Kate is my great-grandmother. The Brown family were first known to me through Mary Catherine BROWN, her marriage to Robert Steel STARK in 1896, her death in 1901 and by an article in the Cyclopedia of New Zealand, Volume 4, 1906. That is essentially the only information there was about her.
The above snippet from school records provides a different insight – one that concludes that Mary had been born before her parents married, which might go some way to explain the Registrar’s Office marriage of John and Mary. All the other siblings of John enjoyed weddings of various magnitude, but all held on the farm and not in an office.
After marrying Robert, Kate moved to Riversdale, where she had her 3 children, Bob, Eileen and Les. At this time, her husband Robert finished his apprenticeship as Blacksmith in Riversdale and the family moved to Balfour into a brand new home built near the smithy.
Click the thumbnail to see the full original page
It is interesting to see the use of the word RAE on the marriage certificate, which was both her mother’s middle name and it was also Kate’s grandmother’s maiden name, although that was WREY.
There truly is little public record about Kate other than a couple of Electoral Roll listings.
The children of Kate and Robert follow:
| 1896 | Robert Francis aka Bob | Died | 1966 |
| 1898 | Eileen | Died | 1993 |
| 1899 | John Leslie aka Les | Died | 1962 |
The children in the front are Les, Eileen and Bob. Les is my paternal grandfather, born 1899 and died 1962 at Lincoln College where he managed the Poultry Unit.
Sadly, Kate, as she was known, died aged 28 of Tuberculosis (TB) in Balfour, Southland, New Zealand. She is buried there too. She left behind 3 small children under 5 years old and her exit was noted in the newspapers of the time.
The following is Kate’s obituary in the Mataura Ensign.
Original article on left from “Mataura Ensign, 18 April 1901, Page 6. This is from Paperspast. Sadly, the one at Gore Heritage Museum has the same defect, so probably the source used for digitisation. The one on the right is my interpretation of the missing bits.
