I would like some info on Cecil Augustus de Cortando and any children, siblings etc also where his wife Elizabeth is buried.

He was Baron von Blaramberg but changed that later to C.A. Curtis

Cecil was born in 1843/46 in Oldenburg, Germany and went to New Zealand in 1867 - do you know which ship and who with?
He was the 9th son of Reginald Count Hotezzi de Cortando (Baron von Blaramberg, or Blaremberg) and Vittoria Alma Cortando.

He married Elizabeth Mantel in 1869.

Cecil and Elizabeth VON BLARAMBERG were school teachers in Wellington, Wanganui and Palmerston North.

Cecil von Blaramberg - under the name C A CURTIS - was the principal of a private school, Te Aro Grammer School, in Wellington from 1870 until about 1880.
He was later the headmaster of two state schools - Matarawa, near Wanganui - from about 1880 to 1889 - and Terrave End, in Palmerston North - from 1889 to 1893.

Elizabeth VON BLARAMBERG - under her maiden name of Elizabeth MANTEL - was Assistant Mistress at the TAITA SCHOOL from about 1868 to 1870
She was also a teacher of music and art to private pupils at Matarawa. However she is best remembered as the Principal of the Carow Ladies College - also known as the Carow Girls Collegiate School, Palmerston North, which operated from 1891 until about 1901.
This school was a large two-storey building in Carow Street providing accomodation for boarding pupils as well as serving as the von Blaramberg family residence.
Cecil assisted his wife at this school.

After the closure of the Carow Collegiate School and the sale of the Carow Street property (probably as a result of financial difficulties), Cecil and Elizabeth lived in a succession of small rented houses in Palmerston North.
They continued to operate a small school from each of these houses until about the time of World War One.


He died on 27th August 1921 and is buried in the Old Gorge Cemetery in Woodville, New Zealand next to a son -
Regionald de Cortando who was born in New Zealand in 1871 and died aged 25 in the Club Hotel in Woodville in 1896.

Another son, Claude Douglas Blaramberg, (he dropped the 'von' when he went to war) was killed in action aged 33 in Somme, France on 10 Dec. 1916..

Do you know of other children?