Sister Césarine Cavaignac

1845–1922

Born Virginie Cavaignac in Lugan on March 22, 1845.

1. 1866

   From an early age she expressed a longing for the religious life, and she took her vows on September 17, 1866. A few days later she left for China, but, struck by an eye infection (ophthalmia), she had to return to mainland France eighteen months later.

2. 1869

   In 1869, Mother Marie Joseph Vernet, Mother Superior of the communities on the Islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon, who had returned to France to take part in the Chapter, was determined not to make the return crossing alone. She needed a nursing assistant to help the head nurse of the military hospital at Saint-Pierre. She chose Sister Césarine. After an endless crossing, they arrived on September 14, 1869. Sister Césarine was thus appointed nursing assistant at the Saint-Pierre Hospital.

3. 1870

   In April 1870 she left to take charge of the quarantine station (lazaret) on Île aux Vainqueurs, where she would remain for eight quarantines, serving at the same time as nurse, director, cook, and so on.

4. 1885-1892

   She was awarded two first-class gold medals in 1885 and 1887. In 1886 she was appointed to care for smallpox patients, three kilometers from the town on the Savoyard road, in a dilapidated establishment called “Robinson.” In 1892 she received the cross of Knight of the Legion of Honor.

5. 1903-1904

   In 1903 she received a letter of commendation from the Minister of Health. In 1904 schools and hospitals were secularized, and Sister Césarine had to withdraw from the hospital.

6. 1922

   In March 1922 she caught a chill. After eight days of acute suffering, she died of double pneumonia on March 9.

Excerpt from the speech by Théophile Déminiac

Given at the official ceremony commemorating the centennial of the apostolate of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Cluny on the Islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon (1826-1926).

“Arriving in the colony in September 1869 to serve in the Military Hospital, Sister Césarine, who already had a campaign in China to her credit, became the consoling angel of the unfortunate sailors stranded in the hospital.

With tireless devotion, genuine understanding, and an active, ever-smiling kindness, for many years she lavished on all the sick, whoever they were, her skilled and always comforting care, and she earned the respect and affection of all the medical staff who succeeded one another during that long period.

During the 35 years she spent at the bedside of the sick, Sister Césarine went through seven quarantines at the lazaret during smallpox epidemics.

Behind the Nordet point of Île aux Chiens lies a deserted stretch of land shaped like a crescent open toward the Roadstead. This is the former Île aux Bours, now called Île aux Vainqueurs. Facing the ocean, there are only steep rocky masses, battered and eaten away by the swell, while the opposite slope descends gently to the sea and is covered with a thin lawn that a goat could graze bare in a day. In the hollow of the shore, sheltered by a tiny cape, huddle the few huts that made up the lazaret. One could hardly be more cut off from the world, and anyone who finds himself there is in great haste to leave.

One could surely apply to this sinister place the fateful words: Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’entrate! (Abandon all hope, ye who enter here!)

And yet hope entered there more than once, along with charity, with the white cornette (winged headdress) of Sister Césarine, who at the risk of her life became the servant of the poor smallpox patients. She considered herself “the happiest woman in the world to fulfill such a noble mission, where there is nothing in it for human nature,” and she wrote to her superiors: “My only desire is to devote myself and to sacrifice myself unto death in the service of obedience.” These words, which are the echo of her fine soul, would deserve to be inscribed in gold letters on Sister Césarine's tomb.

She was awarded two first-class gold medals and three diplomas with silver medals.”