meeting was held at the residence of the Duchess de Broglie, in which she told of her efforts to effect a reform in prisons in England. None of the ladies of rank and wealth who heard her were stirred to greater effort than was demanded by the keen interest with which they listened to her words; but a quiet governess was present, Mademoiselle Dumas, and with her140/136 the seeds of truth fell into prepared ground. She determined to attempt for her own country a portion of the work Mrs. Fry had accomplished for England. Obtaining permission from the authorities to visit the prison of St. Lazare, she went daily to the prisoners shut up in the rooms of this great building, formerly the monastery of St. Vincent de Paul, the founder of the Sisters of Charity. After the deaconess home was established, some deaconesses were set apart to aid Mademoiselle Dumas in her work. All these years the mission has continued, not interrupted even during the dark days of the Commune. A committee of ladies aids in providing shelter and work for the prisoners when they are discharged. The great publishing house of Hachette & Co., although the head of the firm is a Catholic, provides employment in folding paper for books.
Through the kind offices of Mademoiselle Monod we called on Mademoiselle Dumas. She is now an extremely aged woman; but her interest in the Christian reformation of prisoners of her sex is as keen as it was over fifty years ago, when her labors began. The registers of many years stand by her desk, and from these we were shown how the records of the mission are kept, and in what way the lives of those assisted are watched and followed for141/137 years. Narratives of individual reformation were related to us, and through the long correspondence of many years she was enabled to tell us of those who had turned to a better life and held to it permanently. As she talked her eyes brightened, the tones of her voice became stronger and clearer, her manner more vivacious, and the years seemed to slip from her. Finally, as if overcome by the memories that the long retrospect had brought to her, and thrilled by the recollections, of all this work meant to her, she ended by exclaiming, “O, my dear St. Lazare!” I looked at her astonished. I had just come from the walls of the gloomy prison, and the place had chilled me with horror as I walked through its corridors, and read the stories of shame and guilt in the faces of its inmates; most hopeless looking faces, belonging to little children of ten and twelve up to hardened and prematurely aged women of fifty and sixty. I could not comprehend a term of endearment applied to such a place. But a moment’s consideration led me to see that this aged saint had there fought and won the best of her life’s battles, and the place remains glorified in her thoughts by most hallowed and Christ-like memories.
Now that Mademoiselle Dumas is kept to her room, the deaconesses still come to her weekly,142/138 make their reports, and keep up the proper entries in her books.
A recent letter from Mademoiselle Monod says: “Mademoiselle Dumas still lives, having completed her ninety-sixth year the 26th of last December (1888). Only yesterday our prison committee met at her house, she acting as presiding officer.”
The life of this quiet woman is but little known outside the circle of her immediate influence, but it has been more valuable to her country than that of many a general or statesman who has been ranked among the famous of the earth.
The deaconess home has also branches of work in different parts of France. These include nine hospitals, two homes for the aged and infirm, four orphanages, two work-rooms for young girls, and a convalescents’ home. The house has established close connection with the deaconess houses at St. Loup in French Switzerland, and with Strasburg. The ties of a common language and former memories are strong, and these are the homes most akin to the Paris home.
The ordinary expenses of the Paris deaconess home are about thirty thousand dollars a year. Nearly seven thousand dollars are collected annually by subscriptions, the remaining sum being made up of returns arising from service.
143/139The institution was founded in 1841 by Rev. Antoine Vermeil, a distinguished minister of the Reformed Church, aided by a devout and worthy minister of the Lutheran Church, Rev. Louis Valette. It has grown up under the joint and harmonious patronage of these two State Churches.
A later deaconess home, entirely devoted to training and employing parish deaconesses, was started in 1874, under the sole control of the Lutheran Church. Some pastors secured the co-operation of a few young Christian women to consecrate a portion of their strength and time to the service of the Church. From this beginning sprang the work that exists to-day. The home is located in the Rue de Bridaine. There are now sixteen deaconesses, six of whom are probationers. Five of them are located in different parishes in Paris, usually at a long distance from the central house. Each goes forth early in the morning to her parish, where is a room of some kind serving as a center to the work. Materials used in nursing and medicines are stored here, and there is an office for the physician, who comes at stated periods to give free consultation. From the district house the deaconess goes in all directions and in all weather to look up families which have fallen away from the Church, to gather in children for the Sunday-school, to visit the sick, and to144/140 collect garments and money from the rich in order to distribute them among the poor. Such are some of their duties. Each sister is under the direction of a pastor, and is aided by his advice, while still remaining a member of the community to which she belongs.
