September 2, 2019 • 44 mins
This case fed an already growing anti-Catholic movement in England in the 1860s. Additionally, it played on the shock of women being incredibly cruel to one another – something that was even used by the plaintiff’s legal team when speaking to the jury.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey everybody. Before we get started, we have a live
show to announce. We will be at the National Gallery
of our Washington for their n g A Nights programming.
We'll be doing a live show there on September twelve.
The program itself is running from six pm to nine pm.
We're actually going to do our show twice that night.
You do have to register for it, but the good
(00:21):
news is registration is completely free. It's just a matter
of signing up. Yep. You can come to our website,
which is missed in History dot com and you can
click on the page where it says live shows, or
you can go to miss in history dot com slash shows.
You will find a link for where you can register
for tickets ahead of time. Again, this is a whole
night of programming and we plan to do the same
(00:42):
show two times so that more folks have the chance
to see it. So we hope to see you in Washington,
d C. On September twelve. Welcome to Stuff You Missed
in History Class, a production of I Heart Radios How
Stuff Works. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly
(01:03):
Fry and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. Uh So, today what
you're talking about a court case that was fairly famous
in the eighteen sixties, less known today. It is the
Great English Convent case. The greatness that is referred to
is definitely not in the sense of good. It's not
really a very delightful case to hear about, but it
(01:24):
speaks to the fervor of public interests surrounding it. Um
It became really a sensational legal and cultural moment for
Victorian England, and it was scandalous because it involved conflict
within a convent, and the idea of hearing what went
on behind the walls of such a place tucked away
from the outside world was completely tantalizing to both the
(01:44):
press and the public. And also that was because it
came at a time when it fed an already growing
anti Catholic movement in England. Additionally, it played on the
shock of women being incredibly cruel to one another, and
that was something that was even used by the plaintiff's
legal team when speaking to the jury when this case
went to trial. So there was an inherently salacious element
(02:05):
to the proceedings as people eagerly waited for the juici
or details of the case to emerge. One thing that
will mention going in is that if you look up
any documents on this, the names involved get spelled all
manner of different ways. Um, the plaintiff is in most
of the legal documents just referred to as Miss Saren,
(02:27):
but she her name was either Susan or Suzanne depending
on what you look at. Uh. Similarly, the primary defendant,
Mrs Starr is also spelled star with two R, star
with one R. There's also Mrs Kennedy involved, sometimes spelled
with one end, sometimes with two And I want to
be clear that in the same legal document these names
will change spellings, so there's a lot of inconsistency about that.
(02:51):
We're kind of going with the most commonly used ones.
And we'll talk also about using their non religious names
versus their names as nuns a little bit. We're going
with the non religious names, just for clarity. Heads up. Also, Uh,
there's a lot of discussion and accusations of abuse and
cruelty in the mix here. Those are sensitive things for you. Um,
(03:14):
this might not be the episode for you. Yeah, as
I was reading it, I was reminded of like mean
girls but worse. Yeah, it's like a lot of fairly
petty abuses, but they really accumulate in a way that
is pretty upsetting and you could understand would be very trying.
So Susan Saren was from a very devout Irish Roman
(03:37):
Catholic family. She was the third daughter in her immediate family,
although her parents didn't really want her to become a
nun her there other two daughters her sisters already were,
but she really felt called to this. She finally convinced
her family that it was the only life for her,
and then visited a number of convents to try to
find the right fit. In eighteen fifty one, she became
(03:59):
a candidate in a Dublin to Ireland Sisters of Mercy Convent,
and then she went from candidate to novice on August five,
eight fifty one, taking the name Sister Mary Scholastica Joseph
and taking her vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, as
well as service to the poor, the sick and the ignorant.
And during the time that Sarin joined the convent, so
(04:19):
did two other women, not at the exact same time,
but all within a few months of one another. Uh
that's Mrs Starr, whose religious name was Sister Mary Joseph
and Mrs Kennedy, whose religious name was Sister Mary Magdalene.
Both of those women had been married before they joined
the convent. That is why they're missus. For the purposes
of simplicity, we are going to stick to using legal
(04:40):
names rather than their religious names, as that is was
primarily used in all of the accounts of the court case,
which is really what we're focusing on today. So by
Sarren's own account, these three sisters were very close. She
would later testify, quote, we were all three thrown very
much into each other's society. I became very intimate with
Mrs st Are and attached to her, and she to me.
(05:02):
We were associated in the work of education. I was
equally attached to Mrs Kennedy, and I should point out
to that even in different publications of these accounts, this
was part of her testimony at trial, some of that
phrasing will shift a little bit because basically the court
stenographers were taking shorthand and then uh writing things out
longhand afterwards, and so sometimes the sentence structure is a
(05:24):
little different. If you ever see another version of this
anything that we're quoting today, you might see slight variations
in how a sentence is worded just af y i uh.
And after a time, Mrs Starr was appointed Mother Superior
of a convent in Yorkshire, England, and at that time
this is sometime around eight or eighteen fifty six, Mrs
(05:45):
Starr asked Saren to join her at this new convent,
which Susan Sarren and her family agreed to, with the
understanding that if she was unhappy there in England she
could return to her old convent in Dublin. So initially
things seemed to go well, but then in eighteen sixty five,
Miss Sarren was expelled from her community and absolved of
all our vows, and this was against her will. Four
(06:07):
years later, in February eighteen sixty nine, Miss Susan Sarn
filed suit against the Mother Superior of Sisters of Mercy,
Mrs Starr, and her assistant Mrs Kennedy, who was the
convent sister in authority. You'll see her listed as Sister
in authority or superior assistant. Sometimes it's the wording comes
out different. Uh. Soren accused Star of abuse and of
(06:28):
conspiring with her colleagues to force Miss Saren to leave
the convent. She also accused them of falsifying evidence which
was presented to a church bishop with the intent to
have her expelled from the order and to address damages
to reputation and character, because after she was expelled from
this life, she wasn't really prepared for another vocation uh
(06:50):
and she was shamed. She felt like she couldn't go
into a lot of churches. So Miss Sarren was suing
for five thousand pounds. Proceedings began on February third, eighteen
sixty nine. Solicitor General John Duke Coleridge was the head
of the plaintiff legal team, assisted by Mr Digby Seymour
and a Mr Wills. Henry Hawkins, George Mellish and Charles
(07:10):
Russell made up the defenses team of solicitors. The case
was presided over by the Lord Chief Justice, Sir Alexander Cockburn,
and the charges as outlined before the court on February third,
eighteen sixty nine, were noted by the Court stenographer as
follows quote. This was an action brought by a professed
sister of the Order of Mercy against the Mother Superior
(07:32):
and a professed sister of the same Order in the
Convent at Hull to recover damages for assault and conspiracy
to drive her from the convent and have her expelled
from the Order. The declaration stated that the defendants, on
diverse occasions, assaulted and beat the plaintiff, and they took
her clothes in property from her and imprisoned her for
a long time, whereby she was rendered sick and ill
(07:54):
and greatly distressed in body and mind. The case, as
it was laid before the court that day went on
to include a trover that's a legal action to recover
the value of property that was discarded by another person.
This was going to cover a watch, some clothing, books
and papers. The accusation on the part of the plaintiff
went on to state that Miss Sarn was legally entitled
(08:17):
to the basic necessities of life, including food, clothing, and shelter,
as well as the right to attend services in the
Roman Catholic Church as a member of the Order, and
that the defendants had deprived her of these rights. Soren
also charged Star with libel, saying that the Mother Superior
told Dr Robert Cornthwaite, the Bishop of Beverly, that Soren
(08:37):
had complained about her boots clothing and food, was late
in her work eight during hours we're doing so, was prohibited,
spoke privately with a priest, was contradictory and disobedient, and
had illicit conversations with outsiders. The defendants in this case
actually paid the trover for the lost items at the outset,
but then pled not guilty to all other charges. When
(08:58):
Color had stepped up to make opening statements, he said
to the jury, quote, you will have gathered from the
opening of the pleadings by my learned friend Mr. Wills,
that the case which I have to bring to your
attention is one a good deal out of the common way,
and requiring more than a common amount of your watchfulness
and patience. The facts of it are strange and painful.
(09:21):
They are strange and painful as a revelation of human nature.
They are more strange and painful as a revelation of
female nature. They are most strange and painful of all,
as a revelation of conventual female nature, showing what women
are capable of when they shut themselves up from their
kind and do violence to the instincts of their nature,
(09:44):
and what mean and petty cruelty they can wreak upon
sister women in the name of the God of Love,
and in an effort to perhaps temper the possibility of
being called into question as attacking the Catholic Church, Coleridge
made a point to mention repeatedly that both parties were
of the same denomination. However, of course he was vilifying
(10:05):
convents and thus the Catholic Church in the process, and
women also women for sure. I mean, that's a big
part of his case, is that like, if you lock
women up together, they'll just become animals. It's really quite terrible. Uh.
He did also urge the jury to not let their
bias regarding Catholics enter into their assessment of the matters
(10:27):
at hand. This case stretched on for three weeks, and
throughout it the public just leaned in to hear more.
