There is an old and very rare print of the Satterlee Hospital still in existence. From this valuable documentary evidence it is clear that the hospital occupied many acres of ground. In order to reach the building it was necessary to cross a bridge in the vicinity of South street. In crossing this at the time the hospital was opened the carriage containing a number of Sisters broke down and they were compelled to walk the remainder of the distance.
During all the time of the war Sister Gonzaga remained in charge of St. Joseph’s Asylum, which she visited at regular intervals. At the close of the war she returned to give her whole time to the Asylum; the other Sisters returning to their various missions.
Sister Gonzaga has had frequent visits from grateful soldiers who were nursed back to life through her Christian devotion. One who heard of her serious illness a few years ago called, and then, as the outpouring of a grateful heart, sent the following letter to the Philadelphia Evening Star as “A soldier’s tribute to the noble work of Mother Gonzaga during the war:”
“In your valuable paper dated yesterday the announcement was made that Mother Gonzaga, in charge of St. Joseph’s Orphan Asylum, southwest corner of Seventh and Spruce streets, was lying dangerously ill. In reciting her many acts of charity for the young orphans under her care and protection, victims of epidemics, etc., during the many years of her life, you were not aware that the short notice touched a tender chord of affection in the breast of many a veteran of the late war.
“Mother Gonzaga was a mother of sixty thousand soldiers, as patients under treatment in Satterlee United States Army Hospital, Forty-fourth and Pine streets, from 1862 until 1865. Those who were under her care, no matter of what religion or creed, when they received the midnight visits of Mother Gonzaga, her silent steps after ‘taps’ and by the dim gaslight, will recognize her familiar countenance surrounded by that white-winged hood or cowl, just bending her form to hear the faint breath or whisper of some fever patient or some restless one throwing off the bed clothes; she kindly tucking them in around his body as a mother would a child; then a visit to the dying to give them expressions of comfort. Those who recall these scenes I say think of her truly as an angel of peace and sweetness.
SISTER MARY GONZAGA.
“Administering medicine when required, loosening a bandage or replacing the same, watching a case of a sufferer in delirium—at all times annoying to those near him—was her daily duty. To see her always calm, always ready, with modesty and fidelity, faithfully performing a Christian duty as an administering angel when physicians, surgeons, friends and all human aid had failed, was a beautiful sight. No poet could describe, no artist could faithfully portray on canvas the scenes at the deathbed of a soldier, that would convey to those not having witnessed them the solemnity of the quiet kneeling, the silent prayer, a murmur faintly heard as a whisper, a Sister of Charity paying her devotion to Him on high, and consigning the spirit of the dying soldier to His care.
“As one of many thousands under her care I shall always think of Mother Gonzaga as one of a constellation of stars of the greatest magnitude—surrounded by many others that were devoted servants, among whom I would mention Dorothea Dix, Annie M. Ross, Hettie A. Jones and Mary Brady. We soldiers cannot forget the service they rendered.
“J. E. MacLane.”
On the 12th of, April, 1877, Sister Gonzaga celebrated the occasion of her golden jubilee in the Sisterhood. On the previous 19th of March she had attained her 50th year in the community. On that day she received the blessing of the Holy Father (Pope Pius IX), a gracious act obtained for her at the suggestion of Rev. Father Alizeri, C. M., a saintly man and a faithful missionary, who has since gone to his reward. Bishops, priests, Sisters and laymen vied with one another on this jubilee occasion in showing the reverence and esteem in which they held the simple religious woman who had gone about doing good for so many years.
Ten years later she was recalled to the mother house at Emmittsburg by her superiors, who desired to relieve her of her responsibility as the head of such a large institution. Born to obedience she promptly responded to the order, and left the house which had become as a home; left friends who had become endeared to her, and left orphans who truly regarded her as a mother. There was not a murmur from this woman who was being taken away from associations with which she had been lovingly and intimately connected for nearly half a century.
Her Philadelphia friends, without solicitation and spontaneously and simultaneously, addressed petitions to her superiors requesting her return to the scenes of her life’s labors. In the words of one who loved Sister Gonzaga, “Heaven was stormed by fervent prayers for the return of the Mother of the Poor.” She remained at Emmittsburg for sixteen months, and at the end of that time returned to Philadelphia. Her home-coming on the 20th of December, 1888, was made the occasion of a great demonstration. The Sisters, the orphans, the managers of the asylum and a host of friends participated.
The actual extent of the good done by Sister Gonzaga is scarcely realized by those who were about her. Many of her charitable acts have been done quietly, even secretly. There was one story with almost the pathos of a tragedy in which she was concerned. The daughter of an estimable family went astray, and the parents in the first violence of their anger and grief turned her out of the house. A few months passed, and then their sober better judgment coming to the surface they attempted to find and forgive the child they had disowned. But they searched in vain, and finally almost in despair turned to Sister Gonzaga. She had not the slightest clue to the missing girl, but she pledged herself to bring her back. In a short time she located the erring one in the insane ward of the Philadelphia Hospital. She was a raving maniac. The girl was restored to her remorseful parents, and by careful nursing was gradually brought back to reason.
On another occasion when the Sister was missing for an hour or so every day it was discovered that she was in daily attendance on a poor woman who lay ill in a small house in a street near by. Although this was entirely foreign to her duties she regularly called and washed and dressed the woman.
Sister Gonzaga departed this life on the morning of October 8, 1897, in her room in St. Joseph’s Orphan Asylum in Philadelphia. A piece of crape, on top of which was fastened a bit of immaculate white ribbon, fluttered from the bell on the door of the asylum on that day to inform the passer-by that this marvelous woman had gone to receive her reward.