Fra Diegu was born Giacchino Bonanno in Valletta on 21st March 1831. His deeply religious parents provided him with a sound primary education and later on apprenticed him with a Merchants Street draper. At the age of twenty-two he became a member of the Tertiary Order of St. Francis, and four years later he joined the Order of Friars Minor as a lay-brother, taking the name of Diegu.
 
Because of his special assignment of scouring the streets of Malta for alms in aid of his convent, Fra Diegu became aware of the needs around him. In 1860, following an incident in St. Julians, the brother began to search out for dissolute girls, offering him the shelter of a special reformatory home which he set up at Cospicua. At this stage he also started work among the many girl orphans who begged their living in the streets.
 
Fra Diegu, as he became known, also found time to expand his pastoral work by paying regular visits to the Central Civil Hospital, Floriana. In the meantime,  the  number of girls had increased so alarmingly that he had to