She continued to write and to travel, spending time in South Africa, Mauritius, Western Australia (where her husband Frederick was Governor), and Trinidad. None was more arresting than her account of the great snowstorm of 1867. Although criticised as exaggerated, her discerning eye and deft style provide memorable pictures of rural events, personalities, pursuits and problems.
They became classics of New Zealand literature and were reprinted many times in Britain and, more recently, here in New Zealand. In 1873 she published a sequel, Station Amusements in New Zealand, which provided would-be settlers with information on buying land, coping with servants, and other problems. It described life in Canterbury, from problems in housekeeping and entertaining visitors on the station, to travel on horseback and hunting wild cattle, and was a big success. In 1870 Lady Barker published Station Life in New Zealand, based on the letters she had sent home to her younger sister, Jessie. After the great snowstorm of 1867 when they lost 4,000 out of 7,000 sheep, Frederick sold his interest in Steventon, returning with Lady Barker to England in December 1868. Mary Anne (or Lady Barker as she still called herself) spent her time writing in the morning and involving herself in the outdoor life of the station. Broome and his partner bought Steventon, a sheep run of 9,700 acres on the Selwyn River near Whitecliffs. Moving to New Zealandįrederick and Mary Anne arrived at Lyttelton in October 1865. He met Lady Barker on a visit to England in 1864 and persuaded her to leave her two sons in England and travel with him to New Zealand. Frederick Broome was 11 years younger than Lady Barker, and had immigrated to New Zealand when he was 15 years old. She remarried to Canadian-born Frederick Napier Broome, sportsman, poet, journalist and diplomat, in June 1865. In July 1861 he died and she returned to England. Lady Barker went to Bengal, India in 1860 with her husband. In 1859 he was knighted for his military service in India.
She returned to England when she was aged two.Ībout 1852 she married a soldier, George Robert Barker.
Mary Anne Stewart was born in Spanish Town, Jamaica where her father was Island Secretary. Station Life in New Zealand (1870) and Station Amusements in New Zealand (1873) have been reprinted many times. Lady Barker only lived in New Zealand for three years but she turned her experience into two classic accounts of life on a sheep station in the early days of the Canterbury settlement.
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