The congregation with a motherhouse in Aston, Pennsylvania, was founded in 1855 by Maria Anna Boll Bachmann (an immigrant from Bavaria, Germany, widowed in 1851 when her husband Anthony was mortally wounded by Nativists in Philadelphia). At that time Bishop John Neumann asked Pope Pius IX for permission to bring German Dominican Sisters into his diocese but was advised by the Pope, also a member of the Franciscan Third Order Secular, to establish a congregation of Franciscan Sisters instead. With Neumann's guidance, the "Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia" was founded. At the time of the smallpox epidemic of 1858, they continued their care of the sick in patients’ homes or, when necessary, in their small convents. During that same year they responded to the need for teachers at St. Alphonsus Parish in Philadelphia. Today, about 450 sisters serve in 22 states and in Haiti, Africa, and Ireland.