Heather was born to the "Maple Furnishing" heiress just over 6 months after the heiress's second marriage. The husband was not Heather's father but knew all about the circumstances and was happy to keep the whole matter secret for the sake of his political career.
Heather's father's father's father's mother's father's mother was a great-great-great-great-aunt of Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom (1926) (through the late Queen Mother, a daughter of Nina Cavendish-Bentinck), which makes Heather and her half-siblings sixth-cousins to Charles, Prince of Wales.
Heather was taken at birth to a 56-year-old foster mother in Chiswick, London, where she lived until 1930, except for a year in Paris attending a finishing school, until she married (without the necessary parental consent, lying about her age) a New Zealand-born artist, Gordon Tovey. They briefly lived in Highgate, near where they had been married. The doctor who had helped with the deception was persuaded not to take action on the false age declaration, in order to have nothing said about his crime of failing to register Heather's birth.
Heather and Gordon soon moved to live with or near Gordon's family in Plimmerton, New Zealand. They spent the rest of their lives in New Zealand, mostly in the Wellington region but with a period from 1932 to 1946 in Dunedin.
Heather eventually, in her 60s, solved the mystery of her birth and met her half-sister and other blood relatives in England. She and her daughter wrote a book about it all: Henderson, Carol, and Tovey, Heather: Searching for Grace, Steele Roberts Publishers, Wellington, 2010.
Siblings
Offspring of Grace Maple, Lady Weigall and Hermann von Eckardstein (1864-1933) | |||
Name | Birth | Death | Joined with |
Kit von Eckardstein (1898-1917) | |||
Offspring of Grace Maple, Lady Weigall and C J Williams (c1856-1941) | |||
Name | Birth | Death | Joined with |
Reginald Benwell (1906-) | |||
Offspring of Grace Maple, Lady Weigall and Elidor Ronald Campbell (1881-1957) | |||
Name | Birth | Death | Joined with |
Heather Campbell (1911-2004) | 3 March 1911 39 Hill Street, Berkeley Square, Greater London, England, United Kingdom | 28 June 2004 Wellington Region, New Zealand | Arthur Gordon Tovey (1901-1974) |
Offspring of Grace Maple, Lady Weigall and William Ernest George Archibald Weigall (1874-1952) | |||
Name | Birth | Death | Joined with |
Priscilla Crystal Frances Blundell Weigall (1914-1996) | 1914 England, United Kingdom | 1996 England, United Kingdom | Edward Curzon, 6th Earl Howe (1908-1984) Harold (Camel) Coriat (-1972) |
- (These tables are automatically generated, but our software isn't yet quite smart enough to list all siblings in a single list where there are half-siblings on each side.)
Siblings
Offspring of Elidor Campbell and Grace Emily Blundell Maple (1876-1950) | |||
Name | Birth | Death | Joined with |
Heather Campbell (1911-2004) | 3 March 1911 39 Hill Street, Berkeley Square, Greater London, England, United Kingdom | 28 June 2004 Wellington Region, New Zealand | Arthur Gordon Tovey (1901-1974) |
Offspring of Elidor Campbell and Violet Antoniette Bulwer-Marsh (c1882-1975) | |||
Name | Birth | Death | Joined with |
Elidor Diarmid Calder Campbell (1916-) | 1916 | Liliana Zarich (c1916) | |
Fiona Mary Campbell (1925-) | 1 November 1925 | Iain Alastair MacDonald (-c1997) | |
Children
Offspring of Heather Campbell and Arthur Gordon Tovey (1901-1974) | |||
Name | Birth | Death | Joined with |
Carol Tovey (living) | 1935 Dunedin, Dunedin City, Otago Region, New Zealand | Neil McKenzie Henderson (1930) | |
Residences
Footnotes (including sources)
‡ General |
|