Biography

Agnes Louisa Ireland was the third child of Agnes Louisa Carney and Thomas Ireland. She was known as Louisa, and was born 18 March 1866 in Dunedin and named after her mother. She was baptised on 7 September 1866 at Knox Church. She attended the Union St School; there is a photograph of her as a second decade pupil attending from 1871-80 in the school’s 69th anniversary booklet, although it is impossible to identify her.

On 11 September 1889, signing as Louisa Ireland, she was a witness to the marriage of James Stewart and Christina Scott of Dunedin at Knox Church. She appears in the 1893 City of Dunedin Electoral Roll, which was the first time women were able to vote. She gave her occupation as “dressmaker” and her address as Union Street. On the electoral rolls for 1899-1908, it states she stayed home doing domestic duties, probably to care for her ageing mother and invalid sister Jessie. Then, according to the 1908 and 1911 electoral rolls, she moved to live at 596 Castle Street. By 1912, Stone’s Directory shows that she had set up a little business as “Miss Ireland, costumiére” in 189 George Street. Then she moved in 1920 to 26 George Street, then in 1923 to Princes Street.

After 1925 she appears to have moved back to the family home at 596 Castle Street, still working as a dressmaker. Allwyn McBain, her niece, remembered going to the South Seas Exhibition with her in 1925-26. Louisa died on 8 October 1949 at the Central Mission Home in Company Bay, Dunedin, aged 84, of myocardial degeneration and broncho-pneumonia. She was buried in the Thomas Ireland family plot on 11 October 1949.

Others buried here: Agnes’s parents Thomas and Agnes Louisa Ireland, and her siblings Jessica, Isabella, Thomas and Lilian.