Maker: Marianne Hargreaves

Panel number: 174

Petition sheet number: 210

Person honouring: Janet Campbell

Relationship to maker: Lived in same town

Janet was born in 1870, the younger sister of Marion Baird Campbell who also signed the suffrage petition (sheet 539).

After moving to Christchurch [from England] with her parents and siblings in 1880 she was enrolled at West Christchurch School. In 1881 both Marion and Janet were recorded in the end-of-year prize list for girls in Standard IV.

By 1890, the family were living at 145 Hazeldean Road in Sydenham, where Janet’s two older brothers, Andrew Armstrong Campbell and James Baird Campbell, were living. Janet and Marion were here when they signed the petition.

Janet was employed in the dressmaking department of the D.I.C. On 6 April 1895 she “had just put on her hat and jacket to go to work when she fell down and expired”. She was just 25 years old. A doctor thought that death had probably resulted from heart disease.

Panel materials: All from an old sewing box that belonged to a Mrs Acton-Adams, given to me in 1982 when she died, aged about 84. They were linen, a pre-made collar, silk skein, lace. I stencilled the shape of the scissors.