From Vendée to the ends of the earth Sister Marie de la Croix (1831 – 1908) Missionary in New Caledonia Marie Cécile de Mijolla, smsm and Amelia Tufale, pfm (for the chapter on the birth of the Congregation of the Petites Filles de Marie) Missionary Sisters of the Society of Mary From Vendée to the ends of the earth Sister Marie de la Croix (1831 – 1908) Missionary in New Caledonia Marie Cécile de Mijolla, smsm and Amelia Tufale, pfm (for the chapter on the birth of the Congregation of the Petites Filles de Marie) Translation into English - Julienne Hayes-Smith, smsm Rome, 2008 Missionary Sisters of the Society of Mary Via Cassia 1243, 00189 Rome, Italy www.smsmsisters.org Email: [email protected] TABLE OF CONTENTS Illustrations ............................................................................ 4 Foreword ................................................................................ 5 Abbreviations and acronyms ............................................. 10 Introduction ......................................................................... 13 Chapter 1 - The years of preparation ................................ 17 I. Childhood at La Roche-sur-Yon ....................................... 17 II. Adolescence in Bordeaux .................................................. 23 Chapter II - Departure from France and the voyage (1858) .............................................................. 43 Chapter III - The first years in New Caledonia (1858 - 1864) ................................................... 65 I. La Conception (December 1858 - May 1859) .................. 65 II. Ile des Pins (May 1859 - August 1864) ............................. 75 Chapter IV - The first years at Saint-Louis (1864-1874) 103 1. Difficulties with Governor Guillain ................................ 103 II. Our Lady of the Providence ............................................ 111 III. Christian formation of the children ................................. 119 IV. Occupations and noteworthy events ................................ 126 V. Our Lady of the Missions ................................................ 138 VI. Health problems .............................................................. 145 Chapter V - Saint-Louis 1874 - 1892 ............................... 157 I. Petites Filles de Marie [Little Daughters of Mary] ......... 157 II. The school continues ....................................................... 172 III. The final years at Saint-Louis (1882 - 1892) .................. 180 Chapter VI - With the leprosy patients in Belep (1892 - 1898) ................................................ 201 Chapter VII - At Belep with the Belema (1898 - 1908) .. 239 Chapter VIII - An outline of Sister Marie de la Croix’s personality ............................................... 277 I. Physical appearance ........................................................ 277 II. Some traits of her character ............................................. 279 III. Her relationship with God ............................................... 295 By way of conclusion ......................................................... 308 Appendices ......................................................................... 311 Bibliography ...................................................................... 342 3 ILLUSTRATIONS Sr Marie de la Croix - about 1885 ......................................... 12 Sr Marie de la Croix - about 1899 ......................................... 12 La Roche-sur-Yon: Place Napoléon, showing St Louis’ church where Pélagie was baptised ............................... 15 Our Lady of Verdelais .......................................................... 15 Family Tree of Pélagie Phelippon ......................................... 16 Our Lady of Fourvière .......................................................... 37 Marist Missions in Oceania (Mangeret, 1932) ...................... 38 Villa Maria, Sydney, where Sr Marie de la Croix spent a few days in November 1858 ................................................. 39 New Caledonia: Places lived in and visited by Sr Marie de la Croix .............................................................................. 40 Facsimile of Sister Marie de la Croix’s writing .................... 41 The Church at Vao, Ile des Pins. ........................................... 63 Frs Favre, Yardin, Poupinel ................................................ 101 Bishops Vitte and Fraysse, Frs Rougeyron, Goujon, Vigouroux and Villard ................................................. 102 The mission of Saint-Louis in 1875 .................................... 154 Sr Marie de la Croix and some pupils - among them the first four PFM (with capes) - in the late 1870s at St Louis 155 Saint-Louis about 1885 - Sr Marie de la Croix with a group of Melanesian sisters ........................................................ 