Potto, McCaul, and Pollock families: Whanganui and Wellington by Fiona, Alexander Turnbull Library

Henry Potto, (1823-1902), and wife Sarah, née Tisdale (c1816-1871), migrated from Walsall, Staffordshire England, on the ship Oliver Lang, in 1856, with four surviving children: George (1846-1935), Alfred (1848-1916), Clara (1852-1909), and Mima (Jemima) (1854-1920). Their youngest child, Rosalia, (1858-1910), was born in Wanganui, where the family settled. Henry set up his saddlery business there in 1857, although later newspaper advertising asserts that it was 1856. No images are extant for Sarah Potto, who died suddenly on the 18th March 1871, shortly after Henry had been declared  bankrupt in February 1871 and was unable to vote; she had been conducting a small business making Tuscan straw hats and bonnets for clients, and in April 1871, one month after her death in March, a Miss Potto, carried on the business briefly, before venturing successfully into dressmaking and millinery. 

“Miss Potto” advertised in Wises' New  Zealand Post Office directory from c1872 - 1891, in Wanganui, and was most likely Mima, to begin with, as two month's worth of advertisements in the Wanganui Herald newspaper from November - December 1872, list a "Miss J Potto." However, once she married John Henry Pollock, a butcher, formerly from Wanganui, on the 2nd February, 1879 in Wellington, she would have been unable to continue. Thereafter it is hard to know which Miss Potto, carried on the dressmaking business up until 1891 on the same premises as Henry Potto’s saddlery. It is possible that one or both of the two sisters assisted: Clara or Rosalia; however, Clara, the eldest, married Benjamin McCaul, in 1878, and was likely very busy after having four children in close succession from 1882-1884, and a fifth in 1889, although not all of the children survived beyond infancy. But it is entirely possible that both Clara and Rosalia, were able to carry on the dressmaking and millinery business under the brand name "Miss Potto." 

While Clara Potto, the eldest daughter, does not appear in the William James Harding photograph collection, that doesn't mean that her photograph wasn't taken. There is a copy photograph in the Auckland City Libraries' collection of the McCaul couple made in 1911 that could well have been taken in Wanganui. Although there was an Auckland connection, in that Walter Allison McCaul, (1821 -1904) a tailor, from Scotland, father of Benjamin, was well established in business there, along with his second wife and family. A legal dispute developed later, with Benjamin McCaul's son, also called Benjamin, suing the estate for his father's share of his grandfather's will, as his father had predeceased, W. A. McCaul.  (Walter Allison McCaul, deceased, Waikomiti - his estate; Plaintiff: Benjamin McCaul, Bulls, Blacksmith; Defendant: Francis William Mason, Auckland, Perfumer - 1907). 

 Rosalia appears in the Wanganui newspapers for musical items while still young, and appears in some Electoral Rolls with the occupation music teacher. The birth dates of her children are quite puzzling however; in that the eldest child, Ivy Gwendolyn James, has no recorded New Zealand birth, although it has been asserted she was born in 1889. However, her parents married on the 19th January 1889 in Melbourne, which leaves very little time for a New Zealand birth. The other two children's births were registered in Melbourne, Australia: Rosalia in 1890, and Donald Potto James, in 1892. The James family came back to New Zealand, possibly in late 1892; and  Rosalia James, music teacher, is listed in the 1893 Electoral Roll, as living at Taupo Quay, Wanganui. However, she doesn't appear in the Suffrage petition, but her sister Clara, and two other McCaul women, mother and daughter, Marion and Jessie McCaul, do.  While middle sister, Mima Tisdale Pollock, is on the 1893 Electoral Roll, living in Roxburgh Street, Mount Victoria, Wellington, but is missing from the Suffrage petition. The only Pollock from Wellington listed on the petition, is a Jessie Pollock, living in Crawford Street, now known as  Dunlop Terrace, adjacent to the Vivian Street Design School, Victoria University of Wellington. 

Marion McCaul, née Dickie, was married to George McCaul, the eldest of the McCaul brothers, and a teacher, although later a lawyer. Her eldest daughter, Jessie McCaul, seen here as an infant, was also a school teacher when she signed the Suffrage petition in 1893. When Marion died in 1932, in her will, she named her two daughters Jessie Slipper, and Florence May Gordon, as being allowed to remain in her house for as long as they wished. 

