Mrs John McGlashan (née Isabella McEwen)

Isabella McEwen was born around 1808 in Dunbar, a coastal town on the south-east coast of Scotland. On 14 January 1827 she married the solicitor John McGlashan in Stirlingshire, Scotland and together they had an impressive ten children.  John was one of the first promoters of the Otago settlement scheme and became the Secretary of the Otago Association, responsible for much of its organisation from his office in Edinburgh. Two of their sons, John and ‘Willie’ (William Archibald) emigrated to Otago on the Maori in 1852 and began farming land at Wakari.  Isabella, John, and their remaining eight children followed suit the next year, arriving in Otago on the Rajah on 8 October 1853.  The Rajah encountered a violent storm near Tasmania and almost foundered, as described in a shipboard diary by their daughter Jane:

‘A loud crash, and then the water rushed over us.  We sprung up, and could just perceive a great mass on the Cabin floor blocking upon the entrance to Mama’s room …’

In the months following their arrival, the McGlashan family lived at ‘Newton Cottage’ on Bell Hill.  John then built a homestead close to his two sons’ farm and named it ‘Balmacewen House’ in honour of Isabella by combining her first and maiden names.  The house later gave its name to the Dunedin suburb of Balmacewen and was also the first building of John McGlashan College which opened there in 1918.  Soon after their arrival in Otago, John became the Provincial Treasurer and Solicitor, and remained heavily devoted to the success of the Otago settlement, even acting as Deputy Superintendent in 1858.  When he died in a riding accident in 1864, he was remembered as ‘one of the Fathers of Otago.’  Isabella remained at Balmacewen after John’s death, kept company by her seven unmarried daughters. She took a less active role in public affairs than her husband had but remained highly respected as one of the early settlers in the province and one of its noted matriarchs. She died in January 1888, aged 80.