Our founder - Sister Marie Gertrude

She was born Amelia Josephine de Henningsen on 21 April 1822 in Brussels. Amelia lived in London from the age of 8 and at the age of 21 she entered a newly founded religious congregation of women in Paris and became Sister Marie Getrude of the Blessed Sacrament, a Sister of the Assumption.

At 28 she arrived in Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape, having been missioned to South Africa with 6 companions at the request of Bishop Aidan Devereux, the first Vicar Apostolic of the Eastern Cape. Sister Getrude was leading the very first group of Sisters ever to minister in South Africa. Her choices in this new setting both attracted and disturbed some of her companions who returned to Paris. Sister Getrude and the slowly increasing number of Sisters who joined her, continued to try and extend the kingdom of a country which had only a resident Bishop for 12 years when the Sisters first arrived in 1849.

Education was the main focus of the Sisters, from the very beginning this was provided to the better off and really poor. In a town that had no health care facilities, the Sisters ran a small dispensary. When war left many children orphaned, the Sisters managed to house them in their limited accommodation and to provide for them for several years.

Over and above all this, the Sisters were involved in whatever was needed by the church in the town and well beyond the town by missionaries who had ventured into Zimbabwe and Lesotho. Two communities of Grahamstown and Bedford were founded with schools, health care outreach and special devotion to the nurturing of the small parish communities of Catholics.

Sister Marie Getrude passed away in 1904 at the age of 82, by this stage she had acquired another name – ‘Notre Mere’ which means ‘Our Mother’ significant of the motherly care she showed to all.

“Follow the voice of your conscience. Integrity, justice and honesty are stronger than sentiment even though they can cost much pain” Sister Marie Getrude.