The courtroom was full every single day of testimony, with
both general public and attendance as well as a significant
number of clergy. The case was so highly publicized and
was seen as unprecedented, which also drew lawyers not involved
(10:48):
in the proceedings to attend as spectators. And coming up,
we will dig into the story of how Mss Saren's
time in the convent really devolved uh, and how that
was related in the courtroom. But first, let's take a
quick sponsor break. There was a sketch made for Vanity
(11:13):
Fair at the time of the trial of Mrs Starr
the Mother Superior, by the artist Carlo Pellegrini. I would
actually love to do an episode on him. At some
point he signed his work ape that was his his
sketch name. And it looks almost like it could be
the work of previous podcast subject Charles Adams, as it
is rather cartoonish and the style feels very similar in
(11:34):
its Star looks both pious and guilty at the same time.
Her hands are clasped on the ledge in front of her,
but she is looking to the side with an expression
that characterizes her as really sort of sinister or sneaky.
The plaintiffs lawyers relate the early history of Saorence time
as a nun and that she had a year's long
relationship with Star without any apparent trouble. Things just changed
(11:58):
abruptly in eight teens ext one, at the time Starr
started questioning Sarin about what she had discussed with her
priest during confession. It doesn't seem unreasonable to me that
she wouldn't want to talk about that, and she took
this line of questioning as an insult and she refused
to answer, and her testimony, Saren stated, quote, I thought
(12:20):
it would be a breach of honor and contrary to
every regulation. And she continued to refuse to share this
information despite being asked repeatedly about it. And from that
point things really turned unpleasant very quickly. Yeah, we'll talk
about it in a little while. That Mrs Starr never
is very clear in her testimony that she wasn't saying
(12:41):
that she thought anything untoward was happening between the two
of them, but she just felt uneasy about it. And
that's actually the caption of the the that sketch we
just talked about, was that she it's something along the
lines that she had an uneasy feeling. And she alleged
that she asked all of the other sisters about their
confessions and that they always share them with her, which
becomes a strange whole other things. She was apparently very
(13:04):
controlling woman. The case against Mrs Starr and her colleague
and how they punished Miss Saren quickly assembled into a
picture of great cruelty. And I do want to point out.
You know, we talk a lot. We will continue to
talk a lot as well in this episode about the
bias against the Catholic Church. During this time, the plaintiffs
legal team was very clearly playing on this, so much
(13:26):
so that there were even times when the magistrate would
break in and be like, I think you're over dramatizing
this or mischaracterizing this. Um so they really are trying
to like paint these two women is just super villains.
But over the course of Sarren's life with Star as
her mother's superior after this this incident began where she
would not tell her her confession. The plaintiff claimed that
(13:48):
she was treated far more cruelly than any of the
other sisters in the convent. She was given more and
more difficult chores than others. This was on top of
the fact that it has already mentioned in a lot
of letters establishinging before any of this happened, that she
was not a physically strong person to begin with. Uh,
and then the punishments for her various infractions as determined
(14:10):
by Mrs Starr. Basically she would say, you are a liar.
There was no recourse or like way too to discuss
or disprove that. Uh. So her punishments that she got
for any of these were incredibly harsh. So some of
the things that that Mssarin reported her portions were reduced
as a punishment. When the Mother Superior accused her of
sneaking or stealing food, the food she was fed tasted
(14:34):
off and might have been rancid. She was given foods
that she was known to dislike, particularly mutton. Every single
day when it was determined that she wasn't cleaning to
the standards of the Mother Superior, she was made to
pin a dirty duster onto her head and wear it
at meals and during time in the community room. That's
one of the things that the magistrate and the Solicitor
(14:55):
General have a big back and forth about, was like
was this a dirty dust? Had it been used on
something wet? Was it extra disgusting? Uh And they have
a big discussion about it. In the court proceedings if
you ever want to go read them, it's basically two
men bickering over just how dirty a duster was. The
boots that were given to Miss Saren for her youth
(15:16):
had holes in them, and if she complained about this,
she was deemed to be disobedient. According to her testimony,
her room was watched at all hours uh and a
thread was placed on the door knobs so that she
couldn't leave without detection. This is also written up in
a couple of different ways. One was that like there
was essentially a thing on her door knob that she
couldn't turn the door now without it falling. There is
(15:38):
another that suggests later on, when things really go quite poorly,
that there was actually a string tied from her door
knob to the bedpost of another sister, so that if
she opened the door, that person would get up and
know that they needed to follow her around. Mrs Star
would simultaneously right to the bishop that something had to
(15:58):
be done to get this in silent and problematic Miss
Sarn out of the convent, while also writing letters at
the same time to her family saying that she could
not leave. Yeah, and that's well documented. That's not like
just an accusation. Those letters existed and were brought up
during the case that she was writing over and over
like we have to do something to get rid of
(16:19):
this woman. In the meantime, her parents we're writing and saying,
can we please have her back in Dublin and her going, Oh,
there's no way she could possibly go back. Similarly, Mrs
Starr used her influence to smear Miss Sarren's reputation within
the church to other convents that she might have moved
to and effectively ensured that way that she was not
approved for transfer there, and then she would use those
(16:41):
failures of those appointments that didn't come through as evidence
against her character. In the four years between eighteen sixty
one and eighteen sixty five, all of this conflict played
out and more, with Sarin never living up to Star's
expectations and always being punished. During that time, Susan Sarn's
mother tried to advocate on her daughter's behalf. She wrote
(17:02):
to church officials that the archbishop and Dublin had approved
a return to her old convent, but Mrs Starr refused,
saying that once she moved to England, Miss Sarren was
no longer under the jurisdiction of Dublin church officials. Even
when word of Sarin's father being gravely ill was sent
on to the convent, Mrs Starr did not relay that
(17:25):
information to his daughter. Yeah, again, that's all stuff that
is substantiated in kind of the letter record that was
brought up during the case. And at one point Miss
Sarin wrote to her uncle, who was also a priest,
and she mentioned him the Mother Superior had said that
she was frustrated with her mother's letters and that there
had also been some miscommunication or confusion about some of
(17:46):
her behavior at the convent, and Susan Sarin framed all
of this in a fairly positive way. She kind of
sets it up like, I know, the Mother Superior doesn't
mean to make these mistakes kind of thing. She suggests
she's not unhappy at all as a nun, but she
was just really unsettled there at her current convent, and
that she would like to move and that she was
(18:06):
sure that things would write themselves if she could. That
letter never made it out of the convent, though Starr
kept it from being sent and wrote her own letter
to Sarn's uncle, who was the Reverend T. Matthews. She
urged him to find another appointment for Miss Saren and
told him that she had committed quote the most grave offenses,
stating quote I fear we shall be obliged to seek
(18:28):
to have her released from the obligation of her vows,
which are no longer to her an occasion of merit
but an occasion of sin, and the Reverend Matthews wrote
back that he knew he couldn't pre judge the situation,
but that this all seemed really, really odd to him,
since his niece had been such an exemplary nun throughout
her time since she took her vows, and so much
(18:50):
so that Mother Superior had in fact asked her to
move to England along with herself, and he suggested that
if they would just wait until after the busy season,
like once Easter was passed, then they could talk about
doing something and then he would have time to travel
to England and investigate the matter himself. And the Mother
Superior Mrs Starr wrote the Miss Sarren had to be
removed before Easter. In the meantime, Susan Sarren's mother and
(19:13):
brother had visited the convent and were admitted only after
having been turned away first. They had a brief visit
in which Miss Sarren assured them that everything was well,
although she was weeping and she was clearly in distress.
Not long after that visit, Sarin wrote to the bishop
and got a reply. Those two letters weren't available at
the time of the trial. Though this communication incensed Mrs Starr,
(19:37):
and she made Miss Sarren confess publicly, including a written
statement that she had written to her uncle without permission.
She couldn't make her confess to having communicated with the
bishop because that was her right as a nun. Yeah,
that was what really made her angry. It was kind
of like you went over my head that she made
her confess to other letter, writing that that was not
(19:59):
apparently okay without permission. In August four, eighteen sixty two,
Mrs Starr wrote a letter to the Bishop herself to
convey her chagrin, writing with emphasis that quote, such intercourse
with externs for such purpose is a violation of a
most essential point of religious life. So as she was
saying was that she felt that since Sarin had communicated
(20:20):
with her uncle with the intent that he would help
her move to a different convent, that she had sinned
gravely and that she should quote be released from her
vows and be dismissed from the community. From that summer
on Star started a whole new series of punishments. The
Mother Superior told Sarren she could only write home once
a year. The letters she received, including those from her father,
(20:42):
who continued to be unwell, were heavily censored and then
destroyed after she read them once with a witness present.
She wasn't allowed any communication with her two sisters or
her brother, who were also clergy. Yeah. The reason that
that Mrs Starr gave all of that censorship was that
she felt that in some of the letters the family
(21:04):
had either exaggerated or lied, and that she thought that
was sinful, so she had struck it out so that Sarin,
who was already in her view ms could not read
more sinful things. Um. And that was also why they
destroyed the letters. It's a bit much, um. And as
all of this was escalating at the convent, the Bishop,
Robert Corinthwaite, had been in contact with miss Oren's uncle, who,
(21:26):
as you recall, was also a priest, and so the
bishop arranged to visit the convent and investigate everything as
quickly as he could, and he arrived in November of
eighteen sixty two. He was already like in the habit
of making periodic visits to all convents, so it was
not odd for him to have shown up there. It
wasn't only for this purpose, but he was there in November.
