Martyrs of Charity: How Philadelphia's Religious Sisters Responded to the 1918 Influenza Pandemic

Abstract: When the influenza pandemic struck Philadelphia in the autumn of 1918, Archbishop Dennis Dougherty wrote to the Mothers Superior of several religious communities instructing them to close parish schools and send their non-cloistered sisters to serve as volunteer nurses throughout the city. Despite having little to no medical training, more than 2,000 sisters from various congregations responded and cared for the city's sickest patients in temporary hospitals and private homes. These Catholic sisters focused especially on Philadelphia's poor, immigrants, and communities of color—who were all especially at risk and, due to overcrowding and social segregation, among the last to be prioritized in routine medical care. Many of these stories would be lost if not for Augustinian priest and archivist Francis E. Tourscher, who in 1919 compiled a summary of the sisters' nursing work for the American Catholic Historical Society of Philadelphia. When the pandemic finally subsided, Philadelphia's Mayor Thomas B. Smith attributed the outbreak's end to the religious sisters' selfless service and tireless care for the city's poor and marginalized amid overwhelming tragedy.