Jean Beazley

Jean Beazley is Lucien Blake's housekeeper and love interest as well as the second protagonist. She is portrayed by Australian actress Nadine Garner.

Marriage
Before the war, Jean used to be married to Christopher Beazley and they lived together in a farm which would later go to Ben and Ruth Dempster.

She had always wanted to travel out of Ballarat and see the world, whereas her husband was content with a simple sedentary life. Not long after the start of the war, she asked him if that was the reason of his not enlisting in the army, which he took as his manliness being called into question. He therefore enlisted and was deployed to the front, dying two weeks afterward.

Personality
Jean is as proud and independent as a woman could be in 1950s Australia. She is also a devout catholic and part of a knitting circle.

As a mature widow, she is very conservative and modest, as shown by her clothing, often flattering and very well put together, but never revealing, as well as her hair which is styled the exact same way all throughout the series.

For Lucien Blake, she is a figure of order and regularity to contrast his own chaotic way of life. She also obviously harbors strong feelings for him, but attempts to hide them on account of being his housekeeper and a widow. At first, she is close to a maternal figure, preparing his dinner and putting him to bed after he's spent the night drinking. As the series progresses, however, Jean progressively comes closer and eventually shows obvious manifestations of love.

Jean appears to be fiercely protective of her children, and tries as best she can to defend and support them, for instance when she confronts an angry mob of men accusing Jack of murder. Sometimes, however this turns to rashness or mild paranoia, such as dissuading Mattie from seducing Jack when in reality he was the one making inappropriate advances toward the nurse.