In both of the deaconess houses of Paris, as in the German houses, a special service sets apart those sisters who have passed their period of probation, and have been received into full connection. As one of the deaconess reports beautifully says: “When Christ calls the soul to a special vocation he gives it special grace, and those who consecrate themselves to him he consecrates to their task by the strength of his Spirit. So in conformity with the usages of the primitive Church we give consecration to our sisters by the laying on of hands. The consecration is not a sacramental act, conferring a particular character, greater sanctity, or special powers; neither is it simply a ceremony or pious formality. It is a real and efficacious benediction, which the Saviour accords to our sisters to consecrate them to their holy work, as he accorded it to the deacons who received the imposition of the apostles’ hands.”
The good that can be accomplished by deaconesses working together with ministers in behalf of145/141 the manifold interests of the Church is incalculable. The most faithful pastor can make only short and unsatisfactory visits. Many sorrows which he overlooks the deaconess can discern and assuage. She knows best how to reach the heart of a sorrowing woman, to care for her needs, to discern her wants, and to bring solace to the sorrowing and succor to the needy. Deaconesses who have been specially trained for service cannot be spared now that the world has learned to know of them. For “charity cannot take the place of experience, nor good-will replace knowledge;” and trained Christian service is the highest of all service.
The old spirit of the Huguenots has not died out of France, and with that ready susceptibility to noble ideas which is a marked characteristic of the French character, we can expect to see the deaconess cause thrive and prosper as it has done in other lands.
1 Speak to God about the little ones, rather than to the little souls of God.
2 See a sympathetic study of the work by Maxime du Camp, a member of the French Academy, in his book Paris Bienfaisant.
CHAPTER X.
DEACONESSES IN ENGLAND.
To learn the first facts about deaconesses in England, we must go back to the early days of the Puritans. In 1576, under Queen Elizabeth, about sixty non-conformist ministers of the eastern counties assembled to make regulations concerning Church constitution and discipline, and one of them was as follows: “Touching deacons of both sorts, namely, both men and women, the Church should be admonished what is required by the apostle, that they are not to choose men by custom or course, or for their riches, but for their faith, zeal, and integrity; and that the Church is to pray in the meantime to be so directed that they may choose them that are meet. Let the names of those that are thus chosen be published the next Lord’s Day, and after that their duties to the Church, and the Church’s duty toward them. Then let them be received into their office with the general prayers of the whole Church.”1
147/143There are other references in the works of the early Puritans that indicate that the office of deaconess was as well known and recognized as were the other offices that were named in accordance with the usages of the primitive Church.
In the early part of the seventeenth century it still survived, as we shall see from a quaint and curious picture that is of especial interest to all Americans, because it portrays what took place in that community of pious souls who furnished us the men we delight to honor as the Pilgrim Fathers. A number of these heroic souls, who could give up their country, but would not yield their faith, went forth from England in 1608, and settled in Amsterdam. They preserved in a foreign land their own Church usages, as the following words show: “In Amsterdam there were about three hundred communicants, and they had for their pastor and teacher those two eminent men before named (Johnson and Ainsworth); and had at one time four grave men for ruling elders, three able, godly men for deacons, and one ancient widow for a deaconess, who did them service many years, though she was sixty years of age when she was chosen. She honored her place, and was an ornament to the congregation. She usually sat in a convenient place in the congregation, with a little birchen rod in her hand, and kept little children in148/144 awe from disturbing the congregation. She did frequently visit the sick and weak, especially women, and as there was need called out ladies and young women to watch and do them other helps as their necessity should require; and if there were poor she would gather relief for them of those that were able, or acquaint the deacons. And she was obeyed as a mother in Israel and an officer of Christ.”2
Whether the “ancient widow” with the little “birchen rod” had any followers in the early Puritan communities of the Plymouth Colony we cannot say, as there are no records that throw light on the subject; but the history of early New England Congregationalism gives us one indication that the office was recognized in the New World. In the Cambridge Platform, a system of Church discipline agreed upon by the elders and messengers of the New England churches assembled in synod at Cambridge, in 1648, the seventh chapter enumerates the duties of elder and deacons, and then adds, “The Lord hath appointed ancient widdows, where they may be had, to minister in the Church, in giving attendance to the sick, and to give succor unto149/145 them and others in the like necessities.” The same confusion of thought concerning the Church widow and the deaconess is here seen, but there is evident the recognition of the services that women were officially to render the Church.
