Gemma Galgani (1878–1903) was born to a Tuscan pharmacist's family in Camigliano and orphaned in her teens. She had hoped to enter the Passionist nuns but was refused on account of her precarious health. She lived as a laywoman with the Giannini family in Lucca, working as a domestic helper.
On the evening of June 8, 1899 — the feast of the Sacred Heart — she received the stigmata. The wounds appeared on her hands, feet, side, and head, bleeding regularly every Thursday evening at 8 o'clock, continuing through Friday afternoon, then closing again until the next Thursday — a pattern that continued for two years. She also experienced ecstasies, the wound of the lance, periodic appearances of a 'crown of thorns,' diabolical attacks, and visions of her guardian angel (whom she famously employed to deliver letters to her Passionist spiritual director in Rome — a phenomenon her director Father Germano confirmed).
In 1901 Father Germano, fearing the toll on her health and the public attention, ordered the stigmata to cease under obedience — and they did. She died of tuberculosis at twenty-five on April 11, 1903. Beatified 1933, canonised by Pius XI in 1940. Her body, found incorrupt at exhumation, is venerated at the Passionist Sanctuary of St. Gemma in Lucca.