The cholera epidemic of 1832 that swept through Baltimore killed 1% of the city’s population, which translated into 800 deaths. The Sisters of Charity of St. Joseph’s, Mother Seton’s community, received recognition and gratitude for its work and service. Another community of sisters did not receive their gratitude for a very, very long time, purely because they were Black.
The Oblate Sisters of Providence were the first community of African American women religious in the United States. Founded by Venerable Mother Mary Lange and counting among its first band of members Sister Theresa Maxis Duchemin, a student of Mother Seton’s school, the Oblate Sisters primarily came from and ministered to the free African American community in the Baltimore area.
The only known photo of Mother Mary Lange, c. 1870s/80s
The Calverton Almshouse was one of the great horror sites of the epidemic. The Sisters of Charity labored in one room providing comfort to the dying, while the Oblate Sisters labored in another; segregation prevented a more efficient and effective method of care. Yet, despite this practice, when Archbishop James Whitefield contracted the disease, he called upon the Oblate Sisters rather than the Sisters of Charity, who held the official mandate for care granted by the Archdiocese.
Despite facing the same horrors, and each community losing Sisters to cholera in the epidemic, the accounts in the Daughters’ Archives fail to mention the work of their Oblate companions. Only in 2023 did the city of Baltimore extend an official recognition of gratitude to the Oblate Sisters.
While better late than never is certainly true, it is our hope that all be recognized in their own times and to see the completeness of the work of God’s Church and every soul that forms it.
Today we would like to highlight a pioneer at one of the Daughters largest and longest-lived institutions, Providence Hospital in Washington, D.C. When Estelle Howard arrived at Providence to begin her career as a nurse, she became one of the first two Black nurses to work at the hospital. She would spend the next 43 years at Providence, garnering a number of other pioneering firsts during her time there.
It was 1947 when Sister Rita Voss called the Freedman’s Hospital Nursing School and asked for the best two students in the graduating nursing class. No white hospital had ever made such a request of Freedman’s before.
Expecting an interview, the two nurses were hired on the spot and asked if they were ready to work. In 1951, Ms. Howard became head of a segregated ward, but as units desegregated, she became the first Black head nurse of an integrated unit. She later rose to the ranks of Assistant Director of Nursing and Control Coordinator of the Emergency Unit.
Among her other accomplishments, roles, and titles at the job were those of a reporter for the employee newsletter and leadership positions in the District of Columbia’s Nurses Association.
Estelle Howard in 1963
In 1982, for her pioneering role and years of dedicated service, Ms. Howard was the inaugural winner of the Sr. Anne Robb Award, given to those who have shown dedication to Providence Hospital, above average performance and achievements, and perseverance in the face of difficulties. Even after this lifetime achievement award, she served for another eight years at the hospital. In her presentation of the award, Sister Irene Kraus called her “a model of a person who focuses on the good in life and people and refuses to be embittered or to respond in kind when she meets unkindness … Miss Howard has the unique ability over the years to be loyal and supportive of those she has worked with at every level.”
Estelle Howard and Sister Irene Kraus in 1982, when Ms. Howard received the Sister Anne Robb Award
Estelle Howard retired after exactly 43 years at Providence on April 23, 1990. The hospital proclaimed it Estelle Louise Howard Day. Her work made it possible for many others to pursue their career as they desired and to make nursing and the Hospital better for its administrators, doctors, nurses, and patients. Even after her retirement, she continued to volunteer at the hospital.
Estelle Howard in 1990, near her retirement
Estelle Howard’s story is documented in the Archives through the various employee newsletters, photo collections, and a profile written about her in 1990, but we are also fortunate enough to have a copy of a life story that she wrote “And Now My Time at Bat Remembering” in 1999. Although it is but a few brief pages, it allows her to tell her story in her own words and as she wished to, with deep reverence for her immediate and extended family and for the elder family members who can preserve and pass on Black family history. It documents her ancestors’ leaving Alabama during the Great Migration and the forces growing up that shaped her life, including the town library, the Great Depression, and stories of family history in Louisiana.
