Wednesday 8 June 2016

Music and Song - Part of the Past NZ History

Waiting for the start of the Mercury Bay Inaugural Music Festival at Whitianga Queens Birthday Weekend  2016
 - photo courtesy Chris Ball

Queen's Birthday Weekend  on the Coromandel Peninsula this weekend , experienced an inaugural Mercury Bay Music Festival. A wonderful medley of music, songs and musicians. With tunes from folk music, world music -  acoustic, traditional, bluegrass, jazz, flamenco.  All kinds of music held in Whitianga Venue's and  music that was good for the soul. Stewart Pedley, a local Whitianga musician, was the first musician up and naturally,  he sang the ballad of the ship Buffalo.  Buffalo Beach at  Whitianga is named  after the wreck of this ship, which lays underwater out in the Bay.
Early Morning Mist Buffalo Beach, Whitianga Queens Birthday Weekend 2016 -
photo courtesy Chris and Anne Ball

Typical of any ballad or folk song that remains with us over the decades and even centuries, the words are often passed down orally and some have evolved and changed on their way down the years. The weekend music festival got me to thinking about the music that is a part of our New Zealand history as well as world history. The ballad  about the ship Buffalo started way back in 1840 - more than 175 years ago.  The words of the first ballad about Buffalo  , were attached to a page of the diary  of Thomas Frederick Cheeseman, second master on the 1837 voyage of HM's Buffalo .

Come all you jolly seamen bold, and listen to my song,
 I'd have you pay attention, and I'll not detain you long,
 Concerning of a voyage to New Zealand we did go,
 For to cut some lofty spars, to load the Buffalo.
 When at New Zealand we arrived, our hands were sent on shore,
 Our tents were then all pitch'd well, and provided with good stores;
 At six o'clock we all rouse out, then such a precious row,
 Come quick and get your grog, my boys, unto the woods you go.
 With saws and axes in our hands, then through the bush we steer,
 And when we saw a lofty tree, unto it we draw near,
 With saws and axes we begin to lay the tree quite low,
 With cheerful heart strikes every man to load the Buffalo.
 Now eight o'clock is drawing nigh, 'All Off! All off!' 's the sound,
 All thro' the trees it echoes loud, and makes the woods resound,
 Then every man lays down his axe, and thro' the bush we come,
 To get their jolly breakfast, every man does nimbly run.

 Our breakfast being over, then to work we do repair;
 Our work is all pointed out, for every man his share.
 There's roughters and refiners, and there's jolly sawyers too,
 To lop and trim those lofty spars, to load the Buffalo.
 When twelve o'clock is drawing nigh, 'All Off!' again's the cry,
 Then every man lays down his axe, and through the wood does hie;
 Our cook had got a dinner that will make all faces shine,
 With pork and murphies smoking hot on which we tars do dine.
 'Grog ho!' is the next cheerful cry, we drink it up with glee;
 We light our pipes when time is up and, smoking, go away
 Unto the woods to finish well the spars that we began,
 And when the afternoon's expired, then home comes every man.
 And when we have our supper got, our barter we prepare,
 With shirts and blankets in our hands, to the native's huts we steer;
 For toki, pigs and murphies  we exchange our traps, you know,
 For to suit our rakish blades of the saucy Buffalo.
 On Wednesdays and Saturdays, at four o'clock we strike,
 Each man to wash and mend his clothes, whilst he has got daylight;
 We've extra grog on Saturdays, to cheer up every man;
 There's happy day on board the Buff ashore in New Zealand.
 Our ship she is well loaded, and for England we are bound;
 Where plenty of good rum, my lads, and pretty girls abound;
 Farewell to Tonga - Mowries and Wyenas also
 They will oft times wish to see again the happy Buffalo.
                                In Diary of T F Cheeseman, Alexander Turnbull Library NZ
                                Copy also on Rootsweb

The ballad Stewart Pedley sings about the ship Buffalo of course adds to her story. John Archer's web site, New Zealand Folk Songs has the words and music to  this version of The Buffalo, sung by Stewart Pedley.


