When Mary Frances Dight was born on 23 August 1837 in Campbelltown, New South Wales, her father, John, was 28, and her mother, Isabella, was 21. Mary Frances Dight was the third child of John Dight III and Isabella Mitchell, both from colonial families dating back to the second fleet’s arrival in Australia.
On 18th March 1858, 20 year old Mary Dight married 29 year old Edward George Harrison, the son of a slave trader and coffee plantation owner from Jamaica:
MARRIAGES.
On the 18th inst., at St. Peter’s Church, by the Rev. H. H. P. Handfield, Edward George, third son of the late John Harrison, Esq., of the Island of Jamaica, to Mary Frances, third daughter of John Dight, Esq., of this city.
Family Notices (1858, March 20). The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 – 1957), p. 4.
Edward and Mary had 12 children in 21 years from 1959 until 1880.
The twelve children of Edward Harrison & Mary Frances Dight:
- Eliza Georgina (7.2.1859-17.2.1941) married Francis Saunders 1890 (DNA match)
- John Dight (9.1860 – 1890) married Edith Halford in 1882 (DNA match) (in EGH Ledger)
- Gertrude Jane (10.7.1862 – 13.3.1920) married Harry Scott 1891 (DNA match) (in EGH Ledger)
- William Hilton (3.3.1864 – 1929) married cousin Ethel Perkins
- Edward George (15.11.1865 – 18.12.1893) unmarried
- Isobel Sophie (8.9.1867 – 16.2.1952) unmarried
- Mary May (2.10.1869 – 20.5.1877) died young – have locket
- ARTHUR DIGHT (3.10.1871 – 27.2.1959) (DNA match) married Phoebe Alice Parsons 1896 in Perth W.A.
- Charles Dight (4.8.1873 – 10.3.1938) married Louise Himstedt 1908
- Nellie Constance (23.7.1875 – 27.2.1886) died young
- Minnie May Mitchell (9.8.1877 – 1960) unmarried
- Frances Alice Edith (11.3.1880 – 27.4.1953) unmarried
Mary Frances Harrison had seven living children at the time of her death, including Arthur Dight Harrison. She died in her home at “Hilton” 8 Brooke Street Lower Hawthorn where she lived with her widowed son Charles Dight Harrison (and probably his daughter Nancy) and unmarried daughters Frances Alice Edith and Minnie May Mitchell. Executors of her will were her daughter Isobel Sophie and Charles Dight and her estate was bequeathed to Frances and Minnie with the direction for them to “give to each of the other members of my family something of mine as a memento or keepsake”.
Arthur received his father’s cash box and the gold necklace his mother wore containing the photograph and hair of his deceased sister, Nellie Constance.
The Harrison Hawthorn house was valued as being worth less that 500 pounds and Mary’s personal estate “within the jurisdiction” being less that 55 pounds – broken down to household furniture and affects 50 pounds and bank savings of 5 pounds. Probate was granted 22nd December 1930 – 3 years after her death. Isobel was Matron at Colac Hospital at the time of probate and her brother Charles signed the legalities over to her.
When Isobel retired, she came back to live with her sisters at 8 Brooke Street. Minnie May Mitchell Harrison was the last of Edward and Mary Harrison’s children to die. She outlived her brother Arthur, remained at Brook Street until at least until 1954 (last census available) and died 8th June 1960 aged 82.
HARRISON.—On the 27th May, at her late residence, Hilton, Brooke street, Hawthorn, Mary Frances Harrison, relict of the late Edward George Harrison, aged 89 years.