In the early part of the present century Southey voiced the complaint, long reiterated, that Protestantism had no missionaries. We who live in the closing years of the same century, surrounded by the multiplied evidences of the extent of missions, when the Protestants of the world are expending nearly ten millions of dollars annually, and employing nearly six thousand men and women as missionaries, cannot realize the change that has taken place. In 1830 Southey again wrote: “Thirty years hence another reproach may also be effaced, and England may have her Sisters of Charity.” He had learned to know their value when serving as a volunteer in Wellington’s army, and a year after the battle of Waterloo he had visited the Béguines at Ghent, and what he saw deeply impressed him. “We should have such women among us,” he said. “It is a great loss to England that we have no Sisters of Charity. There is nothing Romish, nothing unevangelical in such communities; nothing but what is right and holy; nothing but what belongs to that religion which the apostle150/146 James has described as ‘pure and undefiled before God the Father.’”3
Southey’s prophecy has come true. England to-day in her deaconesses possesses her Sisters of Charity. How has this change been brought about? The acquaintance of Mrs. Fry with Fliedner, and her visit to Kaiserswerth, led her to introduce into England the practical training of nurses for the sick. The Nursing Sisters’ Institution in Devonshire Square, Bishop’s Gate, was founded through her efforts in 1840, and still exists “to train nurses for private families, and to provide pensions for aged nurses.”4
In 1842, Fliedner came to London, accompanied by four sisters, at the invitation of the German Hospital at Dalston. These deaconesses won golden opinions from the hospital authorities for their quiet, efficient manner, and their trained skill. The hospital continues to be served by them, but the Sisters now come from the mother house at Darmstadt.
Kaiserswerth and its deaconesses became more widely known through the life and inestimable services of Florence Nightingale. When a child, one151/147 of Fliedner’s reports fell into her hands. Its perusal marked an era in her life. It made clear to her what she should do. She would go to Kaiserswerth, and fit herself for a nurse. Her childish resolve never wavered. “Happy is the man who holds fast to the ideals of his youth.” Florence Nightingale held fast to hers. She went to Kaiserswerth at two different times, and through her deeds and her writings the care of the sick in England has been completely transformed. She has won a nation’s gratitude, and now is living in honored old age in one of the London institutions founded mainly by the money that she contributed, and which she obtained by selling some valuable gifts given her by a foreign government in acknowledgment of her care of its wounded soldiers during the Crimean war.
Another woman distinguished in England’s philanthropies is Agnes Jones, who left a home of wealth and refinement to receive her training also at Kaiserswerth. Returning to England she gave her time and talents in single-hearted devotion to the care of the poor in the Liverpool work-house, and met death in the midst of her labors. The training which led two such women to accomplish such noble deeds naturally was recognized as valuable, and Kaiserswerth soon became an honored name in England.
152/148In 1851 Miss Nightingale sent out anonymously her little book entitled An Account of the Institution of Deaconesses, which added to the knowledge already in circulation about the movement in Germany. Meanwhile articles were appearing in the reviews. In 1848 one was written in the Edinburgh Review by John Malcolm Ludlow, who later, in 1866, gave the results of the thoughts and studies of a number of years in Woman’s Work in the Church, the best historical study of the subject up to the date at which it was written. Since then the Germans have pushed their historical investigations further, and the work needs to be revised and to be brought down to the present time.
