Reared in a deeply religious family, in 1606 she went to St-Omer in Belgium and entered the convent of the Poor Clares, from which she left three years later to return to England and carry on her apostolate among young women; but unable to realize her desire, she returned to St-Omer with five young ladies and opened there a school for the education of the daughters of the English nobility. In 1611 she adopted the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus, with the necessary modifications, whence the appellation “of Jesus” given to its members. In 1614 she was finally able to open a house in London. The new Institute, called the English Ladies, departed from the rules then in use by its freedom from enclosure, in accordance with the purpose of this new institution, and by the government of the company concentrated in the Mother General, who was to be answerable only to the Holy See. In 1616 she sent a memorial to Rome for papal approval, and the following year Paul V blessed the new Institute. Other houses were soon opened, and while at Rome the approval of M. W.’s work was under discussion, a memorial from the English clergy against her arrived, which resulted in the refusal of approval and in the condemnation of W. as a heretic and disobedient. Confined in the Poor Clare monastery at Angers, she was detained there for nearly a year. Once freed, she spent the rest of her life in trials and sorrows, borne with serene resignation and full trust in the ultimate vindication of her work, which was approved in 1703.
The ordinary process instituted on her virtues is under study in the Sacred Congregation of Rites.