Pioneer shearer Margaret Gould died from burns, coroner warns of risks to elderly living alone

Margaret Gould (nee Hebberd) was a foremost New Zealand woman shearer who grew up in Marlborough. She died following a house fire at her Renwick home in December 2024. Photo / Jo Grigg, CountryWide Media

The life of a pioneering New Zealand female shearer ended tragically before Christmas last year when her clothing caught fire as she cooked over a favoured coal range.

Margaret Gould suffered fatal burns to her entire body as she prepared a meal in the home where she lived alone.

The 93-year-old was found by her neighbour slumped over the range and in great distress, Coroner Mark Wilton said in his findings released today.

He said her death in the early hours of the following day, on December 11 last year, was the result of a tragic accident, and a stark reminder of the heightened risk facing the elderly, especially those who lived alone.

Fire and Emergency New Zealand data showed that around 55% of fire deaths in New Zealand over the past five years were of people aged 65 or over, and many of those people were living alone.

Margaret Gould (nee Hebberd) in her Renwick home, May 2023. The 93-year-old died in December 2024 from serious burns after her clothing caught fire as she was cooking on her coal range. Photo / Jo Grigg CountryWide Media.

Tenant raced to her aid

Gould lived in the rear residence of a property she owned in the Marlborough township of Renwick, near Blenheim.

The property had another home in front, which she rented out.

It was the afternoon of December 10 last year when her tenant’s young son heard a “beeping sound” coming from Gould’s house.

The home had smoke alarms in the hallway and lounge which were activated at the time of the fire, an investigation found.

The tenant ran over and saw black smoke coming from Gould’s kitchen.

She went inside and found her slumped over the coal range with her body and clothing on fire.

The opinion of a fire investigator was that while Gould had been cooking and stoking the fire, she either received radiant heat long enough that her clothing ignited, or her clothes had come into contact with the open flame from the fire.

Specialist investigator Scott Randall said it was also possible that Gould’s clothing had been set alight by an ember falling from the range.

The neighbour had noticed a log sticking out of the firebox, which was open.

She extinguished the fire, doused Gould in water, and waited until an ambulance arrived.

Emergency medical help was given at the scene before Gould was flown to Hutt Hospital, where she died from severe burns to much of her body in the early hours of the following day.

Pathologist Mark Tullett identified 46% full-thickness burns to her entire body which were “extremely severe and life threatening”.

Family member ‘concerned’

Coroner Wilton said Gould had visited her doctor four months before her death for a sprain injury to her arm and shoulder from lifting a heavy pot of water.

The pain was limiting her function, and she was referred to an orthopaedic surgeon.

The GP practice also advised that a family member had called concerned about Gould’s welfare. Home help was discussed, but she voiced her concerns about that.

“Ms Gould was independent and did not like people in her home,” Coroner Wilton said.

He made no recommendations, but endorsed a list of fire safety messages and advice aimed at raising fire safety awareness in the homes of all New Zealanders, and particularly older New Zealanders.

Fire and Emergency encouraged family members and others who visited older people’s homes to check for general fire safety.

Fire safety checks should include making a workable escape plan, checking for fire risks associated with cooking and heating and checking for working smoke alarms.

Fire and Emergency also offered to undertake free home fire safety visits to those who required it.

Coroner Wilton “strongly encouraged” all New Zealanders, and particularly those older, to make use of the “free and excellent” fire prevention service.

‘Celebrity shearer’ well-known in Marlborough

Gould, a former “celebrity shearer”, was born Margaret Hebbard on December 29, 1930, and died weeks short of her 94th birthday.

She was remembered in death notices with love, laughter and for the stories and wisdom she shared.

Marlborough freelance journalist Jo Grigg, whose profile on Gould featured in rural online magazine CountryWide not long before her death, described her as possibly one of the first female blade shearers in New Zealand.

Margaret Gould (nee Hebberd) (left), and her sister Jean Hebberd shearing at Sydney Airport 1962. Photo / Jo Grigg CountryWide Media

Grigg wrote that Gould was one of nine siblings raised on the family farm at Onahau Bay in Marlborough’s Queen Charlotte Sound. When her father, Joseph Hebbard, died in 1942, Margaret Hebbard was 13. She and her brothers and sisters had no choice but to shear the flock themselves.

“It was the war and there were no shearers around.”

She could blade-shear up to 102 sheep a day, Grigg wrote.

Her sisters, Jean and Gwen Hebbard, also became competent blade shearers.

Grigg wrote that Margaret and Jean Hebbard, who became well-known in Marlborough, went on to compete at the Golden Shears (blade class) at the inaugural competition in 1961, and were invited to shear at events in Australia, making them perhaps the first female “celebrity shearers”.

Once, they were asked by the David Jones department store to do a shearing demonstration on a stage at the top of the Sydney store, where the sheep were sent up in the lift, Grigg wrote.

The sisters were also asked to shear sheep on floats at gala days and at garden parties.

Margaret Hebberd, as she was then, scored her first paid job shearing on a farm near Ward, South Marlborough, the day she turned 15.

She married in 1971 and, in the 1980s, moved to Renwick.

Tracy Neal is a Nelson-based Open Justice reporter at NZME. She was previously RNZ’s regional reporter in Nelson-Marlborough and has covered general news, including court and local government for the Nelson Mail.