Ellen Anne Baker was born in Jersey, Channel Islands, on 15 July 1843, the eldest daughter of Hannah Hough and her husband, George Baker. The family emigrated from Liverpool on the Earl of Sefton in December 1854, coming to Nelson, New Zealand, via Melbourne, on a small brig in mid 1855.
In 1858, Ellen Baker married James Duff Hewett. The Hewetts farmed a property at Kai Iwi, 12 miles from Wanganui, and had three sons and one daughter. James Hewett was killed in a Hauhau raid on the farm in 1876. Eventually the widow took the children back to England to live with her husband's family.
On their return to New Zealand in the early 1880s Ellen Hewett was very active in evangelical work with the Māori and inhttps://teara.govt.nz/en/biographies/...
Ellen Anne Baker was born in Jersey, Channel Islands, on 15 July 1843, the eldest daughter of Hannah Hough and her husband, George Baker. The family emigrated from Liverpool on the Earl of Sefton in December 1854, coming to Nelson, New Zealand, via Melbourne, on a small brig in mid 1855.
In 1858, Ellen Baker married James Duff Hewett. The Hewetts farmed a property at Kai Iwi, 12 miles from Wanganui, and had three sons and one daughter. James Hewett was killed in a Hauhau raid on the farm in 1876. Eventually the widow took the children back to England to live with her husband's family.
On their return to New Zealand in the early 1880s Ellen Hewett was very active in evangelical work with the Māori and in the Women's Christian Temperance Union. Her family encouraged her to write a book of reminiscences of her early life, and Looking back was published in 1911. It was extremely successful, going into a second edition only four years later and still available in its sixth edition in 1978. Ellen Hewett died in Auckland on 14 February 1926 and was buried at Purewa cemetery, Auckland....more