My Family mean a lot to me. And this is my maternal grandmother - Ellen Franklin Pain, known as Nellie.
She was born in England and arrived in the South Island of New Zealand, on the Steamship 'Arawa' on the 9 October 1886, with her parents and 7 siblings, when she was 17.
She married my grandfather, Louis Malachi Pain who was born in Greymouth, NZ, and had 4 daughters (one was my mother) and 3 sons.
Nellie died quiet young, when my mother was 14, so I never met her or my grandfather at all. I did know all of my aunts and one of my uncles.
Below is a photo of my maternal great grandparents (the Franklins) and their adult children.



Below are my paternal grandparents and my aunties and uncles, taken in 1905 when Granma was pregnant with my father.
My grandfather Michael John McCormick was born in 1858 in Larne, Northern Ireland. He arrived in NZ in 1880 on board the 'Dunedin'.
And once in NZ he jumped ship and became one of the first illegal immigrants in the land.
In 1885 he met and married Elizabeth Dickson, who was born about 1868 in Wellington. I did meet my grandmother, but remember her as an old lady, and my uncles, and a few of the aunties too.