VIEL, PLACIDA, Blessed. — In the world Eulalia Vittoria, born at Quettehou (diocese of Coutance) on 26 Sept. 1805, died at St-Sauveur-le-Comte on 4 March 1877.
Her life in the family, wholly imbued with piety, and her habit of gathering girls of her own age around her in order to instruct them in the catechism and train them in goodness, won her the appellations of “little saint” and “good Vittoria,” and likewise prepared her very early for the religious life, which she embraced at the age of 16, in 1833, by entering the recently founded Congregation of the Sisters of the Christian Schools of Mercy. Such she proved to be during the time of her novitiate and in the first years of her formation, so that the foundress, St. Maria Maddalena Postel, on the very day of her profession, 21 Sept. 1838, chose her as her counsellor and mistress of novices. In 1846 she succeeded the foundress as mother general. The numerous and lengthy journeys undertaken in various European countries, both to collect alms for the construction of the motherhouse and to make her Institute known, brought about a fine flowering of new houses and vocations. Above all, however, she devoted herself to the formation of her religious, who saw in her the most perfect embodiment of the Rules and of charity towards childhood and the most destitute neighbour.
She was beatified by Pius XII on 6 May 1951.