EARLY SETTLERS

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 191, 9 May 1940, Page 5

EARLY SETTLERS

Further Biographical Notes Family records supplied by members of the New Zealand Founders’ Society are producing some interesting history. Following is a further list of biographical details. .Mrs. Pearl F. Dalziell, Wellington, is descended from John and Henrietta Charlotte Johnston, who arrived at Wellington by the ship Prince of Wales in 18-12. John Johnston was a member of the Wellington .Legislative Council. The ancestors of Miss Edna J. B. Danby were early arrivals in Wellington, coming by the Birman in 1842. Thomas Waters, one of them, was a promoter and lirst chairman of the Wanganui Steam Navigation Co. An ancestor of Nirs. Harry Davis, Island Bay, was James Johnstone, who came from Edinburgh lirst to Tasmania and later to Lyttelton, landing there in 1850. He was brought out specially by Captain Thomas, surveyor to the Canterbury Association, to supervise the building of the emigration barracks in Canterbury, before the arrival of the Canterbury Pilgrims. One ancestor of Mrs. Evelyn Mary de Moutalk, Paraparaumu, was George Eliot Eliot, who arrived at the Bay of Islands in 1840. Another was Charles Alfred St. George Hickson, who arrived with his parents, Captain John Hickson and Mrs. Hickson, at Auckland in the ship Anne in 1848. For many years he was Secretary of Stamps, Wellington. Of the late Mr. Eliot it is recorded that, during the Maori wars, he went to Sydney where he raised a volunteer force, which he commanded and brought to Auckland. A sister of the first president of the Founders’ Society (Mr. Cheviot Bell) is Mrs. Violet C. Denniston, Collegiate School, Wanganui. Her father was the late Sir Francis Bell and her grandfather the first Sir Francis Dillon Bell, who arrived at Wellington by the Ursula in 1843. Her paternal grandmother was Margaret Hort. third daughter of Abraham Hort, who came to Wellington aboard the Oriental in 1840. The part played by the Bell family in the history of New Zealand is well known. Coming from Scotland, Simon and Agnes Hossack arrived in Lyttelton in the early days of the Canterbury settlement. One of their descendants is Mrs. Jessie M. Devine, Wellington.

The pioneer ancestors of Mr. M. H. Donald and Miss Ida M. Donald, Wai; pukurau, Robert.and Jane Donald, emigrated from Scotland to Lyttelton, arriving there in the Travancore in the very early days of that settlement. A ve,ry early arrival in Nelson was John Gillett, grandfather of Mr. R. A. Douglas, Otaki. An uncle of Mr. Douglas, John Gillett, jun., was one of the first white children born in the 'district of Takaka, Nelson. A reminder of the early sea service between Wellington and-Napler is given by the family history of Mr. F. J. Douglass, Napier. His grandfather, Fredrie Adolphus Douglass, master mariner, came from Sweden, landing in Lyttelton in 1851. from the Labuan. Between 1853 and 1856 he was master of the schooner Salopean, which inaugurated the first regular shipping service between the ports of Wellington and Napier. Among the arrivals in Wellington’s first emigrant ship were Thomas John Drake, his wife, Selina, and their sou, Arthur. The son later became well known in local body affairs in the Horowhenua district., Thomas Drake was a clerk in a Loridon bank when he decided to emigrate. In the land ballot for Wellington be drew the town acre where the Wellington Club now stands. He planted many trees there. For many years this area was known as Drake's Acre till he sold it for the site of a gentlemen’s club. He afterward took up land in Johnsonville. Two of his grandchildren are Mr, I. N. Drake, ■Manakau, and Miss Loeta Constance Drake, also of Manakau.