(21:47):
He reassured miss Saren after investigating, that he thought she
had done nothing wrong and that he would see that
she would be treated more kindly and that she could
come directly to him with any complaints and not complain
to anyone else within the Higher Key. But after he left,
matters continued exactly as they had before, except they actually
got worse. Star created a whole new list of rules
(22:09):
that's Aren't had to live by. She wasn't allowed to
speak with anyone outside the convent. If a visitor came
and addressed a question to her, she was required to
motion them to someone else. She had to submit a
written record of her faults every month, and her workload
was increased. When her brother died rather suddenly, they kept
the news from her for months. She was told long
(22:31):
after the fact, and then was forbidden from taking any
time to grieve. And all of this seemed to really
take a toll significantly on miss Oren's mental state, and
in a lengthy letter that she wrote to Mrs Starr
during a retreat, her writing takes on a very unsettling
tone and it really starts to exhibit the language of
(22:52):
someone who has been systematically abused and has come to
believe that what their abuser is telling them is in
fact the truth. There is one particular passage in which
she describes what to most ears would sound like an
exceedingly minor transgression of folding up a letter that she
had been writing before a senior sister had instructed her
to do so. And then after talking about this, she
(23:14):
writes this rather heartbreaking to me line of I am
always I believe to be doing things wrong. And then
she also goes on in that same letter, which is
quite lengthy, to describe a recent confession in which she
was troubled that the priest didn't seem to understand how
sinful she was, and she wrote, quote, I really tried
to make him think me as bad as I did myself.
(23:36):
Sarn's brother, who was a priest, visited and this visit
left him unsettled. After being allowed less than fifteen minutes
with his sister and seeing her looking and behaving unlike herself,
he wrote to the bishop, who questioned Mrs Starr on
the matter. She replied that quote, the presence of Sister
Scholastica amongst us is a very heavy cross. She is
(23:58):
an enemy living in our mid And we're going to
continue to talk about the last months of Miss Sarn's
time at the Convent in just a minute, but first
we'll take a break from all of this rather sad
and disturbing tale and have a moment of thanks for
one of the sponsors that keeps his show going. In
(24:22):
April of eighteen sixty five, Mrs Starr began a campaign
with the Bishop regarding the quote problem of Miss Saren.
She asked the Bishop to appoint an investigative committee with
the intent that Sarin would ultimately be dismissed, and over
the course of numerous letters, the Mother Superior made Miss
Sarn out to be a sort of poison on the convent,
(24:42):
ruining virtually everything about their otherwise harmonious life, and making
everyone anxious. This is according to Mother Superior, and she
threatened to resign, writing quote, I do not possess the
virtue and talent to govern in trying circumstances. It is
a fault of character in me which time has rather
increased rather than lessened, that I take things too much
(25:04):
to heart and am too solicitous about those who are
under my care. The Bishop replied on April sixty five
that it was not possible for him to accept Mrs
Starr's resignation. He encouraged her to have faith in God.
He stated that if it truly was a case where
the Mother Superior or the sister must go, that the
sister should be the one to leave. He had never
(25:25):
seen the problem with Sister Scholastica, but he couldn't let
one of his convents go without a leader. And stars
follow up letter after he says no, no, you can't quit, uh,
kind of brings up the same idea that she Mother
Superior will leave, and then Miss Sarren doesn't even need
to know that she was the cause, and that all
sounds sort of benevolent. But then the language quickly shifts
(25:47):
to outlining the many alleged sins that the younger Nune
has committed, many of them really really minor infractions. But
then in particular she starts accusing Miss Sarin of theft,
and while no one has ever caught her, because apparently
she was so sly, several different people did suspect her,
which Mrs Starr sort of holds up in the letter
(26:09):
is nearly as good as real evidence says, where I
beg you to keep in mind that Mrs Starr's mother
Superior was very influential, so it seemed like most of
the other nuns went along with whatever she said. In
such matters. Starr even accused Sarin of stealing food from
the children who came to the convent for school, that
she was stealing their dinners, although none of the children
(26:31):
or their parents ever reported such a thing. There's no
record of any kind of complaint along those lines. In
order to investigate this possibility of theft, Sarn was forced
to undress in front of Star and her assistance in
order to see if she was concealing stolen food or
other items. This was done twice, once in May of
eighteen sixty three and another time in December of eighteen
(26:52):
sixty five. In each case, there was no evidence of
any misappropriated goods or food, but the experiences were humiliating.
And this this was not something she alleged like. This
was acknowledged, Yes, this absolutely happened, uh and was defended
as as the only way they were ever going to
know for certain if she was a thief, and they
(27:14):
the plaintiffs legal team makes the case that if they
had found even a crumb, if they had been able
to find essentially a molecule of a thing, they would
have reported it because that would have been their evidence.
But they never found anything. Uh. The Bishop finally acquiesced
after all of this discussion two Star's request, and a
(27:34):
committee was assembled to review the case, and ultimately Miss
Sarren was expelled from the community. The evidence in the
matter was given to the bishop, but Miss Sarren and
her uncle who represented her before the committee, were not
given access to any of it, and it was unclear
even what the many crimes that she was accused of were.
They did not have a list of what she was
being accused of to work from or defend against. It
(27:58):
was really, in the words of her uncle, I think
he called it something like a travesty. And when the
court case went to trial, no copy of that evidence
that allegedly went before the committee could be obtained, and
the offenses that were allegedly addressed in that missing evidence
didn't even have anything to do with the alleged theft,
which had actually been the issue that finally drove the
(28:20):
bishop to action. According to the Solicitor General, who was
representing Sarn her legal battle. These were the same sorts
of petty charges that Starr had been trotting out for
some time. Sarren had been disobedient, that she had written
letters without permission, that she had eaten buttered toast, and
that she had been eating cake. During the trial, those
last two were met with some laughter in the courtroom.
(28:41):
Four fits of the bishop's committee had to vote in
favor of the nun's innocence for the terms of the
church's committee assignment. That didn't happen, though, and she was expelled.
Miss Saren was unwilling to leave the convent though. While
she had been unhappy with her treatment there, she did
not want to leave what she believed was her calling,
and to drive her out, Mrs Starr confined her to
(29:02):
her room. Her fire was taken away. This was in winter,
she could not have soaper water. She was only given
leftover food from the plates of other sisters after meals
were concluded, and when she refused to change from her
religious garments to regular clothes, she was eventually stripped of
her habit while she slept, so she had no choice
but to change into the provided civilian where and finally,
(29:25):
after this dragging on for some time, Susan Sarn had
had enough. She became quite ill and her spirit was broken,
and so she wrote to her brother, who immediately came
to take her away from the convent. During the testimony,
Sarren's uncle, father Matthews, testified that while things had started
out fine at the convent in England, over the years
that Sarin was there, he went from being welcomed and
(29:48):
well received to being kept away from her are only
allowed to see her in very brief visits. He also
described his niece slowly changing and felt that things were
not right with her, and when the Bishop was on
the stand, he recalled that after his visit in which
he reassured Miss Saren, that Mrs Starr had cried when
he left because she was unhappy with what he had
(30:08):
said to her. He said, quote, I did not like
to tell them Mrs Starr and Mrs Kennedy my feelings,
and I left them very dissatisfied, and certainly Mrs Starr cried.
The Solicitor General also pointed out that Star contradicted herself
and her testimony. For example, she mentioned that after the
Bishop's visit, she wrote, quote the issue of the visitation
gave her and her supporters an immense triumph over us,
(30:31):
of which they show their full appreciation whenever they have
an opportunity. But then, under questioning, it turned out that
she couldn't come up with any such supporters. She'd initially
said that she meant Sarren's family, but they hadn't been
allowed to visit often, if at all, and even when
they did see Miss Sarren, it was briefly. They usually
didn't see the mother superior. Yeah. He was basically like,
(30:53):
when exactly did anybody learn this over you? Because these
people weren't even around when you said they were. Uh.
And there were a lot of instances like that where
her sort of double dealings where she was writing simultaneous
letters saying very different things were coming up. And uh,
she she did not do particularly spectacularly under questioning, there
were a lot of I don't know is in the mix. Uh.
(31:15):
Mrs Starr was actually found also to have destroyed some
of the papers that were germane to this court case.
She said that she did so because she had felt
that the matters in them were settled, but some of
them were destroyed after Miss Sarron began legal action, which
of course is not something you're supposed to do. Mr Coleridge,
the Solicitor General, noted that while both Mrs Starr and
(31:38):
Mrs Kennedy were quick to say that one of miss
sarn sins was pointing out the flaws of others, that
they were both awfully quick to belt out a let
me of the transgressions that they felt that she had committed.
Through the witnesses that they called, the defense tried to
build a case against Miss Sarren's character. They claimed that
she liked possessions and things like clothes. They also said
(31:59):
that she liked to around the convent at night, which
was both odd behavior and something they didn't want her
to do. She wasn't enthusiastic about teaching children, and she
was said to sneak food outside of allowed meal times.
Her writing to family members using language such as my
dearest uncle was considered excessive and overly affectionate. In short,
(32:19):
she was not per the defense upholding her vows. And
of course, there was also this hope for some of
the spectators that as the defense started to characterize Saren
as a very poor nun, that there might be something
truly salacious revealed in the midst of all of the testimony,
and at one point it did come up that Miss
(32:40):
Saren became quote excited when a certain priest would visit
the convent. This, of course, immediately got people thinking there
was some sort of sexual relationship. That idea was pretty
quickly dismissed, even by Mrs Starr, but still the rumor
mill kind of ran with that one. It's clear from
some of the response to things that came up in
(33:00):
this trial that there was a degree of humor that's
the Solicitor General and some of the assembled crowd found
in the rules of the convent, and to counter that,
a big part of the defense's case was trying to
convey that while some of the rules of religious life
seemed petty or silly to outsiders, they were a vital
part of a larger devotion. So being obedient to the
(33:21):
Mother Superior, they argued, was part of the vows that
Sarren had taken and a life she had agreed to freely.
