Biography contributed by Katherine Blakeley
Caroline was born in England about 1820. She may have married Henry Gardner, a widower and baker, in Surrey in 1855.
Caroline, Henry, and his three children emigrated to Canterbury in 1858 on the Indiana. They had a daughter, Elizabeth Caroline, in Christchurch in 1859.
In the late 1870s the family settled in Sandietown near Timaru where Henry ran a bakery.
Things do not appear to have gone well as, in October 1880, Henry put an advertisement in the paper stating: 'Any debts contracted by Mrs H Gardner and daughter, Elizabeth Gardner will not be acknowledged by Mr Henry Gardner, baker, Timaru'.
When she signed the suffrage petition Caroline was living with her daughter Elizabeth in Steep St, off Maitland St, in Dunedin.
Henry died at Saltwater Creek, near Timaru, in 1899 – he is buried in the Timaru Cemetery. Caroline died at Kuri Bush, south of Dunedin on 19 November 1905 – she is buried in the Southern Cemetery, Dunedin.
Sources
BDM online NZ https://bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz/
DCC Cemetery Records http://www.dunedin.govt.nz/facilities/cemeteries/cemeteries-search
Family Search https://www.familysearch.org
Free BDM https://www.freebmd.org.uk
GRO England https://www.gro.gov.uk
Otago Nominal Index http://marvin.otago.ac.nz
Papers Past https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz
Timaru District Council https://www.timaru.govt.nz
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