The (Kent) Hughes family

The late Jenny Crew (see News)

Does anyone have any of Tina's Letters?

Judy Whiting, a resident of New Zealand, is one of the many great-grandchildren of Clementina Jane Hughes (née Rankin). She has recently been staying with her family in Adelaide, Australia where she "came across some fantastic family bits and pieces including a letter from one of Tina's sisters to (?) one of her daughters. It describes Tina and Wilfred's wedding. I am wondering if there are any of Tina's letters home still in existence...would love to read them if they exist.....have a letter from Nell to Winifred which is also interesting reading......Robbie and Ant have an early painting of Nell's and I have an unsigned painting that was in Gran's papers that could be a very early one as well but that could well be wishful thinking!!"

If you have any letters that Tina wrote to members of the family please let me know.

Amended Family Tree

It was only after my manuscript of "Gummy's Story" had gone off to the publishers in July 2012 that Brian Kent-Hughes contacted me from Australia. He has since corrected a number of errors in the family tree which appears on Page 76 of my book. He has also pointed out to me that the family name was originally Hughes rather than Kent-Hughes and that the Kent name was only introduced as a middle name by Montague Kent Hughes who changed his name by deed poll to avoid confusion with another doctor of similar name. His brothers and sisters also became known as Kent Hughes. The next generation introduced a hyphen to make the name into Kent-Hughes which has been in use ever since. Brian's amended version of his family's 'tree' can be viewed by clicking here.

In addition, I have now prepared an extended family tree to show another generation which amounts to 60 more descendents plus their partners. This has been compiled from an extensive record recently compiled in Australia by Brian Kent-Hughes to whom I extend my grateful thanks.

Shown on the right is a sketch of Clementina Jane Hughes (née Rankin) drawn by her elder sister, Nell.

Sonia Ennals' email about her family, the Kent Hughes:

"I have now found my mother (Judith Ennals, née Garde Wilson)’s birth certificate and it confirms she was born on 20th June 1926, in Ettie Street, Sherwood.  I think that was in Kingaroy.  She married my father, John Ennals in Geneva on 28th June 1952 and they divorced absolutely on 12th July 1965.  It is odd that her birth certificate refers to her older brother Wilfred (Bill Wilson) and her older sister Patricia Wilson.  It does not mention her oldest brother by her mother's first marriage to Paul Loubet.  He was David Clement Loubet Wilson and first went to Malaya in 1941 with the Australian Army.  He went back to Malaya in 1947 and worked in the Malay Civil Service for 15 years and married Zahrah Awang.  He was highly decorated, was awarded an MBE in 1991 and died in Kuala Lumpur on 7 June 1992.  He visited us in the UK on many occasions and my mother also went to visit him and his Malay family there and attended the weddings of his adopted twins Rohana and Rohani.  He also had an older adopted daughter Seri.      

My grandmother’s name on my mother’s birth certificate is Ellen Mary Kent and with Hughes as a surname.  She was always known as Dr Ellen Kent-Hughes or Nell to her friends.  She left Melbourne and had her first practice as a GP in Brisbane, before going to Mitchell where I believe she met her second husband, my grandfather, Garde Francis Wesley Wilson.  He was born in Dalby, Queensland.  She moved from Mitchell to Kingaroy and then set up a practice in Armidale, NSW in 1928 to find a better climate and schools for her children.

I found a hand-written letter of recommendation from my mother’s Uncle Bill (Sir Wilfred) written on Ministry of Transport headed notepaper, recommending her to someone in, probably, Paris when she went travelling from Australia to Europe.  Wilfred and Nell were Clementina’s oldest children and you have Wilfred’s autobiography. 

Going back to my grandmother, Clementina’s oldest child, she wrote of arriving in Brisbane with her 18 month old son, and taking up her first practice there, where she was in charge of an area of 648 square miles.  She was based in Mitchell and her first house had only one bedroom which she gave to the Nanny, and she and her little boy slept on the verandah. She was given a car but could not use the crank handle to go on her visits so acquired a pony and trap though she had no idea how to harness it up.  She describes being married as a student and widowed before the baby was born.  Also how she treated drunks and those with diphtheria etc., and even her own little boy was affected.  She mentions meeting Garde Wilson who approached her when she was struggling to control the pony in the trap.  She herself even succumbed to typhoid fever and describes being put on the mail train to get to a hospital in cooler Toowoomba and sharing a compartment with two children with whooping cough and one with diphtheria in the next carriage.  She had many achievements in her long life and she too was awarded an MBE in 1968. 

My mother Judith, described her great-grandmother, Ellen Man’s arrival in Australia:  Charles Hughes brought her, as a young bride, to the Northern Tableland in 1850.  She road side-saddle up the New England ranges and they settled on Hernani at Wollomombi.  Sadly their first child died!  Ellen (pictured right) was apparently looked after by the aboriginal women".     

Sonia Ennals