Stewart Pedley at opening of  inaugural Mercury Bay Music Festival Queens Birthday Weekend 2016
singing another version of the song The Buffalo - photo courtesy Chris Ball

Travelling up to Whitianga for the Music Festival bought to mind another song said to be  written in 1900 , by H A Cobbledick, Otautau. However the song could have been a sawmill anywhere in New Zealand for they were all very similar in people, community  and process. Tairua ( on Coromandel's Eastern Seaboard )  from 1864, saw  a sawmill of some size milling Kauri. Whitianga where the inaugural music festival was held, saw a sawmill established in 1863, also milling kauri.


Date taken from note accompanying H2011.16/17. Coastal view of Tairua township and mills. Blakeley family collection. Webb & Webb / Photographers Courtesy State Library Victoria, Australia http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/129299
Both places were close communities , bound by the fact that back then, travel to the mills were by sea, there being no roads. Mercury Bay sawmill was the headline topic of newspapers when electric light was introduced in the mill in 1883. Also in this year George Fraser of Fraser & Tinne bought invited guests aboard ss Rotomahana to Whitianga for the opening of a new upgraded mill and new machinery. Both Tairua and Whitianga mills were in full production into the 1900's.
                                                                                
SAWMILLING SONG.

The traffickers in Maori pine
Are a hardy lot of boys,
Who laugh and sing in rain or shine,
 And make their share of noise.
They are a right good sort, from bosses
Way down to cheeky Hoys and hosses
They work with a will from day to clay,
Content to sweat and pay their way.
Then work, boys, work, with right good cheer,
With muscle and brains the wood craft steer
Squirl, saw, squirl!
Buzz, planer, buzz Gee lip! Gee whaoo!

The business does.
Crosscuts and axes merrily ring
To the bushmen's gladsome lay,
Thro' the bush on- the "shoe" the logs they bring
To the skids by the trolley-way '
Midst flowers and blossom,
'mongst fern and creepers,
'Neath th' fragrant shade, the forest,
reapers Garner Zealandia's giant grain,
For their daily bread and a modest gain. (Refrain.)

The trolleyman guides th' spoil to the mill,
And th' benchmen eager spring
Upon the veteran slain with a will,
 Their cantliooks hurrying,
And wedges and pinchbars, till all is in readiness
For the breaking-down saw.
Here is no laziness
Full steam a-head, and th' log lies in twain,
For the breast saw to rip thro' again and again (Refrain.)

The sawyer guides unerringly His gauge with glittering eyes
 Cuts the best and the most from the forest tree,
No matter what its size! His tailer out" with prompt revision
Discreetly classes each division He gives the slahby the dross to clear,
And loads the trolley waiting near. (Refrain.)

Away to th' yard the trolleyman hies
With his all-sorts load from the mill!
No reins upon his horses wise,
But a brake to slow down hill;
And the yardman, in no mood to dally,
Docks, classes, and stacks, and --keeps the tally
 Day in, day out, with a very good grace
 Contentment's smile upon his face! (Refrain.)

 And so it is that red pine boards,
And white and black pine, too,
Are shipped in truck and waggon loads,
For to build a city new!
And kourai, miro, rata, totara.
With birch and other Zealandia flora
Some dressed by steam and some in the rough,
But all, like our men, straight, square, and tough!
Then work, boys, work, with right good cheer,
 With muscle and brains the wood craft steer.
Squirl, saw, squirl! Buzz, planer, buzz!
Gee up Gee whaoo I The business does. 

