Watson, Mary, 1860-1881

Mary Watson, nee Phillips, was born on 17 January 1860 at Fiddler's Green, Newlyn, in Cornwall, the natural daughter of Mary Phillips and Thomas Oxnam. The family emigrated to Australia in 1877, living first at Maryborough. When the family moved to Rockhampton, Mary decided to go to Brisbane in answer to an advertisement for the position of a governess to the two children of a Mr Bouel. Bouel owned a hotel in Cooktown and Mary was also asked to play the piano at Bouel's hotel. There she met Robert Watson, who, with his partner Percy Fuller, ran a beche-de mer fishing business at Lizard Island on the Barrier Reef, 35 kilometres from the mainland.

After marrying Bob Watson on 30 May 1880, Mary accompanied her husband to Lizard Island along with Fuller, a Mr. Green, two Chinese workmen, Ah Leong and Ah Sam, and South Sea Islander labourers. Her younger sister Carrie also stayed with the Watsons at Lizard Island for a few months. From January 1881 Mary Watson kept a diary in which she recorded in short entries the day's events and weather conditions, the varying fortunes of her husband's fishing business and her attempts to fashion some sort of life in her new environment.

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