Historical information

A person calling herself Jack Jorgenson died at Elmore near Ballarat, Victoria on Tuesday evening, turned out to be a woman and had for years concealed her sex. She was known in the district as "Jack Jorgenson". she went to the district as a farm labourer but did not show any great desire to obtrude on the notice of the residents. Though living a lonely life in a small hut, she did not act as one who had anything to conceal. She wore masculine attire in a natural manner, but thee was a tone of femininity in her voice that she could not conceal. In 1887 she joined the local mounted rifles, and attended almost every drill and every camp until 1891, when she resigned. Her face presented a remarkable appearance, it having been terribly injured by a fragment of shell during the course of the Schlewig-Holstein war between Prussia and Denmark. She stated that in her youth she had been a soldier in the german army, and had seen active service in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870. Jorgensen was a Dane and so far as is known had no relative here. Her sex was disclosed only after her death, the only person knowing of it being Dr H..se of Elmore, who attended her some time since. The woman is believed to be the sister of a Mrs Newman of South Melbourne. Deceased had been using male attire for 20 years, and did all sorts of heavy manual work, including grubbing trees and harvesting and she once ...

Physical description

Newspaper clipping