                  —H. A. COBBLEDICK. Otautau, October, 1900.
                     Otago Witness, 7 November 1900, Page 59


In Kirk, T. F.L.S. The Forest Flora of New Zealand. Wellington: Government Printers, 1889.
Before the sawmilling at Whitianga, it was  the felling of kauri for ship spars. In 1840 when HMs Buffalo was wrecked at  Mercury Bay, one Captain William Stewart was visiting his friend and business acquaintance Gordon Browne, at the time. Captain Stewart had just returned from piloting the  Ship HMS Herald  down South as far as Stewart Island/ Rakiura and helped rescue the crew and provisions of HMS Buffalo. Stewart was to pilot Bolina with the captain and crew
survivors from HMS Buffalo out of the local waters on its way to Auckland.

As well as a ship's pilot Stewart was known as a Sealer and Trader in the Southern Waters of Stewart / Rakiura Island and  the western bottom corner  of the South Island in the Sounds of New Zealand. 

Small Bay Stewart Island Rakiura in 2012 - photo Chris Ball

So too was Captain John Grono of the Governor Bligh. His rescue of marooned sealers from the brigantine Active  in the Sounds that led to one of the first Australasian Folk Songs. Ten men left behind and  rescued from their ordeal by Captain Grono on 27 November 1813 were:

David Loweriston
Alexander Book (Books)
Robert Robison (later known as Robert McKenzie)
James Anderson
John Waid (Ward)
William Jones
Frances Ferara (Francis Farrero)
John Cames (Camel/Campbell)
William Jackson
Bartholomew Vincent

One of the Sounds of the Western Corner of the South Island - Dusky Sound with Resolution in Centre Back - Photo JM Stewart 1985
Captain John Bader, Active , after dropping off the men in about  1810, with David Loweriston in charge. Captain Bader never returned  for them. Bader had taken the Active to Port Jackson, Sydney for further supplies and never been heard of again since that date.  Alexander Books and Robert McKenzie who were amongst the rescued men, became sons-in-law of Captain John Grono.

Seals in Halls Arm down in Sounds, South Island, New Zealand  in about 1970s - photo JM Stewart
 
David Lowston
 
My name is David Lowston, I did seal, I did seal,
 My name is David Lowston, I did seal.
 Though my men and I were lost,
 Though our very lives 'twould cost,
 We did seal, we did seal, we did seal.

'Twas in eighteen hundred and ten, we set sail, we set sail.
 'Twas in eighteen hundred and ten we set sail.
 We were left we gallant men,
 Never more to sail again,
 For to seal, for to seal, for to seal,

We were set down in Open Bay, were set down, were set down.
 We were set down in Open Bay, were set down.
 Upon the sixteenth day,
 Of Februar-aye-ay,
 For to seal, for to seal, for to seal.
Our Captain John Bedar, he set sail, he set sail.
 Yes, for Port Jackson he set sail.
 I'll return men without fail,
 But she foundered in a gale,
 And went down, and went down, and went down.

We cured ten thousand skins, for the fur, for the fur,
 Yes we cured ten thousand skins for the fur.
 Brackish water, putrid seal,
 We did all of us fall ill,
 For to die, for to die, for to die.
Now come all you lads who venture far from home, far from home
 Come all you lads who venture far from home
 Though the schooner Governor Bligh took on those who didn't die
 Never seal, never seal, never seal.

 So remember those who sail on the sea, on the sea
 Remember those who sail on the sea
 Where the icebergs tower high that's a pitiful place to die
 Never seal, never seal, never seal.
                                                    Anon.

Seals in Dusky Sound 1985 - Photo JM Stewart

There are a number of whaler and sealer songs. Along with many Sea shanties written in the days of those sailing ships. Songs and shanties helped seaman while they worked for life aboard was hard. For sealers and whalers often they were months in isolated places such as the Sounds of the South Island, New Zealand.