In Good Words for 1861 there were two articles by Dr. Stevenson, of the Irish Presbyterian Church, entitled “The Blue Flag of Kaiserswerth,” afterward incorporated in his work, Praying and Working, a book too little known among us.
The great upholder of the deaconess cause in the Church of England was the late Dean of Chester, Rev. J. S. Howson. His essay, first published in the Quarterly Review, was amplified and issued in book form in 1860 under the title Deaconesses. It won many friends. The cause remained a favorite one with him, and he constantly advocated it by speech and by deed. Since his death153/149 his latest thoughts, which remained substantially the same as those that he first advanced, have been published in a work entitled The Diaconate of Women.
Within the Church of England, however, the deaconess cause has not met the same prosperous development that it has obtained in connection with certain independent institutions, notably that of Mildmay.
Among the institutions on the Continent, as well as in the pages of this work up to the present, the terms “sister” and “deaconess” are used synonymously, to indicate one and the same person. But when we come to consider the deaconess institutions within the Church of England we cannot continue to use these two names in the same way. A deaconess is a member of a deaconess institution, actively engaged in charitable deeds, but, like the deaconess on the Continent, she can sever her connection with it when adequate cause presents itself, and return to her family and friends. A sister belongs to a sisterhood which closely resembles the Roman Catholic sisterhoods in many features. These sisterhoods began in 1847 with a number of ladies brought together through the influence of Dr. Pusey, who formed themselves into a community to live under its rule. Their influence and number154/150 increased, and twenty-three sisterhoods are mentioned in the last official report.5
Doubtless it was the activity and great usefulness of the continental deaconess houses that provided the stimulating examples which acted on the Church of England and led to the rise of sisterhoods and deaconess institutions. But the two opposing tendencies within the Episcopal Church—namely, that which desires to approach the Church of Rome, with which it feels itself in sympathy on many points, and that which views with disfavor any conformity to it, and strives to keep to the landmarks set at the great Reformation—these two distinct tendencies are closely reflected in the woman’s work of the Anglican Church.6 The sisterhoods are distinctly under the fostering care of the former element, the deaconesses are manifestly favored by the latter. Sisterhoods, again, differ among themselves, some being strongly conventual in their life and practice, adopting the three vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, and a few even advocating penance and confession. The vows are taken for life, and, in connection with the view of the sacred obligation to life-long service, great stress is laid upon the position of the sister as the “bride of Christ”—the155/151 same thought of the mysterious union with the heavenly Bridegroom that is so dwelt upon in the nunneries of the Catholic Church. With such views Protestants, distinctly such, can have no sympathy. Those who look upon the deaconess as a valuable member of the Church economy do so because they regard her as a Christian woman, strengthened and disciplined by special training to do better service for Christ in the world. This is the recognized difference: “The sisterhood exists primarily for the sake of forming a religious community, but deaconesses live together for the sake of the work itself, attracted to deaconess work by the want which in most populous towns is calling loudly for assistance; and with a view of being trained, therefore, for spiritual and temporal usefulness among the poor.”7
There are now seven deaconess establishments in the Church of England, each having a larger or smaller number of branches, with diocesan sanction and under the supervision of clergymen.8
The first of these was founded in 1861, and is now known as the London Diocesan Deaconess Institution. At that time Kaiserswerth was156/152 accepted as its model; deaconesses were sent there to be trained; Kaiserswerth rules were adopted as far as possible, and a modification of the Kaiserswerth dress for the sisters. The house was then represented at the triennial Conferences in Germany, and in the list of mother houses published at Kaiserswerth9 the name still appears. It would seem, however, that now the Kaiserswerth connection is entirely set aside by the London house, for in an historical sketch of the revival of deaconesses in the Church, that is found in the organ of the institution, called Ancilla Domini, for March, 1887, there is no mention made of any of the continental houses. The Anglican Church apparently dates the entire work from the setting apart of its first deaconess, Elizabeth C. Ferard, in 1861, as she was the first to receive consecration through the touch of a bishop’s hand. The former connection with Kaiserswerth and the great work carried on in Germany from 1836 to the present time are quite ignored.
