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Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1737, 12 July 1917, Page 3

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OLD XEW ZEALAXDER DEAD. DAUGHTER OE A MISSIONARY. Airs A. H. Spicer, -widow <> 1' (lie Lite Air A. 11. Spicer, and clde.-l daughter (A (he lain Air James Greece, catechist |o the Clmreh oi' England Missionary Society, died al the residence of her grand-dau-ghter, Airs E. Holland, Urngei Road, Renmera, on Sunday lasi. The de- ( eased lady was horn al Pnriri on August iMkh, 183 1. and was, il It claimed, the first while girl horn soulh of the May of Islands. Her father —the pioneer missionary of Ihe Hanraki district —landed there on Christmas Day, 1833. There was no other Europeans in the district, and al that lime the natives ’were savage and uncivilised. Air Preece, with Ids family, moved jo Thames in 1835. Aits Spicer was soon afterwards placed/at school in Auckland, When her father volunteered in 1817 to establish a mission station at Ahikereru, Airs Spicer, still a, schoolgirl, accompanied her father to that- place, and, being in poor health, the Alaoris carried her from Whakalane across a trackless and hridgeless country. Ahikereru up to that lime had been the scene of in-ter-tribal wars, and the natives, for protection from lliehir enemies, had their pas mu the (op of the ranges, overlooking Te AVhaiti and Ahikereru. The missionary induced the Alaoris to live peaceably, and they subsequently removed to the Hat land through which the Whirinaki River follows its course. Airs Spicer returned to complete her education in Auckland, and has resided in .flint city since her marriage, with the exception of short terms of residence at Wellington, .Melbourne, and oilier places. The old lady, having a retentive memory, often related many stirring episodes of her life and of early New Zealand history. The dec-eased well remembered the Rev. Samuel Alarsden, and when his descendants attended the Alarsden centenary, at Russell in 191-1 they made a special visit to her. .Aim Spicer had lon children, those surviving being Air.--, 11. Wallace Lawson, Airs Newton Matthews, Misses Mamie and Lila Spicer, and Airs J. E. D. Spicer, all of Auckland,