Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley
Rachel Boult was born in about 1866 in New Zealand – the daughter of William Boult, a butcher, and Eliza Harding. Her sister Lizzie also signed the petition.
The family lived at Waitahuna in Otago, then called Havelock. Rachel’s father died in 1874 and in the early 1880s the family moved to Dunedin, living in the Kensington area.
Rachel married John Simpson McArthur, a widower with two children, in 1896. John worked as a bootmaker and they had four further children.
Rachel died on 12 February 1935 and she is buried in the Southern Cemetery with her mother. John died in 1942, he is buried in his family grave in the Northern Cemetery.
Sources
BDM online NZ https://bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz/
DCC Cemetery Records http://www.dunedin.govt.nz/facilities/cemeteries/cemeteries-search
Otago Nominal Index http://marvin.otago.ac.nz
Papers Past https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz
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