This statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary was originally atop the tower of St Mary’s Cathedral. A gift of Wellington’s first bishop, Phillipe Viard, it was presented in September 1867 and blessed on the Feast Day of the Nativity of Our Lady, September 8. It fell, undamaged, in the 1898 fire that destroyed the Cathedral. Many consider its preservation miraculous. The statue is one of only a few items remaining after the fire.