Serenity in Dusky Sound, South Island NZ 1985 - photo J M Stewart

Reference Source:
  • The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser , Sat 18 Dec 1813, Page 2 
  • MERCURY BAY TIMBER COMPANY. New Zealand Herald, 3 April 1883, Page 6
  • A SAWMILL LIGHTED WITH ELECTRICITY. Daily Telegraph ,14 September 1883, Page 3
  • SAWMILLING SONG. Otago Witness, 7 November 1900, Page 59
  • Ebenezer Church (1809) Newsletter No. 14: April 2013 http://www.ebenezerchurch.org.au/documents/newsletter14.pdf









Thursday 2 June 2016

Captain William W Stewart - pilot , sealer and trader

The Wreck of HMS Buffalo Heritage Board Buffalo Beach, Whitianga 2015 - photo courtesy Chris R Ball

When HMS Buffalo was wrecked on 28 July 1840 in Mercury Bay, Coromandel Peninsula, there also, were  Maori , Gordon Browne ( AKA Brown) of the timber camp and Captain William W Stewart. This Captain Stewart, was with a reputation for being  a ship's pilot in New Zealand waters. Both Browne and Stewart, were attributed with assisting Captain Wood  and  the crew of  HMS Buffalo, in the aftermath of the ship wreck.

This Captain William W Stewart is not to be confused with another  Captain James Stewart of the brig Elizabeth. Research has shown a number of writers through the one hundred seventy six years since 1840, have confused the two.

The name of this  Captain William W Stewart was said to be the source of  Stewart's Island being called this during the 1800 and 1900's. ( Now this island is referred to as  Stewart Island/Rakiura) This Captain Stewart was the first mate aboard the Pegasus in 1809 and chartered the waters around Pegasus Island ( renamed Codfish Island / Whenua Hou and designated a nature reserve in 1986 - today in 2016 known as the Whenua Hou Nature Reserve)
 
Stewart Island - Port  in 2012 - photo courtesy Chris R Ball

 
McNab, referring to this voyage of Pegasus one hundred years later in 1909 wrote "
" Leaving Hobart Town after this date, probably in July, she made across to the southern portion of New Zealand. We find in August, 1809, that she was under the command of Captain S. Chace, with Mr. William Stewart (after whom Stewart Island was named) as first officer. On the 7th of that month, when skirting along the southeast coast of Stewart Island, she fell in with a harbour, to which was given the name of Southern Port and into which she sailed, while Mr. Stewart took observations of the position, and made a chart of the harbour, showing the depths of water with great detail. The draft of the chart was forwarded to the editor of the “Oriental Navigator” and published by him in 1816." ( McNab 1909)
Captain William Stewart is said to have first arrived in Port Jackson, Sydney aboard the  brig Harrington in 1801. A  Messrs Chace and Co. owned vessel, this sealer had arrived from Calcutta, Captain William Campbell her Master.
 
Sydney two years before Captain Stewart arrived at Port Jackson in Sutherland, A , M.A & Sutherland G ,M.A. 1894. History of Australia and New Zealand . London: Longmans, Green and Co.https://archive.org/details/historyofaustral00suthiala
 
A search of Australian newspapers show that for those first few years, Captain William Stewart as master of Venus, Commerce, George Edwin, Cumberland  and Prince of Denmark.
 
 The support in 1824 of  English merchants, Thomas and David Asquith, for the establishment of a settlement at Stewart Island, saw this eventuate in June 1826. The Hobart Town Gazette wrote:
 
" Captain Stewart, of the ship Prince of Denmark, had also arrived from England and had commenced his settlement of his own or Stewart's island, which since the discoveries of Captain Cook was supposed to form the southern extremity  of Tavaipoenamboo, or the southern island,  but which Captain Stewart first discovered to be an extensive island separated from the main by a Strait of 20 miles." ( Hobart Town Gazette 10/06/1826)
 
Captain Stewart set up ship building at Pegasus with the sawyers and ship wrights who were the settlers. . Out of the enterprise was to come the  schooner Joseph Weller - the first vessel to be on the New Zealand Register.
It was also at this time that the Rosanna, Captain Herd carried a number of immigrants to the River Thames for settlement. The cargo on this voyage was also made up of sheep and cattle. On the voyage, Captain Herd called at Port Pegasus, Stewart Island briefly.
 
