Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley.
Janet Milne was born about 1855 in Scotland.
She emigrated to New Zealand in the mid 1870’s & she married James Beat, a horse driver, on May 27th 1878 in the Palmerston parish, north of Dunedin.
They had 3 children & they moved to Dunedin in the 1880’s.
In 1886 Janet was charged with “behaving in a disorderly manner”, she was found guilty & fined.
In 1889 Janet appeared in court “with her three young children, admitted using obscene language, but pleaded that she had done so under provocation” - she was convicted.
When Janet signed the suffrage petition she was living in Leith Street.
She appeared before the court several more times for minor misdemeanours, many involving alcohol.
In 1896 Janet’s daughter, Margaret, was committed to the industrial school for “associating with women of ill repute”.
Three years later Janet was charged with keeping a “disorderly house” which contained four women of “ill repute”, she was sentenced to 7 days in prison.
She died at her home on September 20th1918, an inquest found death due to “exhaustion, following cirrhosis of the liver” - she is buried in the Andersons Bay Cemetery.
James died in 1921 in Christchurch - he is buried in the Sydenham Cemetery.