156 Belep between 1898 and 1908 - Sr Marie de la Croix and Sr Marie St Jean with a group of pupils ........................... 237 The tomb of Sr Marie de la Croix in Belep ......................... 310 4 FOREWORD The particularly rich personality of Sister Marie de la Croix and the remarkable work that she accomplished in New Caledonia are obvious reasons why other writings have already been devoted to her. Thus, between 1930 and 1950, Mother Marie de la Merci Marnas wrote several booklets tracing the major outlines of this extraordinary life. Preceding the writings of M. M. de la Merci, but less known because it was never published, is another biography for which we are indebted to Fr Jean Pionnier, Marist Missionary in New Caledonia. He arrived in Nouméa in 1870. On many occasions at Saint-Louis, he met Sr M. de la Croix for whom he had deep admiration. That is why, at the beginning of the 20th century, shortly after her death, he undertook this writing in which he provides information about her not found anywhere else, and that only a contemporary could know. That explains the special interest of his biography. He had access, as also did M. M. de la Merci, to a certain number of documents - mainly letters - preserved either in Nouméa or in France, from which he very frequently quoted. However, he does not appear to have had at his disposal in its entirety the considerable amount of documentation now found in the archives of the Archdiocese of Nouméa, those of the Marist Fathers in Rome, or those in our own archives, also in Rome. Primarily and principally, this documentation consists of numerous letters of Sr M. de la Croix (more than 600) that have fortunately been preserved. Her main correspondents were Fr Victor Poupinel, visitor general of the Oceania Missions until 1870, then general councillor in Lyon; Fr François Yardin, mission procurator until 1872, and his 5 successor, Fr Gabriel Germain. The letters to Fr Poupinel, by far the most numerous, have a very special interest. Sr M. de la Croix had complete confidence in this priest, whose outstanding qualities had won her heart. Living in very great solitude, especially during the first years of her missionary life, she needed to express herself, to confide in someone, and with him she did so unreservedly. Between 1866 and 1871, she also wrote several very interesting letters to Mother Marie du Cœur de Jesus, foundress of the congregation of Our Lady of the Missions, to which Sr M. de la Croix belonged for a few years. The religious of this congregation very kindly gave me copies of this correspondence preserved in their archives (ARNDM). From the 1880s onwards, Sr M. de la Croix’s communications with the priests in France ceased, but she continued to write. Consequently we have in our general archives a whole set of letters written to the Petites Filles de Marie1, her former novices. There we discover her motherly concern and the depth of her interior life. After she left for Belep in 1892, it was to Sr Marie Saint- Anne, who replaced her at Saint-Louis, that henceforth until her death, almost every month, she wrote letters full of trust, giving details of her new life. The documentation does not stop there. In their correspondence with the general administration in France, the priests in New Caledonia who had dealings with the sisters, for example, Frs Pierre Rougeyron, provicar until 1874, and Jean-Baptiste Vigouroux, parish priest of Saint-Louis, and likewise Bishop Ferdinand Vitte and Bishop Alphonse Fraysse, vicars apostolic, often made reference to Sr M. de la Croix. Lastly, the minutes of meetings of the Bishop’s 1 Little Daughters of Mary. 6 Council and the official publications of the vicariate provide some very interesting information. Quotations from Sr M. de la Croix’s letters are frequent throughout the following pages so that readers are provided with the direct contact they no doubt desire. However, as this is not a critical edition, in a few cases corrections have been made in the passages quoted, mainly in punctuation, to make the text easier to understand. Sr M. de la Croix wrote in great haste and did not reread her letters because she did not have the time. That is why it has been necessary to add a coma or a full stop occasionally… Except for very rare exceptions, the spelling in common use today has been adopted for place names, always with the aim of facilitating understanding. Since the aim of this work is not at all the same as that which governed the choice of letters and extracts of letters in the four volumes of Our Pioneers - from their correspondence, it is not surprising that, in many cases, the texts used