Outback Graves Markers

Mary Katherine (SHARPE) COMTESSE (more)

Cause of Death: Natural Causes

Mary Katherine died suddenly on Cobra Station at Bengemall.  She was buried near the old homestead by Police Constable Harold Charles Slater (Regimental No 1234) and GF Egan, JP.  Her death was certified in writing by William James Comtesse, husband, of Cobra Station, Bangemall.  James Comtesse, with the help of his neighbour, Jack McGuire, of Gifford Creek, made a coffin for his wife and she was laid to rest in the country she and her husband had set out to pioneer.

Born in England, at the age of 19 years, she married a Mr Thorp and they had a daughter named Gay, who was 20 years of age at the time of her mother's death.  (There was a Gaynor Elsie born in Birkenhead, England, in 1907.  There is no confirmation that this is the same person.)

At the age of 40 years, Mary Katherine remarried in Carnarvon to William James Comtesse.  Cobra Station was taken up in 1906 by James Comtesse of the Euranna Hotel, later named Bangemall Hotel.  Owing to the absence of particulars, the Coroner deemed an inquest to be necessary.  The body of the deceased was exhumed and examined by Dr Hemsted, who then performed a postmortem.   An inquest was held at Bangemall on 17 February, when the finding of the Acting Coroner, Mr GF Egan, J.P., was that death was due to "natural causes, indirectly brought about by excessive use of alcohol".

 

Mary Jane (GOULD) CREAM (more)

Cause of Death:

Mr. William Cream was, for many years, at Bidgemia Station in the Gascoyne district, but a few years before his death, he left there and acquired Cobra Station. The deceased, who suffered greatly from rheumatism, had endured a long and painful illness for about two years, and passed away peacefully on the Wednesday afternoon. In addition to her husband, she left one son, Raymond, and three daughters, Mrs. S. E. Gould, Nabawa; Mrs. F. A. Leeds, Port Hedland, and Miss Ethel Cream, to mourn their loss.

Ethel Maud married Robert Henry Jensen on 8 December 1934, the year after her mother's death.

Mary Jane Cream had been for many years, a resident in the Upper Gascoyne, her husband, Mr. William Cream, having been manager of Dairy Creek Station and of Bidgemia, and on the sale of the latter property, they purchased Cobra Station, where they resided ever since. Her hospitality was always extended to travellers. One of the older school of women residents in the bush, when telephones and motor cars were unknown in the back country, she was untiring in her efforts to ease the lot of those who suffered the inconveniences and discomforts of long distance travelling by horse drawn vehicles or on horseback.
Mrs Cream was buried on Gifford Creek near the woolshed and the old homestead.  To the dismay of the police, there was no autopsy but the family declined to 'dig Mum up'.
Mary Jane was born to Sarah and Edward Gould, who married 4 August 1860 at Glastonbury, Somerset, England.  They migrated to Western Australia on the Mary Harrison with their first born child, arriving in Fremantle on 25 June 1862.  A few weeks later, Mr and Mrs Gould went to Champion Bay before starting farming at Killeley and finally settling at Rudd's Gully, near Geraldton.  They had five sons who all became successful farmers, and their six daughters all married men on the land.  Mary Jane was the second of these 11 children.  Here siblings were: Sarah Jane born 1861 in Somerset, England; Mary Jane; Robert born 21 May 1865; Alice born 17 April 1867; John born 1869; George born 29 September 1871; Edward Jones born 1873; Elizabeth born 6 April 1875; Edith Maud born 1877; Joseph William born 29 June 1880; Harriet born 12 March 1882.
Sarah Gould, who was born 16 June 1839 in Somerset, England, died 25 April 1920 in Geraldton, just four months short of celebrating her 60th wedding anniversary.  Her husband, born 1 April 1842, also in Somerset, died three years later on 18 June 1923, in Nabawa, near Geraldton.
The grave is located north-east of the old homestead and adjacent to a creek.