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Title: From age to age : the story of the Church of England in the Diocese of Wellington, 1858-1958
Author: Monaghan, H. W. (Harold Wyatt)
Published: Standing Committee of the Diocese of Wellington, Wellington, N.Z., 1957
The Diocese of Wellington
FROM AGE TO AGE
The story of the Church of England in the Diocese of Wellington 1858 - 1958
by H. W. MONAGHAN
PUBLISHED BY THE STANDING COMMITTEE OF THE DIOCESE OF WELLINGTON NEW ZEALAND
First published November 1957
PRINTED BY WRIGHT A CARMAN LIMITED, WELLINGTON
To the Memory of Octavius Hadfield
CONTENTS
Foreword page xi
Introduction xiii
Acknowledgments xv
Part I—The Missionary Period
1. In the Beginning 1
2. The Maori and the Missionary 9
3. Richard Taylor 18
4. Waikanae and Otaki 26
5. The Archdeacon of Kapiti 36
6. The First and Only Bishop of New Zealand 42
7. The Constitution 51
8. Pioneer Days in Wellington 58
Part 2—The Bishops
9. Charles John Abraham 73
10. Octavius Hadfield 78
11. Frederic Wallis 87
12. Thomas Henry Sprott 101
13. Herbert St. Barbe Holland 114
14. Reginald Herbert Owen 121
15. Retrospect 131
Part 3—Diocesan Organisations
16. Diocesan Organisations 139
The Mothers’ Union - C.E.M.S. - Lay Readers
17. The Social Service Work of the Diocese 144
The G.F.S. - St. Mary’s Guild - The City Mission - The Missions to Seamen
vii
viii
CONTENTS
18. The Educational Work of the Church 153
The Sunday Schools - The Anglican Bible Class Union - The Youth Council - The Church Schools Board - Our Secondary Schools - The Wanganui Collegiate School - Hadfield Scholarships - The Church and the University - Our relations with other Churches
19. Diocesan Finance 166
Diocesan Office - The Maori Educational Trust
20. The Missionary Work of the Diocese 174
The Missionary Committee - The Maori Mission - The Chinese Mission
Part 4 —The Clergy and the Parishes 181
Archdeacons - Chancellors - The Maori Mission - Parishes and Parochial Districts
Part 5—The Hadfield Journal 225
Bibliography 244
Index 245
ILLUSTRATIONS
The Diocese of Wc 11 ington Frontispiece
The Right Reverend Charles John Abraham facing page 1
The Right Reverend Octavius Hadfield 66
The Right Reverend Frederic Wallis 82
The Right Reverend Thomas Henry Sprott 98
The Right Reverend Herbert St. Barbe Holland 114
The Most Reverend Reginald Herbert Owen 130
The Rev. Richard Taylor 146
Archdeacon Thomas Fancourt 146
The Right Reverend Eric John Rich 147
St. Peter’s Church 147
St. Paul’s Cathedral Church 162
The High Altar of All Saints’, Palmerston North 162
St. Mary the Virgin, Nireaha 163
St. John’s, Feilding 163
Decorative Work, St. Paul’s, Putiki 178
The Altar, Rangiatea 178
Wanganui, 1844 179
St. Mary’s, Levin, 1956 179
Old Bishopscourt 179
St. James, Lower Hutt 194
St. Mary’s, Karori 194
IX
ILLUSTRATIONS
15
Private Chapel, Moawhango, Taihape 195
Christchurch, Taita '95
Christchurch, Wanganui 210
St. John’s, Tutu Totara 210
St. George’s, Patea 211
St, Mary’s, Hawera 211
FOREWORD
When we see something good, let us praise it. I believe that all who read this book will agree that here is something very good and will wish to praise it. This foreword gives me the opportunity on behalf of the Wellington Diocese publicly to express gratitude to Archdeacon Monaghan, the writer of this book.
What patient research is evident here, what scholarship, what knowledge, and what a happy, easy English style. Archdeacon Monaghan is both shrewd and kindly when he deals with individuals and he is generous in his judgments. He throws fresh light upon Bishop Hadfield and upon the greatness of his work and influence. He includes in this book a part of Hadfield’s Journal which appears in print for the first time.
When we look back on the first 100 years of the Wellington Diocese we see much in its history for which we thank God. Our heritage is good, but only by the grace of God can we walk worthily of that heritage.
This book, a noble contribution to the Centenary Year 1958, will be a lasting possession for the Diocese of Wellington. I speak for our clergy and laity when I ask Archdeacon Monaghan to accept our warm congratulations and our sincere thanks.
Reginald New Zealand,
Primate and Archbishop of New Zealand,
Bishop of Wellington.
Bishopscourt.
Wellington.
August, 1957
16
INTRODUCTION
In his book on the literature of the Sixteenth Century Dr C. S. Lewis describes the prose writing of that period as “clumsy, monotonous, garrulous . . . nothing is light or tender or fresh. All the authors write like elderly men”. This opinion fills me with misgiving as I set forth to write this book. It suggests a handicap which the writer cannot escape and probably cannot expect to overcome.
Many years ago, browsing in the Victoria College library, I came across a passage in a book of philosophy which I have never forgotten. The writer said that while it is always necessary that the heads of the prophets should be above the heads of the people they should never be too far above. Every good teacher, speaker, or author knows that he must never lose sight of those to whom he is speaking or writing. Therefore let me make it clear at the outset that I am not writing this book for the scholars and doctors of the Church but for what the New Testament calls “the common people”: the men and women, young and old, whom I have met so often at the services in our churches. I can see amongst them that faithful member of the Mothers’ Union who is seldom absent; there are those two business men who have given long years of service on the vestry: that young lad who cannot make up his mind about his vocation to the ministry: those two young women who teach in Sunday School: a doctor who never misses an early celebration: and there is someone present whom I must certainly not forget. He is a lawyer who represents the parish at synod and as I tell the story he has a notebook in his hands and he is obviously going to see that there shall be no nonsense about this history: he will check up the dates and figures in the story. I must
xiii
INTRODUCTION
19
never forget that he is there or else half the value of the book will be lost. These are the people and all others like them for whom I write this history.
I entertain the hope that this book will do something to correct some faulty perspective which seems to me to mar the picture already painted of the early church in New Zealand. The mission in the north and the northern missionaries have been given the pre-eminence which always belongs to the founders of a work. Their heroism in those first days, their ability and devotion, make them worthy of all the praise they have received, but these men were not the only founders of the missionary church in New Zealand. The work of the men in the South was just as heroic, just as able, just as devoted and just as successful as the work of the men in the north. There were no greater missionaries, abler scholars or more devoted servants of the early church in this country than Hadfield of Otaki and Taylor of Wanganui.
If you have ever travelled southward by rail from Christchurch probably you have been conscious of the monotony of the first part of the journey. The vista of the Plains is shut off by long miles of shelter hedges and you cannot get a view of the snow clad mountain range in the background. But later on the hedges thin out and you get glimpses of the Alps. As you read this story your journey will pass through many monotonous pages hedged in by the humdrum everyday doings which make up so much of life of the Church, but there is reason to hope that sometimes the glory of the mountains will break through and your soul will rejoice in the knowledge that this is your church, your diocese, your spiritual home. One more fact I wish to place on record. In the course of the telling of this story I shall have to try and appreciate the work and characters of many men the latchet of whose shoes I should not have been worthy to unloose.
H. W. Monaghan
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I express my thanks and acknowledge my indebtedness to all who helped in the writing of this book. First and foremost to the late Miss Amy Hadfield, who up to the time of her death in 1956 took the greatest interest in this history. She was the last surviving child of Bishop Hadfield. I was able to visit her at Marton and she gave me permission to print the Hadfield Journal, the only part of it which has ever appeared in print. She has placed the original document for safe keeping in the Wellington Public Library. She also, together with Mr A. Marshall, gave me permission to use the unpublished biography of the Bishop written by Mr R. G. C. McNab, which at the same time she gave to the Diocese and which is now in the care of the Turnbull Library.
Most of all I am indebted to Mr S. T. C. Sprott, the Diocesan Secretary, who from the beginning has been most generous in giving his help in many ways. He has made many most helpful suggestions and corrected many mistakes. The sections on Diocesan Finance and the Maori Educational Trusts are entirely his work.
I acknowledge with thanks the research work in the files of the early newspapers done by Mr A. E. Monaghan and to the clergy who contributed to the parish histories and photographs.
The late Mr F. J. Carter, who was for so many years, Diocesan Treasurer, took a great interest in the work and gave much help in preparing the clergy lists. Archdeacon G. M. McKenzie gave much time in seeing the book through the press and my wife and Canon J. C. Davies
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
21
undertook the proof reading and compilation of the index. Finally our thanks are due to our printers, Messrs Wright and Carman Ltd., for their assistance and patient courtesy in the making of the book.
H. W. Monaghan
Part 1
THE MISSIONARY PERIOD
The Right Reverend Charles John Abraham
Chapter 1
IN THE BEGINNING
One windy day in November 1839 a small ship named Columbine beat up against a northerly gale through the entrance and dropped anchor in Port Nicholson. It had sailed down the East Coast from Paihia in the Bay of Islands and it carried on board two C.M.S. missionaries, Henry Williams, and his colleague, a sickly young man named Octavius Hadfield. It had been their intention to go through Cook Strait and on up to Kapiti, but the force of the gale and perhaps a little natural curiosity made them alter their course and seek shelter in what was to them an unknown harbour. That day saw the beginning of Missionary enterprise and the work of the Church of England in what is now known as the Diocese of Wellington.
Every picture needs a background but, as the art master said, the essential thing about a background is that it be kept back. The story of the beginning of the C.M.S. Mission in the far North has been told so often and so well that the barest outline, to refresh our memory, is all that is required for this essay.
After the passing visits of Captain Cook the first contact the Maori people made with Europeans was through the whalers and traders who visited the islands and established stations for their wild enterprises at various points around the New Zealand coast. Some of the more enterprising of the natives made passages on these ships to Australia and a few ventured as far as England.
That is how Samuel Marsden first became interested in the Maori people. He was a Government Chaplain
1
27
FROM AGE TO AGE
stationed at Parramatta near Sydney and many Maoris found a warm welcome there. He erected shelters for them in the Parsonage grounds and at one time had as many as thirty staying with him.
