Restore our early settler ancestors' John & Mary Toms grave

John and Mary Toms arrived in New Zealand in 1855 from Northamptonshire England. They came with four of their five children, Charles, Maryanne, Joshua and John Goodman. Charles was newly married and his wife Elizabeth had come with them. Daniel their eldest son had stayed England.

According to family stories Charles and Elizabeth initially stayed in Wellington whilst the rest of the family had been hired by William Fox to work on his Rangitikei property. Eventually they all settled in the Rangitikei area. Charles and his father John Toms are listed as labourers with freehold property entitling them to vote on the 1853 – 1864 Electoral roll.

Mary Toms died at Porewa in 1878 and is the first buried in the plot. Her husband John died in 1893 also at Porewa. John Symonds their son-in-law Maryanne’s husband is also buried in the plot having died in 1888. A memorial to Maryanne’s death in England in 1893 is engraved on the headstone along with an infant Symonds.

The many descendants of John and Mary Toms owe their good fortune of living in New Zealand to the Toms decision to travel here on the New Era in 1855.