Station life in New Zealand by Lady Barker

After Sir Frederick Broome's death in 1896, Lady Broome returned to London, dying there on 6 March 1911. She published the last of her 22 books, Colonial Memories under this name. Frederick Broome was knighted on 3 July 1884, and thereafter Mary Anne called herself 'Lady Broome'.

Drawing on these experiences, Lady Barker published A Year's Housekeeping in South Africa (1880) and Letters to Guy (1885). Broome's subsequent colonial appointments had him traveling to Mauritius, Western Australia, Barbados, and Trinidad. When Frederick Broome was appointed Colonial Secretary of Natal in 1875, Lady Barker accompanied him there. This last title led to her being appointed Lady Superintendent of the National Training School of Cooking in South Kensington. Over the next eight years, Lady Barker wrote ten more books, including A Christmas Cake in Four Quarters (1871), a sequel to Station Life entitled Station Amusements in New Zealand (1873), and First Lessons in the Principles of Cooking (1874). The book was reasonably successful, going through several editions and being translated into French and German. In 1870, she published her first book Station Life in New Zealand, a collection of her letters home. Still calling herself 'Lady Barker', Mary Anne Broome became a correspondent for The Times, and also published two books of verse, Poems from New Zealand (1868) and The Stranger from Seriphos (1869). Both Mary Anne and her husband then became journalists. They remained there for three years they lost more than half their sheep in the winter of 1867, and in response Broome sold out and the couple returned to London. By this time, they had moved to the sheep station Steventon, which Broome had partnered with H. The couple's first child was born in Christchurch in February 1866, but died in May. The couple then sailed for New Zealand, leaving her two children in England. On 21 June 1865, Mary Anne Barker married Frederick Napier Broome.

When Barker was knighted for his leadership at the Siege of Lucknow, Mary Anne became 'Lady Barker'. She was educated in England, and in 1852 married Captain George Robert Barker of the Royal Artillery, with whom she would have two children. Born Mary Anne Stewart in Spanish Town, Jamaica, she was the eldest daughter of Walter Stewart, Island Secretary of Jamaica.

Station life in New Zealand by Lady Barker