THE EARLY DAYS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXV, Issue 31, 8 February 1915, Page 7

THE EARLY DAYS.

THE ESTABLISHMENT OF NEL- | SON. Deferring to the recently-held provincial settlement anniversary celebrations the “Lyttelton Times” remarks that Nelson comes fourth in the list in the order of establishment, and goes on to say: It is interesting to Canterbury people to remember that the Wakefields originally contemplated setting up the second settlement of the New Zealand company in the neighbourhood of Port Cooper, as Lyttelton Harbor was then known, but Governor Hobson in 1841 raised strong opposition to the establishment of another colony so far south. The South Island was then of course unpeopled by white men except at the rough whaling stations, and in the new-born Anglo-French settlement at Akaroa, .By this time the company’s second expedition had reached Port Nicholson from England, under charge of Captain Arthur Wakefield, brother of Efhvard Gibbon Wakefield, and most, of the passengers seemed to have been under the impression that they were to be set ashore in Port Cooper. The expedition consisted of three vessels, the barque Whitby ( 187 tons), Captain Lacey; the'barque Will Watch (215 tons), Captain Walker; and the brig Arrow (200 tons), Captain Gear, Strangely small the tonnage of these pioneer craft of the nation-makers reads to-day. The New Zealand Company’s agents at Wellington, wore uncertain as to how they should dispose of the new arrivals, constituting complete headquarters for an independent settlement. At last, as a compromise. Captain Wakefield decided that an area of land purchased by Colonel William Wakefield at Blind Bay would be. a suitable locality. Even then Governor Hobson opposed the proposal, announcing that none of the New Zealand Company’s land titles would be acknowledged outside the original block of 110,000 acres around Port Nicholson. As to the Blind Bay proposal, he specifically warned Colonel Wakefield that the lands in the vicinity were claimed by many Natives other than those from whom it had been purchased by the company. The terms of purchase arc indicated by Wakefield’s boast that he got a million acres in the South Island from Te Hauparaha for loss than £SO worth of goods. However, the Blind Bay Settlement idea was carried out. Captain Wakefield and his three ships sailed across the strait and into Blind Bay, and the pilot. Mr Cross, took a boat and discovered’ the beautifullysheltered inlet of Wakatu, with the long natural breakwater of the Boulder Bank guarding it rom the sea. There the pioneer officials, surveyors, and other employees and some settlors pitched their tents, and the Maoris built whares for them, and so the infant town of Nelson came into being It was (in February 1, 1842, that the first immigrant ship, the Fifeshire, a vessel of 557 tons; cast anchor off the canvas and thatch settlement and the date of her arrival has ever since been celebrated as the, anniversary of tintow n and province. It was a busy time for transformed Wakatu,, that first year of-white settlemeent, for it is recorded that between November, 1841, and July, 1842, as many as sixtyseven vessels of various rigs and sizes worked their way into the Wakatu haven. It is worth recalling also,that journalism made its influence felt ver\ early in Nelson’s life, for a printing plant was brought out in one of the first ships and the first number of the Examiner was issued on March 12, 1812. This enterprising newspaper of long ago was published weekly at a shilling a number.