LATE MRS E. WILLIS.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20223, 6 February 1934, Page 9

LATE MRS E. WILLIS.

Member of Riddiford Family.

By the death of Mrs Eliza Willis sister of the late Mr E. J. Riddiford] a link with an early generation of one of New Zealand s best-known and most respected families has been severed. Mrs Willis died at Marton on Thursday in her eighty-ninth year.

She was one of the elder daughters of the late Mr Daniel Riddiford, who arrived in New Zealand in 1840. Her father took up the well-known Orongorongo property and the family lived there for many years. Old identities remember the time the family decided to live in the Hutt when they came around in Maori canoes from Orongorongo and lived at the homestead called Woburn at Lower Hutt, close to the spot now occupied by Mr Vivian Riddiford. n th. e early seventies at Melbourne Miss Riddiford, as she was then, married Major William Jarvis Willis, who had come out with the British forces during the Maori wars. In common with many other officers the major sold his commission and took up land at Greatford in Rangitikei. Twenty years ago the property, which was known as Woodendean. was sold and part of it was bought by Mrs Willis’s son and part of it also by the late Major W. F. C». Levin. Major Willis died about forty rears ago. Mrs Willis lived on her son’s property at Greatford until three years ago. when she built a home at Marton, where she lived until her death. Mrs Willis was keenly interested in gardening, and a popular rose—“ Mrs E. Willis”—is named after her. She was a generous supporter of charities. She is survived bv three sons—Dr William F. Willis, now practising in London, and Messrs Daniel 1 Willis and Thomas R. Willis—both of whom are now farming part of the old Woodendean estate—and a daughter, Miss Letitia Mary Willis. Another daughter, the wife of Mr Duncan R. Menzies. public accountant, of Wellington. died in 1921. A sister is Mrs Hewitt, of Palmerston North, widow of Captain Hewitt, R.N. Misses Mary, Jean and Egidia Menzies. of Christchurch, are her grandchildren.