Saint Philippine Duchesne was born on August 29, 1769 in Grenoble, France. When she was 19 years old, she joined the convent of the Visitation and was educated by the sisters of the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary. However, in 1792 during the early years of the French Revolution, she saw the dispersion of the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary and returned home to live with her family.

In 1804 she accepted an offer from Madeleine-Sophie Barat to merge her Visitation community with the newly-founded Society of the Sacred Heart. In 1818, Rose Philippine Duchesne went to America with a few other members of the Society. She arrived in New Orleans and traveled the Louisiana territory, ending in St. Charles, Missouri, near St Louis. Here she created a new house of the Sacred Heart Society in a log cabin, the first house of the Society ever built outside of France.

Saint Philippine Duchesne had a desire to work with the indigenous people in the region and in 1841 joined the Jesuits in establishing a school for the Potawatomi tribe in eastern Kansas. In 1842 she became ill and returned to St Charles, where she spent the last ten years of her life.

Rose Philippine Duchesne died on November 18, 1852, in St. Charles, Missouri. She was beatified in 1940 and canonized by Pope John Paul II on July 3, 1988.