suffrage_petition
Surname: 
Lynn
Given names: 
Mrs
Given address: 
Andersons Bay
Sheet No: 139
Town/Suburb: 
Andersons Bay
City/Region: 
Dunedin

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 Mrs Lynn

What do you know?

Peter Grant

Posted: 11 Sep 2022

"Mrs Lynn" of Andersons Bay is Priscilla Lynn, nee Williams of Musselburgh Rise. Priscilla and her husband Thomas Lynn had a dairy farm and market garden and their home was on the southern corner of Musselburgh Rise and Cavell Street. The line above on the petition also I believe relates to Priscilla, so that the entire entry reads "Priscilla Mrs Lynn, Musselburgh Rose, Andersons Bay". The two lines taken by Priscilla have I believe confused the reviewers and a different hand has inserted "Daniels" after "Priscilla".

Priscilla Williams was born in 1841 in the Cotswolds village of Oddington, Gloucestershire, England. In 1863 Priscilla married Thomas Lynn, an agricultural labour of Little Faringdon, Oxfordshire. Thomas Lynn was a follower of Joseph Arch, the leader of the National Agricultural Labourers' Union established in 1872 in the fight for a living wage. Against this background, Priscilla and Tom gave up on England and decided to start afresh in New Zealand with their young family.

Priscilla and family emigrated to Otago, New Zealand in 1873 on the "Scimitar", arriving in 1874, after a terrible voyage due to illness and many deaths on board. Priscilla lost her 14 mth old daughter Edith from scarlet fever on the voyage.

Priscilla's husband Tom was also one of the early members of the Farmer's Club in Dunedin and the family's general political activism may have led to Priscilla making sure she, along with her daughters, signed the Women's Suffrage Petition.

Priscilla died age 91 in 1933 at 'Dunira', North Taieri, Otago, the farm of her sons.

A photo of Priscilla Lynn can be seen here:
http://www.nzgrantfamilygenealogy.com/getperson.php?personID=I24&tree=Grant