'Eliza Arbuckle was born in Paisley, Scotland, in 1821, and when a young woman joined the Baptists, which enraged her mother, a widow, and in consequence Eliza emigrated to Sydney' (Saunders, 'Eliza Davies and Infant Adelaide', Observer 7 Feb 1925). She made the acquaintance of Captain Sturt, who lived at Liverpool at that time. She travelled with the Sturts to Adelaide, possibly in a domestic capacity, and was included along with Captain Sturt's wife and Julia Gawler (the Governor's sister) on an expedition in 1839 to cross Lake Alexandrina by boat, travel on up the Murrray to the Bend (now Morgan) and thence to return overland to Adelaide.
In 1840 she married a master tinsmith, William Davies, in Holy Trinity church, apparently rather at the wish of Mrs Sturt than through her own inclination. Within weeks of her marriage her husband was treating her violently, and in 1842 Eliza left Adelaide for Sydney, and eventually returned to Paisley.
Not long after arriving in Scotland she met Mr Campbell of America, the founder of the body known as the Disciples of Christ, and in 1847 she sailed for New York. She was running a private school when her sister in Woolloomooloo asked her to join her, and Eliza returned to Australia.
In 1861 Eliza revisited South Australia. Her husband, whom she had presumed to be dead, was alive and well in Adelaide. He had since married bigamously, but his new wife and their child had both died. Eliza sued for divorce, and within about six weeks of decree nisi being pronounced, Davies, who had heart disease, fell dead at the Gawler railway station. Eliza returned to Sydney, and after recovering from precarious health, set up school there.
In 1870 she returned to Adelaide to live, and with financial help from G F Angas established a school at Hindmarsh. Saunders reports that 'after a skirmish [Eliza] became a monthly visitor to the Lunatic Asylum'. In 1974 she discontinued her school duties, under medical advice, and returned to the United States
