A 'marriage' catastrophe

Maryborough received its first female officers when Lieutenant Laura Ellis and Captain Jennie Watkins arrived on 1 January 1887. According to Fay Nicholls in her book Maryborough Qld. Corps, 1885-1899, Jennie had a winning smile and was very popular. Yet in May 1887 things went wrong for Jennie.

Major Edward Wright and Captain Skinner arrived in Maryborough, stripped Jennie of her rank and refused to let her speak at a meeting. Wright claimed that Jennie had been married in England to a Mr. Godfrey and was now endeavouring to enter upon a similar contract in Australia. Some of the corps (church) sided with Jennie and she commenced her own gospel meetings in the Temperance Hall.

When Wright left Maryborough he was farewelled with groans and hisses and an effigy of him was burnt.

By 1895, Jennie had moved to Randwick in Sydney and had married Edward J. Walsh.