R. G. Stewart

Signed family name

Stewart

Signed given name

R. G.

Given address

Gore

Sheet number

Town/Suburb

Gore

City/Region

Southland

Notes

Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley

Rebecca Gillon was born about 1842 in Ireland.

She emigrated to New Zealand in the 1860s where she married Hugh Stewart, a sawmiller, on 1 November 1866 in the Tapanui parish.

They had eight children, one who died in infancy.

After their marriage Hugh worked as a bullock driver carrying goods to the gold diggings before he built the Duke of Edinburgh hotel at the Beaumont ferry in 1868.

In 1870 they moved back to Tapanui where Hugh leased a butcher’s shop. In 1887 they sold the butchery business and took charge of the Temperance Hotel in Gore.

'It is under the management of MRS STEWART. Visitors may rely upon having the comforts of a Home together with every attention to be found in an Hotel'.

Hugh was declared bankrupt later that year and then worked as a bailiff for the court.

When Rebecca signed the suffrage petition the family were still in Gore.

At this time Rebecca took charge of the newly built Gore Coffee Palace. A 'first class hotel' with 'Magnificent Dining Room, two Commodious Sitting Rooms, Bath Room – hot and cold water laid on'. Rebecca ran this business with the help of her daughters who also signed the petition. (See 72 Rebecca Stewart, 72 Minnie Stewart and 72 Mary Stewart)

In 1895 Hugh, while acting as bailiff, was shot and assaulted while visiting a farm – he died from his injuries and is buried in the Gore Cemetery.

After Hugh’s death Rebecca obtained the licence for the Aparima Hotel in Riverton which she ran for about a year.

Rebecca died on 8 June 1919 at her daughter’s home in Christchurch – she is buried in the Bromley Cemetery.

Her obituary said she 'was a well-known figure in the social life of the community when Tapanui was a bush village....She was an exceedingly capable business woman, and was much esteemed by her many friends – a splendid stamp of the pioneer women who assisted their husbands to settle this country half a century ago'.