Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley
Jessie McLaughlan McKenzie/MacKenzie was born in 1869 in New Zealand – the daughter of Duncan MacKenzie and Mary Lamont McLean. (See 93 M McKenzie)
Jessie married James Abernethy, a compositor, on 29 March 1888 and they had eight children.
Their first child was born at Howe St, Dunedin followed by a son two years later at Maclaggan St where Jessie signed the suffrage petition.
The family move back to Howe St for the birth of their next child and were living in Great King St when their twin sons died in 1897.
In the 1920s Jessie and James moved to Wellington where James died in 1946 and Jessie died on 3 March 1948.
They were both cremated and their ashes interred in the Karori Cemetery, Wellington.
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
Presbyterian Research Centre https://www.presbyterian.org.nz/archives/
Wellington City Council https://wellington.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