The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Anthony, Sister

ANTHONY, Sister, American nurse and nun, known before entering religious life as Mary O'Connell: b. Limerick, Ireland, 15 Aug. 1815; d. Cumminsville, Cincinnati, Ohio, 18 Dec. 1897. She came with her parents to this country in childhood and in 1835 entered the order of Sisters of Charity at Emmittsburg, Md., removing to Cincinnati in 1837, there to take charge of work in Saint Peter's Orphan Asylum. On the establishment of Saint Joseph's Orphan Asylum at Cumminsville, in 1854, Sister Anthony was placed in charge and the next year she was transferred to Saint John's Hospital, where she remained 10 years. The terrible slaughter at the battle of Pittsburgh Landing appealed so strongly to her sympathies that with two companions she accompanied the noted surgeon, George C. Blackman, to Nashville to minister to the wounded there winning her title of “The Angel of the Battlefield.” She returned to Cincinnati on a hospital steamer with many wounded soldiers whom she cared for at Saint John's Hospital. In 1866 two prominent Protestant business men of Cincinnati purchased the United States Marine Hospital and transferred it to the Sisters of Charity in the hands of Sister Anthony. The name was then changed to “The Good Samaritan,” and she remained in charge till 1882. Not only was she in charge of various institutions of her order, but was several times procuratrix of the community. She is buried at the mother house of Mount Saint Joseph and her grave is annually strewn with flowers on Memorial Day by the soldiers of the Grand Army of the Republic.