Elizabeth Caradus

Who was Elizabeth Caradus?

Elizabeth Caradus was a New Zealand suffragist, temperance and welfare worker. She was born in Falkirk, Stirlingshire, Scotland on 26 April 1832 to Elizabeth Adam and David Russell, a carpenter. The family emigrated to Auckland, New Zealand. She married James Caradus who had been a fellow passenger on the Jane Gifford. She bore him at least fifteen children, about half of whom died in infancy. The family was initially impoverished, but later found security by renting out cottages built by James around the Freemans Bay area of Auckland. During this period Freemans Bay was an industrial slum with coal and lime traders, glass and asphalt works and the town morgue

Elizabeth become involved in the Ladies' Christian Association, which became the third constituent member of the YWCA. She attended the first meetings of the Christian Temperance Union and the Women's Franchise League and the National Council of Women of New Zealand where she was a leading figure. Unusually for sufferance leaders, she came from a working-class background; she did not write many letters but she spoke frequently commonly moved motions. As well as campaigning for temperance and suffrage, she also campaigned against the Contagious Diseases Act 1869, which gave police considerable powers against women suspected of being common prostitutes to combat venereal disease, but took no action against men. The New Zealand Contagious Diseases Acts were a reflection of those in the UK which had initially been restricted to naval and army barracks, but soon spread country-wide.