Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley
Dorothy Gilbert was born on 19 February 1835 in Camborne, Cornwall – the daughter of Thomas Gilbert, a tin miner, and Elizabeth Trevithie.
She married John Goodfellow Allen, a mason, in 1859 and they had one daughter. (See 61 Mrs A Brown)
In 1861 the family boarded the Chile bound for Otago. They settled in Dunedin and had a further five children.
In 1876 John was declared insolvent and around 1881 he left the family to work in New South Wales.
In 1884 a notice was placed in the New South Wales gazette advertising for his whereabouts as his 'wife and children are at present in a state of destitution at Dunedin'.
John does not appear to have returned to New Zealand and what happened to him is not known.
When Dorothy signed the suffrage petition she was living in Burnam St, Kensington.
She died on 8 December 1920 in Dunedin and is buried in the 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
Free BDM https://www.freebmd.org.uk
GRO England https://www.gro.gov.uk
Otago Nominal Index http://marvin.otago.ac.nz
Papers Past https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz