NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Lifestyle

Author gets to know an ancestor

NZ Herald
9 Apr, 2012 05:30 PM5 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

Stephanie Johnson felt her great-great-great grandmother gave her permission to write her story. Photo / Supplied

Stephanie Johnson felt her great-great-great grandmother gave her permission to write her story. Photo / Supplied

Carroll du Chateau talks to writer Stephanie Johnson about her special bond with her latest subject.

Stephanie Johnson is "reluctant" to hang her new novel, The Open World, on the fact that the Victorian heroine is her own great-great-great-grandmother, Elizabeth Horelock Smith. As the author of four other historical novels, Johnson wants this one to stand on its own merits too.

But this time she will find it hard to remove herself from her brave and hard-working ancestor. "The more I wrote about Elizabeth, the more I loved her and got on with her too," she says.

Readers are also getting hungrier for new information about the early settlement of New Zealand, wanting to know not only about the wars and the men, but about the women who built society.

Says Johnson, "Kids at school are learning a lot about New Zealand, but told from a point of view I don't necessarily hold with. There's not much sympathy for those of us who call ourselves 'proudly Pakeha'."

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Elizabeth Horelock Smith's story is upsetting, as true(ish) stories so often are. The daughter of a merchantman who ran a small fleet of trading ships, she was relatively well educated for a girl in England's Victorian era. But her social standing crashed when she married Tom Hogg, who turned out to be a bigamist.

Not only was she abandoned by her "husband" when his first (real) wife appeared, her father died in a fire and she had to bring up her two sons alone.

When Thomas Henry, the elder of the boys, emigrated to New Zealand, Elizabeth and her younger son, John Elisha, or "Ish", followed. Elizabeth was 38. She worked her passage as the "companion" of Lady Mary Ann Martin, who was travelling out to meet her husband, New Zealand's first Chief Justice. The other famous passenger was Bishop Selwyn.

Once in New Zealand, Elizabeth became the close friend and workhorse for the sickly Mary Ann. Although they both helped set up and manage the Native Hospital in Judges Bay, Elizabeth's lack of social standing meant she was consigned to being a behind-the-scenes worker. Only to the Maori was she "Mata Te Mete": a loved and respected curer of the sick and comforter of the dying.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Which was part of the reason Johnson wanted to write Elizabeth's story. "As a companion to her beloved Lady Martin, Elizabeth stood uneasily between servant and friend," she says. "Mary Ann Martin took so much of the credit ... yet she was so sickly she couldn't do much."

Indeed, when a new play, On The Upside Down of The World, was performed by the Auckland Theatre Company last year, informing audiences about early Auckland's Native Hospital, none of us knew that the woman who did most of the back-breaking nursing and work for Mary Ann Martin, the heroine of the play, was Elizabeth Horelock Smith.

Writing a part-fact, part-fiction historical novel is tricky. "You do your research," says Johnson. "And then you kind of throw it out on the wind and let the story-teller part of your brain take over."

In this case, the fact part of the book came from "a handful of [Elizabeth's] letters" that had been kept at the Auckland War Memorial Museum, plus a much larger collection of Thomas Henry's letters and papers. Henry became Judge of the Native Land Court (where he earned a reputation for being too generous to the natives). Ish became a solicitor.

Discover more

Opinion

Fiction Addiction: Most anticipated novels of 2012

26 Jan 08:08 PM
Opinion

Fiction Addiction: What's wrong with NZ novels?

19 Mar 08:59 PM
Opinion

Fiction Addiction: Writers' Festival - Our picks of the programme

22 Mar 11:30 PM
Lifestyle

Bad sex and terrible deeds abound at writers festival

28 Mar 07:30 PM

The second interwoven part of the story involved a trip to London and Buxton, "a sort of English version of Rotorua".

"At that point I threw away a lot of what I'd already written, and started again."

Throughout the "story-teller" side of the novel, Johnson had the feeling "Elizabeth was haunting me. Some rather spooky things happened that I couldn't explain".

Eventually she decided to go to a psychic. "She reckoned she got in touch with Elizabeth, who told me to be careful. She didn't want me to get too close to the truth. There was something about running away from a fire. And that Smith wasn't her real name.

"After that I felt a sort of loosening ... almost that she'd given me permission."

So, guided by instinct, stories about Elizabeth she'd heard from her grandmother, and the facts, Johnson put together a fascinating account of her great-great-great grandmother's life.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Despite the deprivations and social snubs, Elizabeth emerged as a fun-loving, fiery and resilient character who carried a small bottle of a personal potion she called "The Cup of Grace". It contained cloves, sugar, brandy and a good slug of laudanum and was liberally dished out to those in need, including Mary Ann.

Johnson believes that Mary Ann's ongoing illness may well have been anorexia nervosa. She also made her a virgin, possibly because, as was the practice of the day, her husband may have been warned that she was too ill for childbearing.

As she aged, Elizabeth "had this obsession about going back to England," which mystified and irritated her sons.But England did not offer the comfort she hoped for. Elizabeth died, almost penniless and with few friends, in a London lodging house.

"In England I gave a lecture at the Centre for New Zealand Studies," says her great-great-great-granddaughter, "and we went out for dinner in Islington afterwards. I said, 'down there is Cross St. That's the lodging house she lived in'," says Johnson. "And the man looked at me and said, 'Cross St? You're a real, real, Londoner'. And I had this huge sense of belonging. It was just so lovely to feel it."

The Open World (Vintage $37.99) is out now. Stephanie Johnson will talk about the book and writing reconstructed biography at the Auckland Writers & Readers Festival on May 13.

Save

    Share this article

Latest from Lifestyle

Premium
Lifestyle

Perimenopause is ruining my sleep - what can I do?

24 Jun 06:00 AM
Royals

Prince Harry’s email to King Charles after silence claim

24 Jun 12:38 AM
Premium
Lifestyle

The six signs you’re not drinking enough water

24 Jun 12:00 AM

Inside Leigh Hart’s bonkers quest to hand-deliver a SnackaChangi chip to every Kiwi

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Lifestyle

Premium
Perimenopause is ruining my sleep - what can I do?

Perimenopause is ruining my sleep - what can I do?

24 Jun 06:00 AM

NY Times: Evidence-backed ways to address sleep issues associated with perimenopause.

Prince Harry’s email to King Charles after silence claim

Prince Harry’s email to King Charles after silence claim

24 Jun 12:38 AM
Premium
The six signs you’re not drinking enough water

The six signs you’re not drinking enough water

24 Jun 12:00 AM
‘Turning into America’: Outrage at restaurant’s menu act

‘Turning into America’: Outrage at restaurant’s menu act

23 Jun 10:24 PM
Why wallpaper works wonders
sponsored

Why wallpaper works wonders

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP