Ada's Family Life

Ada's childhood and experience of marriage helped to shape her drive to make the world a better place.

Ada's parents travelled to New Zealand after the family coachbuilding business at Henley-on-Thames became financially strained. Her father William Pike, was described as a wheelwright in the ship's passenger list, when they immigrated. When they arrived in 1873 he was already a sick man, with long standing tuberculosis.

William died in 1877, leaving his wife, Maria, still carrying their ninth and last child, William Henry.

Maria Pike (nee Beckett) needed to earn a living to support her nine children, and we guess, may have been doing so before her husband's death.

She earned her living by practising therapeutic massage and by administering other remedies.

Massage was to become a family tradition, with two of her sons and two of her daughters continuing the practice.

Maria led a strong family unit, and her eldest daughter, Ada, retained a close relationship with her sisters for most of her life.

Links to my pages on Ada Wells

• Suffragist • Wells family • Ada's education • Chester Wells • Chronology