When St. Malachy parish was founded in 1860, the Mill Creek neighborhood in which it was located was largely Irish. By the early 20th century, the neighborhood formed the heart of a major African American neighborhood of St. Louis, with successful small businesses, churches, and a music scene helmed as the home base of Scott Joplin and Josephine Baker.
In 1941, the Archdiocese of St. Louis turned operation of the parish over to the Jesuit Fathers. By this point, redlining and segregation had eroded the neighborhood, with the city neglecting to care for water, electricity, or deteriorating buildings. It was in this environment that the Jesuits invited the Daughters of Charity, long established in the St. Louis area, to open a school.
The school operated from 1941 to 1959, although enrollment began to decline after 1947 when Archbishop Joseph Ritter enacted desegregation throughout the Catholic schools of the Archdiocese. Prior to desegregation, the accounts in the collection written by Daughters of Charity depict a group of sisters trying their hardest under highly restricted circumstances, teaching in a substandard building with secondhand supplies and minimal assistance.
Archbishop Ritter had advocated integration in the schools before the Supreme Court Brown v. Board decision, and the end of segregated schooling offered a happy ending for the children and their educations. A 1957 account in the collection attested that “because the children of our families are now permitted to attend white schools, their families are moving into better neighborhoods.” This did not mean that the old neighborhood saw an end to its neglect, however. Whether it was described as “slum clearing” or “urban renewal,” the effect was the same when, in 1959, almost 20,000 residents were removed and much of the neighborhood – including St. Malachy Parish – was demolished. https://news.stlpublicradio.org/show/st-louis-on-the-air/2018-03-01/remembering-mill-creek-valley-once-home-to-20-000-black-st-louisans
From St. Louis Globe Democrat
The St. Malachy School collection is not large, just half an archival box that stacks three or four inches high. The Daughters’ accounts reflect the challenges of the times in which they lived and served. They show a strong awareness that their students were being shortchanged, both by the poverty of their neighborhood and the way in which their schools had been neglected for resources. There is evident regret that they were unable to do more for their students:
Sister Aurelia [Hogan] had trained her summer school catachumens well, and the neophtes [sic] followed suit. The older boys brought out saw-horses on which they placed boards, making two long tables, while benches and chairs were quickly hauled forward. The children, smaller ones first, formed in a single line leading toward the counter, at which seven W.P.A. [Works Progress Administration] colored workers dished up a steaming hot dinner. We marveled at the order maintained, for though each child received his portion and immediately walked to his place, not one touched a morsel until the entire table – about fifty children had been seated. Then, with heads reverently bowed, they said Grace in unison, and ate dinner. Poor hungry children! Father informed us that this was the only “square” meal some of them got all day. It was furnished in part by the W.P.A. surplus commodity program, while Father supplied the rest with whatever financial assistance he was able to procure from charitable benefactors.
….
Of classroom equipment there was none – no text-books, no blackboards nor chalk, no paper nor pencils. So, with a fervent “Veni Sancte” in our hearts, we read and sang – anything to quell disorder, — until Father McHattie arrived to perform what was probably the hardest duty of his new position. How his big, compassionate heart must have hurt as he quietly explained to the children that as we could accommodate only two hundred pupils, he was forced to send nearly half of them back to their former schools. Then Father read a list of names and a sad, heartbroken crowd of youngsters followed him out of the room.
The narrative accounts of St. Malachy and the neighborhood all depict African Americans from a white point of view, but this does not mean that the collections are devoid of information that directly provides pieces of information about individual members of Mill Creek’s African American residents. While there are no surviving class lists in the collection, programs of events provide names of students along with their graduating year. Other publications reflect the pride of taking part in the school and parish communities and demonstrate a proud and successful Black Catholic parish.
Edition of a Parish newsletter, 1946
Commencement program, 1943
The collection also, perhaps most valuably, contains approximately 50 photographs that show the life of the school and of the Mill Creek neighborhood. Among them are the joy that only comes from children.
The collection is available here in the Archives for on-site research. It is a candidate for digitization in the near future, and we hope to provide an update when that day arrives. Based upon research need, we can create scans for remote use. Please contact archives@doc.org for more information or to schedule an appointment.
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