Eliza Rolls Vaughan

Louisa Elizabeth Vaughan (8 October 1810, London – 24 January 1853, Welsh Bicknor), commonly known as Eliza, was a Welsh Catholic convert and mother of influential Catholic figures in England and Australia. She is under consideration for beatification in the Catholic Church.

Biography Early life Eliza was born on 8 October 1810 in London to John Rolls, a member of the renowned Rolls family of The Hendre and Justice of the Peace for Monmouthshire; and Martha Barnet, only daughter and heiress of Jacob Barnet, a businessman. She was the youngest of five with two brothers, John E. W. and Alexander, and two sisters, Martha Sarah and Jessy. Her grandnephew, Charles Stewart Rolls, a motoring and aviation pioneer co-founded the Rolls-Royce car manufacturing firm.

Described as a family of "earnest evangelicals", Eliza and her siblings were baptized in the Anglican Protestant tradition, the faith her family ancestry upheld. Despite her Protestant upbringing, she was deeply impressed by the exemplary service of the Catholic Church towards the poor and heard of many Catholic saints during her childhood education in France.

Marriage and Conversion On 12 July 1830, Eliza married John Francis Vaughan, eldest son of William Vaughan of Courtfield. Mary Elizabeth Barbara, O.S.A. (1845–1884) as Mother Clare Magdalen, Augustinian nun of Saint Augustine's Priory, Newton Abbot, Devon; Bernard John, S.J. (1847–1922), Jesuit priest and missionary described as "The Modern Savonarola"; Reginald Aloysius (1849–1919), married Judith Aloysia Shanahan, an Irish Catholic in Australia; and Margaret Mary (1850–1899), desired to be a nun but ill health prevented her hence lived at home and in her final years in a convent; St Margaret's Parish Church in Welsh Bicknor, one of the places where Eliza spends time in prayer. Eliza taught her children to combine spiritual and religious duties with fun and joy in a way that was very natural to them. The Integrated Parish Communications describes her as "a particularly encouraging example of a mother imbued with a priestly spirit who frequently prayed for vocations."