Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley
Sarah Jane Mather Strachan was born on 17 December 1859 in Montrose, Angus, Scotland – the daughter of James Strachan, a shipwright, and Agnes Mather.
Her mother died in 1865 and her father re-married in 1866. (See 161 Mrs Strachan)
Sarah emigrated to Otago in 1877 on the James Nicol Fleming accompanied by her stepmother and siblings – her father had presumably worked his passage.
She did not marry and when she signed the suffrage petition she was living in Stuart St, Dunedin working as a domestic servant.
Sarah died at the Dunedin Hospital of heart failure on 29 March 1896 while she was being examined under chloroform.
She is buried in the Southern Cemetery, Dunedin.
Sources
DCC Cemetery Records http://www.dunedin.govt.nz/facilities/cemeteries/cemeteries-search
Family Search https://www.familysearch.org
Otago Nominal Index http://marvin.otago.ac.nz
Papers Past https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz