Phoebe Patrick

Biography contributed by Colyn Storer (née Morley), great niece of Phoebe's stepmother, Emma Gray Morley.

Phoebe Patrick was born on 23 September 1868 at 141 Surrey St Glasgow, Scotland, the eldest child of Hugh Patrick and Mary (née Bluer). Phoebe emigrated with her father to New Zealand in about 1879 and lived in Wanganui in 1879-1880. She received a prize at Wanganui Girls School in 1880, when she was a student in Standard 3. Her father was a Commission Agent. They moved to Devonport about 1881 and Phoebe was enrolled at Devonport School in 1884.

Her father married Emma Gray Morley on 3 October 1883. They had two children, Marion and Hugh, but sadly her father died aged 40, on 18 June 1889. Phoebe was still living with her step mother at Takapuna when the 1893 Petition was taken.

Phoebe married Austin Crago in Auckland on 3 May 1893. They had five surviving children: Robin, who later changed his name to Stanley and married and died in Australia, Elsie, Albert, Eric and Leslie.

They lived at Takapuna. In the 1913 Directory their address was described at Castor Bay, an outlying area of Takapuna. Austin stated in 1912 that he was an old age pensioner and had suffered a work injury in 1911, so ‘l was unable to work and the family was in poor circumstances.’ When her husband Austin died on 1 April 1914, Phoebe still had a young family to bring up.

Phoebe was listed in the NZ Electoral Rolls from 1919 till 1949, living at 31 Ewen St Takapuna with her children, until they moved away and/or married. In 1954 she was living with her unmarried youngest son, Leslie Philip, at 64 Robley Cres, Glendowie where she died on 27 November, 1956. She was cremated on the 29th at Waikumete Crematorium. Her ashes were scattered.

Sources

Scotland's People
BDM Online NZ
Papers Past
Ancestry.com.au (New Zealand electoral rolls 1853-1981; New Zealand cemetery records 1800-2007)
Family information