Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley
Margaret Henderson was born in Victoria, Australia in 1861 – the daughter of William Henderson and Margaret Harvey. (See 33 Mrs Henderson)
She travelled to Otago with her family in December 1861 on the Oriental and they settled on the Otago Peninsula where they had a farm.
Margaret married James Landreth, a farmer, in 1883 and they had eight children, one who died in infancy.
About 1890 they 'took up a bush section five miles from the township' of Owaka. 'In those days there were few roads, and Mr and Mrs Landreth had to carry all their groceries through a muddy bush track from the township...Their first living places were a tent, then a slab hut; and later a two-roomed house made from boards split from the totara trees which had grown on the site.'
'As the years went by, all the bush was felled and green fields appeared, a good six-roomed house was built, together with all the necessary outbuildings'.
Around 1920 Margaret and James retired to Owaka where James died in 1943 and Margaret died on 10 July 1945, they are buried in the Owaka Cemetery.
Sources
BDM online NZ https://bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz/
Otago Nominal Index http://marvin.otago.ac.nz
Papers Past https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz
BDM Victoria https://online.justice.vic.gov.au
