Their condition excited the sympathy of the immigrating colored women.

These ladies had been educated both in the Island of Santo Domingo and in Paris.

At once interested in the uplift of this sex, they soon constituted the nucleus of the society that finally formed the St.Frances Academy for girls in connection with the Oblate Sisters of Providence Convent in Baltimore, June 5, 1829.[1] This step was sanctioned by the Reverend James Whitefield, the successor of Archbishop Marechal, and was later approved by the Holy See.

The institution was located on Richmond Street in a building which on account of the rapid growth of the school soon gave way to larger quarters.

The aim of the institution was to train girls, all of whom "would become mothers or household servants, in such solid virtues and religious and moral principles as modesty, honesty, and integrity."[2] To reach this end they endeavored to supply the school with cultivated and capable teachers.