She (+1261)

Biography

Blessed Ella (+1261) Ella Fitzpatrick married William, a brother of Richard the Lionheart whom she accompanied on the third crusade. The ship on which they were returning to England was caught in a storm and William thought he saw his wife holding the mast that was about to break with her hands. Grateful for a decisive intervention in his life, he decided not to hit her again, something he did often. He kept his promise, and from then on he lived as virtuously as his wife. Upon her death, Ella founded a convent of Augustinian nuns in Alycock of which she was its first abbess.