Being a single mother is never easy. In the days before state benefits, life could be very tough. Women relied on their families and friends, church or community groups to help financially or to mind the children while they went out to work. Public disapproval was strong – society expected children to be born within marriage and raised by two parents.
The Maungatapu murders
Capital punishment in New Zealand
The death penalty
The first execution in New Zealand was that of a young Maori named Maketu, convicted at Auckland in 1842. Walter Bolton became the last to be executed when he was hanged at Mount Eden prison in 1957. In total there were 83 verified executions for murder and one for treason in New Zealand between these dates.
The Burgess gang - Maungatapu murders
Richard Burgess: career criminal
The crimes - Maungatapu murders
A timeline of crime: May–June 1866
For a few short months the gang embarked upon a crime spree along the west coast of the South Island that would culminate in the murder of five men on the Maungatapu Track.
May:
Hokitika
Burgess stole two revolvers from the Hokitika police camp on 10 May. He staged a 'discovery' of these guns at a nearby beach in the presence of two witnesses, Sullivan and a man called Chamberlain. A search of his room located the stolen weapons but his witnesses helped him escape any charges. The Hokitika police supplied the local press with details of his Dunedin history and advised Burgess and Kelly to leave town.
Birth of the gay movement - homosexual law reform
Social and political groups for homosexuals in New Zealand began with the Dorian Society in the 1960s. By the next decade, sexual and social liberation was in the air. The early 1970s saw the growth of the modern feminist and gay movements.
From childcare to baby farming
'Fearful slaughter of the innocents'
The post-war family - children and adolescents, 1930-60
Families after the Second World War
As a consequence of the post-war economic boom there was increasing demand for consumer goods. The 1956 census revealed that more than half of New Zealand homes possessed washing machines, refrigerators and electric ovens. For those families who could afford these time- and labour-saving luxuries, so-called 'women's work' became easier. In addition, women who had been mobilised during the war had a taste of life outside the home.
Although many relinquished their jobs at the end of the war in favour of returning soldiers, some chose to remain, if only part-time, in the paid workforce.
Sullivan's betrayal - the Maungatapu murders
Sullivan turns on the gang
Without bodies the case was circumstantial. On 22 June 1866 searchers found the dead packhorse and the missing men's swags. Rewards for information were offered in vain, but a breakthrough occurred when the government promised £200 and a free pardon to any accomplice (not the actual murderer) who would turn Queen's evidence. This reward poster was placed where the prisoners could see it.
Reforming the law - homosexual law reform
The Homosexual Law Reform Bill
To bring about change in the law, the gay movement needed a parliamentary champion. It found one in Member of Parliament Fran Wilde. She consulted with gay groups to develop a private members bill, the Homosexual Law Reform Bill, which she introduced to the House of Representatives on 8 March 1985.
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