Mère Marie Agnès

Marie Louise Françoise Briand, in religion Mother Mary Agnes (March 22, 1870, in La Prénessaye – March 17, 1955, on the island of Makogai in Fiji) was a French Catholic nun, Marist missionary in Fiji. She was regional superior for the Fiji Islands of the Missionary Sisters of the Society of Mary from 1908 to 1946. Devoted to lepers in the Pacific, she was the director of the Makogai leper colony from 1916 to 1950, one of the largest in the world. She was awarded with the Order of the Legion of Honor and the Order of the British Empire.

Life Marie Briand was born on March 22, 1870, in the hamlet of La Hautière in the municipality of La Prénessaye, in the Côtes-d´Armor. Her father was the coachman of Ernest Carré-Kerisouet, master of the Forges du Vaublanc, in Plémet. In 1877, the Briand family moved to Vaublanc in Plémet. Her father left service in 1881 at the age of 55 and the family left Plémet to settle in St-Brieuc.

In the summer of 1890, a few months after the death of her father, Marie Briand met two sisters who were members of the Third Order of Mary (the future congregation of the Missionary Sisters of the Society of Mary). Shortly afterwards she entered the novitiate of these sisters in St-Brieuc which was then transferred to Sainte-Foy-lès-Lyons in 1891. Marie Briand took her vows on January 15, 1893, under the name of Sister Mary Agnes. Two weeks later, she embarked in Marseille for Sydney. She stayed there for a year to learn English, and in 1894 she joined the Waikiri Mission on Taveuni Island. She was in charge of the girls' school for 22 years but also served occasionally as a nurse.

In 1908 she was appointed Regional Mother Superior for all the Marist Sisters of Fiji. In 1911 a small leper colony was established on the island of Makogai. It started out with 2 nuns and 40 patients. This figure had risen to 100 patients by 1916 when the colonial government of the Fiji Islands appointed Mother Mary Agnes as the director of the facility. Under the governance of Mother Mary Agnes the leper colony became one of the largest in the world, counting more than 400 patients in 1925 and 700 in 1950 when the Mother Superior retired. It welcomed lepers from other British colonies in the Pacific as well as those from New Zealand and its dependencies from 1922.

The Makogai leper colony was cited as a model of efficiency and the governance of Mother Mary Agnes always described as a fair balance between compassion and discipline, which earned Mother Mary Agnes the nickname “General in skirts”. which led to the creation in 1939 of the Makogai Lepers Trust Board, which became the Pacific Leprosy Foundationhttps://www.leprosy.org.nz.

In 1950, Mother Mary Agnes retired from the management of Makogai but remained on the island until her death in 1955. She was buried, at her request, in the patients' cemetery. She had received the Legion of Honour from the French government in 1952 in recognition of her 34 years of service to lepers.