biographies

Sexton, Hannah Mary Helen (1861 - 1950)

M.B., Ch.B. (Melb.)

Born
1861
North Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Died
10 October 1950
London, England
Occupation
Gynaecologist, Medical practitioner and Obstetrician
Summary

Dr Helen Sexton was the first woman appointed to the Honorary Staff of the Women’s Hospital and was one of the founders of the Queen Victoria Hospital.

Details

Transcription of item written by Dr Colin Macdonald and published in "The Book of Remembrance", The Royal Women's Hospital, Melbourne, 1956.


HANNAH MARY HELEN SEXTON
(1899 - 1910)

Hannah Mary Helen Sexton, professionally known as Helen Sexton was the first woman appointed to the Honorary Staff of the Women’s Hospital. She was born in North Melbourne in 1861, the youngest of the five children of Maria and Daniel Sexton, a builder, who had come to Australia in 1854 from Limerick, Ireland.

On matriculating from the Carlton Ladies’ College (long since defunct) where Miss Parnell was the Headmistress, Helen was anxious to become a doctor, but her mother opposing any idea of medical training, she commenced in the early eighties an Arts course at the University of Melbourne. Subsequent to the death of her mother, Helen met Miss Lilian Alexander who was also anxious to study medicine. The two young women decided to approach the University Council for permission to do this but first looked around for reinforcements. To this end, early in 1887, they put a notice in the daily press asking any “young ladies desirous of studying medicine in Melbourne” to get in touch with them. Six responded, and a good deal of publicity was given to their cause. Helen Sexton and Lilian Alexander interviewed each member of the University Council personally, so that when Dr. Alexander Morrison of Scotch College moved that “The Council approve of the admission of ladies to the degrees of medicine, the motion was easily carried. The following year seven ladies, including Helen Sexton, commenced the medical course, and in her own words “They attended all lectures at the University and hospital work with the men students, the only difference being that they dissected in a small room apart from the men”.

Helen Sexton graduated M.B.B.S. in 1892, at the age of 31, her entrance to the profession being preceded by that of Clara Stone and Margaret Whyte in 1891. Margaret Whyte went to the Women’s Hospital in 1892 as the first resident woman doctor, and Amy Castilla followed.

In 1896 with five other medical women under the leadership of Dr. Clara Stone, Helen Sexton helped to found the Queen Victoria Hospital, which started as an outpatient clinic in a hall in Latrobe Street at the back of the Welsh Church.

In 1899 Helen Sexton was elected to the staff of the Women’s Hospital as an honorary gynaecological surgeon, the appointments then being by vote of the subscribers.

Apparently Dr. Sexton had considerable surgical skill, for she developed a large practice, being often called in consultation by her male colleagues. She had a kindly, though somewhat brusque, manner and took a real and affectionate interest in her patients. She had, too, a broad sense of humour which must have helped to carry her through early difficulties in the profession. However, in her work at the Women’s Hospital apparently no contretemps developed, as she herself said “the work went on most harmoniously, and I doubt if any of my eleven male colleagues ever thought of the question of sex”.

Unfortunately her health was not good, and because of this she retired from the staff of the Women’s Hospital in 1910 and in 1912 went to live in Europe.

Soon after the outbreak of the first world war, Dr. Sexton, though by this time over fifty years, took a small field hospital to France, the gift of herself and other women doctors. She served in the French Army with the rank of Majeur, and when this hospital was disbanded, was given a temporary appointment at the Val de Grace in Paris. In 1917 she came back to Australia, returning to England in 1919. She now finally retired from all practice, and afterwards spent many years in satisfying her delight in travel and in European art, making her home in Florence, Italy, for a long period.

During the last decade of her life she was almost totally helpless with arthritis, but it has been written “that her splendid smile still shone, and the few words she could speak were always concerned with somebody’s well being”.

Helen Sexton, held in high esteem by colleagues both in Australia and England, died in London on October 10th 1950, in her ninetieth year.

Archival/Heritage Resources

Royal Women's Hospital Archives

  • Book of Remembrance, 1956 - 1975; Royal Women's Hospital Archives [ Details... ].

Prepared by: Robyn Waymouth

Created: 1 August 2006, Last modified: 26 November 2006