On February, the Solicitor General made his closing speech. In
it he stated how big this case really was to
the welfare of Miss Saren, saying, quote, it is my
duty to tell you now that this is, in truth
and fact, an issue of her social life and death.
(33:45):
It is a question whether she is to be permitted
to continue the life to which she has devoted herself,
to which she is intimately wedded and passionately attached, or
whether she is to be flung back upon the world
which she believed she had left forever, and for which
she is now entirely unsuited, with a stain upon her
character which no lapse of time can ever avail to
(34:06):
a face. He also took the opportunity to point out
that the convents of England were, in his view, operating
under such a veil of secrecy that it allowed these
kinds of abuses to happen. He pointed out how in
this particular case, all the cruelty brought to bear by
Mrs Starr seemed really against what he knew of Christianity. Yeah,
he definitely uses that tactic of going, look, I'm not
(34:29):
a clergy member. I wouldn't claim to be an expert
on religion, but what I know of Christianity this doesn't
seem to fall in line with Yeah, there's a difference
between being strict and bullying someone yes. Um. The jury
reached its verdict on February eighteen sixty nine, after deliberating
for less than an hour, and while a number of
(34:51):
papers actually reported that things seemed to be stacked in
favor of the defendants, the jury found in favor of
the plaintiff on the counts of libel and conspiracy. See
Sarin was not, however, awarded the five thousand pounds that
she had sought. She was awarded five hundred. This wasn't
the end of it, though. Starr and her staff appealed
the jury's decision, but the second wave of legal action
(35:13):
didn't get all the attention that the first one had.
It faded from the public eye as other cases rose
up and came into focus, and it never made it
to trial. In April of eighteen seventy the matter was
settled out of court, and this trial, and particularly Mrs
Starr's testimony in it, really only fanned the flames of
suspicion against the Catholic Church and a general anti Catholic
sentiment in England. Uh that was of course in place
(35:36):
long before Miss Sarin brought her case to the court,
even before the trial began, like leading up to it,
newspapers were running editorials suggesting that girls and young women
who might be considering entering a convent should consider such
a move very carefully, given the possible situations that the
Sarin versus Star case illuminated. Yeah, you and I had
(35:56):
a conversation before we came into the studio about how
uh stars response to a lot of these allegations was
sort of like, yeah, that's how we do it in
a convent, not whether there's a problem or a bad
way to behave. Yeah. I mean, she really didn't deny
most of the charges. In some cases she tried to
say no, no, that's framed for maximum dramatic effect and
(36:16):
to make us look bad. Yes, we took her food away,
but you have to understand that was a punishment that
we felt fit the crime of of complaining about her
food or their belief, even though they never found evidence
that she was stealing food. So it's a little bit weird.
Like we said, there was no, not really a lot
of oh that didn't happen, more a matter of well,
(36:37):
it didn't happen quite like that, and if it did,
it wasn't that bad. That's how we do it. In
a preface written by James Grant Esquire to accompany the
publication of the trial account. Shortly after it was concluded,
he wrote, quote, the whole country has been astounded by
the evidence which has been brought forward in the course
of this remarkable trial of the real character of Roman Catholicism.
(36:57):
The outer world now see Potpoury with a clearness of
vision with which they never saw it before. And the
site will not, I feel assured, render it more attractive
in the eyes of those whose mental perceptions are not obscured.
They must, on the contrary, be appalled as well as
amazed by the hideousness of the features which potpour represents
as exhibited within the last few weeks in Westminster Hall. Yeah,
(37:21):
he also was trying to make a case that there
should be some sort of oversight put in place where
convents were regularly inspected and toured by people outside the church.
I mean, he makes very clear in that preface that
he is anti Potpourri. So that, um. The story of
the Great Comment case persisted for decades after it was over, though,
(37:45):
as the juicier details were recounted over and over and
sometimes bent and dramatized a bit, even into the early
eighteen nineties, there were still penny press versions of this
trial being printed, and the covers would feature things like
two nuns whipping a partially undressed third none. Obviously, there
was a significant degree of bias against the convent and
(38:06):
the Catholic Church from the outset in this case, Although
the Solicitor General urged the jury to disregard such personal bias,
it's almost impossible to imagine that there was done. Yeah,
it's not like I mean, I'm sure they all intended well,
but I'm there. I'm also sure that in the backs
of their minds many of them were like uh. There
was also a point made by Mrs Star at one
(38:28):
point that, of course Miss Saren wanted to make this
a legal matter and try it before a Protestant jury
that would have anti Catholic bias, rather than go through
the Church's channels of review, which she felt would obviously
find in favor of her mother's superior um. It is
also difficult to truly separate the bias that we've been
talking about from many of the accounts of the trial
(38:50):
that we have. So while the court reporter's account is
theoretically unbiased and the barristers in the case all appeared,
at least on the surface, to strive to act outside
of any such cultural or religious bias. They too, probably
were motivated on some level by it, or, in the
case of the plaintiffs representation, to be carefully playing on
the juries inherent bias, even while saying do not be biased. Moreover,
(39:14):
one of the reasons that this case was published so
frequently in England following its conclusion was this desire to
warn young women away from a life in the clergy.
So if Sarren was able to return to her life's
calling and another convent after this case was finally settled,
there are no records of that that we can find. Yeah,
I didn't turn any up, um and she, you know
(39:37):
it kind of she kind of vanishes from the public
record after that. It's entirely possible she went and lived
with family from that point on and that was the
remainder of her life, because it doesn't seem like she
was really going to be able to like suddenly take
on a career or be married. Yeah, I mean, this
was what she wanted forever. And one of the things
that comes up in the trial is that the greatest
(40:00):
heartbreak and to her one of the most painful things
about being expelled is that they took her ring from her,
which is, you know, like the symbol of her being
married to the church and a bride of Christ, and
that that was like the biggest heartache that she endured
amongst all of these other things was that they were saying, no,
that thing that you said you are, you're not, which
(40:21):
was incredibly painful for her. One of the things that
I think would have been really difficult at the time,
even for people who we're trying to really put their
own biases aside, Like, there weren't that many other situations
where a group of people would be living by themselves
together by themselves, is not like isolated from the rest
of the society in a group for their whole lives. Like,
(40:46):
there wasn't a lot of comparison to another similar situation
where you might also see instances of abuses and bullying.
So it probably appeared to people as though this was
unique to Catholicism or unique to con events, when really
theyre just weren't exactly comparable situations. Yeah, I mean, I
(41:06):
wish I could take those people forward in time and
show them like any Internet interest group and watch how
it employed in similar highly not the same level of stuff,
but it certainly happened. I am I was. I keep
being reminded throughout this of just being bullied by classmates
in middle school, Like it felt like that level of pettiness,
and oh yeah, there's a mean girls element to it.
(41:30):
And really, when you think it all started because she
wouldn't tell this woman what she had confessed to her priest,
it gets very you realize how petty the seed is
that leads to so much pain. And also, I mean,
for the mother's fire. It wasn't like I'm sure she
wasn't like, yeah, this will drag out for years in
letters in court, but she couldn't get over that like
(41:52):
anger at having not been told this thing, and probably
she didn't even recognize that was the catalyst anymore. Um,
don't be like that people. Uh is our life lesson
be kind to one another? That's easy to say. I know,
I have such much more pleasant and delightful and colorful
(42:13):
listener mail. Um. This comes from our listener Colleen, who writes,
Dear Holly and Tracy, thank you so much for the
wonderful show. I work for a publisher that produces materials
for K to twelve classrooms, and I am currently working
on a series of primary source libraries for middle and
high school students. I needed one more document for World
War One, and it was the episode A Brief History
(42:34):
of Donuts that gave me the idea to use a
photograph of a donut lassie. It's one story that the
kids won't miss in history class. Enclosed are a couple
of sticker packs I developed for work. I hope you
will get a kick out of them. Sorry, not sorry
for all the terrible puns. Thank you again for all
that you do. You're a constant source of inspiration and education. Colleen, Colleen,
this is so sweet, and now I can tell Tracy.
(42:55):
Before we started recording, I was looking at these stickers,
which are adorable, and I started buckling to myself like
I had lost my wits. And it's because one of them.
I don't normally love puns, but these are very clever.
And the one that I love, it's sort of like
an encouragement sist sticker, and it's got a picture of
Henry the Eighth wearing some groovy eighties style slat sunglasses. Um,
(43:16):
and it says great but the Great is spelled g
r v I I I and that just tickled me
to pieces. That's great. Um. They are also great ones
with fierce Genghis Khan and uh to legit Elizabeth the First,
among others. They're fabulous and I love them so thank
you so much, Colleen. You can write to us in
history podcast at how stuff Works dot com. You can
(43:36):
find us everywhere on social media as Missed in History.
