The first Christian Missionaries to come to the Khasi Hills were the Calvinistic Protestants from Wales in 1840. 50 years later, the German Salvatorian missionaries arrived in 1890, which marked the Catholic Church's coming to the North-Eastern part of India. The first attempts towards women's education were made by the Salvatorian Sisters who reached Shillong in 1892. The pioneers were Sisters Laurentia Heilmeier, Scholastica Hopfenmueller and Benedicta Ruderich. Initially, they helped set up schools, orphanages, dispensaries and homes for the aged. St Mary’s School was started as a Primary School and orphanage in 1913. When the school was barely two years old, World War 1 broke out and the German Missionaries were expelled from India. Archbishop Mueleman immediately sent Fr Paul Lefevbre, a Belgian Jesuit to take temporary charge of the mission. He made an urgent appeal to the Religieuses De Norte Dame des Missions(RNDM), which translated in English as Sisters of Our Lady of Missions, for help. The Sisters from Chittagong responded and 4 sisters arrived to take charge of the Primary School and Orphanage. They inherited a school of 90 children and there were 42 orphans. The school's original site was where the present Don Bosco Technical School is located and they moved to the present site known as Merryville in 1928. Thus began the saga of St. Mary’s Higher Secondary School, which today is the largest girls school in the State.