Besides the London house already mentioned an East London deaconess home was opened in 1880, to provide deaconesses and church-workers for East London. Besides the deaconesses and probationers thirty-two associates are connected with this home. The associates are ladies who do not intend to157/153 become deaconesses, but give as much time as they can to the work. They live with the deaconesses, conform to the rules, and wear the garb, but pay their own expenses. These associates are a highly important part of the working force. They form a valuable tie connecting the sisters with sources of influence and aid that would otherwise be closed to them. Nearly always they are ladies of independent means, and come for longer or shorter periods to relieve the deaconesses, their zeal often being as great as that of the sisters whose places they take.
Besides these houses there are homes located at Maidstone, Chester, Bedford, Salisbury, and Portsmouth, in the respective dioceses of Canterbury, Chester, Ely, Salisbury, and Winchester.
In the home at Portsmouth sisters not only engage in nursing and parish work, but are also given special training for penitentiary and out-of-door rescue work. They also have a home for the rescue of neglected children.
The Salisbury Home is beautifully situated in the quiet cathedral city of the same name. The house is a picturesque and venerable mansion, covered with clinging green vines, opening out into a garden which in olden times belonged to the convent. There is in connection with the home an institution for training girls for domestic service,158/154 supported by the funds of a charity given for that purpose. The whole service of the house is done by the girls. They attend upon the deaconesses and the ladies who board there to receive training in the hospital. Each deaconess pays for board and lodging while training, and, if able to do so, when she returns for rest, or a visit to her old home.
In other houses the deaconess is expected to keep her own room in order, and may have some duties in the house, but servants do the rough work. The social status of the English deaconesses is, as a rule, markedly different from the German deaconesses. Here ladies of rank and inherited social traditions, of refinement, of accomplishments, and of education, many of them women of means, defraying their entire expenses and often those of their poorer sisters, are largely represented among the deaconesses. On the other hand, the German deaconesses, as we have seen, are largely of that station in life that furnishes many for domestic service. Although of course there are among them women of all ranks and all degrees of education, still such women form the larger number; and the conditions under which Fliedner began the work, as well as the difference of custom and habit in the two countries, incline the German houses to maintain the rules of service by which nearly159/155 every detail of domestic service in their institutions is cared for by the deaconesses. There is more of ceremony and formality in the English deaconess institutions which are under the direction of the Church of England. At Salisbury, for instance, the candidate must reside in the home for three months, that her ability and efficiency may be tested. If accepted, she then puts on a gray serge habit, a leathern girdle, white cap, black bonnet, the veil and cloak of a probationer, and is admitted to the “degree” of a probationer at a special service. The year of probation having come to an end, she is again presented to the bishop, and is set apart as a deaconess by the laying on of hands. This time the habit is changed from gray to blue, and a black ebony cross, with one of gold inlaid, is hung upon her neck.10
This is very different from the way in which Fliedner regarded the dress and adornment of the deaconesses for whom he was responsible. The king of Prussia desired to present them with a small silver cross as their badge of service, but the simple-hearted German pastor dissuaded him, saying that the deaconesses needed no ornament save a meek and quiet spirit, and they must avoid symbols which would suggest Romish imitations.
160/156The Strasburg deaconesses also at first wore a small cross, but Pastor Härter discontinued it when he found that the wearing of it gave occasion for complaint.
Yet however we may differ in the lesser details, of garb, of rules, and of ceremonies, from those accepted by some of the Church of England deaconess institutions, we can give unstinted admiration to the lives of self-denial, and active, unceasing efforts in behalf of others, that we see among their numbers. Take, for instance, the little publication The Deaconess, issued by the East London Home, and notice the undertakings carried on by the members—district-visiting, nursing of the sick, mothers’ meetings, Sunday-school teaching, Bible classes, and all the multitudinous ways of meeting the squalor, poverty, ignorance, sickness, and sin of the poor of the east of London. There is no poetic enthusiasm that strengthens one for such work, the dirt, the degradation, the forlorn condition are so trying. The little children so precociously wicked, so preternaturally cunning, that the natural charm and attraction of childhood have wholly disappeared; the sights and sounds that assail the senses; the dulled, hopeless faces, the apathy, the stunted intellectual growth—these are the depressing influences that continually beset the161/157 deaconesses, and nothing short of God-given strength and Christ-like enthusiasm can enable these women to devote six, eight, and ten years of service to this worst city district, and to come forth with sunshiny, peaceful faces, and sympathetic, loving hearts.