When he visited England in 1807 he succeeded in interesting the Church Missionary Society, then in its infancy, in a mission to the Maori people in New Zealand, and brought back with him two artisan missionaries, William Hall and John King. After the ship had sailed he found on board a young Maori of rangatira rank, named Ruatara. This young Maori was in a pitiable condition, sick nigh unto death, and his sickness had been caused mainly by the ill treatment he had received at the hands of various shipmasters. Marsden nursed the young man back to health and made a firm friend of him. Ruatara is a name worthy of lasting remembrance for it was he who made the opening for missionary enterprise in New Zealand.
On arrival at Sydney Marsden’s plans were delayed by news of the massacre of the Boyd and it was not till near the end of 1814 that he found himself off the coast of New Zealand in his little ship of 1 10 tons named Active.
Having first courageously made peace with the natives responsible for the massacre of the Boyd he moved on to the Bay of Islands where his friend Ruatara had everything and everybody ready for a church service on Sunday. Christmas Day, 1814. The first Christian service in New Zealand began with the Old Hundredth Psalm and Marsden preached the first sermon to the Maori people from the text “Behold I bring you glad tidings of great joy.” Ruatara did his best to interpret his friends’s words to his fellow-countrymen.
Hall. King and a third layman named Thomas Kendall were left behind to establish the station. Ruatara died soon after Marsden left and the lay-missionaries were faced with a difficult task. They would not trade firearms or tobacco with the natives, as the whalers did, and as a
IN THE BEGINNING
28
result they were subjected to many annoyances, which threatened to become serious. But the real trouble came later. In 1820 the war chief of the Ngapuhi, named Hongi, accompanied by Kendall, visited England. The story of that unhappy visit is well known. Kendall was ordained and Hongi was received by the King. When they returned to Sydney Hongi traded many of the fine presents he had received for arms and ammunition and returned to his own country with plans for bloody conquest of the unarmed tribes.
Having wiped out the great Mokoia Pa (where part of Auckland is today) he returned from his southern campaign to the Bay of Islands with 2.000 prisoners of war and a host of warriors with their blood-lust quickened. It looked as if the Mission was threatened with extinction, but Hongi had seen that in England the Church held an honoured place under the protection of the Crown, and he extended his protection, as far as he was able, over the C.M.S. Station. But the work of ten years was wiped out. Then came Henry Williams.
When he arrived in New Zealand he was thirty one years of age; he had seen active service in the Royal Navy and had resigned his commission to be ordained and undertake missionary work. When he arrived he was in priest’s orders.
Much has been written about Henry Williams. He stands out at the head of the story —a man of sincere Christian piety ready for any sacrifice in the missionary cause; courageous and possessed of great physical strength: a leader of men with a very practical outlook on life, the Maoris at once recognised him as a “rangatira” and a man after their own heart and he won an influence over them unequalled by all. save one. of his fellow missionaries. He saw no harm in buying land at a fair price, as prices went in those days, and when the Society later called on him to hand over his land he refused to do so, and was dismissed from the C.M.S, but was restored later.
A. 2
29
FROM AGE TO AGE
Henry Williams arrived in 1823 and three years afterwards he was joined by his brother William, a graduate of Oxford who, with Archdeacon R. Maunsell, undertook so successfully the work of translation and printing on the Mission Press. When the whole of the New Testament was printed in Maori in 1835-36 the first edition of 5,000 copies was soon exhausted and a further 10,000 copies had to be ordered at once. In the same year 3,000 copies of the Maori version of Morning and Evening Prayer were printed and a further 30,000 copies became immediately necessary.
Henry Williams soon established schools and the Maoris crowded to learn to read in their own language. There were many Maoris belonging to southern tribes living at Paihia who had originally been brought there by Hongi’s war parties and many of these, when the influence of the Mission had procured their release, drifted back to their home tribes taking with them the books and teaching they had received at the Mission schools. Williams built a little ship of 60 tons which he called Herald and when he first travelled southwards down the East Coast he found that many of the natives who had never seen a white missionary already had a knowledge of the Gospel and the Church services. So before long schools were established at Tauranga, Rotorua, Waiapu (near where Gisborne is today) and at the Waikato Heads.
When Marsden paid his last visit to this country he found everywhere evidence of success which rejoiced his heart. It should ever be remembered that Marsden held no transient interest in the evangelisation of this country. We all remember the scene of that first service on Christmas Day 1814 and then we are inclined to leave his memory framed in that lifeless portrait in the National Gallery in Wellington.
In reality Marsden was a great Christian priest with an ardent love of the Maori people burning in his heart. If we see him often salting barrels of fish or loading kauri
30
IN THE BEGINNING
logs aboard his little ship, it is not because his interests were in trade, but because he had to find funds to finance his voyages and also because the authorities in Sydney who gave him leave of absence, were more interested in the tally of his cargoes than in his tale of the Mission.
He paid in all seven visits to New Zealand; on one of them he came as far south as Cloudy Bay, but he did not visit Wellington.
His last visit was a triumphal progress. He was then over seventy, aged beyond his years, and very near the end of his life. The Maoris carried him from place to place on a litter, and everywhere he visited, crowds came together to pay a last tribute to their old friend. So Marsden passes from the story: this great hearted missionary; this godly, humble man who sought no reward, aspired to no honour, save that so readily bestowed upon him, “The Apostle of the Maori People.”
Shortly after Marsden’s departure the Bishop of Australia, Bishop Broughton, visited the Mission. Unfortunately the visit was spoilt by an epidemic of influenza but one act concerns us nearly. The Bishop held the first ordination in New Zealand, and the candidate who was admitted to priest’s orders was the deacon Octavius Hadfield, who had accompanied the Bishop from Australia. This young man was an undergraduate of Oxford who came to Australia to be ordained deacon. He was still an invalid, but he resolved to dedicate what might be left to him of life, to missionary work in New Zealand. After his ordination the call to work soon came. This is how it happened. A young slave named Ripahau had been taken into the Mission school at Paihia. He left the Bay with a war party for Rotorua and instead of returning to Paihia went south and eventually turned up at Otaki. The life of the natives at Otaki was dominated by the great war-chief, Te Rauparaha. News of what was going on up in the north had reached these parts and many of the younger people must have been very eager to know more
6
FROM AGE TO AGE
of the new teaching, and particularly to learn the new art of reading.
When Ripahau arrived at Otaki two young men of high rank. Tamihana, a son of Te Rauparaha, and his cousin Tc Whi-Whi. made friends with Ripahau and at last persuaded him to teach them to read. He had brought with him a copy of the Book of Common Prayer and a tattered copy of the Gospel according to St. Luke, which had a very romantic history. With these scant materials they set to work. That shrewd old warrior Te Rauparaha was not at all sure that he wanted anything to do with these new missionary pakehas or with this new teaching, so to secure themselves from any interference, Tamihana, Te Whi-Whi and one or two of their companions, took their teacher over from the mainland to the island of Kapiti. the old fortress stronghold of the Ngati Toa, and Jones's whaling station, and there set to work seriously. “We learnt every day, every night. Wc sat at night in the hut. all round the fire in the middle. Whi-Whi had part of the book and 1 part. Sometimes we went to sleep on the book, then woke up and read again. After we had been there six months we could read a little very slowly.” These are the words of the young chief. Tamihana. himself.
The next time you top the hill at Pukerua Bay and Kapiti comes into view, picture to yourself this scene. Two young Maori warriors, sitting in the flickering fire light in a hut, learning, as little children used to do, their alphabet: picking out each syllable slowly forming each word of those immortal stories from the “most beautiful book in the world.” “What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it.”
They hesitated no longer but set off in a ship bound north, and circumventing Te Rauparaha’s schemes to prevent them, they reached Paihia safely and lost no time in beseeching Henry Williams to come and seek the sheep
IN THE BEGINNING
32
in the south, who were lost indeed. Henry Williams was greatly impressed by the earnestness and perseverance of these young men but he had to tell them that he could not come. His large land investments anchored him for the rest of his life in the north. They visited William Williams at Keri-Keri and told their tale again. This time young Hadtield was listening but he could not follow all that was said. When it was explained to him he volunteered, in spite of his ill health, to pack up and go with them.
That is how Octavius Hadfield came to be aboard that little ship which put into Port Nicholson that November day in 1839.
During their short visit to Wellington they visited several pas around the harbour and distributed literature. As he went round he found that Colonel Wakefield, the advance agent of the New Zealand Company, had made a signed agreement with six chiefs who represented the tribes around the harbour, for the purchase of all land with reservations of one tenth for the Maoris. There was some dissatisfaction amongst some of the tribes about the sales and more especially about the distribution of the goods which constituted the price. Then Henry Williams did a very unwise thing. He met a Maori named Richard who had been not a very satisfactory scholar in his school in the north. This man offered to sell Williams 60 acres of land in what is now the heart of the city of Wellington. Williams drew up an agreement with Richard for the sale of the land for Mission purposes and Hadfield in his diary records witnessing the agreement. But of course this land had already been sold to the New Zealand Company by the tribal l chiefs. As we shall see later this deal of Henry Williams caused great trouble.
The weather continued unfavourable and after another unsuccessful attempt to sail through Cook Strait the little Columbine returned to Port Nicholson and the two missionaries decided to travel overland to Otaki. Hadfield
FROM AGE TO AGE
was in very bad shape and it took them four days, travelling along bush tracks and the beaches, to reach Waikanae.
The story of their reception, of Williams’ journey up the Wanganui river, and his return to the far north through the middle of the Island is told elsewhere. The reputation of Te Wiremu had preceded him and doubtless the tribes at Otaki and Waikanae were disappointed that the great pakeha rangatira could not stay with them but left with them only this weak and sickly looking young man.
Little did they know that their missioner was to become the greatest of them all.
33
Chapter 2
THE MAORI AND THE MISSIONARY
Hadfield and henry williams arrived at Waikanae on November 18th. 1839, and on the next day they paid a ceremonial visit to the great chief Te Rauparaha, who was living on the island of Kapiti or on one of the small islands near its eastern shore. In Hadfield’s journal we read: “He was sitting in state ready to receive us. He certainly looked more like a chief than any man I have yet seen. He listened attentively to what was said, and appeared much interested in the Gospel message. He has been one of the most bloodthirsty men in the land; may the Lord have mercy upon him. We had prayers with him and the natives there and went on board the Atlas, Captain Matthew’s ship, for the night, being invited by him.”
It will be helpful in understanding much of what follows if we make a brief study of the life and character of this chief Te Rauparaha. Consider him as he sat there that day to receive the Missionaries and the contrast between the background of the old warrior’s life and the upbringing and character of the sickly looking missionary who stood before him.