Missed in History dot com is also the website u
r L if you want to come and visit and
find all of the episodes that have ever existed, and
if you would like to subscribe, that sounds like a
grand plan to us. You can do that on the
I Heart Radio app, on Apple podcasts, or wherever it
is that you listen to your podcasts. Stuff You Missed
(44:01):
in History Class is a production of I Heart Radio's
How Stuff Works. For more podcasts for my Heart Radio,
visit the heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.
Hey everybody. Before we get started, we have a live
show to announce. We will be at the National Gallery
of our Washington for their n g A Nights programming.
We'll be doing a live show there on September twelve.
The program itself is running from six pm to nine pm.
We're actually going to do our show twice that night.
You do have to register for it, but the good
(00:21):
news is registration is completely free. It's just a matter
of signing up. Yep. You can come to our website,
which is missed in History dot com and you can
click on the page where it says live shows, or
you can go to miss in history dot com slash shows.
You will find a link for where you can register
for tickets ahead of time. Again, this is a whole
night of programming and we plan to do the same
(00:42):
show two times so that more folks have the chance
to see it. So we hope to see you in Washington,
d C. On September twelve. Welcome to Stuff You Missed
in History Class, a production of I Heart Radios How
Stuff Works. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly
(01:03):
Fry and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. Uh So, today what
you're talking about a court case that was fairly famous
in the eighteen sixties, less known today. It is the
Great English Convent case. The greatness that is referred to
is definitely not in the sense of good. It's not
really a very delightful case to hear about, but it
(01:24):
speaks to the fervor of public interests surrounding it. Um
It became really a sensational legal and cultural moment for
Victorian England, and it was scandalous because it involved conflict
within a convent, and the idea of hearing what went
on behind the walls of such a place tucked away
from the outside world was completely tantalizing to both the
(01:44):
press and the public. And also that was because it
came at a time when it fed an already growing
anti Catholic movement in England. Additionally, it played on the
shock of women being incredibly cruel to one another, and
that was something that was even used by the plaintiff's
legal team when speaking to the jury when this case
went to trial. So there was an inherently salacious element
(02:05):
to the proceedings as people eagerly waited for the juici
or details of the case to emerge. One thing that
will mention going in is that if you look up
any documents on this, the names involved get spelled all
manner of different ways. Um, the plaintiff is in most
of the legal documents just referred to as Miss Saren,
(02:27):
but she her name was either Susan or Suzanne depending
on what you look at. Uh. Similarly, the primary defendant,
Mrs Starr is also spelled star with two R, star
with one R. There's also Mrs Kennedy involved, sometimes spelled
with one end, sometimes with two And I want to
be clear that in the same legal document these names
will change spellings, so there's a lot of inconsistency about that.
(02:51):
We're kind of going with the most commonly used ones.
And we'll talk also about using their non religious names
versus their names as nuns a little bit. We're going
with the non religious names, just for clarity. Heads up. Also, Uh,
there's a lot of discussion and accusations of abuse and
cruelty in the mix here. Those are sensitive things for you. Um,
(03:14):
this might not be the episode for you. Yeah, as
I was reading it, I was reminded of like mean
girls but worse. Yeah, it's like a lot of fairly
petty abuses, but they really accumulate in a way that
is pretty upsetting and you could understand would be very trying.
So Susan Saren was from a very devout Irish Roman
(03:37):
Catholic family. She was the third daughter in her immediate family,
although her parents didn't really want her to become a
nun her there other two daughters her sisters already were,
but she really felt called to this. She finally convinced
her family that it was the only life for her,
and then visited a number of convents to try to
find the right fit. In eighteen fifty one, she became
(03:59):
a candidate in a Dublin to Ireland Sisters of Mercy Convent,
and then she went from candidate to novice on August five,
eight fifty one, taking the name Sister Mary Scholastica Joseph
and taking her vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, as
well as service to the poor, the sick and the ignorant.
And during the time that Sarin joined the convent, so
(04:19):
did two other women, not at the exact same time,
but all within a few months of one another. Uh
that's Mrs Starr, whose religious name was Sister Mary Joseph
and Mrs Kennedy, whose religious name was Sister Mary Magdalene.
Both of those women had been married before they joined
the convent. That is why they're missus. For the purposes
of simplicity, we are going to stick to using legal
(04:40):
names rather than their religious names, as that is was
primarily used in all of the accounts of the court case,
which is really what we're focusing on today. So by
Sarren's own account, these three sisters were very close. She
would later testify, quote, we were all three thrown very
much into each other's society. I became very intimate with
Mrs st Are and attached to her, and she to me.
(05:02):
We were associated in the work of education. I was
equally attached to Mrs Kennedy, and I should point out
to that even in different publications of these accounts, this
was part of her testimony at trial, some of that
phrasing will shift a little bit because basically the court
stenographers were taking shorthand and then uh writing things out
longhand afterwards, and so sometimes the sentence structure is a
(05:24):
little different. If you ever see another version of this
anything that we're quoting today, you might see slight variations
in how a sentence is worded just af y i uh.
And after a time, Mrs Starr was appointed Mother Superior
of a convent in Yorkshire, England, and at that time
this is sometime around eight or eighteen fifty six, Mrs
(05:45):
Starr asked Saren to join her at this new convent,
which Susan Sarren and her family agreed to, with the
understanding that if she was unhappy there in England she
could return to her old convent in Dublin. So initially
things seemed to go well, but then in eighteen sixty five,
Miss Sarren was expelled from her community and absolved of
all our vows, and this was against her will. Four
(06:07):
years later, in February eighteen sixty nine, Miss Susan Sarn
filed suit against the Mother Superior of Sisters of Mercy,
Mrs Starr, and her assistant Mrs Kennedy, who was the
convent sister in authority. You'll see her listed as Sister
in authority or superior assistant. Sometimes it's the wording comes
out different. Uh. Soren accused Star of abuse and of
(06:28):
conspiring with her colleagues to force Miss Saren to leave
the convent. She also accused them of falsifying evidence which
was presented to a church bishop with the intent to
have her expelled from the order and to address damages
to reputation and character, because after she was expelled from
this life, she wasn't really prepared for another vocation uh
(06:50):
and she was shamed. She felt like she couldn't go
into a lot of churches. So Miss Sarren was suing
for five thousand pounds. Proceedings began on February third, eighteen
sixty nine. Solicitor General John Duke Coleridge was the head
of the plaintiff legal team, assisted by Mr Digby Seymour
and a Mr Wills. Henry Hawkins, George Mellish and Charles
(07:10):
Russell made up the defenses team of solicitors. The case
was presided over by the Lord Chief Justice, Sir Alexander Cockburn,
and the charges as outlined before the court on February third,
eighteen sixty nine, were noted by the Court stenographer as
follows quote. This was an action brought by a professed
sister of the Order of Mercy against the Mother Superior
(07:32):
and a professed sister of the same Order in the
Convent at Hull to recover damages for assault and conspiracy
to drive her from the convent and have her expelled
from the Order. The declaration stated that the defendants, on
diverse occasions, assaulted and beat the plaintiff, and they took
her clothes in property from her and imprisoned her for
a long time, whereby she was rendered sick and ill
(07:54):
and greatly distressed in body and mind. The case, as
it was laid before the court that day went on
to include a trover that's a legal action to recover
the value of property that was discarded by another person.
This was going to cover a watch, some clothing, books
and papers. The accusation on the part of the plaintiff
went on to state that Miss Sarn was legally entitled
(08:17):
to the basic necessities of life, including food, clothing, and shelter,
as well as the right to attend services in the
Roman Catholic Church as a member of the Order, and
that the defendants had deprived her of these rights. Soren
also charged Star with libel, saying that the Mother Superior
told Dr Robert Cornthwaite, the Bishop of Beverly, that Soren
(08:37):
had complained about her boots clothing and food, was late
in her work eight during hours we're doing so, was prohibited,
spoke privately with a priest, was contradictory and disobedient, and
had illicit conversations with outsiders. The defendants in this case
actually paid the trover for the lost items at the outset,
but then pled not guilty to all other charges. When
(08:58):
Color had stepped up to make opening statements, he said
to the jury, quote, you will have gathered from the
opening of the pleadings by my learned friend Mr. Wills,
that the case which I have to bring to your
attention is one a good deal out of the common way,
and requiring more than a common amount of your watchfulness
and patience. The facts of it are strange and painful.
(09:21):
They are strange and painful as a revelation of human nature.
They are more strange and painful as a revelation of
female nature. They are most strange and painful of all,
as a revelation of conventual female nature, showing what women
are capable of when they shut themselves up from their
kind and do violence to the instincts of their nature,
(09:44):
and what mean and petty cruelty they can wreak upon
sister women in the name of the God of Love,
and in an effort to perhaps temper the possibility of
being called into question as attacking the Catholic Church, Coleridge
made a point to mention repeatedly that both parties were
of the same denomination. However, of course he was vilifying
(10:05):
convents and thus the Catholic Church in the process, and
women also women for sure. I mean, that's a big
part of his case, is that like, if you lock
women up together, they'll just become animals. It's really quite terrible. Uh.
He did also urge the jury to not let their
bias regarding Catholics enter into their assessment of the matters
(10:27):
at hand. This case stretched on for three weeks, and
throughout it the public just leaned in to hear more.
