"The Bendigo Advertiser was shocked, shocked by what it headlined as an "Extraordinary Case of Concealment of Sex" in its September 4, 1879, issue. Reporting the "story of local resident Edward De Lacy Evans," the Victoria, Australia, newspaper described it as "unprecedented in the annals of the whole world." What amazed and startled the newspaper most, however, was not that he "has for 20 years passed for a man in various parts of the colony," but during that time he married three different women."
"A month later, Melbourne's Illustrated Australian News (October 1, 1879) was equally astonished by "one of the most extraordinary instances of successful personation ever recorded." Although De Lacy Evans, "disguised in men's attire, worked on various goldfields as a miner," and although his "somewhat effeminate face and figure at times excited comment, yet [he] also contrived to evade detection all that time, and probably [his] secret might have died with [him] so far as the public were concerned but for an accident.""
"The accident occurred several months earlier, when Evans was injured at work in the mines. On July 21, 1879, his brother-in-law, Jean Baptiste Loridan, took him to the Bendigo Hospital, claiming he had become "dangerous to others." Refusing to take a bath, Evans left the institution and went home, but was brought before two police court magistrates the next day, who agreed with a medical evaluation that he suffered from "softening of the brain" and ordered him returned to the hospital."
Edward De Lacy Evans passed for a man in Victoria, Australia, for about twenty years and married three women during that time. Newspapers characterized the case as an extraordinary instance of concealment and successful personation. Evans worked on goldfields disguised in men's attire and sometimes drew comment for a somewhat effeminate face and figure, yet he evaded detection. After a mining injury in July 1879, family members took him to Bendigo Hospital and magistrates ordered his return after medical evaluation diagnosed "softening of the brain." During transfer and forced bathing at Kew Lunatic Asylum, attendants discovered female anatomy, exposing his assigned sex at birth.
Read at San Francisco Bay Times
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