The Maori people whom the early missionaries came to win were very different from the people we know today. In the period which this part of our story covers the history of the West Coast tribes from Waitara to Wairau was dominated by the life of one man. this chief Te Rauparaha. It is necessary to know something of his story. He was born in 1770 and was therefore nearly seventy years of age when Hadfield first met him. If we knew the full story
9
35
FROM AGE TO AGE
of that old man’s life we should be able to appreciate better the great difficulties the missionaries had to face and the measure of success they achieved.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century the Maori population was probably about 200,000, distributed unevenly about the country. The warmer climate made Northland, the Waikato, Rotorua, Poverty Bay, Waiapu and the Manawatu the most favoured areas of population. The first contact they made with European civilisation came through the establishment of whaling stations and the visits of shipmasters eagerly seeking the great Kauri timbers of the Northland. The Maoris soon earned the reputation of being a savage, warlike, shrewd people with whom it was not safe to take liberties. Samuel Marsden was probably the first man to discover the finer and nobler qualities beneath the outward savagery.
They certainly were much given to intertribal warfare. In his book New Zealand Past and Present, Richard Taylor described the original state of the Maori race throughout the length and breadth of New Zealand as “killing and being killed. Never satisfied, a restless race, always longing to deprive one another of what either possessed and the other wanted to have. To the stronger belonged the wives, the goods, and the body of the weaker. As far as outward form went, a noble race, bold in battle, shrewd in council, skilful in execution.” Polygamy was common and no disgrace attached to the immorality of unmarried women. It naturally followed, that although the Maoris have always been indulgently fond of their children, in those days infanticide was common. Slaves were brought back in great numbers from successful campaigns and their lives were in the hands of their captors who too often regarded them as store fodder for their cannibalistic feasts. “No more convincing proof is required of the frequencies of this practice,” writes Richard Taylor, “than the old Maori middens; there, amongst the heaps of shells and bones of birds and fish, are the charred fragments of human bones.
n
MAORI AND MISSIONARY
and, along the entire length of New Zealand's shores similar hillocks are to be seen standing forth in strong relief to the surrounding sandhills as so many monuments of bygone barbarism and cruelty.” In quite recent years such middens were visible on Makara beach near Wellington.
Before the advent of the white man all the fighting was hand to hand combat. This placed a premium on personal courage, physical strength, skill and endurance. Palisaded and deeply trenched pas gave considerable protection against attack and the total casualties in such warfare were comparatively light. The introduction of firearms revolutionised Maori warfare and those who supplied the arms and ammunition must be held largely responsible for the terrible bloodshed of the early decades of last century.
In 1820 the Ngapuhi chief Hongi. having obtained a supply of firearms and ammunition, started a campaign of devastation and bloodshed amongst the tribes in the north and then carried his attacks southwards to the East Cape and the Waikato. Te Rauparaha, an inferior chief of the Ngati Toa tribe which lived around Kawhia, seized the leadership of the Ngati Toa and, sensing the menace of the great northern tribes, formed an alliance with three other chiefs to lead a war party of 1,000 warriors to the south. They fought their way southwards through Taranaki, Rangitikei, Manawatu and the Wairarapa. Te Rauparaha saw at once the possibilities of the island of Kapiti as a centre for future operations and he readily agreed with his fellow chiefs to remove his tribe from the north. This famous heke—emigration) —began in 1821. It was a big undertaking done in stages with a long stay with the Ngati Awa at Waitara. The main tribes in the south to be dispossessed were the Ngati Apa, the Rangitane and the Muaupoko. The Muaupoko were unwise enough to perpetrate an act of treachery on the invaders in which some of Te Rauparaha’s wives and his eldest son were
37
FROM AGE TO AGE
killed. He never forgave or forgot it as the unfortunate Muaupoko found to their sorrow. He soon made himself master of the mainland and in 1823 occupied Kapiti. He was wise enough to see that if he was to hold this territory he would need allies so he persuaded large parties of the Ngati Awa and the Ngati Raukawa to come and join him. He defeated the Muaupoko on Lake Horowhenua and drove off a determined attack on Kapiti by a combined force of the dispossessed tribes. This was a great battle and it is recorded that the waters around Kapiti were black with war-canoes. Te Rauparaha and the Ngati Toa retained Kapiti and the mainland around Plimmerton; the irreconcilable war chief, Te Rangihaeata, Te Rauparaha’s nephew, settled on Mana Island and the land opposite around Porirua harbour: the Ngati Awa were at Waikanae and the Te Raukawa tribe at Otaki. Much to Te Rauparaha’s disgust the Ngati Raukawa concluded an agreement with the fugitive Muaupoko and allowed them to settle near Levin. Some of the old boundary posts are still to be seen and the descendants of the tribe live there today.
Te Rauparaha and his allies were now strongly settled in their strongholds and he felt that he was now in a position to attend to war further afield, including an invasion of the South Island. He stocked up with a fresh supply of arms and ammunition from England and launched his great war-canoes across the Strait and took D’Urville Island. From there he campaigned down the east coast to Kaikoura, killing and taking captive 1,400 people. He then sent an advance party, under the pretence of a friendly mission, to Kaiapohia (the great pa at Kaiapoi).
The ruse was exposed and eight Ngati Toa leaders were massacred including Te Rauparaha’s uncle, Te Pehi. The man responsible for exposing the treachery of the Ngati Toa mission to Kaiapohia and contriving the massacre of its members was a Ngaitahu chief from Akaroa. Te Rauparaha made an agreement with one Captain Stewart to carry to Akaroa concealed in his ship 200
MAORI AND MISSIONARY
38
warriors. This captain, this despicable man, sailed his ship into Akaroa harbour as a peaceful trader and then, like the wooden horse at Troy, it disgorged from its hold the Ngati Toa warriors before whom the unsuspecting natives of Akaroa fell easy victims. Those who were not slaughtered were sent back as slaves to Kapiti to await a worse fate. Te Rauparaha then attacked the great pa of Kaiapohia. The story of its fall is well known. But the savage conqueror was not yet satisfied. He attacked and destroyed the pas on Banks Peninsula, and having staved off a combined counter attack on his way north, returned in triumph to Kapiti.
This has taken us far from the scene of our story but the time will not have been wasted if it gives us a fuller knowledge of this man Te Rauparaha and his followers. These were the men to whom Hadfield was sent to preach the Gospel of peace. These were the men whom Hadfield restrained from attacking Wellington after the Wairau massacre and kept loyal during the later wars.
When Te Rauparaha returned from his southern campaign he was over 60 years of age and he did no more fighting except possibly at the Wairau. True, just before Hadfield arrived, he had stirred up a fight between the Ngati Awa and the Ngati Raukawa but it is doubtful if he had any part in the attack which his nephew Te Rangihaeata and a band of vagabond Maoris made on the settlers in the Hutt Valley in 1850.
This brief sketch will give some idea of the nature of the man who received Hadfield on Kapiti that November afternoon in 1839. It was the beginning of a new era. Two men were now to lead the tribes. Never again was Te Rauparaha to lead his warriors into battle. Never again would the plains and hills of the Manawatu resound to the cries of the wounded and the captive. Never again would cannibalistic orgies. Peace had come and the island is now the island of Kapiti witness the killing of slaves and a sanctuary for native birds.
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FROM AGE TO AGI
Of course when Hadfield came to Waikanae the tide had turned in favour of the Christian Gospel. It is well known that for the first ten years after the coming of the missionaries (1814-1824) only one convert was made. In the next ten years, throughout the whole land, the Maoris began to crowd to the mission schools. The Mission Press could not keep pace with the demand for Prayer Books and New Testaments in Maori. One missionary writes; “The natives viewed the Bible as the inspired word of God. and everything it commanded men to do, they believed should be done, as far as they were able. The greatest desire was manifested to possess a copy of it, and to be able to read for themselves the message of mercy sent to them in it. Nor was it merely the desire to say they had it, they really read it, or really devoured it. Old men of seventy have learnt to read.” It has been reckoned that in the heyday of the mission the percentage of literates amongst the Maoris was greater than the percentage of literates in England.
This accounts for one of the most amazing facts of the story of the evangelisation of New Zealand: the work done by the Maoris themselves. After the Mission Schools had been established for a few years wherever a missionary went to what he thought was a new field he found that some knowledge of the Gospel message had gone before him. When Williams and Hadfield paid their first visit to Port Nicholson in 1839 they found that a Maori teacher was already at work. At Waikanae they found a school at work and a chapel of sorts in use for services. As Williams made his way home up the Wanganui river he found that in most of the pas there was a teacher conducting a school and holding daily services, and the people, young and old, crowding into the schools to learn to read the Prayer Book and the Scriptures. These teachers had come down from the Mission Schools of the north and had started work entirely on their own initiative.
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MAORI AND MISSIONARY
This response of the Maori people to the message of the Gospel is so amazing that, in view of what happened afterwards, it calls for some explanation. Remembering the great apostasy which followed the King Movement and the rise of Hau-Hauism we ask ourselves if the great conversion of the tribes in the decade between 1840 and 1850 was on any sound foundation of conviction and understanding. Were they sincere in their profession of faith? Some think that it was unintelligent if not insincere and that the missionaries were misled. There is good reason for believing that this was not the truth at all. Amongst Christian Maoris immorality became the exception and not the rule; they gave up cannibalism and freed their slaves and in business they were found honest and trustworthy. The lives of many, like Riwai Te Ahu, in devotion, endurance and self-sacrifice approached to saintliness and the repeated tributes to the sincerity of their faith and the worthiness of their living by men like Taylor and Hadfield compel us to believe that their religion was not a vain thing.
The great apostasy was caused by the war which sprang from the policy of the Government which the Maoris thought, with good reason, was an attempt to reverse the Treaty of Waitangi and deliberately designed to deprive them of their lands and national existence. The establishment of an independent legislature and the alteration in the status of the Governor to whom the Maoris had always appealed as the direct representative of the Queen had something to do with the rise of the King Movement.
Out of this seething discontent emerged Hau-Hauism. These things fell upon the Maori Church like an earthquake on a half-finished building. It is a wonder that anything survived at all. As Mr S. T. C. Sprott put it in a recent address “The Waikato hostilities culminated in the seige of the Orakau pa where, when summoned to surrender, the famished Maoris replied with their never to be forgotten defiance ‘Ake, ake, ake,’ we fight on for
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ever and ever. These words are, as you know, the concluding words of the Maori version of the Lord’s prayer and I think it is permissible to regard them as the throwing back into the teeth of the white-man the white-man’s religion.”
