Archives of Maryland
(Biographical Series)

St. Elizabeth Ann Seton (1774-1821)
MSA SC 3520-13567

Biography:

From Seton Hall University (http://web.archive.org/web/20040817083249/provost.shu.edu/charterday/seton.htm)


St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, born August 28, 1774 in New York City, was the first native born United States citizen to be canonized by the Catholic Church.  Founder of the Sisters of Charity, Mother Seton also is believed to have miraculously cured three women.  She is the patron saint of  widows, Catholic schools, and  ill children.  

The second daughter of Dr. Richard and Catherine Bayley, Elizabeth "Betty" Seton was born into a life of ease.  Richard Bayley was a distinguished physician devoted to his work.  He married Catherine Charlton, the daughter of the Reverend Richard Charlton, rector of St. Andrew's Episcopal Church on Staten Island, on January 9, 1769, in New Jersey. 1  Mrs. Bayley died in 1775, shortly after Elizabeth's birth.  Dr. Bayley then married Charlotte Barclay, and six more children were added to the Bayley family. 2  Elizabeth was educated primarily by her father, but she did attend a finishing school with her older sister, Mary Magdalen.  At "Mama Pompelion's" the girls learned French and piano, proper subjects for young ladies of their social status. 3  The youthful Elizabeth was also fond of dancing, and said that she "never found any effect from it but the most innocent cheerfulness." 4

At the age of nineteen, Elizabeth married William Magee Seton, the heir to a shipping and import business.  Their marraige was a happy one, and produced five children: Anna Maria (b. 1795), William (b. 1796), Richard Bayley (b. 1798), Catherine Josephine (b. 1800), and Rebecca (b. 1802). 5  Elizabeth was a devoted wife and mother, but also found time to work to improve the lives of less fortunate women.  Along with Isabella Graham, Elizabeth formed a society to help widowed mothers, called the Society for the Relief of Poor Widows. 6  

The Seton's good fortune did not last.  The family business went bankrupt during the 1803 conflict with France, and William developed tuberculosis soon after.  Taking his doctor's advice, William sailed to Italy for fresher air in the hopes of a full recovery.  Elizabeth and their eldest child, Anna Maria, accompanied him.  Because of a yellow fever epidemic that recently broke out in New York, the ship passengers were quarantined upon arrival in Leghorn, Italy.  The fresh country air the Setons expected was replaced with a cold, damp room in a quarantine zone. 7  These conditions only hastened William's illness, and he died on December 27, 1803. 8

Elizabeth Seton was devastated by the loss of her husband.  She remained in Italy with her daughter Anna for several months at the home of family friends, the Filicchi's.  A Catholic family, the Filicchi's introduced Elizabeth to a more rigorous devotional schedule, which helped her through her grief and moved her toward embracing Catholicism.  Upon her return to the United States in 1804, Elizabeth was ready to commit to becoming a Catholic; she converted in 1805.  This spiritual change worried and confused Elizabeth's extended family, both because of the traditional distrust of Catholics and because the Catholic faith was most common among working class Irish citizens in New York. 9

In order to support herself, Elizabeth Seton ran a boarding house for boys who attended school in New York City.  She sent her own two sons to school in Georgetown, but also wanted a Catholic education for her daughters.  When Father Louis William Valentine DuBourg, President of St. Mary's College in Baltimore, visited New York, he suggested that Elizabeth move to Baltimore and start a school for girls there.  The idea intrigued her, and on June 15, 1808, Elizabeth arrived in Baltimore, with the intent of opening a school on Paca Street.  The school attracted many girls from wealthy Catholic families, and soon became self-supporting.  During her time in Baltimore, Elizabeth also initiated the idea of a new religious order, which would later be called the Sisters of Charity.  The idea was extremely popular, so when given the opportunity to expand and move to Emmitsburg, MD, Elizabeth and her new Sisters decided to leave Baltimore. 10

In Emmitsburg, Elizabeth founded St. Joseph's School, which admitted its first female students in 1810. 11  St. Joseph's would continue to focus on admitting girls from wealthy families.  Tuition rates started at $100 per year. 12  The girls were tutored in the usual subjects of reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, and history, but also learned music, needlework, and the popular languages of the day--French, Spanish, and Italian.  In just three years, the school was filled to capacity with fifty students and a long waiting list. 13

