The Two Worlds of Ann Gertrude Wightt

by Joseph Mannard

2025 · Georgetown University Press

"In 1831 Sister Gertrude, the Directress of Georgetown Academy (now Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School), donned the hat and cape of one of her students and left the Academy and life of a nun. She soon became a fixture on the Washington social scene and was an intimate of Dolly Madison. Born Ann Gertrude Wightt to a family of Maryland Catholics, Ann was a boarding student at the Academy and then became a nun in the convent of the Sisters of the Visitation in Georgetown. After leaving the Academy, she lived first with Madame Iturbide, former Empress of Mexico, and later with Britannia Peter Kennon of Tudor Place before her death in 1867. This book is the first biography of the enigmatic figure of Ann Gertrude Wightt. Mannard shows how Wightt was an innovative educator at Georgetown Visitation helping the school earn a national reputation in female education. While acknowledging the mystery of her decision to leave the convent, Mannard situates her flight in the context of similar cases of women leaving the religious life, and more generally in the context of women's and Catholic history in the nineteenth century. The author also examines how Wightt became a notable capital hostess and practitioner of parlor politics"-- Provided by publisher.