Barbara Pearce

Signed family name

Pearce

Signed given name

Barbara

Given address

Queenstown

Sheet number

107

Town/Suburb

Queenstown

City/Region

Otago

Notes

Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley

Barbara Inkster was born on 10 January 1830 in Northmaven in the Shetland Islands – the daughter of Andrew Inkster, a small farmer and fisherman, and Barbara Williamson.

Her mother died in the 1840s and Barbara lived with her widowed father working as a farm labourer until her father died in 1873.

She emigrated to Otago in 1875 on the Nelson accompanied by her brother Andrew and her nine-year-old niece Agnes. (See 107 Agnes Inkster).

Barbara married John Pearce, a miner and widower, on 7 March 1878 at her brother’s home in Bannockburn, near Cromwell.

Their marriage does not seem to have lasted long as John left after two years.

In 1884 Barbara’s home in Bannockburn was destroyed by fire and the following year she applied to the court for maintenance from John - he was ordered to pay 20s per week.

Her home was sold in 1886 and Barbara moved to Queenstown with her niece Agnes where they signed the suffrage petition.

She went back to Bannockburn in 1894 before moving to Lumsden where she was living with her brother Andrew when he died in 1909.

The following year Barbara went to Dunedin to help Agnes who had been in hospital and was having problems with alcohol.

Barbara gave her money to buy biscuits and Agnes 'returned with a flask of whisky, drank it, and became uproarious, and attacked her aunt. She is alleged to have begun by dragging her out of bed, to have then struck her on the head twice with a flatiron, and finally to have thrust her out of the house, and left her sitting on the footpath'.

Agnes was sentenced to five months hard labour.

Barbara died on 12 February 1916 in Invercargill, she is buried with her brother Andrew in the Lumsden Cemetery.