We can see the reason for the apostasy but this does not explain the enthusiasm and confidence of the beginning. Probably at least three factors were at work. First the Maoris never lacked intelligence and when they heard the way this new religion emphasised peace on earth many must have found in it the hope of ending the incessant internecine wars and the horrors which accompanied them since the introduction of firearms. It has been estimated that in the first three decades after the introduction of firearms to Maori warfare 60,000 persons perished. Perhaps the white man’s religion could check the horror and misery of a white man’s war.
Furthermore as the European settlement increased so did the white man’s mana. The Maoris soon saw that the traders and whalers they had first met were not typical pakehas. Men like Hadfield, Taylor, Selwyn, Grey and the better class settlers who were crowding into the country increased the Maori respect for the pakeha. They were filled with wonder at the first sight of the ships and now they saw the superiority of tools which the white settlers brought, the houses they built and the crops they grew. All this indirectly added to the mana of the white man’s religion. His God must be higher than the Maori atua. Yet no one could be higher than 10, the Supreme One they had left secure in his island sanctuary. Rangiatea, in the Pacific. Quite recently an educated young Maori told the present writer that when the southern Maoris heard of the wonders happening in the north they thought that lo must have escaped and left his ancient shrine and become the white man’s God. So they sent north for teachers to learn the white man’s religion and built a great church at Otaki that lo might find a new sanctuary in Rangiatea. Where he got
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this from I know not but he was very serious about it and we know that the early translators would not allow the word lo to appear as a name for God.
But apart from all these things we must believe that there was an altogether different and deeper influence at work which brought about the bright glad dawning of the morning of the Maori mission. However obscured the image of God had become after centuries of paganism the Maori was still in a real sense the child of God and the Gospel called to something in his heart, as it always does to every human heart, however darkened or depraved. When he listened to the Christian teachers and gave up cannibalism, internecine war, slavery and infanticide, he found that he was not just obeying the outward commandment of a new law but doing something because of an inner law long hidden in the Maori heart and belonging to his true nature. So, all over the land they learned to read and pray in their own mother tongue and the Holy Spirit of God drew near and called the Maori people, and called not in vain.
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Chapter 3
RICHARD TAYLOR: TE TEIRA: AND THE BRIGHT MORNING STAR
Henry williams left Otaki for his long journey home on December sth. 1839. Hadfield had purposed accompanying him to Wanganui but he was so very ill, “continually suffering pain all day”, that he decided not to undertake the journey. Williams travelled overland to Wanganui visiting the pas on the way and then went still further north towards Patea. From there he went back to Wanganui and travelled up the river into the central districts around Taupo and Rotorua. From there he continued via Tauranga and Auckland to his home at Paihia. It was indeed a notable journey and probably the first time any white man had travelled overland from Wellington to the Bay of Islands, and it is a great tribute to the endurance, strength and courage of the great missionary.
Henry Williams was much impressed by what he had seen of the Wanganui district: the large native population, the number of pas in which they were trying to teach themselves, the earnestness with which they pleaded to be sent teachers. Indeed he was so impressed that at first he entertained the idea of going there himself, but on second thoughts, feeling that he was so committed to the north, he sent the Rev. John Mason accompanied by a teacher named Matthews. Mr Matthews settled amongst the pakehas and did not stay long. He came back in 1848 and did useful work. Mason arrived in 1840 and took up his residence in the Maori village at Putiki on the southern side of the river. John Mason made a splendid beginning
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and laid a fine foundation on which the work of this great station was afterwards built. He was an able man with a conscientious sense of duty and after one year’s work he had thirteen native chapels built and fifteen schools in his district in which 700 received instruction. He built, mainly by Maori labour, a brick church at Putiki and opened service in it in 1842 in the presence of 800 persons. But John Mason and his wife were not to live long at Putiki. They had been there only three years when in January 1843, Mason was drowned in trying to cross the Turakina river. Hadfield was travelling with him and there was nearly a double tragedy. The river was in flood and they were trying to ford it near the mouth. Hadfield’s horse baulked and took control and returned its rider to the bank. Mason was unseated and, being a poor swimmer, was soon in difficulties. Hadfield dismounted and stripping off his coat dived in to the rescue but when he reached his colleague he had already sunk under water and Hadfield was unable to get him out. Hadfield was drifting further and further out and only with a great effort was he able to reach the bank and crawl exhausted ashore.
Mason’s body was washed up on the shore and Hadfield conducted the funeral service at Putiki. Thus ended the promising life of John Mason, the first member of the New Zealand Mission, 30 years after its work began, to lose his life in its service. The Rev. Richard Taylor was sent to take Mason’s place and this great missionary, whose memory deserves to be kept green, served there till the end of his life with success which is amazing.
Mr Taylor was a Yorkshireman and took his Master’s degree at Queens’ College, Cambridge. He was ordained in England and served in two parishes before coming out as a C.M.S. missionary. He brought his family to Sydney and at first assisted Samuel Marsden in his chaplaincy work. On Marsden’s death he left for New Zealand and took over the work Hadfield had been doing at Waimate. He was soon sent further afield and was on his way to
A. 3
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assist William Williams at Waiapu when the news of Mason’s death caused him to be diverted to Wanganui.
He was a man of many gifts and considerable learning. During his thirty years’ service at Putiki he paid two visits to England and took the opportunity of publishing two books. The first one Te Ika a Maui was written in 1855 and deals mainly with the customs, mythology and religious rites of the Maori people together with an account of the geology and natural history of the country. He was an artist of considerable ability and his books are illustrated with many sketches and coloured plates figuring fishes, birds, insects and plant life. His first book doubtless won for him a Fellowship of the Geological Society. The second book, New Zealand Past and Present with Prospects of the Future, is obviously based on the diaries he kept so consistently and tells us more of his work as a missionary. Both books are well written and are standard works of reference today.
He arrived at Wanganui in 1843 and at once set about building a permanent home for his family. The plans for this building can still be seen in the Wanganui Museum. The brick church which Mason had built at Putiki was destroyed by an earthquake and Taylor at once set about to replace it with a larger wooden building and at the same time he supervised the building of a church for the European settlement. This church, of which we publish an illustration, is of great interest because it was the first church built for pakeha worship in the Diocese. The foundation stone was laid in 1843 and, although the building was not quite finished, Taylor conducted the first service in it on Sunday, January' 7th, 1844. It was thus a little before the first church built in Wellington, the first St. Paul’s.
Richard Taylor was a man of great energy and of considerable organising ability, with a plan of visitations extending from the Rangitikei area in the south to as far north as Waitara and including all the Wanganui River
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country. He undertook these long journeys on foot and seemed to think nothing of setting out to Otaki or even Wellington. Many of these journeys involved crossing rivers, clambering through bush or at least along rough bush tracks with much exposure to wet and cold. In his diary he records a trip he had to make to Taupo. The great war chief of the Taupo tribe, Ngati Tuwharetoa, was the famous Te Heu Heu who had on several occasions led war parties down the river threatening Wanganui and the local tribes. This chief suffered a tragic end. Together with his wives, children and fifty men, he was overwhelmed in a great landslide on the shores of Taupo. Taylor thought that this called for some act of sympathy which might improve the relations between the tribes, so, although it was mid-winter he decided to go to Taupo. The journey up the river by canoe was all right, but it took four days through rain soaked forests and across the snow covered plain to reach the Lake. He took a funeral service at the site of the disaster and spent some time with the tribe before attempting the return journey. In rain and cold it took nine days to reach the head waters of the Wanganui and he arrived home with not a dry stitch on him and his clothes so tattered and tom through scrambling through scrub that, as he records, “not even a beggar would accept them”. And this was the man who had come out to New Zealand to improve his health.
There was another visit to Taupo which merits a memorial. Two of Taylor’s teachers named Manihera and Kereopa volunteered to go as missionaries to the heathen inland tribes. At Taupo, near Tokaanu, they were ambushed and fired upon. Kereopa was killed outright and Manihera lingered for only a few hours. The cause of this attack was utu or revenge for the death of a Taupo chief in an affray with Manihera’s people. Although they were not killed for their faith they were there as Christian missionaries and the Maori church has in them its martyrs.
In addition to his work at Putiki amongst the Maoris,
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Taylor did a great deal for the pakeha settlement across the river. He took services with them regularly; he started a school and a hospital and he was invariably called on to act as peacemaker with the hostile tribes. So great was his influence with the Maoris that more than once he proved to be the final defence which saved the settlement from attack. His success as a missionary can be best judged from some extracts from his diary describing one of his great gatherings at Putiki.
“Dec. 22nd (1848). I had morning service in my field, where the pulpit was carried. Afterwards I examined the candidates for baptism. . . . After evening prayer I addressed the rest of the candidates for the Sacrament, which occupied me till eleven at night. I accepted the large number of six hundred and seventy two. It is a very gratifying consideration that 1 have such a body of persons in my district living so consistently, that even the most censorious could not allege anything against their moral or religious conduct.
“Dec. 23rd. A goodly assembly on the field this morning. After service I had the usual annual meeting of all the teachers belonging to my district. Fifty two of them preached before me from a selection of texts which they had not previously seen. . . . Many of course, wandered very far from the text, but still gave good sermons; and. with only a few exceptions, had an extraordinary flow of speech.
“I was thus occupied the whole morning until three. Two magistrates were then appointed for the whole Wanganui District. . . . In the evening I had my meeting of the teachers, when all the various matters connected with the Church were discussed. It was after eleven when we separated.
“The Wanganui races were held at the same time; they were attended by the entire European population of the place, and some strangers as well, who expressed their astonishment that in so large a native assemblage so few
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should have been influenced by curiosity to go and see them.
“The contrast certainly was great between the two ways of keeping the Festival of the Nativity. Whilst seven hundred Europeans were attending the races on one side of the Wanganui River, exactly opposite, nearly four thousand of the lately barbarous heathen had congregated from all parts, and from considerable distances, some coming fully one hundred and fifty miles, to celebrate the Saviour’s birth.
“Dec. 24th. I began the service a little after seven. It was a glorious day, not a cloud to be seen. We had the pure light of the sun shining upon us; but it was a still more glorious sight to see before me upwards of three thousand natives uniting in the solemn service of our Church, and listening with great attention to the word of God. Around the pulpit stood my band of fellow-labourers, the teachers, no inconsiderable company, being one hundred and fifty in number; and by my side nearly ail the head chiefs were assembled, dressed in their picturesque costumes of dog-skin mats, or elegantly woven parawais; some in their newly acquired European clothing. Beyond them the whole field was filled with the congregation. After the sermon I administered the Sacrament to three hundred and sixty. I was obliged to divide the communicants, part for the Sunday and part for the Christmas Day. as the church could not contain the whole at once.
