She was born in the central Italian region of Umbria in 1377, and, obedient to her parents' wishes, married a man who turned out to be notably unfaithful and given to violence. She had two sons. Her somewhat desperate marriage lasted for some 18 years, during which she displayed stoic patience. Eventually her husband was brought home dead, the victim of a vendetta killing. Her two sons died shortly afterwards and Rita entered the religious life at Cascia, a small town in the Appenines not far from Norcia, the birthplace, many centuries before, of Benedict and Scholastica. She gave herself to constant prayer and penance, and, like several others, received the marks of Christ's Passion. She died of tuberculosis in 1447 and was at once the object of devotion, although her formal canonisation did not come until 1900. A whole religious centre, including hospital and orphanage, was opened by the place of her tomb in 1946. She is especially invoked in Latin America, in the USA and in Ireland, notably by those faced with domineering husbands [no shortage of candidates here]. In England, the centre of her devotion is at Honiton, in Devon.