The settlement at Pegasus came to nothing and was abandoned. Just over a decade later ,  1840 was significant for a number of events occurring  in New Zealand. These events also involved Captain William Stewart by nature of place, occupation and disaster.
 
In January 1840, HMS Herald, Captain Nias,  was reported departing Port Jackson, Sydney for New Zealand, the new  Lieutenant  Governor of New Zealand, Captain Hobson  :-

" 19.-For New Zealand, H.M.S. Herald. Passengers-Captain Hobson, Lieutenant Governor of New Zealand, and family, Mr. Felton Matthew, Dr. Johnson, and Mr. Hustler." ( Australian Chronicle 21/01/1840).

It seems from newspaper accounts that Captain Hobson and Captain Nias had a number of heated arguments with each other on this voyage.

Captain Nias of HMS Herald  was to play a  part in both the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi 6 February 1840. Then subsequent voyages of HMS Herald down the coasts of New Zealand to Stewart's Island for Major Thomas Bunbury of the 80th Regiment to obtain signatures for the Treaty of Waitangi. Bunbury was commissioned by Governor Hobson who by  then was not feeling well. Some of Major Bunbury's 80th Regiment troops were sent to New Zealand aboard HMS Buffalo as military support also in February. Captain William W Stewart was also to play a part as pilot aboard HMS Herald for these voyages and in some instances witness to the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi.

Buick in " The Treaty of Waitangi" in 1914, wrote:-

"On the morning of April 28 the Herald left her anchorage in the outer harbour of the Bay of Islands, carrying with her Major Bunbury, commissioned to accept the signatures of the Southern chiefs ; Mr. Edward Marsh Williams engaged to act as interpreter, and a small company of marines whose presence it was thought would add somewhat to the impressiveness of the occasion." ( Buick, 1914, p167)
 
Edward Marsh Williams, interpreter,  was said to be son of the Reverend Henry Williams. This Mr. Williams is said to have revisited England in 1835 aboard HMS Buffalo. HMS Buffalo had arrived in April 1839,  on her third voyage to New Zealand waters to procure timber spars for the British Navy. This voyage bought HMS Buffalo further down the coast than Tutukaka and Ngunguru Bay in the 1837 voyage.  Down to the Eastern Seaboard coast of the Coromandel Peninsula - Mercury Bay at Whitianga and Te Karo ( today in 2016 sometimes referred to as Sailor's Grave) near Tairua.

 William W Stewart was said to have been visiting his friend and timber trade partner ,  Gordon Browne ( AKA Brown) at the Mercury Bay timber camp in 1840 - the timber camp established at Mercury Bay by Browne about 1838.Captain Dacre, who is said to have helped establish that timber camp had a deal of quality timber spars for HMS Buffalo who in the first half of 1840 was in these waters.
HMS Herald had proceeded to Coromandel from the Bay of islands, arriving on 30th February. Major Bunbury and Williams visited William Webster - an american who had set up a timber and trading station  at Whanganui Island on the Coromandel Harbour. Buick writes that Major Bunbury: 

"Hearing that the Scottish exile, Captain Stewart, the discoverer of the southern Island which bears his name, was at Mercury Bay, a special messenger was hurried off to him requesting that he would pilot the Herald in these waters, and likewise use his influence with the chiefs of Mercury Bay in the direction of securing their presence at the meeting, to both of which the sealer Captain gave a ready response." ( Buick, 1914, p168)

HMS Herald continued her journey South, reaching Akaroa, Banks Peninsula on 24th. Now accompanying Major Banbury,  were Edward Williams and Captain William Stewart.

Their skills as interpreters and acquantaince with the maori chiefs were said to be useful. Following Akaroa HMS Herald continued on down the Eastern Coast, of what is now known as the South Island of New Zealand, to Stewart Island / Rakiura.

