Career
Christina had eight children in this marriage. The Smiths moved to Rivoli Bay south (Greytown) in 1845 where Christina acted with Christian compassion for the Buandig people concerned at their treatment by other European settlers and engaged in education and Christian missionary work with the aborigines. Foreign several years she was the only white woman in the southern end of the district.
The family moved to a small farm near Mount Gambier in 1854 where Christina opened a night school teaching aboriginal orphans and adults until James Smith"s death in 1860.
A day school was opened in 1864 in Mount Gambier teaching scripture and the rudiments of a basic education to aboriginal children. After an epidemic and loss of support for her school and with student numbers reduced to 4, the school closed in 1868, although it continued as a home for Buandig orphan children.
She also contributed material in 1881 to the work of anthropologist Alfred William Howitt. Smith died on 28 April 1893 at Mount Gambier and is buried in Lake Terrace cemetery.
The school in Mount Gambier where Christina Smith taught was added to the South Australian Heritage list in 1994.
The Lady Nelson Discovery Centre in Mount Gambier uses a hologram image of Christina Smith to explain the story of the region"s early contact between settlers and Aboriginal people.