“Afterwards I crossed over the river and gave the usual services to the military and the town people. I had a pretty fair attendance of the latter at the second service. I administered the Lord’s Supper to twelve. During the evening service fat Putiki) I baptised the large number of one hundred and sixty-two, of whom forty were children. The sun had set before the service was terminated.
“Dec. 25., Christmas Day. Very fine but sultry —74 degrees in the shade. I addressed my large congregation from the morning lesson. . . . Afterwards I administered the
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Lord’s Supper to three hundred and fifty, making a grand total, including my own family, of seven hundred and ten, perhaps the largest number that had ever met to receive the Sacrament in this land. Afterwards I crossed over and took two services; the soldiers were all there; but at the second service there were only three besides my party.
"Dec. 26th. The river natives quietly entered their canoes and paddled away to their distant homes, gradually diminishing the fleet of canoes which was drawn up in front of the pa, and the coast natives also silently departed on their several ways.” (From New Zealand Past and Present, pp. 54, 55.)
There was nothing exceptional about this gathering described above. Similar scenes took place at the great festivals each year until the coming of the Maori wars.
Taylor worked alone until 1850, in which year he was able to send a resident teacher named Telford to Pipiriki. Mr Telford has left a vivid description of his first journey to his station up the river and thus describes his arrival at Pipiriki on June 13th, 1850:
“About 12 o’clock we reached Pipiriki, the interesting scene of my future labours. As we drew near it the appearance of the river and of its sides had a most sublime aspect; cliffs towering perpendicularly out of the water, like immense bastions, upwards of 200 feet high, covered with moss and ivy. In some places trees sprang forth from fissures and, rearing their tall stems upward looked like sentinels along the face of the precipices on either side while in different places long streams of crystal water poured over from a great height and made enchanting music, mixed as their sounds were with the songs of myriads of happy birds in the surrounding forests. I found that all the natives had been expecting my arrival. We heard their voices welcoming us long before we could see their faces. After we had rounded the point of land which concealed them from us, we saw them all seated on the river-side and around the entrance to their beautiful village, evidently
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in the highest spirits. Having shaken hands with more than I can remember, we went first to look at the new church which is now in the course of erection. It is a noble building, 75 feet long by 35 feet broad and about 20 feet high, exclusive of the height of the roof, which is not yet put on. This being rather a difficult part of the work they will require the assistance of an English carpenter to enable them to finish it in a manner worthy of the lower parts which they have themselves erected without any European help. In the evening we assembled the natives within the walls of the new church for the first time, and had service there. That was a meeting which would have rejoiced the heart of the friends of the Society’s work in New Zealand could they have been present. Surely it will gladden their hearts to hear of it. Our labour here is not in vain in the Lord. Much fruit has already appeared to His glory.”
Richard Taylor paid a long visit to England in 1867 when he published his second book, New Zealand Past and Present —and did a good deal of deputation work, preaching in many churches for the C.M.S. He returned to Wanganui and took up his work again until his death in 1873. He was indeed a great man! Many expected that when Hadfield refused the first offer of the bishopric of Wellington it would be offered to Taylor, but Selwyn chose his friend Abraham. All his life he remained a member of the C.M.S. and his great ability, his boundless energy and devotion and the amazing success of his work place him in the first rank of its servants in New Zealand.
Next time you are going to Wanganui, perchance to the races, find time to stop at Putiki, the pa on the south side of the river, and go in and see the beautiful church built in later years. The Maori ornamental work is considered by experts to be amongst the best in the Diocese. Remembering that you stand on holy ground, kneel down and be mindful of the great days we have described and pray for those who minister and worship there now and for God’s blessing on the Maori Mission.
Chapter 4
WAIKANAE AND OTAKI
When octavius hadfield took farewell of Henry Williams on December sth, 1839, and took full responsibility for the work in the Cook Strait area, he was twenty-five years of age. He was born in the Isle of Wight a year before the Battle of Waterloo: the youngest of a family of sixteen children. His father was a man of property, wealth and culture. In 1818, when Napoleon was secure at St. Helena, Mr Hadfield decided to take his family to Belgium and France. He stayed in different parts for ten years and his family must have received a very liberal and unorthodox education. The boy Octavius was intelligent and able to profit from his experiences. It was during these years of childhood that the prompting of the Spirit turned his thoughts to ordination and missionary service.
On returning to England he entered Charterhouse, but when he had reached the top form his health broke down and he had to return to the old home in the Isle of Wight. He entered Pembroke College, Oxford, but his health again failed and he had to come down from the University without a degree although he had already acquired a culture and a knowledge of the classics beyond that of the average graduate. A winter in the Azores restored his health sufficiently for him to offer himself to the C.M.S. for service abroad. As the then Bishop of London would not ordain men without a University degree, Hadfield left England a layman. He left for Australia on what proved a very eventful voyage. The crew mutinied and in an account which reads like a chapter from Treasure Island the young
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missionary had an experience which doubtless stood him in good stead when he faced the rough whalers and savages of Kapiti.
When he arrived at Sydney, Bishop Broughton ordained him to the diaconate. and this was the first ordination in Australia. But Hadfield had no intention of working in Australia; New Zealand was his chosen field and he accompanied Bishop Broughton there in 1838. On January 6th, 1839, he was ordained priest and was thus the first man to be ordained to the priesthood in New Zealand.
At the time of his ordination we can picture him, a young man of twenty-five years, who had been carefully nurtured in a well-to-do home; cultured, intelligent, with a sound knowledge of Latin, Greek and Hebrew, a talented linguist, speaking French fluently. He was tall, but sparely built, with fine features and obviously not of robust health. In fact he was often prostrated with asthma and some acute digestive trouble. But it should be carefully noted that Hadfield did not come to New Zealand in search of health. He came because he felt called to be a missionary, and he came to New Zealand because he thought that the climate would suit him and enable him to regain and retain sufficient vigour to fulfil his vocation.
This was the man who was left to evangelise the West Coast Maoris and the tribes in the Sounds across Cook Strait.
He established two centres to work from, one at Waikanae with the Ngati Awa tribe and the other at Otaki with the Ngati Raukawa. Six weeks previous to Hadfield’s arrival these two tribes had engaged in battle in which the Ngati Raukawa had got the worst of it. Hadfield found the Ngati Awa much more friendly than the Te Raukawa at Otaki, but he did his best to share his time evenly between them, riding from pa to pa. The chief of the Ngati Awa was a very well disposed old man who exercised his authority through his son Wiremu Kingi. This youne chief was a firm and faithful friend of Hadfield all
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through his career, and at the beginning he opened up the way at Waikanae. He found there another friend in a young Maori named Riwai Te Ahu. He served Hadfield as a volunteer batman, and proved himself a young man of intelligence and sterling character. He served long as a lay teacher and was rewarded by being the second Maori to be granted ordination.
At Otaki the two young men who had journeyed north to get a teacher, Tamihana Te Rauparaha and Matene Te Whi Whi, gave Hadfield loyal support and Tamihana made a missionary tour all through the South Island and accompanied Selwyn on his first visit to the South a year later.
The remaining fragment of his journal (see appendix) gives us a vivid picture of the first few weeks of the young missionary’s labours. He lived in a tent while small whares were being built for him, one at Waikanae and one at Otaki. He had with him a few native teachers who had learnt to read in the northern schools. These were of the greatest help while he was learning the language. His day began at dawn with morning service, followed at about 5 a.m. by school. These were largely attended by young and old and each teacher handled a group of fifty. They had slates and a limited number of copies in Maori of Evening and Morning Prayer and parts of the New Testament. He spent part of the week at Waikanae and then rode to spend the rest at Otaki. At first he was not well received at Otaki. partly because of the influence of Te Rauparaha, who was annoyed because of the priority he gave to the Ngati Awa at Waikanae. But there was something in this young missionary which soon won not only the respect but the trust and affection of all his people. He never patronised them, and they soon recognised in him all the attributes of a real rangatira. His consistent courtesy, his gentleness combined with strong determination. his dauntless courage, all made a great impression on them and at last broke down all opposition. His nearest neighbour was Mason, and afterwards Taylor at Wanganui.
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Occasionally he rode to Wellington to minister to the church people who for a time were without a chaplain. And then added to all this he felt bound to visit the Maori people in the Sounds area of the South Island. He made these journeys in an open boat. Those who are familiar with the vagaries of tide, current and wind in Cook Strait will be prepared to accept the proposition that Hadfield’s trips to the Sounds were as hazardous as Selwyn’s longer voyages to Melanesia. There was no foolhardiness about these trips. He went because the people on the other side were so eager to have him. They had built two churches, one large one at Queen Charlotte Sound and a smaller one on D’Urville Island. Native teachers ministered in these churches and they threatened that, if Hadfield could not come to them, they would all go across to him.
On one occasion he nearly lost his life. Returning home with several Maori companions in an open boat, they ran into a high wind and the sail carried away; in trying to hold her head into the wind the rudder broke and all the Maoris lay down flat in the boat waiting the end. But they drifted into the beach at Paekakariki, where friends, who were anxiously watching for them, went out to them and all landed safely. He had two horses which were brought down in the Columbine and landed at Kapiti. From Kapiti they were brought to the mainland in a Maori canoe. This gives us some idea of the efficiency of Maori seamanship in those days. They must have been good horses for it was recorded that once he rode to Wellington over the rough track, much longer than the road of today, in five and a quarter hours, but in fairness it must be said that the horse bolted twice. He used his horses when he paid his regular visits northwards and to the pas up the Manawatu river. with 600 pupils and attendances at the daily church serup the work. In 1841 he had eighteen schools at work
Thus for five years he struggled on and gradually built vices reached up to 500. In these early years he was too
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occupied with his work to get mixed up in secular affairs, thus winning the approval of the members of the New Zealand Company. He always held Colonel Wakefield in high esteem, and later in life declared that Colonel Wakefield, the leader of the New Zealand Company, was the greatest man who had come to New Zealand.