Reference Source:
 
 
 
 
 

Tuesday 10 May 2016

Historic Bridge Kopu, near Thames NZ - opened 1928

Looking towards  toward the mouth of the Waihou River, the two bridges called Kopu and the town of Thames
photo courtesy Chris Ball 2015 

In wider family stories of the Waihou River Crossing to Thames from Turua are that of Lemuel Bagnall JP and his son Henry Carlton Bagnall married to Mary Morton Gorrie ( my 2nd cousin). Lemuel Bagnall Senior, a Member of Auckland Provincial Council (Thames) 1873 – 1876, former one-time Chairman of the Thames County Council, the Thames Harbour Board and later Mayor of Auckland 1910 – 1911 and member and Chairman of the Auckland Board of Education. Lemuel Bagnall Senior was no stranger to the construction of needed bridges, in his capacity on the various boards and council bodies. The newspapers of the time carry articles on the lobbying for adequate bridges. 
 
In The Cyclopaedia of New Zealand, Vol 2, Auckland Province. Christchurch: Cyclopaedia
Company Limited, 1902
Lemuel Bagnall Senior was Managing Director of the Sawmilling Company based at Turua – Bagnall & Sons. In the first decades of the 1900s, the sawmill closed and   pre-world war one, saw the introduction of farming. A first radiator dairy factory in New Zealand, installed at the Turua Estate, Thames, by Lemuel Bagnall Senior.

The first radiator dairy factory in New Zealand, erected on Messrs Bagnall Bros Turua estate, Thames
photo courtesy Auckland Libraries, AWNS-19021023-5-1 '
The method of crossing the Waihou in the Bagnall’s day, prior to the what is now called the Historic Kopu Bridge, was punt or ferry. The Waihou River was the method used for River Transport and shipping the means. A brother of Lemuel Bagnall Senior – Charles Louis Bagnall was lost to the Waihou river in 1883, as an outcome of a launch incident.

By 1918 both Lemuel John Bagnall senior and his eldest son Harold Carleton Bagnall were deceased. Neither were to see the opening of a bridge from Kopu  across the Waihou River to near Turua. Brother of Lemuel Bagnall Senior – Richard Wellington Bagnall continued the family tradition of Public Affairs involvement as a member and chairman of the County Council. He would have seen the opening of the Hauraki Bridge 11 May 1928 - a swing span bridge to allow river vessels to journey on  up the Waihou river.

          Red Letter Day - Opening of Hauraki Bridge 11 May 1928
                Papers Past National Library NZ
           New Zealand Herald , 12 May 1 928 , Page 8

The New Zealand Herald 19 January 1926, reported the naming of the Waihou Bridge.(Many of the then residents of the area in 1926 were pleased with the bridge being named the Hauraki Bridge. They saw as a commemoration to the deeds of the members of the 6th Hauraki Regiment during WW1. (one of these - ours losing their life was Captain Colvin Stewart Algie). Many names for the bridge had been mooted.

By 1932 when Richard Wellington Bagnall died, painting of the new Hauraki Bridge was mooted. By then it had also become a route, not just to get to Thames, but further up the Coromandel Peninsula. With the opening of the Kopu Hikuai Highway came a more accessible route to the Eastern Seaboard of the Coromandel Peninsula. A new bridge opened in 2011.

Historic and new side by side across the Waihou River -  now called Historic Kopu Bridge and new Kopu Bridge
Photo courtesy  Chris Ball 2013 
Reference Source:
  • The Cyclopaedia of New Zealand, Vol 2, Auckland Province. Christchurch: Cyclopaedia Company Limited, 1902. – Lemuel Bagnall Snr. And Harold Carleton Bagnall
  • NZBDM – New Zealand Births, Deaths, Marriages
  • ACCIDENTS AND INQUESTS. New Zealand Herald, 18 June 1883, Page 3
  • WAIHOU RIVER BRIDGE. New Zealand Herald, , 19 January 1926, Page 10
  • New Zealand Herald, Hauraki Bridge, 12 May 1928, page 8