with the Merrills from time to time. Catharine joined the First Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis on May 18, 1838, at the age of fourteen, and was among the fifteen members who withdrew on November 19, 1838, to organize the city's Second Presbyterian Church. Merrill later became a founding member of Indianapolis's Fourth Presbyterian Church. Merrill's education was more extensive than was typical for women and girls of her era. Her father established a school at the family home in Indianapolis, where she was among his early students. She also attended the Indianapolis Female Institute, which opened on June 14, 1837. From 1859 to 1861 Catharine and a younger sister, Mina, took an extended trip to Europe, where Catharine studied literature in Germany. Shortly after the outbreak of the American Civil War, the two women returned to the United States. Career Merrill pursued a lifelong career as an educator, but she also served as a nurse during the American Civil War. These two occupations were typical for unmarried women at that time and Merrill excelled at both. She also became a writer. Educator Merrill began her teaching career at the private school her father founded in the family's home at Indianapolis, and assumed full responsibility for the school as he turned to other business pursuits. As the school's enrollment increased, it moved to the basement of the Fourth Presbyterian Church at Market and Delaware Streets. Later, it relocated to other sites in the city and became known as "Miss Merrill's School". In the mid-1850s, Merrill also taught at other schools in Indiana and Ohio. She served as headmistress and taught at a female school in Crawfordsville, Indiana, for about a year, and taught at the Female Seminary in Cleveland, Ohio, before returning to Indianapolis. Civil War nurse In June 1861 Merrill sailed to the United States after an extended stay in Europe, arriving in Indianapolis on July 5, 1861. By October she was serving as a nurse. Merrill cared for soldiers at hospitals in Indianapolis and Kentucky. By the war's end in 1865, she had returned to Indianapolis to resume teaching at her school, which other local women had run for Merrill during her absence. University professor In 1869 Ovid Butler endowed the Demia Butler Chair of English Literature at North Western Christian University, now known as Butler University, in honor of his daughter, a graduate of the university who had