Edward Wakefield, the nephew of Colonel Wakefield, who in his book Adventure in New Zealand shows himself a severe critic of the work of the Church and seldom misses an opportunity of belittling the missionaries and ridiculing their work, has this to say of Hadfield: “I had not yet been introduced to Mr Hadfield’s acquaintance; but I had already begun to feel sorry for the prejudices which I had entertained against him on first hearing that he had come with Mr Williams. All the natives, whether converts or not, spoke in the highest terms of his conduct in every particular. I knew, intimately, many of his more immediate followers at Waikanae, some of them of high rank among the tribe; and could not help imbibing from them some of that respectful admiration for his character which they were proud of acknowledging. His scholars were plainly anxious to deserve his praise and affection, rather than bound to their duties by an irksome restraint. . . . The heathen natives too, who had enjoyed an opportunity of observing or conversing with Mr Hadfield, confessed that he had all the qualities of a chief, and that he was a pakeha ngawari, or ‘mild white man’, who did not discourage their ancient customs by anger or coarse tokens of disgust, but by gentle reason. They also admired his manly courage, of which they noted more than one proof, and his art of gaining the love of the natives even before he had converted them to his creed. Even the corrupt and profane beachcombers of Kapiti would go out of their way to say a good word or do a service for Mr Hadfield. ‘He is a missionary,’ they would say with an oath, ‘but he is a gentleman every inch of him. and when he can do a poor fellow a good turn with the Maoris, why, he will!’ They
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respected him too, for not interfering, unless applied to, in their dealings with the natives. With this voluntary and unanimous testimony from all quarters, who could help feeling rejoiced that one good missionary had already acquired so much influence in the immediate neighbourhood of the settlements.” {Adventure in New Zealand, p. 348.)
An interesting description of Hadfield is given by the commander of Jewess, Captain G. F. Moore. The ship was driven ashore at Paekakariki on April 15th, 1840, with the loss of two lives. It was loaded with a cargo for the new settlement at Wanganui and both natives and crew had set to work to help themselves to the goods, when there arrived another party of Maoris, headed by “a tall, straight, slender, sinewy, sunburnt pakeha, who, in a pleasant voice, politely introduced himself as the resident missionary of the Waikanae district. He was attired in brown moleskin trousers, tied with flax over strong boots at the ankles and below the knees; and over all a blue serge shirt, confined at the waist by a leather strap, in which were a good sheath knife and a sharp tomahawk. He carried a long flax stalk as a walking stick. His attendants, young men, carried some provisions and the missionary’s gun. I found Hadfield an agreeable, intellectual, cheerful young gentleman, well versed in the Maori language, habits and manners. He had already gained the respect and regard of the natives of his district and all the Maoris were agreed that he was a ‘Rangatira pai’.” (Journal G. F. Moore.)
In 1841 Henry Williams, at the request of Governor Hobson, came to secure the signatures of the southern chiefs to the Treaty of Waitangi, and Hadfield assisted him in this work. It is important to remember this because, in the troubles which came later, the missionaries made it a point of honour to stand by the Maoris when the promises of this Treaty were disregarded.
Probably the best known and most highly esteemed
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achievement of this period of Hadfield’s ministry is the part he played in the aftermath of the Wairau massacre. The massacre occurred over a dispute about the purchase of land in the Wairau Plain near Blenheim. The New Zealand Company wanted this land for subdivision and the Ngati Toa chiefs, Te Rauparaha and his nephew, Te Rangihaeata disputed the Government claim. When the surveyors went to work the Maoris pulled up their pegs and burnt the hut they had built out of material found on the land. The Maoris were careful to burn only the hut, which they claimed was their property, and they preserved all personal belongings in the hut.
The Government then sent in a company of armed constabulary under Captain Arthur Wakefield, to enforce their claim. When the parties met a shot was fired, possibly accidentally, by one of the soldiers. This shot, it is claimed, killed the wife of Te Rangihaeata, who was carrying a child on her back. The Maoris replied with a volley and the fight was on. The Maoris soon got the best of it; ten of the whites fell in the fight and nine surrendered. These nine, including Captain Wakefield, were massacred by Te Rangihaeata as utu for his wife. The Maori leaders knew that what had been done meant big trouble, and manning two big war canoes set off at once across the Strait and landed at Waikanae. Te Rauparaha knew that to attack Wellington he must first win over the Ngati Awa of Waikanae. Towards evening on June 19th, 1843, two canoes landed at Waikanae and a band of exhausted warriors, wet with sea spray and in great agitation of mind, hastened ashore. Te Rauparaha at once set forth with fiery oratory to rouse them to war. When he had finished, Hadfield stepped forth and pleaded for peace. But neither prevailed, all was excitement, some were for war, some for peace, and then in the midst of the confusion Riwai-te-Ahu rang the bell for evening service and the multitude crowded in. After the service Wiremu Kingi told Te Rauparaha that the Ngati Awa were for peace, not war,
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and that 1,000 warriors would resist the passage of anyone moving to attack Wellington. Te Rauparaha and his followers moved on to Otaki where the Ngati Raukawa needed little rousing. However Hadfield followed up and took his stand in their midst and pleaded for peace. Doubtless all his words would have been in vain had it not been for Wiremu Kingi’s threat to attack any men moving on Wellington, but the Ngati Raukawa did not move. A few bands tried to slip through but none of them reached Wellington.
At that time it is estimated that the West Coast tribes could have mustered 10,000 warriors. In Wellington the defences were scanty and there were only 700 men bearing arms, and there is not any doubt that the Settlement would have been wiped out but for the young missionary Octavius Hadfield, supported by his friend Wiremu Kingi, the Ngati Awa chief.
The next day Hadfield, at considerable risk, rode to Wellington to reassure the settlers and prevent any untoward action. In the whole city is there any memorial to the man who saved it in its infancy?
The work at Waikanae so prospered that it was decided to build a church. A site was chosen near the beach and it is interesting to hear that its big timbers were given by old Te Rauparaha. It was in appearance very like the present great church of Rangiatea, but the ridge beam was ten feet shorter. This church was always menaced by sand drift. When most of the Ngati Awa at Waikanae returned to their northern home, the sand got the upper hand and the church has completely disappeared, unless perchance, some of its timbers were used in the erection of the small church which now stands in the Waikanae settlement.
In 1844, after five years of strenuous, dangerous and exciting work, Hadfield’s health, which troubled him all the time, broke down entirely and he was carried by his friends on a litter to Wellington and taken to the home
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of Mr J. H. St. Hill, the District Magistrate, a keen churchman of Wellington. For four years Mrs St. Hill tended the sick man with unceasing care. His doctor was Dr Fitzgerald, a devout Roman Catholic, who, when all hope had long been given up, finally found a cure.
But for four long years Hadfield lingered on the very threshold and Selwyn in one of his letters actually speaks of him as already dead.
But those bedridden years were not wasted. The Governor, Sir George Grey, and Bishop Selwyn, when they were in Wellington, visited him daily. They recognised that he was the very first authority on Maori affairs. The Maoris communicated with him and he got one message from old Te Rauparaha himself. He had a clear insight to the Maori mind and knew what they were thinking about public affairs, so he was able to give to Governor and Bishop advice and guidance which were invaluable to Church and State. These years gave the sick man time for reading and reflection and quickened the philosophical turn of his mind which bore rich fruit in later life.
He was more than a well read scholar of great ability; he was an original thinker and a philosopher. Had he lived later he might have won great fame as a psychologist and anthropologist, for he seemed able to read the native mind like an open book. So apparent was his genius that he was made the trusted confidant of Governors, Bishops and Ministers of State. If his advice was not always welcome nor heeded, it was never ignored, and after events generally proved its worth.
When he felt well again he decided to return to his post. His journey from Wellington was a triumphal progress. Parties of Maoris met him all the way with signs of great joy at his recovery. At Waikanae he was of course accorded a great reception but what moved him most was the way he was received at Otaki. He had experienced much opposition there but now it seemed that they could not do enough to welcome him back. They held a great hui.
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Of course they had something to show him; the great church which he had planned and Samuel Williams had supervised, was nearly completed. They held service in it and Hadfield must have prayed that it was a symbol of a new era dawning for the work of the church in his great pastorate.
A 4
Chapter 5
THE ARCHDEACON OF KAPITI
When selwyn was appointed Bishop of New Zealand he had an argument with the Crown Lawyers concerning the Royal Letters Patent under which he was appointed. Amongst other things he claimed the right to appoint Archdeacons by his own act. These church officers were made the subject of some heavy humour in the House of Lords and the view the Colonial Office took was that they were only ornamental dignitaries and their designations merely titles of honour. As the Sovereign is the fountain of all honour the letters Patent retained for the Crown the right of appointing Archdeacons. But Selwyn decided that the office of Archdeacon in the diocese of New Zealand should be “no peacock’s feather to distinguish one clergyman above another but a partnership of help and work,” and therefore he claimed the right to appoint his own Archdeacons. This right was granted.
He planned to divide his large diocese into archdeaconries, and one of these, covering very much the same area as the present diocese of Wellington, he called the Archdeaconry of Kapiti and appointed Hadfield to it. It was a pity that when a new Archdeaconry of Belmont was recently established the opportunity was not taken to revive this old and romantic title, even though the island of Kapiti was not then included in the archdeaconry as it is now.
During Hadfield’s illness in Wellington his place had been filled, first by the Rev. H. Govett, who did not stay long and later became Archdeacon of New Plymouth, and then by the Rev. Samuel Williams, a son of Henry
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Williams, then in deacon’s orders. Mr Williams was well suited for the task and did splendid work at the station. He spoke Maori fluently, his experience in the north enabled him to extend the work of the schools and his genius as a farmer led to a great improvement in the agricultural operations. He also made a splendid clerk of works for the building of the great church of Rangiatea which Hadfield had planned. Hadfield had his help for a few years after his return and then, at the request of Governor Grey, he was sent to establish the Maori College at Te Aute. Te Aute was then in the Archdeaconry of Kapiti but the great work Samuel Williams did there belongs to the story of the Diocese of Waiapu.
Te Rauparaha took a keen interest in the building of the great church. His interest was interrupted by his arrest by the Government as an accomplice in the attacks on the Hutt Valley. This trouble took place while Hadfield was sick in Wellington. The man really responsible for that attack was probably the implacable Rangihaeata who got together a band of vagabond natives. Governor Grey decided to arrest Te Rauparaha, which he did, and took him in the frigate Calliope to Auckland. The arrest was really illegal for there was no evidence against the old chief. However he was never brought to trial and was treated as a guest rather than a prisoner, and returned to Otaki after a very interesting holiday at the Government’s expense. He was now an old man and saw a good deal of Hadfield. He was probably never baptised, but he attended services and instruction in the great church until the end and he was buried in the churchyard. It is generally believed that his body was secretly disinterred and taken away by his tribesmen and buried somewhere on Kapiti. There is no doubt that it was largely due to his influence that the church was built by voluntary labour and most of the materials, including the great timbers, were supplied from his own forest. He was determined that it should be the greatest church in the land.