Even though her religious and leadership duties were extensive, Elizabeth remained a devoted mother.  When she learned her teenage daughter, Anna, was in love, she wrote to a friend, "my Annina: so young, so lovely, so innocent, absorbed in all the romance of youthful passion.  As I have told you, she gave her heart without my knowledge; and afterwards what could a doting and unhappy mother do but take the part of friend and confidante..." 14   To her relief,  there was a "rational and patient conclusion" : "The young Du Pavillon, to whom she gave her foolish little heart, found on his return to his family and possessions someone who nabbed him on the spot..." 15  In a letter to her dear friend, Mrs. Juliana Scott, Elizabeth also confided her concern about her son, Richard: "He is an enormous young man, very well disposed, but, like his brother before he left us, shows no remarkable talents, though William [her other son] has...shown a truly solid mind." 16  Elizabeth also noted that Richard is "Mother's boy forever, but a lively, crazy one...He is nearly a year and half younger than William, and four years younger in mind." 17

In 1812, Anna developed tuberculosis, as her father and other members of her father's family had before her.  Her death was long and painful, finally coming on March 12, 1812.  A year later, in a letter to Juliana Scott, Elizabeth wrote, "Dearest Anna, was ever the beauty of the soul so pictured as on that dying face?" 18  Meanwhile, her youngest daughter, Rebecca, had "a little slip on the ice last winter which we though nothing of, has become entirely lame and often unable to walk across the room without assistance, her desire of remaining in the same room with me, and her fear of disturbing her dear Anna was so great (as we have since found out) that she concealed her sufferings as much as possible." 19  Rebecca's injury was beyond contemporary medical knowledge, and she was lame until her early death in 1816. 20  Elizabeth's grief was tempered by seeing "so good and innocent a little soul set free." 21  

When Elizabeth herself died on Janurary 4, 1821, she left everything she owned to her only living daughter, Catherine, who was also named executor of the estate.  

The legacy of Mother Seton can be felt throughout Maryland.  The National Shrine of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton is located in Emmitsburg, near Mount St. Mary's University.  Mother Seton's tradition of excellence in Catholic education has also continued.  In Emmitsburg, less than one mile away from the site of her original school, is the Mother Seton School.  In Baltimore,  Seton Keough High School is an all-girls Catholic school which combined Seton High School and Archbishop Keough High School.  

Elizabeth Seton's contributions to the Catholic church and community made her a candidate for sainthood.  She founded the Sisters of Charity, the parochial school system in the U.S., and also is believed to have performed three miracles.  Elizabeth Seton is attributed with having cured Sister Gertrude Korzendorfer of cancer, Ann Theresa O'Neill of acute lymphatic leukemia, and Carl Kalin of encephalitis. Having met the requirement to be canonized (one must have died a martyr or have performed at least two miracles), she was elected to be a saint.  On March 17, 1963, she was beatified by Pope John XXIII, and on September 14, 1975, she was canonized by Pope John Paul VI.  "Mother Seton," as she is affectionately known, was a part of the force that changed the shape of Catholicism in America.  



Endnotes:
1. Joseph I. Dirvin, Mrs. Seton: Foundress of the American Sisters of Charity (New York: Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, 1962), 4. Return to text.
2. Elaine G. Breslaw, "Elizabeth Bayley Seton, 1774-1821: Maryland's Saint," in Notable Maryland Women (Cambridge: Tidewater Publishers, 1977), 335-341. Return to text.
3. Edward James, Notable American Women, 1607-1950: A Biographical Dictionary, Vol. 1 (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971). Return to text.
4. Breslaw, 23. Return to text.
5. James. Return to text.
6. Ibid. Return to text.
7. Carolyn B. Stegman, Women of Achievement in Maryland (Forestville: Anaconda Press, 2002), 68. Return to text.
8. Breslaw, 336. Return to text.
9. Breslaw, 337.  Return to text.
10. Breslaw, 338. Return to text.
11. Ibid. Return to text.
12.Dirvin, 325. Return to text.

14. Dirvin, 232. Return to text.
15. Joseph B. Code, Letters of Mother Seton to Mrs. Juliana Scott (Baltimore: The Chandler Printing Co., 1960), 212. Return to text.
16. Code, 254. Return to text.
17. Dirvin, 347. Return to text.
18. Code, 226. Return to text.
19. Code, 227. Return to text.
20. Breslaw, 340. Return to text.
21. Code, 257. Return to text.

Return to St. Elizabeth Ann Seton's Introductory Page


This web site is presented for reference purposes under the doctrine of fair use. When this material is used, in whole or in part, proper citation and credit must be attributed to the Maryland State Archives. PLEASE NOTE: The site may contain material from other sources which may be under copyright. Rights assessment, and full originating source citation, is the responsibility of the user.

Tell Us What You Think About the Maryland State Archives Website!
© Copyright February 19, 2025 Maryland State Archives