The courtroom was full every single day of testimony, with
both general public and attendance as well as a significant
number of clergy. The case was so highly publicized and
was seen as unprecedented, which also drew lawyers not involved
(10:48):
in the proceedings to attend as spectators. And coming up,
we will dig into the story of how Mss Saren's
time in the convent really devolved uh, and how that
was related in the courtroom. But first, let's take a
quick sponsor break. There was a sketch made for Vanity
(11:13):
Fair at the time of the trial of Mrs Starr
the Mother Superior, by the artist Carlo Pellegrini. I would
actually love to do an episode on him. At some
point he signed his work ape that was his his
sketch name. And it looks almost like it could be
the work of previous podcast subject Charles Adams, as it
is rather cartoonish and the style feels very similar in
(11:34):
its Star looks both pious and guilty at the same time.
Her hands are clasped on the ledge in front of her,
but she is looking to the side with an expression
that characterizes her as really sort of sinister or sneaky.
The plaintiffs lawyers relate the early history of Saorence time
as a nun and that she had a year's long
relationship with Star without any apparent trouble. Things just changed
(11:58):
abruptly in eight teens ext one, at the time Starr
started questioning Sarin about what she had discussed with her
priest during confession. It doesn't seem unreasonable to me that
she wouldn't want to talk about that, and she took
this line of questioning as an insult and she refused
to answer, and her testimony, Saren stated, quote, I thought
(12:20):
it would be a breach of honor and contrary to
every regulation. And she continued to refuse to share this
information despite being asked repeatedly about it. And from that
point things really turned unpleasant very quickly. Yeah, we'll talk
about it in a little while. That Mrs Starr never
is very clear in her testimony that she wasn't saying
(12:41):
that she thought anything untoward was happening between the two
of them, but she just felt uneasy about it. And
that's actually the caption of the the that sketch we
just talked about, was that she it's something along the
lines that she had an uneasy feeling. And she alleged
that she asked all of the other sisters about their
confessions and that they always share them with her, which
becomes a strange whole other things. She was apparently very
(13:04):
controlling woman. The case against Mrs Starr and her colleague
and how they punished Miss Saren quickly assembled into a
picture of great cruelty. And I do want to point out.
You know, we talk a lot. We will continue to
talk a lot as well in this episode about the
bias against the Catholic Church. During this time, the plaintiffs
legal team was very clearly playing on this, so much
(13:26):
so that there were even times when the magistrate would
break in and be like, I think you're over dramatizing
this or mischaracterizing this. Um so they really are trying
to like paint these two women is just super villains.
But over the course of Sarren's life with Star as
her mother's superior after this this incident began where she
would not tell her her confession. The plaintiff claimed that
(13:48):
she was treated far more cruelly than any of the
other sisters in the convent. She was given more and
more difficult chores than others. This was on top of
the fact that it has already mentioned in a lot
of letters establishinging before any of this happened, that she
was not a physically strong person to begin with. Uh,
and then the punishments for her various infractions as determined
(14:10):
by Mrs Starr. Basically she would say, you are a liar.
There was no recourse or like way too to discuss
or disprove that. Uh. So her punishments that she got
for any of these were incredibly harsh. So some of
the things that that Mssarin reported her portions were reduced
as a punishment. When the Mother Superior accused her of
sneaking or stealing food, the food she was fed tasted
(14:34):
off and might have been rancid. She was given foods
that she was known to dislike, particularly mutton. Every single
day when it was determined that she wasn't cleaning to
the standards of the Mother Superior, she was made to
pin a dirty duster onto her head and wear it
at meals and during time in the community room. That's
one of the things that the magistrate and the Solicitor
(14:55):
General have a big back and forth about, was like
was this a dirty dust? Had it been used on
something wet? Was it extra disgusting? Uh And they have
a big discussion about it. In the court proceedings if
you ever want to go read them, it's basically two
men bickering over just how dirty a duster was. The
boots that were given to Miss Saren for her youth
(15:16):
had holes in them, and if she complained about this,
she was deemed to be disobedient. According to her testimony,
her room was watched at all hours uh and a
thread was placed on the door knobs so that she
couldn't leave without detection. This is also written up in
a couple of different ways. One was that like there
was essentially a thing on her door knob that she
couldn't turn the door now without it falling. There is
(15:38):
another that suggests later on, when things really go quite poorly,
that there was actually a string tied from her door
knob to the bedpost of another sister, so that if
she opened the door, that person would get up and
know that they needed to follow her around. Mrs Star
would simultaneously right to the bishop that something had to
(15:58):
be done to get this in silent and problematic Miss
Sarn out of the convent, while also writing letters at
the same time to her family saying that she could
not leave. Yeah, and that's well documented. That's not like
just an accusation. Those letters existed and were brought up
during the case that she was writing over and over
like we have to do something to get rid of
(16:19):
this woman. In the meantime, her parents we're writing and saying,
can we please have her back in Dublin and her going, Oh,
there's no way she could possibly go back. Similarly, Mrs
Starr used her influence to smear Miss Sarren's reputation within
the church to other convents that she might have moved
to and effectively ensured that way that she was not
approved for transfer there, and then she would use those
(16:41):
failures of those appointments that didn't come through as evidence
against her character. In the four years between eighteen sixty
one and eighteen sixty five, all of this conflict played
out and more, with Sarin never living up to Star's
expectations and always being punished. During that time, Susan Sarn's
mother tried to advocate on her daughter's behalf. She wrote
(17:02):
to church officials that the archbishop and Dublin had approved
a return to her old convent, but Mrs Starr refused,
saying that once she moved to England, Miss Sarren was
no longer under the jurisdiction of Dublin church officials. Even
when word of Sarin's father being gravely ill was sent
on to the convent, Mrs Starr did not relay that
(17:25):
information to his daughter. Yeah, again, that's all stuff that
is substantiated in kind of the letter record that was
brought up during the case. And at one point Miss
Sarin wrote to her uncle, who was also a priest,
and she mentioned him the Mother Superior had said that
she was frustrated with her mother's letters and that there
had also been some miscommunication or confusion about some of
(17:46):
her behavior at the convent, and Susan Sarin framed all
of this in a fairly positive way. She kind of
sets it up like, I know, the Mother Superior doesn't
mean to make these mistakes kind of thing. She suggests
she's not unhappy at all as a nun, but she
was just really unsettled there at her current convent, and
that she would like to move and that she was
(18:06):
sure that things would write themselves if she could. That
letter never made it out of the convent, though Starr
kept it from being sent and wrote her own letter
to Sarn's uncle, who was the Reverend T. Matthews. She
urged him to find another appointment for Miss Saren and
told him that she had committed quote the most grave offenses,
stating quote I fear we shall be obliged to seek
(18:28):
to have her released from the obligation of her vows,
which are no longer to her an occasion of merit
but an occasion of sin, and the Reverend Matthews wrote
back that he knew he couldn't pre judge the situation,
but that this all seemed really, really odd to him,
since his niece had been such an exemplary nun throughout
her time since she took her vows, and so much
(18:50):
so that Mother Superior had in fact asked her to
move to England along with herself, and he suggested that
if they would just wait until after the busy season,
like once Easter was passed, then they could talk about
doing something and then he would have time to travel
to England and investigate the matter himself. And the Mother
Superior Mrs Starr wrote the Miss Sarren had to be
removed before Easter. In the meantime, Susan Sarren's mother and
(19:13):
brother had visited the convent and were admitted only after
having been turned away first. They had a brief visit
in which Miss Sarren assured them that everything was well,
although she was weeping and she was clearly in distress.
Not long after that visit, Sarin wrote to the bishop
and got a reply. Those two letters weren't available at
the time of the trial. Though this communication incensed Mrs Starr,
(19:37):
and she made Miss Sarren confess publicly, including a written
statement that she had written to her uncle without permission.
She couldn't make her confess to having communicated with the
bishop because that was her right as a nun. Yeah,
that was what really made her angry. It was kind
of like you went over my head that she made
her confess to other letter, writing that that was not
(19:59):
apparently okay without permission. In August four, eighteen sixty two,
Mrs Starr wrote a letter to the Bishop herself to
convey her chagrin, writing with emphasis that quote, such intercourse
with externs for such purpose is a violation of a
most essential point of religious life. So as she was
saying was that she felt that since Sarin had communicated
(20:20):
with her uncle with the intent that he would help
her move to a different convent, that she had sinned
gravely and that she should quote be released from her
vows and be dismissed from the community. From that summer
on Star started a whole new series of punishments. The
Mother Superior told Sarren she could only write home once
a year. The letters she received, including those from her father,
(20:42):
who continued to be unwell, were heavily censored and then
destroyed after she read them once with a witness present.
She wasn't allowed any communication with her two sisters or
her brother, who were also clergy. Yeah. The reason that
that Mrs Starr gave all of that censorship was that
she felt that in some of the letters the family
(21:04):
had either exaggerated or lied, and that she thought that
was sinful, so she had struck it out so that Sarin,
who was already in her view ms could not read
more sinful things. Um. And that was also why they
destroyed the letters. It's a bit much, um. And as
all of this was escalating at the convent, the Bishop,
Robert Corinthwaite, had been in contact with miss Oren's uncle, who,
(21:26):
as you recall, was also a priest, and so the
bishop arranged to visit the convent and investigate everything as
quickly as he could, and he arrived in November of
eighteen sixty two. He was already like in the habit
of making periodic visits to all convents, so it was
not odd for him to have shown up there. It
wasn't only for this purpose, but he was there in November.