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A full description of this church, the greatest achievement of early Maori architecture, the building of it and the restoration for the centenary celebrations, has been set out in detail by Mr Eric Ramsden in his book Rangiatea, which makes a very valuable contribution to the historical records of the Diocese. Most of the Ngati Awa had left Waikanae and returned to their old home in the Waitara district, so that the work of the mission was now centred in the new village of Otaki. A good house had been built as well as a larger school, with a boarding establishment, and the Maoris gave thirty acres of land towards its maintenance. The scholars worked on the farm cultivating wheat, barley and oats, to which had been added stock breeding of horses, cattle and sheep. There was also a big increase in the industry of flax dressing which still thrives in the Manawatu.
In 1852 Catherine, the third daughter of Henry Williams, journeyed down from the north and was married to Hadfield in the new church by Richard Taylor. Thus began a life-long companionship. There were ten children of the marriage, one of whom, Miss Amy Hadfield of Marton, was alive when this book was being written and died on February 29th, 1956. Mrs Hadfield brought to the mission one long experienced in the work. She was of special help with the girls’ department and in every way proved a perfect help meet in all the long years of work which lay ahead of them.
These years, after his return from Wellington, were probably the happiest years of Hadfield's ministry. The work flourished, the coming of Selwyn added hope and enthusiasm to the Church and his own work as Archdeacon took him more often into other districts and to meetings and councils with other clergy. But these years of joy and hope were not to last long. There came a falling off and “withering” of the mission work all over the country. This was due to a combination of causes. The first enthusiasm was waning; the impact of large numbers
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of immigrants, many of whom were not concerned with religion, was a real setback. These settlers were mainly concerned in getting land and there was a growing uneasiness amongst the Maoris about the good faith of the Government in implementing the Treaty of Waitangi. All these were factors in the worsening situation. Hadfield soon became involved in controversy with the Government about native land affairs. He could express himself clearly and incisively. Loose thinking and unfair criticism always aroused him to action and, it must be admitted that he seemed to enjoy crossing swords with a worthy opponent. In those days they were very outspoken and made little attempt to soften their words, and all the time most of them took it as the accepted style of controversy and did not allow hard words to impair personal friendships. Things have changed since then and Miss Hadfield held that this is why in his old age Hadfield destroyed nearly all of his Journal. She said she remembered going for a picnic in the Otaki Gorge when both her father and Sir William Fox were present. They joked and talked like bosom friends and yet only a short while before they had been engaged in a violent controversy which Hadfield ended as follows: “Either his (Fox’s) memory is on a par with his other intellectual faculties or the falsehood must be his.”
This is not the place to discuss the trouble about the Waitara land dealings and the controversy between Hadfield's old friend Wiremu Kingi and the Government. Hadfield was convinced that the Government was treating the Maoris absolutely unjustly and that their policy was so wrong and foolish that it would certainly provoke war, and he did not hesitate to say so. Wiremu Kingi, who was the chief of the Waitara tribe being evicted, was the same fine man who had been such a help to the mission at Waikanae and who had defied Te Rauparaha when he wanted to lead an attack on Wellington. Letters passed between Wiremu and Hadfield
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and one of them was the cause of Hadfield being questioned before the Bar of the House at the General Assembly in Auckland in 1860. Richmond and Fitzherbert submitted to him 84 prepared questions and although he stood alone and unprepared, nothing he asserted could be disproved. The Press opened an attack on him as a traitor and “pious firebrand” and accused him of being the author of a petition sent to the Queen praying for the recall of Governor Gore Brown. The petition bore the signatures of 497 Maoris. The petition was successful and Sir George Grey was sent for a second term of office.
Hadfield had sent to the Secretary of State for the Colonies a resume of the case for the Maoris in a pamphlet entitled One of England’s Little Wars and followed it up with another The Second Year of one of England’s Little Wars.
In the excitement of war the public, led by the Press, dubbed Hadfield a traitor and a bigotted, meddlesome missionary. Although Selwyn and Bishop Abraham shared Hadfield’s views it was Hadfield who led the attack and exposed himself to the calumny of the Press and the hostility of the public.
And when it was all over everyone acknowledged that Hadfield had been right. Dr Featherstone acknowledged that it was “an unjust and unholy war”. Richmond came to Hadfield to bid him farewell as he left for a visit to England and said, “I was misled”. In one of Hadfield’s letters we read these words —“By the by, a day or two ago, in his (The Native Minister’s) absence—l went to see Stafford who was chief Minister during the Waitara war and after answering my questions on business, he volunteered to talk of the Waitara war. To my surprise he allowed that the whole war was a mistake and that he objected to it, but was overruled by his colleagues. I let him go on; it was amusing. It is very satisfactory after all the abuse I got that I should have been made a kind of Father confessor for the Prime Minister,”
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In 1928 a Royal Commission awarded £5,000 annually to the descendants of those whose land had been taken at Waitara.
When the Diocese of Wellington was formed, Hadfield was offered the Bishopric but he declined the offer and Charles Abraham, Selwyn’s great friend, who was Warden of St. John’s College, was appointed instead. The new Bishop was to be consecrated in England under Royal Letters Patent and Hadfield accompanied him to England as chaplain.
When Bishop Abraham resigned in 1870 the Bishopric was again offered to Hadfield and this time he accepted it and left the Mission to the care of the Rev. J. T. McWilliam. who filled his place as few others could have done.
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Chapter 6
THE FIRST AND ONLY BISHOP OF NEW ZEALAND
Marsden and the C.M.S. men chose the far north for the site of the Mission Station. This was probably because it was then the best known part of the country; the climate and situation were very pleasant and there was a big Maori population. When George Augustus Selwyn arrived he appreciated all these things and was very pleased with all he saw, especially with the stone buildings at Kerikeri. He converted a large room in one of these buildings into a library which he used as a retreat in which to recuperate after his long journeys. It was reminiscent of his rooms at Cambridge. This room can still be seen and quite recently it contained, lying about in confusion, interesting old ledgers and account books of the early days of trading with the natives.
When the seat of Government shifted to Auckland Selwyn followed and built his college of St. John at Tamaki, above St. Heller’s Bay. At this time the largest white settlement in the country was at Port Nicholson and the members of the New Zealand Company were very disgruntled because the Bishop did not settle in Wellington, and especially because the Company had raised a considerable sum towards the endowment of the bishopric. Auckland had come into being without any organised plan of colonisation, whereas Wellington had been colonised by a company. Wellington said that the Auckland settlement was just a mob of land sharks and speculators and Auckland replied that Wellington was a wind swept wilderness unfit for human habitation. Similar pleasantries have ever since continued to pass between the two cities.
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However Selwyn made Auckland his headquarters and his visits to Wellington were only occasional and often very short, so he has not left many monuments to his episcopate in this diocese. There are no Selwyn churches. The story is told that one night in company with the Governor, Sir George Grey, and the Hon. A. S. Tollemache, he was camped near Ahuriri. The Governor had been exhorting the Maori people to set aside grants of land for the benefit of their children; doubtless Selwyn improved the occasion with similar appeals. During the night some Maoris, thinking over the words of the Governor and the Bishop, conceived a bright idea, so bright that they could not wait till morning to put it across. They woke the camping party up to ask the pertinent question as to whether the Governor and the Bishop practised what they preached. Had they given money for the education of the children or for the church? The thrust went home and when the Governor returned to Wellington he purchased a section and gave it to the Church. His companion gave two adjoining sections and that is how we got the land on which the present St. Paul’s and the Diocesan Office are built.
Selwyn has been fortunate in his biographers, but by any standard, he was a very great and remarkable man. He came of a distinguished family. He was a great Etonian and had a brilliant career at St. John’s, Cambridge, where after graduating he was awarded a fellowship and later a Doctorate of Divinity. Later he was also made a D.D. of Oxford, (honoris causa.) In appearance he was very handsome, with the physique of a trained athlete. He excelled in swimming and horsemanship and had rowed for Cambridge in the first University boat race. At an early age he was a schoolmate of John Henry Newman and at Eton he became an intimate friend of William Ewart Gladstone. Early in life he looked forward to Holy Orders and so spiritual was his outlook on life that no other vocation ever found a place in his thoughts. He had a passionate
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love for the church of his fathers which was quickened by his acquaintance with the enthusiasm and devotion of the men of the Oxford Movement. The study of the Fathers engrossed him all his life and his knowledge of them was exceeded only by his knowledge of the Bible.
Had he remained in England, without any doubt, the highest distinctions were within his reach. He was ever a great disciplinarian and the first man he put under discipline was himself. He loved to consider himself a man under orders and when the Archbishop of Canterbury offered him the Bishopric of New Zealand he accepted it because he considered it an order from his Commander-in-Chief. Thus Gladstone wrote —“Until almost the eve of his accepting the Bishopric of New Zealand he had never thought of such a step. Every influence that could act upon a man appeared to mark him for preferment and prosperity in England. Connected, as tutor, with families of wealth and influence, universally popular from his frank, manly and engaging character, and scarcely less so from his extraordinary vigour as an athlete, he was attached to Eton, where he resided, with a love surpassing the love of Etonians. In himself he formed a large part of the life of Eton, and Eton formed a large part of his life. ... At a moment’s notice, upon the call of duty, he tore up the singularly deep roots which his life had struck into the soil of England”. So this great man came to us and the news of his coming filled the heart of many a C.M.S. missionary with misgiving: they did not look forward to passing from the easy low church control of their Society to the rigid discipline of a high-church bishop. However, so great was the charm of his personality, so great his enthusiasm for his work, so great his love for all his people, both Maori and Pakeha, that he at once won their admiration, their confidence and their loyal support. He passed up and down the country like a knight in shining armour (sometimes in rags and tatters) sans peur et sans reproche. Even the Canterbury Pilgrims acknowledged
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that the Bishop from the wilds of the north was a very charming man, and, once some of them went so far as to suggest that he should come and be Bishop of Christchurch. The Bishop was a man of indomitable courage and whenever danger threatened any of the districts in his great diocese he set off at once to take his stand beside his men. Thus he was with Williams at Kororareka when Heke sacked the town. After the Wairau massacre and the attack on the Hutt Valley he came south as soon as possible to take Hadfield’s place at Otaki.