Taking the total number of deaconess institutions under the Church of England, there are eighty one deaconesses, thirty-four probationers, and two hundred and twenty-nine associates.11
So far, sisterhoods have proved more attractive to the women of the Church of England than have deaconess establishments. The latter do not seem to increase largely in numbers. Vexing questions have arisen as to how the deaconess should be set apart to her work. Should she be consecrated by the imposition of the bishop’s hands? What relation should she have to the Church? These questions have been partially settled by the principles and rules that were drawn up in 1871 and were signed by the two archbishops and eighteen bishops. They define a deaconess as “a woman set apart by a bishop, under that title, for service in the Church;”12 placing her under the authority162/158 of the bishop of the diocese. These recommendations have not been formally adopted by the Church of England; they hold good only so far as they are accepted.
But there are other institutions, lying outside of the boundaries of the State Church, which have developed more fully and prosperously than those within it. Of these we must speak first of the institution of Dr. Laseron, which is more closely connected with Kaiserswerth than any other in England. In 1855 Dr. Laseron and his wife lost their only child; and as Mrs. Laseron walked through the streets with burdened heart she looked at the little children with quickened sympathy, and noticed how many were poor and hungry and scantily clothed. She talked with her husband, and they opened a “ragged school” for children. This increased and branched off, until now there is an orphanage, workhouses for boys, and a servants’ training school for girls. Requests were frequently made for some of the older girls to act as nurses among the poor; and, finally, Dr. Laseron, who was a German by birth, determined to found a deaconess house and hospital. A small hospital of twelve beds was opened, and proved insufficient to meet the demands; and none could be accepted as deaconesses, as there was no opportunity to train them in so163/159 small a place. While waiting to see how the house could be enlarged, he mentioned his perplexity to Mr. Samuel Morley. This gentleman heard him with interest, and said that he was one of the directors of a large hospital; that at a recent meeting of the directors a Catholic bishop had offered to send Sisters of Charity who, without compensation, should nurse the sick, and he had thought what a fine thing it would be if the Protestant Church had also its women of piety who could devote themselves to a similar work. The result of the conversation was that Mr. Morley contributed forty thousand dollars, with which Dr. Laseron purchased a site in Tottenham, built a hospital with fifty beds, and a deaconess was called from Kaiserswerth to superintend it. The hospital has been again enlarged, so that it now accommodates one hundred patients. Sixty-four deaconesses are connected with it, who are at service in the hospitals of Cork, Dublin, Scarborough, and Sunderland. This institution is unsectarian, and has met with special aid from non-conformists. It still keeps in close relation to Kaiserswerth, and is represented at the Conferences. It has constantly thriven, and the mother-house at Tottenham is a center for various benevolent enterprises.
In connection with Dr. Barnardo’s Orphanage164/160 there is also a deaconess house. Harley House, the missionary training-school under the direction of Dr. and Mrs. Grattan Guinness in East London, has a deaconess home as one of its branches. The Kilburn (St. Augustine’s) Orphanage of Mercy, and the London Bible-women’s Mission are also centers for the training and organizing of women’s work in London.