When Henry Potto, died in 1902, according to his probate, he left his modest estate to his two daughters, still living in the Manawatu: Clara Carter McCaul, and Rosalia Elizabeth Styles James.  Jemima Tisdale Pollock, was the wealthiest of the Potto sisters, and features in the 1882 Return of New Zealand Freeholders  as does her father Henry Potto, (also available in Find My Past New Zealandland records as a transcript). Her 1920 probate is accessible via the FamilySearch digitised Historical New Zealand records collection - which you can access onsite at both the National Library and Archives New Zealand - otherwise, you need to register and sign in to FamilySearch for free access (courtesy of Archives New Zealand) - or access the probate directly via Archives New Zealand's Collections Search. 

Postscript: 

I first encountered the striking image of a Miss M Poto, on Twitter, when Courtney Johnston, tweeted a DigitalNZ set for Whanganui born photographer, Ben Cauchi, in 2012. I then became intrigued by the surname, was it Maori, Italian, or something else? However, on closer examination of the image in the NDHA, (National Digital Heritage Archive) I realised that the surname was Potto, and that a Wanganui / Whanganui man initially identified as a Mr Potts, was much more likely to be Henry Potto, father of these striking young women.

Addendum: The Jet jewellery both girls are wearing, is quite possibly worn in memory of their mother who had died unexpectedly, on the 18th March 1871, which would make Mima, almost nineteen years old, and Rosalia about thirteen. 

A selection of sources: 

• Archives New Zealand's Collections Search    https://collections.archives.govt.nz/web/arena [Records search]
• Family History Research Guide, National Library of New Zealand    https://natlib.govt.nz/researchers/guides/family-history  
• GRO index search     https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/Login.asp [Requires a login and password, but it is free to search] 
• Historical Births, Deaths, & Marriages records online     https://www.bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz/search 
• Kiwi Collection  NZSG (New Zealand Society of Genealogists) Note some larger public libraries will have earlier editions of the NZSG Kiwi Index  up to V. 2 (2015) - as individual NZSG Members currently pay an additional subscription fee to access the latest version - with strict IP guidelines.
• McCaul 1893 Suffrage petition page link    https://bit.ly/McCaulSuffrage
• National Library of New Zealand website      https://natlib.govt.nz
• New Zealand, Archives New Zealand, Probate Records, 1843-1998    familysearch.org/search/collection/1865481   [Note you should first look at Archives New Zealand's Collections Search (colour coded purple) for records such as probates, etc., as they have been busy digitising records. After a preliminary search, (less can sometimes be more, as the spelling of names may vary) you can filter your search in a number of ways.  However, for common names you will need more information (Historical BDMs, Death notices, Electoral Rolls, Directories, the NZSG Kiwi Collection, etc., to substantiate that you have the right person.) 
• New Zealand, City & Area Directories, 1866-1954    https://search.ancestrylibrary.com.au/search/db.aspx?dbid=1845 [Note you have to be onsite in a library with an Ancestry Library Edition subscription, and most public libraries have one.]
• New Zealand, Electoral Rolls, 1853-1981    https://search.ancestrylibrary.com.au/search/db.aspx?dbid=1836  
• Oliver Lang  (ship) in White Wings (volume I) Fifty years of sail in the New Zealand Trade, 1850 to 1900 by Henry Brett. Brett Printing Company Ltd, 1924, Auckland  Part of: New Zealand Texts Collection, New Zealand Electronic Text Centre, [NZETC]  Victoria University of Wellington
• Paperspast    https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz [Note that there are now five collections: newspapers, magazines, manuscripts (Donald McLean), parliamentary papers (AJHR), and books] 
• Petone Settlers database  huttcity.govt.nz/Leisure--Culture/Museums-and-galleries/Our-museums/petone-settlers-data   [New Zealand Company 1839–1850, Provincial government 1853–1870, Vogel govt. period 1871–1888, Social Security period 1886–1897 ] (Hutt City Council) This useful database is currently offline, but if you contact the Petone Settlers Museum, they will carry out a 'look up' for you: Email: heritage@huttcity.govt.nz A staff member has recently advised that the original 'cards' used in the database, are currently being digitised, and will be made available on their Recollect website.