The Cannons were a merchant family whose ancestors were wealthy Huguenots who fled France for New Netherlands about 1632 and lived in New York City by 1693.

Harriet planned to move to California, and began to say her good-byes to family members but shortly before embarking in 1855, she learned that Catherine had died.

[1][2] On March 6, 1856 Harriet Cannon became a probationer of the Episcopal order of deaconesses, Sisterhood of the Holy Communion, founded about a decade earlier by Anne Ayres.

Dr. Muhlenberg described the deaconesses as "the centre around whom the others are to rally, carrying out her directions and deriving through her, in return, supplies, protection, and all needful provision for their comfort.

"[2] During this time, he also described a visit as attending physician: ...he found a young probationary Sister, rocking, as he lay wrapped in a blanket within her arms, a little boy, very ill with the loathsome disease.

It better integrated with the rest of Manhattan when street car lines extended into the area in 1906, significantly after Mother Cannon's death.

[5] Controversies also ensued, as discussed infra, and the order transferred many of its services to other facilities, although some functions continued at the location which ultimately became Inwood Park for decades.

In 1868, Mother Cannon, renowned for her good humor, established a school as well as headquarters for the new community on a site overlooking the Hudson River in Peekskill, New York.

[6] Novices, sisters and Mother Cannon (when she was not traveling) lived in a converted farmhouse on the site for decades as the complex was slowly built.

[7] In 1871 Mother Cannon sent Sister Constance and several others to Memphis, Tennessee at the invitation of Bishop Charles Quintard to establish a school for girls and an orphanage.

The new order was recognized for its good works seven years later, after four sisters (Constance, Thecla, Ruth, and Frances) died while nursing victims of yellow fever outbreak (along with Episcopal priests Rev.

[8] On the following All Saints Day, James De Koven and the rector of St. John's Church of Washington, D.C. lauded their efforts,[2][9] and they are now honored liturgically on September 9 as the Martyrs of Memphis.

She returned to the Peekskill motherhouse in good spirits, but fell gravely ill shortly after a retreat on Passion Sunday.

[12] The Memphis branch closed St. Mary's Preparatory School for Girls after the 1967-68 term, but now operates a retreat center near Sewanee, The University of the South.

In August 1896, months after Mother Harriet's death, Laura Forman from Asbury Park, New Jersey brought a lawsuit, charging that while she was visiting her sister in New York, her father kidnapped and wrongfully committed her to this facility, where she was fed bread and molasses and occasionally gagged.

The Bureau of Social Hygiene reported that only four adult prostitutes were sent to the House of Mercy, but 57 girls had been sentenced to indefinite terms at the facility.

However, funding had dried up, and by 1921, the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children leased the building while it built a permanent home on Fifth Avenue between 105th and 106th Streets.

The property became Inwood Hill Park with the assistance of workers from the Works Progress Administration (WPA) during the Great Depression.