Mary Ward (nun)

Mary Ward, I.B.V.M. (23 January 1585 – 30 January 1645), was an English Catholic Religious Sister whose activities led to the founding of the Congregation of Jesus and the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary, better known as the Sisters of Loreto (not to be confused with the American Sisters of Loretto), which have both established schools around the world.

Ward was declared Venerable by Pope Benedict XVI on 19 December 2009; this is the first of three steps on the path to being declared a saint.

Biography

Mary Ward was born in Mulwith, North Yorkshire, to Marmaduke Ward and Ursula Wright. She was born at a time of great conflict for Roman Catholics in England. Two of her relatives were involved in the Gunpowder Plot. In 1595 her family home burned down in an anti-Catholic riot; the children were saved by their father. In 1599 she moved to the house of Sir Ralph Babthorpe at Osgodby, Selby. It was there at the age of 15 that Mary felt called to the religious life. She entered a monastery of Poor Clares at Saint-Omer in northern France, then in the Spanish Netherlands, as a lay sister. In 1606 she founded a new monastery of the Order specifically for English women at nearby Gravelines.

Mary Ward

Mary Ward may refer to:

Mary Ward (scientist)

Mary Ward (27 April 1827 – 31 August 1869) was an Anglo-Irish amateur scientist who was killed when she fell under the wheels of an experimental steam car built by her cousins. As the event occurred in 1869, she was the world's first person known to be killed by a motor vehicle.

Early life

During the 19th century, when most women had little encouragement for a science education, Mary was unusual. She was born Mary King in present-day Ferbane, County Offaly on 27 April 1827, the youngest child of Henry and Harriett King. She and her sisters were educated at home, as were most girls at the time. However, her education was slightly different from the norm because she was of a renowned scientific family. She was interested in nature from an early age, and by the time she was three years old she was collecting insects.

Interests

Mary King was a keen stargazer, like her cousin William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse. He was building the Leviathan of Parsonstown, a reflecting telescope with a six-foot mirror which remained the world's largest until 1917. Mary often visited him at his home and, as she was a good artist, sketched each stage of the process. These sketches, along with photographs made by Parson's wife Mary Rosse, were used recently to help restore the telescope.

Mary Ward (nurse)

Mary Amos Ward, BEM (1885, Stoke Bruerne – 1972, Northamptonshire) was an English nurse to the boat people on the waterways. She was a significant figure in the history of the British canal system.

Biography

She was the daughter of rope and twine manufacturer Thomas Amos. The family life centred on Stoke Bruerne, one of the major junctions of the English canals. She was never professionally qualified as a nurse, but she spent ten years travelling as what was then called a "nursing sister" in convents in Europe and the USA before returning home to nurse her sick father. This brought her into contact with the boat families again, many of whom she had known when she was growing up. "People think my boat people are dirty and crude and want to get rid of them, but they are wonderful, proud, wise people".

She married Charlie Ward and, as her father's health declined, he took over the running of the family business. When this moved to a shed (formerly occupied by the stonemason) by the side of Lock 15, it became her surgery from where she administered medicine and care to the boat people. At first this was in an unofficial capacity and until the late 1930s she financed it from her own pocket. At this point the canal companies (precursors to British Waterways) began to recognise the importance of her work and she was appointed as a "consultant sister" to long-distance boatmen and families. Over several decades she acted as nurse, midwife, and even amanuensis to the mostly uneducated, illiterate boat people.