EIGHTY-FIVE YEARS AGO

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26620, 17 November 1947, Page 4

EIGHTY-FIVE YEARS AGO

FROM THE FILES OF THE ©tago Bail? ZTtmes

DUNEDIN, NOVEMBER 17, 1862 The Daily Times reports that £6OO had been forwarded to London from Otago to assist the cotton workers in Lancashire and that there was £56 7s 5d in hand.

Tenders are being called .by the province of Southland from parties willing to run a steamer every month for a period of six months, or more if agreed on, from Melbourne direct to the Port of Invercargill, carrying her Majesty’s mails. “The steamer will be bound to leave Melbourne within 18 hours after the arrival of the English mail and to make the Port of Invercargill the first of arrival.”

It is announced that the share list of the New Zealand Steam Navigation Company, Ltd., will be closed on December 31, after which a preference will be given to shareholders in the allotment of shares then unsold. “Upwards of 3000 shares have been already applied for.” The capital of the company is £50,800 in 5000 shares of £lO each. “Orders have been transmitted to England by present mail for two powerful screw steamers of about 400 tons builders' measurement, and it is proposed to send orders home for further vessels in the course of a few months to meet the increasing requirements of the New Zealand trade.” The principal office of the company is Wellington.

In its summary for England, the New Zealand Advertiser (Wellington), under the heading of Otago, pays the following tribute to the position held by the province:—“ This province has snot now far ahead of all others. , Its population will soon be equal to that of the whole North Island. Its goldfields are as productive as any in the world, and the last escort brought down nearly 16,0000 z. It has a firstrate superintendent in the person of Major Richardson. ... At Dunedin two daily papers are published, .though a few years ago it could not support a single weekly one, and the Times has a paid correspondent in every considerable place throughout the colony.”

“We believe the Separation Committee is coming to life again. It sees in the present condition of affairs unanswerable arguments for separation, and it hopes that the local jealousies which have interfered to prevent that amount of union between the provinces which was a necessary condition to success will now be merged in the common danger."

Writing from Umbrella Gully (near the Nevis Stream, and about 22 miles from the Dunstan), a miner gives the following quotation of prices:—Flour lOd per lb (a week back 15d to 18d). sugar 2s, coffee 3s 6d, tea 5s (very bad), candles 3s, soap 3s, oameal Is 9d, salt 3s, long-handled shovels 20s each, picks and tin buckets, not to be had; long pick handles 6s each, very scarce. This miner had a very high opinion of the Nevis'district as a goldbearing region, there being gold for 25 miles up the Nevis Stream.

“On Saturday afternoon a violent assault was made on one of the warders at the gaol by Henry Garrett, who is at present undergoing sentence for highway robbery." The Daily Times reports that a few days previously a warder named Flannery had reported Garrett, and he was punished for disobedience of orders. On the Saturday Garrett rushed Flannerv and delivered several kicks and blows and “made a desperate attempt to gouge out the eyes of his opponent.” The sentry on the gallery fired his rifle to sound an alarm, and Garrett was soon firmly secured.