We must pause more at length over the prison mission under the care of Mrs. Meredith. American women are beginning to occupy themselves with questions of philanthropy and religious activity to an extent not before equaled. The women’s prisons in England are especially fruitful of suggestions to us, as many here are interested in having our women prisoners separated in prisons by themselves, as has already been attempted in a few States. Mrs. Meredith’s work is in behalf of the prisoners after they have served their sentence and are discharged. She is the daughter of General Lloyd, who was formerly governor-general of prisons in Ireland. As a little child she was accustomed to go about with her father, and the interior of prisons became familiar to her. Later in life, when her family ties were broken, and her hands left free for service, her interest was engaged in behalf of the women convicts who were discharged165/161 from prison. She enlisted the support of other ladies of like views, able to assist her, and in 1866 the Prison Gate Mission began, which has continued to the present day. Every morning, as the gate of Millbank prison swings back to allow those who have been released from penal bondage to come forth, a sister stands waiting to invite those who will go with her to a room near by, where breakfast awaits them; there are ladies to inquire about their plans and to offer them work. A great laundry was opened in 1867 to provide employment for these women. Here washing is done for two classes: for the poor and sick, to whom the service is given as a charity, and to those who pay for the work and whose money enables the mission to be partly self-supporting. Then the ladies extended their plans to take in the children of the prisoners. A law was passed by Parliament which enabled Mrs. Meredith and her associates to have the care of those children at the Princess Mary Village Home until they are sixteen years of age. This home was founded at Addlestone in 1870, and was named after the Princess Mary, Duchess of Teck, who aided in obtaining funds to build it. The institution takes not only the female children of criminal mothers, but also little girls who are likely to drift into a career of crime. It is conducted on the cottage plan, each166/162 little house having ten inmates and a house mother to superintend it, and being complete in its own arrangements. There are eighteen cottages, a large, generous school-room, a small infirmary for the sick, and a little church. About two hundred children of criminals and the unfortunate class are here cared for. Instead of allowing them to drift away and to perpetuate vice, crime, and immorality, they are taken entirely from their old surroundings, and new influences of knowledge and purity are thrown about them. There is no part of Mrs. Meredith’s mission which has such hope for the future and is so valuable in results as this preventive work among the children.
There are also a woman’s medical mission (1882), a Christian woman’s union, a girls’ school, and a deaconess house in Jerusalem under the control of the same association. How it arose is well intimated by the following extract from a letter from Mrs. Meredith to the author, dated March 9, 1889: “You will know that my course has been progressive with regard to the mode of congregating the women who joined me in working. At first we merely came together daily from our own homes, as those who make a business concern do. Then to spare time and money we began to live together. The next step was to admit useful and devoted women who167/163 had no property, and to form an association with degrees of membership. When we found ourselves becoming a corporation of importance, and having combined to acquire property and to found institutions, we invited the help and counsel of some men of known eminence. Our institutions are all branches of a parent stock, and are now placed in the charge of these good men, and we have taken the name of the Church of England Woman’s Missionary Association. I am daily persuaded of the value of such organizations.”
In connection with the London West Central Mission there is an association of ladies called the Sisters of the People. “They are expected to be worthy of the beautiful name they bear. They are true sisters of the unprivileged and the disheartened; as ready to make a bed, cook a dinner, or nurse a baby as to minister to the higher need of the immortal spirit. The sisters live together in the neighborhood of their work, and wear a distinctive dress as a protection and for other reasons; but they take no vows, and are at liberty to withdraw from the mission at any time. Their work is directed by Mrs. Hughes. Katherine House, the residence of the Sisters of the People, was opened early in November, 1887, and from that day the work of the sisters dates its commencement. Their168/164 daily labors are very similar to those of the deaconesses of Mildmay, who work among the London parishes. Each sister has a district allotted to her, which she visits regularly and systematically. The first object which she sets before herself is to get to know the people, and to make them feel that she is their true sister and friend, irrespective of the fact that they are themselves good or bad, respectable or degraded. When once true friendliness is established, the way is opened for direct religious influence; and many, who in the first instance would never pay any attention to religion, will listen to an appeal from one whom they love and respect.”13
Katherine House accommodates twelve sisters. A second house is urgently needed, and a strong plea is made for it in the Report.
There are besides “out sisters,” who work with the sisters but reside at their own homes. This is a valuable feature of this mission, as it interests ladies who are living in their own homes, and yet who can be very useful to those who devote their whole work to the sisters’ labor. In the Report a great many instances are given which show what an intimate knowledge of the poor people is obtained by these sisters, and in what practical ways they169/165 minister to the bodily and spiritual needs of those whom they find in their house-to-house visitations. The term “sister,” as it is used in the report of the London West Central Mission, is in all respects a synonym for “deaconess,” as the name is understood in the large deaconess establishment at Mildmay. To the study of this we shall devote the following chapter.