PIONEER WOMEN

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26186, 9 August 1950, Page 2

PIONEER WOMEN

MEMORIAL SEAT ON SUMMIT ROAD PRESENTATION TO CITY Two handsome stone seats, one facing towards Lyttelton and the other towards the Canterbury plains, were officially presented to the city yesterday bv the women’s branch of the Christchurch Citizens’ Association. The seats are close to the Pioneer Women’s Memorial on the Summit road, and were erected to the memory of pioneer women and named after outstanding pioneer women—Mrs Jane Deans and Mrs Emily Rose Jacobs. Two seats have been erected by the Lyttelton Borough Council on the Lyttelton side of the Bridle Path, another has been built by the Heathcote County Council, at the Heathcote end of the Bridle Path, and a sixth will be built higher up the hill on the Heathcote side by members of the Junior Chamber of Commerce with material supplied by the Heathcote County Council At the well-attended and verv successful gathering yesterday, Mrs G. H. Watts (president of the women’s branch of the Citizens’ Association) presided and welcomed the Mayor of Christchurch (Sir Ernest Andrews), the Mayoress (Mrs F. Hardy Cookson), the Mayor of Lyttelton (Mr F. G. Briggs), and Mrs Briggs, and the visitors. The seats, she said, cost £74 each, and would be incorporated in the women’s memorial which she hoped would eventually be completed by the erection of a pilot light on the Summit road. This would cost £6OO, but she hoped the women citizens would succeed in having it erected. The Dean of Christchurch (the Very Rev. A. K. Warren) spoke of the strong religious basis that was the greatest factor in the minds and characters of the pioneers of Canterbury. In 1832, he said, Bishop Hinds, then Bishop of Norwich, wrote an essay on the advantages of colonisation on a religious basis—an almost revolutionary idea at that time. Eleven years later, Edward Gibbon Wakefield conceived the idea of establishing a Church of England settlement in a new Canterbury, and in 1847® John Robert Godley proceeded to further that scheme. Dean Warren said he felt that it was their Christian faith that sustained the pioneer women who came to Canterbury 100 years ago. He urged his hearers to try to recapture something of the spirit the pioneers brought with them to the new settlement.

Descendants of Pioneers Mrs John Deans, whose husband is a grandson of the Jane Deans whose life is commemorated in the name of one of the seats, gave an interesting outline of the life and character of that brave Scots woman, whose husband, John Deans, died 18 months after they were married. Jane Deans, she said was born in Ayrshire, where after the early death of her mother, she lived .with an aunt. There she met John Deans, who in 1841, came to the district as a cadet to learn farming. Before he left for New Zealand they agreed to marry later, but it was 1852 before he was in a position to ask Miss Mcllraith, as she was then, to come to New Zealand to be married. She replied that she was not brave enough to come to New Zealand, and suggested that he should return to Scotland. This he did. They were married in 1852 and travelled to New Zealand in the sailing ship, Minerva, the journey occupying 113 days. Some time after the birth of their son, also named John Deans, her husband died. His widow managed the two properties he had left at Riccarton and Homebush, did all the bookkeeping for both, was largely responsible for the extensive tree-planting schemes carried out at Riccarton and Homebush, and was always ready to help anyone in difficulties. “If we and those of the younger generation have the same high ideals and carry them out, we shall not have lived in vain.” said Mrs Deans. Mrs H. C. Hewland, a daughter of Mrs Emily Rose Jacobs, after whom the second seat was named, said that her mother’s maiden name was Thompson. Her father was headmaster of a school in Malta, and in 1839 moved with his family from Malta'to Leghorn. In 1853, when Emily Rose was four years old, the family of five sons and three daughters came to Lyttelton in the ship Minerva. The family went to Avonhead to the home of a Mr Bray, whom Mr Thompson had known in Leghorn. Mr Thompson taught in the Rev. Mr Jacobs’s school, later Christ’s College. Some years later his daughter was. married to Mr Jacobs, who became Dean of Christchurch, Mrs Hewland said she was one of a family of eight—two sons and six daughters. Her mother at the Deanery entertained many distinguished churchmen and visitors, and was an enthusiastic worker for the Christchurch Cathedral.

After Mrs Watts, on behalf of her organisation, had formally presented the seats to the city, the Mayor congratulated the women’s branch of the itizens’ Association on its achievement, and paid tribute to the wonderful spirit of the pioneer women. He hoped the memorial to these fine women would always be respected and revered by all who passed along the Summit road.

After the ceremony, the guests were entertained at afternoon tea at the Sign of the Takahe. A telegram regretting his inability to attend the ceremony was received from the Prime Minister (Mr Holland).