(21:47):
He reassured miss Saren after investigating, that he thought she
had done nothing wrong and that he would see that
she would be treated more kindly and that she could
come directly to him with any complaints and not complain
to anyone else within the Higher Key. But after he left,
matters continued exactly as they had before, except they actually
got worse. Star created a whole new list of rules
(22:09):
that's Aren't had to live by. She wasn't allowed to
speak with anyone outside the convent. If a visitor came
and addressed a question to her, she was required to
motion them to someone else. She had to submit a
written record of her faults every month, and her workload
was increased. When her brother died rather suddenly, they kept
the news from her for months. She was told long
(22:31):
after the fact, and then was forbidden from taking any
time to grieve. And all of this seemed to really
take a toll significantly on miss Oren's mental state, and
in a lengthy letter that she wrote to Mrs Starr
during a retreat, her writing takes on a very unsettling
tone and it really starts to exhibit the language of
(22:52):
someone who has been systematically abused and has come to
believe that what their abuser is telling them is in
fact the truth. There is one particular passage in which
she describes what to most ears would sound like an
exceedingly minor transgression of folding up a letter that she
had been writing before a senior sister had instructed her
to do so. And then after talking about this, she
(23:14):
writes this rather heartbreaking to me line of I am
always I believe to be doing things wrong. And then
she also goes on in that same letter, which is
quite lengthy, to describe a recent confession in which she
was troubled that the priest didn't seem to understand how
sinful she was, and she wrote, quote, I really tried
to make him think me as bad as I did myself.
(23:36):
Sarn's brother, who was a priest, visited and this visit
left him unsettled. After being allowed less than fifteen minutes
with his sister and seeing her looking and behaving unlike herself,
he wrote to the bishop, who questioned Mrs Starr on
the matter. She replied that quote, the presence of Sister
Scholastica amongst us is a very heavy cross. She is
(23:58):
an enemy living in our mid And we're going to
continue to talk about the last months of Miss Sarn's
time at the Convent in just a minute, but first
we'll take a break from all of this rather sad
and disturbing tale and have a moment of thanks for
one of the sponsors that keeps his show going. In
(24:22):
April of eighteen sixty five, Mrs Starr began a campaign
with the Bishop regarding the quote problem of Miss Saren.
She asked the Bishop to appoint an investigative committee with
the intent that Sarin would ultimately be dismissed, and over
the course of numerous letters, the Mother Superior made Miss
Sarn out to be a sort of poison on the convent,
(24:42):
ruining virtually everything about their otherwise harmonious life, and making
everyone anxious. This is according to Mother Superior, and she
threatened to resign, writing quote, I do not possess the
virtue and talent to govern in trying circumstances. It is
a fault of character in me which time has rather
increased rather than lessened, that I take things too much
(25:04):
to heart and am too solicitous about those who are
under my care. The Bishop replied on April sixty five
that it was not possible for him to accept Mrs
Starr's resignation. He encouraged her to have faith in God.
He stated that if it truly was a case where
the Mother Superior or the sister must go, that the
sister should be the one to leave. He had never
(25:25):
seen the problem with Sister Scholastica, but he couldn't let
one of his convents go without a leader. And stars
follow up letter after he says no, no, you can't quit, uh,
kind of brings up the same idea that she Mother
Superior will leave, and then Miss Sarren doesn't even need
to know that she was the cause, and that all
sounds sort of benevolent. But then the language quickly shifts
(25:47):
to outlining the many alleged sins that the younger Nune
has committed, many of them really really minor infractions. But
then in particular she starts accusing Miss Sarin of theft,
and while no one has ever caught her, because apparently
she was so sly, several different people did suspect her,
which Mrs Starr sort of holds up in the letter
(26:09):
is nearly as good as real evidence says, where I
beg you to keep in mind that Mrs Starr's mother
Superior was very influential, so it seemed like most of
the other nuns went along with whatever she said. In
such matters. Starr even accused Sarin of stealing food from
the children who came to the convent for school, that
she was stealing their dinners, although none of the children
(26:31):
or their parents ever reported such a thing. There's no
record of any kind of complaint along those lines. In
order to investigate this possibility of theft, Sarn was forced
to undress in front of Star and her assistance in
order to see if she was concealing stolen food or
other items. This was done twice, once in May of
eighteen sixty three and another time in December of eighteen
(26:52):
sixty five. In each case, there was no evidence of
any misappropriated goods or food, but the experiences were humiliating.
And this this was not something she alleged like. This
was acknowledged, Yes, this absolutely happened, uh and was defended
as as the only way they were ever going to
know for certain if she was a thief, and they
(27:14):
the plaintiffs legal team makes the case that if they
had found even a crumb, if they had been able
to find essentially a molecule of a thing, they would
have reported it because that would have been their evidence.
But they never found anything. Uh. The Bishop finally acquiesced
after all of this discussion two Star's request, and a
(27:34):
committee was assembled to review the case, and ultimately Miss
Sarren was expelled from the community. The evidence in the
matter was given to the bishop, but Miss Sarren and
her uncle who represented her before the committee, were not
given access to any of it, and it was unclear
even what the many crimes that she was accused of were.
They did not have a list of what she was
being accused of to work from or defend against. It
(27:58):
was really, in the words of her uncle, I think
he called it something like a travesty. And when the
court case went to trial, no copy of that evidence
that allegedly went before the committee could be obtained, and
the offenses that were allegedly addressed in that missing evidence
didn't even have anything to do with the alleged theft,
which had actually been the issue that finally drove the
(28:20):
bishop to action. According to the Solicitor General, who was
representing Sarn her legal battle. These were the same sorts
of petty charges that Starr had been trotting out for
some time. Sarren had been disobedient, that she had written
letters without permission, that she had eaten buttered toast, and
that she had been eating cake. During the trial, those
last two were met with some laughter in the courtroom.
(28:41):
Four fits of the bishop's committee had to vote in
favor of the nun's innocence for the terms of the
church's committee assignment. That didn't happen, though, and she was expelled.
Miss Saren was unwilling to leave the convent though. While
she had been unhappy with her treatment there, she did
not want to leave what she believed was her calling,
and to drive her out, Mrs Starr confined her to
(29:02):
her room. Her fire was taken away. This was in winter,
she could not have soaper water. She was only given
leftover food from the plates of other sisters after meals
were concluded, and when she refused to change from her
religious garments to regular clothes, she was eventually stripped of
her habit while she slept, so she had no choice
but to change into the provided civilian where and finally,
(29:25):
after this dragging on for some time, Susan Sarn had
had enough. She became quite ill and her spirit was broken,
and so she wrote to her brother, who immediately came
to take her away from the convent. During the testimony,
Sarren's uncle, father Matthews, testified that while things had started
out fine at the convent in England, over the years
that Sarin was there, he went from being welcomed and
(29:48):
well received to being kept away from her are only
allowed to see her in very brief visits. He also
described his niece slowly changing and felt that things were
not right with her, and when the Bishop was on
the stand, he recalled that after his visit in which
he reassured Miss Saren, that Mrs Starr had cried when
he left because she was unhappy with what he had
(30:08):
said to her. He said, quote, I did not like
to tell them Mrs Starr and Mrs Kennedy my feelings,
and I left them very dissatisfied, and certainly Mrs Starr cried.
The Solicitor General also pointed out that Star contradicted herself
and her testimony. For example, she mentioned that after the
Bishop's visit, she wrote, quote the issue of the visitation
gave her and her supporters an immense triumph over us,
(30:31):
of which they show their full appreciation whenever they have
an opportunity. But then, under questioning, it turned out that
she couldn't come up with any such supporters. She'd initially
said that she meant Sarren's family, but they hadn't been
allowed to visit often, if at all, and even when
they did see Miss Sarren, it was briefly. They usually
didn't see the mother superior. Yeah. He was basically like,
(30:53):
when exactly did anybody learn this over you? Because these
people weren't even around when you said they were. Uh.
And there were a lot of instances like that where
her sort of double dealings where she was writing simultaneous
letters saying very different things were coming up. And uh,
she she did not do particularly spectacularly under questioning, there
were a lot of I don't know is in the mix. Uh.
(31:15):
Mrs Starr was actually found also to have destroyed some
of the papers that were germane to this court case.
She said that she did so because she had felt
that the matters in them were settled, but some of
them were destroyed after Miss Sarron began legal action, which
of course is not something you're supposed to do. Mr Coleridge,
the Solicitor General, noted that while both Mrs Starr and
(31:38):
Mrs Kennedy were quick to say that one of miss
sarn sins was pointing out the flaws of others, that
they were both awfully quick to belt out a let
me of the transgressions that they felt that she had committed.
Through the witnesses that they called, the defense tried to
build a case against Miss Sarren's character. They claimed that
she liked possessions and things like clothes. They also said
(31:59):
that she liked to around the convent at night, which
was both odd behavior and something they didn't want her
to do. She wasn't enthusiastic about teaching children, and she
was said to sneak food outside of allowed meal times.
