suffrage_petition
Surname: 
Kennington
Given names: 
Mary Jane
Given address: 
Willowby
Sheet No: 284
Town/Suburb: 
Willowby
City/Region: 
Canterbury
Notes: 

Biography contributed by Clare Cramond

Mary Jane Filmer was born in Davington, a parish of Faversham in Kent, England, around 1845. Her parents were James and Bennett Filmer and they appear to have passed away when she was still a child. James was an agricultural labourer.

In 1867, Mary jane married William Kennington at Faversham. The 1871 Census has Mary Jane and three of her children living in Kent within a household of several families, including two of her sisters. It is noted, 'Husband Away'.

Assisted immigration offered a new start for the family and in March 1883, Mary Jane, William and their children Joseph aged fourteen, Angelina eleven, Robert one year and a two month old baby arrived in Canterbury, New Zealand on the ship Crusades. Two other children may have died earlier in infancy. The baby was Louisa Mary Corbett Kennington. 

Their destination was given as Ashburton and they lived in the Willowby area for some years, including the time when Mary Jane signed the Women’s Suffrage Petition. 

Between 1906 and 1911 they shifted to Eltham in Taranaki. Louisa and her parents lived together and William died there in 1916. By 1919, Louisa and Mary Jane were living in Tauranga, and from there they shifted to Te Aroha West where Mary Jane died on 16 August 1920. 

Sources

1851 England Census, Kent, Faversham. Ancestry.com

England, Select Marriages 1538-1973. Ancestry.com

1871 England Census, Kent, Herne. Ancestry.com

"New Zealand, Archives New Zealand, Passenger Lists, 1839-1973", , FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FSY2-4ML : Wed Nov 01 04:57:46 UTC 2023), Entry for Mary Jane Kennington, 22 Mar 1883.

"New Zealand, Electoral Rolls, 1865-1957", Database. FamilySearch. https://familysearch.org

Papers Past https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/ New Zealand Herald, Volume LVII, Issue 17552, 18 August 1920, Page 1

"New Zealand, Archives New Zealand, Probate Records, 1843-1998," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QK9V-VZNL : 9 March 2021), Mary Jane Kennington, 1922; citing , Hamilton Probates - Second Sequence, 1910-1953, record number 1609, Archives New Zealand, Auckland Regional Office; FamilySearch digital folder 007168860.

Click on sheet number to see the 1893 petition sheet this signature appeared on. Digital copies of the sheets supplied by Archives New Zealand.

Community contributions

No comments have been posted about Mary Jane Kennington

What do you know?