Research Notes
Jean Williamson Creighton
1868 - 1946
1868 - 1946
Born 1868 at Beechworth to Scottish pioneers to John Creighton and Ann Sheddon. Oldest of eight children.
In March 1891, a six month old baby boy named Ernest Dunn was buried in the Presbyterian section of the Beechworth Cemetery. He was the son of Samuel Thomas Dunn and Jane [Jean] Williamson Creighton. Having been born with hydrocephalus, the baby's life expectancy was minimal.
Five years later in August 1896 twenty-eight year old Jean Creighton successfully applied for the position of pupil nurse at the Ovens District Hospital. See Ovens and Murray Advertiser, 22 August 1896.
After receiving her certificate of competency as a trained nurse in December 1898, Jean was appointed staff nurse a position she maintained until mid March 1899 after which she travelled to Melbourne to marry the father of her first born child, Samuel Thomas Dunn, an engine fitter.
The couple moved to Queenstown, Tasmania where the only daughter Olive was born on 7 June 1900. Their sons, Archibald and Reginald, were born at Beechworth and Carlton respectively, in 1902 and 1904. After Reginald's birth, Jean joined her husband at Chillagoe, a mining town in northern Queensland. They lived at various other locations in Queensland including The Palms, Pleystowe and Prosperine before finally settling at Ayr.
Mrs Dunn who, as Miss Creighton, was the first to gain a nurse’s certificate at the Ovens District Hospital, is at present revisiting her home in
Beechworth and has been made particularly welcome by old friends and former hospital patients who appreciated Nurse Creighton’s skilful nursing. Mrs Dunn’s home is at Ayr, North Queensland, where Mr Dunn holds a responsible position in a large sugar mill. Mrs Dunn likes the
Queensland climate and enjoys the best of health. Ovens and Murray Advertiser, 8 December 1926.
Samuel died 16 September 1938 and was buried at Home Hill cemetery. Probate granted on his estate worth almost £ 8,000 in October 1938. See The Townsville Daily Bulletin, 27 October 1938.
After Samuel's death, Jean appears to have lived for some time with her daughter Olive, her son-in-law and grandchildren at Hopetoun Street, Doomben, a suburb of Brisbane. She died 12 November 1946, aged seventy-eight, at Jack Street, Kedron, a northern suburb of Brisbane. Her death certificate reveals her death was the result of cardiac thrombosis, myocardial degeneration and senility. While the death certificate lists the children from Jean's marriage to Samuel, there is no mentioned of Ernest, her first born child - a family secret perhaps which she took to her grave.
©Anne Hanson, 2024 E-mail: Anne Hanson