Mary Steedman

  Noted events in her life were:

• source. Kay Thomas who notes:
Mary Snr was very good at healing people. She was probably a midwife, as Mary Jnr was, and she told us she learned these things from her mother. My brother Brian Daryl Thomas and I knew our granny Cheetham when we were children as we visited her every Sunday.

• note:. Pauline Thorpe notes:
was born in 1853 in Camberwell, London, England. She died on 22 Mar 1940 in Mackay, Qld, Aus.Died of Cholecystitsis, Senility. She was buried on 23 Mar 1940 in Mackay Cemetary, Qld, Australia She was a Nurse 1870 to 1874 in London, Eng. She was a Nurse 1874 to 1933 in Mackay Qld, Aus..

Obituary - Late Mrs. James Fourro. Daily Mercury, Mackay, Queensland, Australia. 23rd March 1940
At the venerable age of 87 years, and with a splendid record of just on 66 years of citizenship, another of that gallant band of men and women who helped the late John Mackay ro pioneer our great heritage passed peacefully to her eternal reward on Good Friday, March 22, at the residence of her daughter and son-in-law, Mr and Mrs J. Hurley of North Street, Mackay. The late Mrs Fourro is survived by nine children, two step-children, 59 grandchildren and 40 great-grandchildren, most of whom reside in Mackay and Proserpine districtss, and all of whom are carrying on the great traditions which were handed down to them by this wonderful old lady. Born in London in 1853, the late Mrs Fourro, after leaving school took up nursing and her skill and proficiency in this profession was to stand her in good stead in the noble part that she was to play in helping to build up the Mackay district. In 1871 she married a young London engineer, William Henry Stoneham, and when their first child was 12 months old the young couple left London to try their fortunes in far-away Australia.
The sailing ship Lady Douglas took three months and three weeks to bring them to their destination. They arrived in Bowen on May 31, 1874 and two weeks later they reached Mackay on the old Tinoni. When Mrs Stoneham left London she carried a letter from a medical friend to a Dr. M'Burney, who lived somewhere in Australia and when Dr. M'Burney came along to examine the Lady Douglas passengers at Mackay Mrs. Stoneham thought that the world was not such a big place after all. The letter told the doctor that young Mrs Stoneham was an experienced nurse and he endeavoured to induce her to start a hospital in town. She declined the offer and went bush with her husband and young son. Taking the bullock wagon express across the Pioneer River, the Stonehams selled on the old Pioneer Estate, where Joseph Cartner was very pleased to have young Stoneham's engineering experience and help in erecting and operating a sugar mill close to the spot where John Spiller had planted his first sugar cane.

The Stonehams built a grass house and, following the usual practice of the times, they laid in 12 months' supply of food. They intended to save money and return to their native London as soon as they could do so. They did not count upon a bush fire that came along and burnt them out. They lost everything they had excepting a teapot which contained their marriage lines, and thus ended their cherished hopes of a return to their native land. Cartner left young Stoneham a suit of clothes to go to Mackay and get fresh supplies and the Stonehams started all over again. When Mr Cartner shifted to Ashburton, the Stonehams went with him and W.H. Stoneham was engineer there at the erection of the mill and until it was pulled down and the machinery transferred to Farleigh. From Ashburton the Stonehams went to Sarina, where Mr. Stoneham was appointed engineer to the Plane Creek mill. In 1899 the Mackay City Council selected him to lay the first mains in our present water service and he also coppered the piles for the first Pioneer bridge. It is interesting to recall that Mackay had three daily newspapers at this period - "The Chronicle", "The Mercury" and "The Standard".

From Mackay the Stonehams went to Proserpine mill for four years, after which they returned to Mackay, where Mr. Stoneham's services were requisitioned to set the pans in Cattle Creek mill. Subsequently he went to Pleystowe as engineer, from which mill he eventually retired to his residence in North Street, Mackay, here he died in 1911.

Whilst Mr. Stoneham was applying his engineer knowledge to the building and operating of our sugar mills, Mrs Stoneham's services were being given unstintingly towards building up and maintaining a healthy community. In addition to having 10 children of her own, she brought many hundreds of Mackay natives into the world. In the old days, when there were no maternity hospitals or baby clinics this grand old lady worked with great skill and efficiency under very primitive conditions, and many a nervous expectant mother had her fears dispelled by the calm, reassuring manner in which she went about her nursing.

She continued her ministrations until a few years ago and she was 80 years of age when she brought her grandson Vincent Hurley into the world seven years ago. Her nursing was not confined to maternity cases. Many a fever-stricken patient would have died in days gone by had it not been for her care. And no appeal was ever made to her in vain.

On one occasion the late Father Bucas asked her to come into town to nurse two fever-stricken patients. She was very busy in her own home at the time and she told Father Bucas that it would be hard to get away. "Well, my child," said the priest,"if you come in and nurse them they will get better. If you can't they will surely die." That settled it. She forgot about her own home and went in to nurse them, and they completely recivered. On one occasion she was nursing at O"Neill's Pioneer Hotel, where Wilkinson's Hotel now stands, and late one night a fire broke out which destroyed several buildings near where the Princess booking office is now. The late Mrs. Titley had a shop there, and she would have perished in the flames if Mrs. Stoneham had not remembered that she had taken a sleeping draught that night for her insomnia. She told the firemen of it and Mrs. Titley was rescued from the flames. Her life was a long series of practical acts and a history could be written around her experiences of nursing in the bush. Children born under bullock wagons, in isolated homesteads across flooded creeks, children born in fine homes, children of the poor, children of the rich - they were all her children - and wasn't she proud of them?
She had a calm, pleasant manner, and she enjoyed excellent health. She never wore a pair of glasses in her life and she sewed buttonholes a few days before her death. Her second marriage was with James Fourro and he died in 1937. One son, Richard Stoneham, died in November, 1930. The surviving children are William, Jack, Tom and Robert Stoneham, of Proserpine; Mary (Mrs. Cheetham), of Bundaberg; Ruth (Mrs, Devine),Proserpine; Carrie (Mrs, Griggs); Kate (Mrs, Ringuet), and Mabel (Mrs. Hurley), of Mackay and district. James Fourro, of Ayr post office and William Fourro, of Mackay, are stepsons.

To her 110 living descendants the sympathy of a large circle of friends is extended. The last sad rites of the Church of England were performed at the bedside and the cemetary by Rev. G>H> Robinson. The pallbearers were Messrs. Jack and Tom Stoneham, Doug Devine, Jack and James Hurley and J.M. Melherin. Shipmates with the Stonehams were James Finlay, John Blake and Sergeant Ferguson, all of whom have since crossed the Great Divide. The only remaining passenger from the Lady Douglas is Mr. William Stoneham, of Proserpine, who learnt to walk after the ship left London.

Mary married William Stoneham Snr in 1871 in Camberwell, South London, Surrey England. (William Stoneham Snr was born on 20 Jun 1852 in Brighton, Sussex England, died on 27 Feb 1911 in Mackay, Queensland Australia and was buried on 28 Feb 1911 in Mackay, Queensland Australia.). The cause of his death was Cancer of the rectum, metastasis, exhaustion.

Mary next married James Fuourro. (James Fuourro was born circa 1850.)