Alice Lightoller was born in Waipawa on the 13th of June 1895. Her parents were Frederick James Lightoller and Joyce Gladwin. Her middle name was not in fact "Mary", but that was the name she took when she was confirmed and, according to her daughter Doreen, she liked to use it.

Her full-blooded brother and sisters were Janet, Ann (who died as a baby), Frederick, Joyce and Helen (who died as an infant). At the time of her birth, Alice had a half-brother and sisters in England, as well as a half-sister, Jane, married to Frederick Clay and living in Opotiki.

On the 18th of February 1901, her sister Janet married Charles Henry Nash in Waipawa.

In 1904, Alice's family moved from Waipawa to Petone. Alice was 9. They lived in a house at Beach Street, Petone, where her father worked as an accountant and her mother as a laundress. Her youngest sister Helen died there in 1905.

By 1906, Alice's family were living at 5 Aurora Street, Petone. In August 1907 her mother became ill with tuberculosis. She died at home on Saturday 23 November, and was buried at the Taita Cemetery. Alice was 12 years old.

By 1911 Alice's father had moved to 12 Manchester Street in Petone and was working as a labourer. Towards the end of 1913 they moved from Petone back to Waipawa.

In early December Alice's father committed suicide and died on Friday 12th December 1913. He was 72 years old. Alice was 18 and she lived with her brother and sisters in Waipawa with their oldest sister Janet.

In 1917, Alice became a Roman Catholic. On the 21st of November 1917 Alice married George Peers at Waipawa. He was a World War I veteran.

George and Alice lived in various places throughout their married life: Otawhao HB (where Doreen Mary was born in 1918 and Richard George in 1921); Hatuma HB (where Margaret Alice was born in 1926); Waipukurau; Napier; Waipawa; Trentham (where Roger Joseph was born in 1933); and Hastings.

Another son, unnamed, was stillborn while they lived at Otawhao.

George was frequently ill and hospitalized as a consequence of his war injuries. Often the family had little money. During the Great Depression he lost his farm in Hawkes Bay, and during the 1931 Napier Earthquake they lost the house they had just bought in Napier. Fortunately at the time they were still living in Waipawa. Alice took in boarders during her husband's illnesses to try and pay the bills.

The family then shifted to Trentham around 1931. The children went to the Upper Hutt Convent School. George worked as a Prison Warden. At Trentham another son was born in 1933: Roger Joseph Peers. He died when two years old and is buried at St Joseph's Church, Upper Hutt.

George and his family moved back to Hastings where they lived at Grays Road. Doreen remained at Trentham. In 1939 she married Frank Goodman.

Alice was called "Granma" by her grandchildren.

Son Richard (called Dick) went to the Second World War, and was killed in 1944 at Rosskeen, Scotland, on a flying expedition.

In 1949 daughter Margaret married Bertrand Harold Worsnop. George and Alice had now moved into a house in Hastings in Caroline Road.

On the 16th of January 1949, Alice died of a heart attack, and was buried in the Hastings Cemetery. She was 53.