Fires & Roses
by Nancy Lusignan Schultz '78

Fires & Roses (The Free Press), an account of the burning of the Charlestown (Mass.) convent in 1834, is the newest book by Nancy Lusignan Schultz '78. Based on years of archival research, the book tells the story of the destruction of the Ursuline convent school for girls on Mount Benedict. Anti-Catholic sentiment, already at a fever pitch in 1834 Boston, exploded one August night and resulted in a riot. A mob of 100 drunken men broke into the Charlestown convent, destroyed its icons, smashed pianos and finally set fire to the building. For the next 50 years, the convent's ruins sat overlooking Boston Harbor, a symbol of a time when Catholicism and communities of educated women engendered terror in 19th-century America.

Of particular interest to Holy Cross alumni are those sections of the book dealing with Bishop Benedict Fenwick. In the course of her research, Professor Schultz discovered a rare portrait of Bishop Fenwick that had been stored in an attic for decades. The portrait is reproduced in the book.

Nancy Lusignan Schultz is a professor of English at Salem (Mass.) State College. Her previous books include Fear Itself: Enemies Real and Imagined and Veil of Fear: Nineteenth-Century Convent Tales. For more information visit the book's Web site at www.fireandroses.com/