Her writing to family members using language such as my
dearest uncle was considered excessive and overly affectionate. In short,
(32:19):
she was not per the defense upholding her vows. And
of course, there was also this hope for some of
the spectators that as the defense started to characterize Saren
as a very poor nun, that there might be something
truly salacious revealed in the midst of all of the testimony,
and at one point it did come up that Miss
(32:40):
Saren became quote excited when a certain priest would visit
the convent. This, of course, immediately got people thinking there
was some sort of sexual relationship. That idea was pretty
quickly dismissed, even by Mrs Starr, but still the rumor
mill kind of ran with that one. It's clear from
some of the response to things that came up in
(33:00):
this trial that there was a degree of humor that's
the Solicitor General and some of the assembled crowd found
in the rules of the convent, and to counter that,
a big part of the defense's case was trying to
convey that while some of the rules of religious life
seemed petty or silly to outsiders, they were a vital
part of a larger devotion. So being obedient to the
(33:21):
Mother Superior, they argued, was part of the vows that
Sarren had taken and a life she had agreed to freely.
On February, the Solicitor General made his closing speech. In
it he stated how big this case really was to
the welfare of Miss Saren, saying, quote, it is my
duty to tell you now that this is, in truth
and fact, an issue of her social life and death.
(33:45):
It is a question whether she is to be permitted
to continue the life to which she has devoted herself,
to which she is intimately wedded and passionately attached, or
whether she is to be flung back upon the world
which she believed she had left forever, and for which
she is now entirely unsuited, with a stain upon her
character which no lapse of time can ever avail to
(34:06):
a face. He also took the opportunity to point out
that the convents of England were, in his view, operating
under such a veil of secrecy that it allowed these
kinds of abuses to happen. He pointed out how in
this particular case, all the cruelty brought to bear by
Mrs Starr seemed really against what he knew of Christianity. Yeah,
he definitely uses that tactic of going, look, I'm not
(34:29):
a clergy member. I wouldn't claim to be an expert
on religion, but what I know of Christianity this doesn't
seem to fall in line with Yeah, there's a difference
between being strict and bullying someone yes. Um. The jury
reached its verdict on February eighteen sixty nine, after deliberating
for less than an hour, and while a number of
(34:51):
papers actually reported that things seemed to be stacked in
favor of the defendants, the jury found in favor of
the plaintiff on the counts of libel and conspiracy. See
Sarin was not, however, awarded the five thousand pounds that
she had sought. She was awarded five hundred. This wasn't
the end of it, though. Starr and her staff appealed
the jury's decision, but the second wave of legal action
(35:13):
didn't get all the attention that the first one had.
It faded from the public eye as other cases rose
up and came into focus, and it never made it
to trial. In April of eighteen seventy the matter was
settled out of court, and this trial, and particularly Mrs
Starr's testimony in it, really only fanned the flames of
suspicion against the Catholic Church and a general anti Catholic
sentiment in England. Uh that was of course in place
(35:36):
long before Miss Sarin brought her case to the court,
even before the trial began, like leading up to it,
newspapers were running editorials suggesting that girls and young women
who might be considering entering a convent should consider such
a move very carefully, given the possible situations that the
Sarin versus Star case illuminated. Yeah, you and I had
(35:56):
a conversation before we came into the studio about how
uh stars response to a lot of these allegations was
sort of like, yeah, that's how we do it in
a convent, not whether there's a problem or a bad
way to behave. Yeah. I mean, she really didn't deny
most of the charges. In some cases she tried to
say no, no, that's framed for maximum dramatic effect and
(36:16):
to make us look bad. Yes, we took her food away,
but you have to understand that was a punishment that
we felt fit the crime of of complaining about her
food or their belief, even though they never found evidence
that she was stealing food. So it's a little bit weird.
Like we said, there was no, not really a lot
of oh that didn't happen, more a matter of well,
(36:37):
it didn't happen quite like that, and if it did,
it wasn't that bad. That's how we do it. In
a preface written by James Grant Esquire to accompany the
publication of the trial account. Shortly after it was concluded,
he wrote, quote, the whole country has been astounded by
the evidence which has been brought forward in the course
of this remarkable trial of the real character of Roman Catholicism.
(36:57):
The outer world now see Potpoury with a clearness of
vision with which they never saw it before. And the
site will not, I feel assured, render it more attractive
in the eyes of those whose mental perceptions are not obscured.
They must, on the contrary, be appalled as well as
amazed by the hideousness of the features which potpour represents
as exhibited within the last few weeks in Westminster Hall. Yeah,
(37:21):
he also was trying to make a case that there
should be some sort of oversight put in place where
convents were regularly inspected and toured by people outside the church.
I mean, he makes very clear in that preface that
he is anti Potpourri. So that, um. The story of
the Great Comment case persisted for decades after it was over, though,
(37:45):
as the juicier details were recounted over and over and
sometimes bent and dramatized a bit, even into the early
eighteen nineties, there were still penny press versions of this
trial being printed, and the covers would feature things like
two nuns whipping a partially undressed third none. Obviously, there
was a significant degree of bias against the convent and
(38:06):
the Catholic Church from the outset in this case, Although
the Solicitor General urged the jury to disregard such personal bias,
it's almost impossible to imagine that there was done. Yeah,
it's not like I mean, I'm sure they all intended well,
but I'm there. I'm also sure that in the backs
of their minds many of them were like uh. There
was also a point made by Mrs Star at one
(38:28):
point that, of course Miss Saren wanted to make this
a legal matter and try it before a Protestant jury
that would have anti Catholic bias, rather than go through
the Church's channels of review, which she felt would obviously
find in favor of her mother's superior um. It is
also difficult to truly separate the bias that we've been
talking about from many of the accounts of the trial
(38:50):
that we have. So while the court reporter's account is
theoretically unbiased and the barristers in the case all appeared,
at least on the surface, to strive to act outside
of any such cultural or religious bias. They too, probably
were motivated on some level by it, or, in the
case of the plaintiffs representation, to be carefully playing on
the juries inherent bias, even while saying do not be biased. Moreover,
(39:14):
one of the reasons that this case was published so
frequently in England following its conclusion was this desire to
warn young women away from a life in the clergy.
So if Sarren was able to return to her life's
calling and another convent after this case was finally settled,
there are no records of that that we can find. Yeah,
I didn't turn any up, um and she, you know
(39:37):
it kind of she kind of vanishes from the public
record after that. It's entirely possible she went and lived
with family from that point on and that was the
remainder of her life, because it doesn't seem like she
was really going to be able to like suddenly take
on a career or be married. Yeah, I mean, this
was what she wanted forever. And one of the things
that comes up in the trial is that the greatest
(40:00):
heartbreak and to her one of the most painful things
about being expelled is that they took her ring from her,
which is, you know, like the symbol of her being
married to the church and a bride of Christ, and
that that was like the biggest heartache that she endured
amongst all of these other things was that they were saying, no,
that thing that you said you are, you're not, which
(40:21):
was incredibly painful for her. One of the things that
I think would have been really difficult at the time,
even for people who we're trying to really put their
own biases aside, Like, there weren't that many other situations
where a group of people would be living by themselves
together by themselves, is not like isolated from the rest
of the society in a group for their whole lives. Like,
(40:46):
there wasn't a lot of comparison to another similar situation
where you might also see instances of abuses and bullying.
So it probably appeared to people as though this was
unique to Catholicism or unique to con events, when really
theyre just weren't exactly comparable situations. Yeah, I mean, I
(41:06):
wish I could take those people forward in time and
show them like any Internet interest group and watch how
it employed in similar highly not the same level of stuff,
but it certainly happened. I am I was. I keep
being reminded throughout this of just being bullied by classmates
in middle school, Like it felt like that level of pettiness,
and oh yeah, there's a mean girls element to it.
(41:30):
And really, when you think it all started because she
wouldn't tell this woman what she had confessed to her priest,
it gets very you realize how petty the seed is
that leads to so much pain. And also, I mean,
for the mother's fire. It wasn't like I'm sure she
wasn't like, yeah, this will drag out for years in
letters in court, but she couldn't get over that like
(41:52):
anger at having not been told this thing, and probably
she didn't even recognize that was the catalyst anymore. Um,
don't be like that people. Uh is our life lesson
be kind to one another? That's easy to say. I know,
I have such much more pleasant and delightful and colorful
(42:13):
listener mail. Um. This comes from our listener Colleen, who writes,
Dear Holly and Tracy, thank you so much for the
wonderful show. I work for a publisher that produces materials
for K to twelve classrooms, and I am currently working
on a series of primary source libraries for middle and
high school students. I needed one more document for World
War One, and it was the episode A Brief History
(42:34):
of Donuts that gave me the idea to use a
photograph of a donut lassie. It's one story that the
kids won't miss in history class. Enclosed are a couple
of sticker packs I developed for work. I hope you
will get a kick out of them. Sorry, not sorry
for all the terrible puns. Thank you again for all
that you do. You're a constant source of inspiration and education. Colleen, Colleen,
this is so sweet, and now I can tell Tracy.
(42:55):
Before we started recording, I was looking at these stickers,
which are adorable, and I started buckling to myself like
I had lost my wits. And it's because one of them.
I don't normally love puns, but these are very clever.
And the one that I love, it's sort of like
an encouragement sist sticker, and it's got a picture of
Henry the Eighth wearing some groovy eighties style slat sunglasses. Um,
(43:16):
and it says great but the Great is spelled g
r v I I I and that just tickled me
to pieces. That's great. Um. They are also great ones
with fierce Genghis Khan and uh to legit Elizabeth the First,
among others. They're fabulous and I love them so thank
you so much, Colleen. You can write to us in
history podcast at how stuff Works dot com. You can
(43:36):
find us everywhere on social media as Missed in History.
Missed in History dot com is also the website u
r L if you want to come and visit and
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