Abingdon, 1860-2011

In 1859 Father John O’Toole, Parish priest in Abingdon, asked Bishop Grant (Southwark) for some Sisters to found a Convent in Abingdon. Bishop Grant approached Mother Clare Moore in Bermondsey to sound her out about the possibility and Mother Clare’s response was positive. Sir George Bowyer, a man of wealth who lived at nearby Radley Park and who had built the Parish Church of Our Lady and St. Edmund (1857) offered the Sisters his cottage at Northcourt, lease rent free on a short term base. On January 10th 1860, Mother Clare Moore escorted the pioneer Sisters Mother Elizabeth Rigby who was to be the first and longstanding Superior, Sr. M. Xavier Spence, and Sr. M. Joseph O’Hara (a Novice) to Abingdon. These three Sisters were the Abingdon pioneers! On January 11th they began teaching in St. Edmund’s sacristy. 1862 saw the Sisters move to two semi-detached houses on the Oxford Road, which once again Sir George Bowyer made generous in his provision for them.

The sisters responded to a number of requests for branch houses and foundations. In 1882 Reverend Mooney of Aldershot requested a branch house in the town for help with the school in Aldershot the house was open until 1889. In Bournemouth, M Evangelist Power RSM the superior died on 15 March 1889, and the bishop approached the Abingdon community to request the loan of M Clare Joseph Lidden RSM for three months, she went on 14th April with a companion, M Agatha Mulholland RSM, who was her assistant; M Berchmans Lalor RSM and a Sister Patricia went some days later. The Abingdon sisters had two foundations in the Isle of Wight, a small house in Ryde which according to St Mary's RC Church, Ryde website, was opened in 1883, and which the Sisters of Mercy left at the turn of the century. There was also a foundation to Shanklin from the Abingdon Community from 1909 to 1943 and 1945 to 1949. The sisters from Abingdon were in St Marys Convent which had been Eastmount, they moved to Park Road, Shanklin in 1920 when the lease on Eastmount expired they returned to Abingdon in 1943 when, during the second World war, a bomb hit the convent. It was opened again in 1945 but closed finally in 1949.

Sisters from the Community later made Foundations in Bangor, North Wales (1915), Woodley, Berkshire (1956) and made possible the reestablishment of the Alderney Community (1948) which had been dispersed by the German occupation in 1940.

Much change and development has taken place since 1860 with Sisters engaged in teaching in the parish school, in their own Private School which comprised of both boarders and day pupils and boys and girls. On June 3rd 1999 the Community moved from the Convent on Oxford Road to Lismore Lodge, 34 St. John’s Road and 1996 saw the first lay Headmistress at Our Lady’s Convent Senior School and the first lay Headmaster at Our Lady’s Convent Junior School in 2007. This coincided with changes in the community which left two Sisters in residence until this smaller house closed in 2011 after 151 years of ministry in the Abingdon area.