MARY McCARTHY GOMEZ CUETO

Today, Palm Sunday, is the beginning of Holy Week so I thought it an appropriate time to post this picture. I think it will be familiar to any of you who visited St Patrick’s Convent in the 1950s or 1960s. That is when I saw it on my visits to the Convent. As a young child it was a source of great fascination as the eyes seemed to look right at you and follow you. There are two very interesting stories behind this piece of religious art. One is the story of the ‘Cristo de Limpias’ but, though of great interest, it is not the story I wish to tell here. The other story and the one I will tell is that of the donor of this ‘Cristo de Limpias’.



Donated to the Children of Mary, St Patrick's,
by Mary McCarthy Gomez Cueto
(Click on the picture to enlarge it)

 The inscription on the base of the statue informs us that it was presented to the Children of Mary, St Patrick’s, by Mary McCarthy Gomez Cueto. Who was Mary McCarthy Gomez Cueto? I suspect some of you have heard of this lady. For those of you who haven’t, here is the story of another St Patrick’s alumna.

Mary Conception McCarthy was born in St John’s on 27th April 1900. She was the daughter of Thomas and Ann McCarthy. Her uncle, Professor P J McCarthy, was a well known St John’s musician who accompanied the silent films at the Nickel Theatre. The family was well off as Thomas McCarthy was the proprietor of a successful grocery business located at 439 Water Street.

On the corner of Leslie Street and McKay Street, in the west end of St John’s, is a very large old house, set back a little from the road.  As late as the 1970s, and possibly even now, this house was commonly referred to as “McCarthy’s”. This had been the home of several of Mary’s uncles, including Professor Patrick McCarthy. Mary lived with her parents and sister, Rose, at 23 Patrick Street. Later the family lived on Waterford Bridge Road. Mary was educated at St Patrick’s Convent School and at Littledale.

Young Mary McCarthy was as talented as she was beautiful and she took part in many theatrical productions in St John’s. She studied piano and voice under her uncle, Professor McCarthy, and then under the noted Professor Charles Hutton. Mary possessed exceptional musical gifts and she eventually went on to the Boston Conservatory of Music to further her studies.

One night at an opera in Boston Mary was introduced to a wealthy Spanish businessman, Pedro Gomez Cueto. Pedro, who was considerably older than Mary, was smitten. The feeling was mutual and Pedro made the journey to St John’s to ask Thomas McCarthy for the hand of his daughter in marriage. Thomas was either reluctant or prudent, or perhaps both, because he asked the couple to wait a year. He told the couple that if after a year they still wished to marry he would give them his blessing. For a year the two carried on a long distance romance as Mary, to please her father, remained in St John’s where she taught music. As in all good love stories, the end of the year saw the couple as much in love as ever and still wishing to marry. Thomas agreed and Mary and Pedro were married. A 1922 edition of the St John’s 'Daily News' informed the populace that on 21st May 1922, Miss Mary McCarthy and Pedro Gomez Cueto were married at New York.

Eventually Pedro’s business interests dictated that the couple live in Cuba and Mary soon made herself at home on another island in another sea. The young bride immersed herself in the life of her new country. I say “new country” because Newfoundland was then a country, not a province as it is today. Among her many activities, Mary helped found the Havana Philharmonic Orchestra, she and a priest founded an orphanage for boys and she was the organist at her church in Havana where she also directed and sang in the choir. Mary still made frequent trips to St John’s, visiting with family and friends and sometimes performing on the St John’s stage.

Mary McCarthy’s life in Cuba was happy and busy until 1954 when her beloved Pedro died. Pedro had amassed a considerable fortune and he left his widow a sum of about four million dollars. Mary, who never remarried, remained in Cuba running Pedro’s business. Then in 1959 Fidel Castro came to power and the business was nationalized and all Mary’s assets, save her home, Villa Mary, were confiscated and she was granted a monthly pension of about $10. To make matters worse, in 1962 the United States imposed a trade embargo against Cuba. The fortune that Pedro had left Mary was in an American bank, the First National Bank in Boston. The embargo meant that Pedro’s widow was unable to access the money that was rightfully hers. Mary refused to leave her adopted home because Cuba and its people had become very dear to her. Besides, Pedro was buried in Cuba and Mary was determined that she would one day rest beside him. The United States refused to release her assets so the wealthy widow was forced to live the rest of her life in poverty. Mary supplemented her meagre pension by teaching singing, piano and English. I like the thought that Mary taught English. It makes me happy to think that somewhere in the world there are Cubans speaking English with a St John’s accent! Those who interviewed Mary in her last years all said that she spoke “St John’s English but Castilian Spanish” and that she “retained her St John’s accent to the end of her days”. Good for you, Mary! (Sorry for that little aside but it pleases me no end that Mary never forgot her roots.)

Even in old age, Mary remained feisty and outspoken. She fiercely disliked Communism and she was not afraid to voice her disgust when the grounds of the orphanage she had founded became part of a Soviet nuclear installation. Nor was she reticent in her criticism of the Americans’ seizure of her property.

In 2002, Mary suffered a broken hip and thereafter she was confined to a wheelchair. Increasing age brought increasing health problems and in 2007 the Canadian Government intervened, strongly stating that Mary needed money to meet her medical bills. Washington finally condescended to allow her about $96.00 a month from her own money! In all her difficulties, this steadfast lady drew strength from her Catholic faith. Deeply religious to the end, Mary recited her rosary several times a day in front of a statue of Our Lady.

On Friday, 3rd April 2009, just weeks short of her 109th birthday, Mary McCarthy Gomez Cueto died. Her final wish was granted when she was interred with her much-loved Pedro in Cementerio de Cristóbal Colón in Havana, Cuba. All over the world television reports and newspaper obituaries told the story of the extraordinary life of this St Patrick’s girl.

That is the story of the donor of the ‘Cristo de Limpias’ which used to have a place of honour in the visitors’ parlour at St Patrick’s Convent. I wonder if the statue is still there or if, like many other religious objects and devotions, it was swept away in the raging tide that followed Vatican II? Does anyone know?