Deborah Vernon Hackett (also known as Deborah Drake-Brockman, Lady Deborah Hackett, Lady Deborah Moulden and Dr Deborah Buller Murphy, 1887-1965) was born in West Guildford, Western Australia on 18 June 1887, the daughter of surveyor Frederick Slade Drake-Brockman and heroine Grace Vernon Bussell and younger sister of Edmund Drake-Brockman. [1] At the age of 18, she married (Sir) John Winthrop Hackett, who was forty years her senior. They had a son, later General Sir John Hackett (commander-in-chief of the British Army on the Rhine before becoming principal of King's College London upon retirement), and four daughters.
In 1932, the University of Western Australia conferred a honorary Doctorate of Laws to Deborah Hackett.[2]