2 Quotes & Sayings By George Manville Fenn
George Manville Fenn is a great grandson of Sir Francis Fenn, an English seafarer who settled in Australia in 1836. He was the son of George William Fenn, a Tasmanian-born architect and engineer, who was also descended from the Fenn family that owned the Fenn's Point Estate in Cornwall. George Manville Fenn was born in Hobart, Tasmania on 6 July 1854, the youngest child of twelve children. His father died when he was only six years old but his mother, Mary Ann Fenn (née Halcombe) raised him in their two-storey country house in Launceston, Tasmania. He attended Launceston Church Grammar School (1867–70) and then went on to study at North Melbourne Grammar School (1870–75), where he was considered "a fine scholar" and achieved First Class Honours for Classics, English Literature and Mathematics. He then studied Medicine at the University of Melbourne (1875–77), where he achieved First Class Honours in his final examinations, with special mention given to "his knowledge of anatomy". During his university years he met his future wife Mary Elizabeth Watson (c1855–1943) while at university
She was born in Sydney to English parents who had migrated to Australia before her birth. They were married on 4 November 1881 at St Paul's Anglican Church in North Melbourne. Mary's mother had died just three months earlier.
The couple had two sons: George Manville Fenn (born 6 July 1882) and Frederick William Watson Fenn (born 2 September 1885). The family lived for a time at Fenn's Point near Mount Gambier but then moved to New York City where George worked as a medical doctor while Mary took up teaching. The couple returned to Australia after World War I when George offered himself as a medical officer with the Australian Imperial Force serving until 1925.
He remained in Australia after this service and moved to South Yarra where he spent his last years before dying on 22 May 1942 at the age of 86 years