Our next Hawaiian isSISTER MARIA LEOPOLDINA BURNS (1855- 1942) who was a member of the Sisters of St Francis of Syracuse, New York, and a close companion and the biographer of St Marianne Cope.
Together with Mother Marianne and 5 other sisters, they departed from Syracuse to travel to Honolulu to answer the request of King Kalākaua of Hawaii
They traveled on the SS Mariposa. With Mother Marianne as supervisor, the Sisters' task was to manage Kakaʻako Branch Hospital on Oʻahu, which served as a receiving station for Hansen's disease patients gathered from all over the islands. The more severe cases were processed and shipped to the island of Molokaʻi
In 1889, together with Mother Marianne and Sister Vincentia McCormick, they opened and ran a girls' school in Hawaii
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| Sr. Leopoldina 3rd from left, M. Marianne far right. |
Sister Leopoldina died on June 3, 1942 with the reputation for holiness. She was the last of the Catholic sisters to serve alongside Father Damien.
The Journals of Sister M. Leopoldina Burns are undated, although apparently they were begun in the 1920s at the direction of Sister Flaviana. Both an original set of notebooks and a rewriting of the same with more development of incidents are extant. In the latter set there are 56 chapters in 15 notebooks. Sister Leopoldina also wrote a Little History of Mother Marianne’s Work which contains selections from the journals.
In 1980, Bishop John Scanlan of Honolulu appointed a historical commission, along with consultants, to collect all available documents concerning Mother Marianne, especially her writings, for submission to Rome
* Written by one of the sisters from the order of St. Marianne and Sr. Leopoldina and O.A. Bushnell, a professor at