suffrage_petition
Surname: 
Bowler
Given names: 
M. E.
Given address: 
East Gore
Sheet No: 109
Town/Suburb: 
Gore
City/Region: 
Southland
Notes: 

Also signed as 103 M E Bowler

Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley

Mary Ethel Hepburn was born in 1868 in Dunedin – the daughter of William Hepburn and Margaret Marshall. (See 156 Margaret Hepburn)

Mary’s father died in 1887 and she married Edmund Robert Bowler, a law clerk, on 12 November 1890 at her mother’s home in Roslyn.

They had three daughters and they lived in Gore where Edmund practiced as a lawyer and where Mary signed the suffrage petition.

They retired to Timaru about 1926 where Edmund died in 1927.

Mary died on 15 May 1947 – she is buried with Edmund in the Timaru Cemetery.

Sources:

BDM online NZ   https://bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz/

Otago Nominal Index   http://marvin.otago.ac.nz

Papers Past   https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz

Presbyterian Research Centre   https://www.presbyterian.org.nz/archives/           

Find a Grave   https://www.findagrave.com/

Click on sheet number to see the 1893 petition sheet this signature appeared on. Digital copies of the sheets supplied by Archives New Zealand.

Community contributions

1 comment has been posted about M. E. Bowler

What do you know?

Don Hutton

Posted: 25 Sep 2018

Mary Ethel Bowler nee Hepburn (1868 - 1947) was known as "Ethel." School Admission Records state her date of birth as 4 September 1868. She was brought up at Wakari, Dunedin, educated at Wakari School (18 Jan 1875 - 16 Dec 1879) and Dunedin High School. (Ref: School Admission Records. NZSG Index CD 2003).

In 1893 she was recorded on the first Electoral Roll for Women for Mataura, Southland, N.Z. In successive electoral rolls until 1919 Ethel and Edmund resided in Gore. One address was Ardwick Street.

Some time after 1919, Ethel and husband Edmund, a lawyer, moved from Gore to Timaru where they resided at 48 Wai-iti Road. After Edmund died in 1927 she remained there for the rest of her life.