Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley.
Isabella Morrison Gillie was born on 14 April 1838 in Berwickshire, Scotland – the daughter of James Gillie and Isabella Morrison.
She emigrated to Otago in 1860 on the “Robert Henderson” with her widowed father and two siblings.
They settled in Dunedin where Isabella married Archibald Dobbie, a farmer on 17 August 1865.
They had 10 children and when Isabella signed the suffrage petition they were living in North East Valley.
In 1893 the family moved to a farm in Edendale where Archibald died in 1913.
Isabella died at her daughter’s home in Dunedin on 20 October 1926 – she is buried with Archibald in the family grave in the Wyndham Cemetery.
Sources:
BDM online NZ https://bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz/
Family Search https://www.familysearch.org
Otago Nominal Index http://marvin.otago.ac.nz
Papers Past https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz
Presbyterian Research Centre https://www.presbyterian.org.nz/archives/