His exaltation of the virtue of obedience explains some of his actions which at the time seemed harsh. The cause of nearly all the troubles with the Maoris arose out of the purchase of land. The C.M.S. decided that its missionaries should not buy land and should hand back any they had already bought. However unreasonable this may have been it was their decision. Some of the men, including Henry Williams, had bought at a fair price and with the full consent of the Maori owners, considerable tracts of land for themselves or for their families. Selwyn considered that there was no just reason for the inquiry and investigation which Williams demanded and whether they held the land themselves or in their sons’ names was a distinction too subtle for Selwyn’s acceptance. So he demanded that Williams should hand over the title deeds. When he refused he disobeyed the orders of his Society and so he had to go. But it should be remembered, that when the C.M.S. dismissed their old servant, the Bishop did not withdraw his licence as the Archdeacon of Waimate.
Selwyn never spared himself and undertook the most arduous journeys from the far north down to Foveaux Strait and Stewart Island. It has been claimed that the distance covered by St. Paul in his missionary journeys exceeded the distances of any of our modern explorers and athletes. Selwyn must have easily broken St. Paul’s record. He travelled afoot, on horseback, by canoe on the rivers and many journeys by sea. In addition to his many other
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accomplishments he became a good navigator and made nothing of voyages to the distant isles of the Pacific. It was doubtless his missionary zeal that sent him forth but it is easy to see that he thoroughly enjoyed himself with all the enthusiasm of an amateur yatchtsman. His most cheerful and lighthearted letters were written at sea and many of them to his father were illustrated with lively pen and ink sketches of considerable merit.
When at home in Auckland he rejoiced in the friendship of the Governor, Sir George Grey, and most of all in his intercourse with Judge Martin out of which grew a friendship of great intimacy. Hadfield at first was a bit dubious about him but the Bishop soon reassured him. During his long illness the Bishop visited him daily whenever he was in Wellington. In the long hours these two great men spent together a great admiration and affection grew up mutually between them which proved lifelong. This tender side of Selwyn’s character is shown by something which he did on the occasion of his first visit to Wellington. He had sent before him one of the young men whom he had brought out with him from England: a young ordinand named William Evans. In a letter dated Wellington, October 10th, 1842, Judge Martin wrote, “As our boat neared the beach the Bishop stood to welcome us. It was very joyous to meet him, but I was struck by his pale, worn face. He was nursing the sick in a house where I lodged last year. The sick man was poor Evans, who had been given over by the physicians; he was to all appearance sinking (with typhoid fever). The Bishop was watching and tending as a mother or wife might tend. It was a most affecting sight. He practised every little art that nourishment might be supplied to his patient: he pounded chicken into fine powder that it might pass in a liquid form into his ulcerated mouth. He made jellies, he listened to every sound, he sat up the whole night through by the bedside. In short he did everything worthy of his noble nature. It went to my heart ... a morning or two ago I strolled up one of
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those sunny hills that I might breathe the fresh air before going into court; and there, amidst the life and beauty of a spring morning, a boy was digging the grave of poor Evans.”
As a bishop the greatest contribution he made to the missionary church was the way he organised it into dioceses and founded it on the democratic ancient system of Government by Synods.
All through his episcopate he championed the cause of the Maori people against all attempts of the Government or unscrupulous speculators to deprive them of their land. In 1848 when Lord Grey was Colonial Secretary a despatch was sent to New Zealand in the form of a Report to the House of Commons recommending a policy for the colonies which practically meant the spoliation of the native people. This policy was to be backed up if necessary by armed force. Although Governor Grey pointed out that the despatch was not mandatory and would certainly not be implemented in New Zealand. Sclwyn thought that a protest should be made against the principle involved. In drawing up his protest he consulted the Governor and Judge Martin but, when it was read in the House of Commons, it sounded so strongly worded in contrast with Governor Grey’s more diplomatic reply that one member felt constrained to call Selwyn “this turbulent priest”. Although the Bishop rejoiced in receiving so historic and honoured a title, he knew that he had incurred the displeasure and censure of the Home Government.
But the saddest thing in Selwyn’s story is the way in which he lost so largely the trust and affection of the Maori people. It came about during the Waikato war. He had joined his colleagues in their protests against the injustice and folly of the Government’s policy. When war broke out in the Waikato, at great personal risk, he shepherded to safety many white settlers, but when the troops went into action he was guilty of what now appears
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to have been an error of judgment. There were ten to twelve thousand troops fighting for the Government. Amongst them were many young, imperial officers amongst whom Selwyn felt very much at home. He considered that the soldiers, being men under orders, were guiltless instruments of the Government and that it was not right to let so many men go into action without proper provision for their spiritual care. All will agree that he was right in so thinking, but then he made his great mistake. Instead of sending some of his clergy to serve as chaplains he went himself. He camped with them, messed with them, and from the Maori point of view was part and parcel of the force they were fighting. Then one day something worse happened. After a fight, in company with one of the officers, he went out on to the battlefield and found a wounded Maori. Selwyn and the officer began carrying this wounded man back to camp for medical attention. On their way they met two soldiers carrying muskets. The soldiers relieved them of their burden of the wounded Maori and Selwyn and the officer each carried one of the muskets. Selwyn was seen doing this by some Maoris and the report spread at once that he was actually fighting against them. Although the wounded Maori afterwards tried to correct this wrong impression it was too late, the damage had been done and Selwyn never recovered his mana as a friend and protector of the Maori. It was tragic. In 1867 Selwyn went to England to attend the first Lambeth Conference. While he was there he was offered the See of Lichfield. He refused the offer and wrote to the Archbishop of Canterbury, “as a matter of promotion, conferred on me by the civil power, I had no hesitation in refusing the Bishopric of Lichfield. My love for New Zealand made me hope that the offer would not be renewed. ... I am commanded to preach at Windsor on Sunday (Dec. Ist) and the Dean’s letter leads me to think that the Queen may speak to me on the subject. As a soldier of the church
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I shall probably feel bound to do whatever my Com-mander-in-Chief bids me.” The Queen did speak to him and he accepted Lichfield.
No reason has ever been given for this remarkable intervention of the Sovereign but, whatever the reason or reasons were, Selwyn was undoubtedly recalled from New Zealand.
He returned to take farewell of his people. The General Synod presented him with an elaborate address which concluded with these words—“We know full well that you never cease to pray and labour for us. and you need no assurance from us that we will ever remember and pray for you. How can we ever forget you? Every spot in New Zealand is identified with you. Each hill and valley, each river and bay and headland is full of memories of you; the busy town, the lonely settler’s hut, the countless islands of the sea, all speak to us of you. . . . We humbly pray God, who has given you the wisdom to conceive and the power to execute your great designs, that your high and noble example may ever be affectionately remembered and dutifully followed by us all; that the mind and spirit of its first Bishop may be stamped for all generations upon the Church of New Zealand, and that the multitude of the isles may learn, in years to come, the name of their first great missionary and rise up and call him blessed.”
A farewell gathering was held in Auckland but the Maoris were not present in any number. Even the tribes from the far north, amongst whom he had first made his home, contented themselves with sending a Maori clergyman to present a very moving address.
The general Maori farewell address was as follows; “To Bishop Selwyn, greeting —Ours is a word of farewell to you from us, your Maori people who reside in this island. You leave here two peoples, the Maoris and the Europeans. Though you leave us here, God will protect both peoples, and Queen Victoria and the Governor will also protect them, so that the grace of Providence may
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rest on them both. O father greetings! Go to your own country; go, the grace of God accompany you. Go on the face of the deep waters. Father take hence with you the commandments of God. leaving the peoples here bewildered. Who can tell that after your departure things will be as well with us as during your stay in this island? Our love for you and our remembrance of you will never cease. You will be separated from us in your bodily presence and your countenance will be hidden from our eyes. Enough! This concludes our words of farewell to you. From your children.”
To New Zealanders, who know how the Maoris can spread themselves on such an occasion, this address speaks for itself.
The inspiration of Selwyn is still with us. I cannot think of a more suitable gift to a theological student than Tucker’s biography which contains so many of Selwyn’s letters. The inspiration of the man is still there and could add a lustre and power to many a ministry in danger of being weak and drab.
Chapter 7
THE CONSTITUTION
The heading of this chapter will doubtless fill the reader with misgiving and make him prepare for a very dreary and dull part of the story. But let him be reassured. It would take a small book to treat this subject in a way which would satisfy the lawyers and learned members of General Synod. We attempt in this chapter to tell simply the story of the origin, the adoption and the significance of the constitution or laws governing our Church in New Zealand. This is something which every intelligent churchman should know. He will find that the Constitution and the story of its adoption gives our church what is perhaps its greatest claim to distinction in the general history of the Church of England. It gives us a liberty to manage our own affairs which the Mother Church does not possess and has good cause to envy.
After the first World War there was a movement in England to revise the Book of Common Prayer. Much time was spent by the best scholars and liturgiologists in preparing a revision acceptable to the Church. But because the Church of England is the State Church of the Realm of England, by law Established and Endowed, this revision had to be authorised by Parliament. In 1928 the House of Commons rejected it. Now there is nothing to prevent a member of the House of Commons being a Jew, a Turk, an Infidel or a Heretic.
There has always been a strong body in the Church at Home protesting against the erastianism the Establishment involves, and claiming that all the advantages of being a State Church are far outweighed by the loss of liberty to
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manage its own affairs. Of course there have always been many who have held to the contrary opinion but George Augustus Selwyn was not one of them.
Selwyn’s study of the Fathers led him to believe that the Church was originally a self-governing body with authority residing, first in the Bishops, and then in synods or councils of clergy and laity over which the Bishop presided. When he accepted the offer of the bishopric of New Zealand he was thrilled with the thought that it gave him the opportunity of establishing a church on the old historic lines without all the encumbrances of State control.
At the very beginning he protested against the wording of his Letters Patent. He considered that they suggested that the source of his authority as Bishop of New Zealand resided in the Crown. He maintained that the source could be found only in the act of Consecration, whereby he was made a bishop. The Crown could only determine where he should exercise that authority. Although his protest about the wording was unsuccessful he successfully maintained his claim to the right of appointing his own archdeacons.
When he arrived he found, of course, that his huge diocese was not divided into parishes, but into large mission districts. The settlements of the New Zealand Company constituted the Southern District which included nearly all of our own present diocese with the addition of Nelson. Marlborough and Hawke Bay. Selwyn afterwards made this the Archdeaconry of Kapiti.
Governor Hobson proclaimed British Sovereignty over New Zealand in 1840. The European population increased and, step by step, independent Government was established. At the time we are dealing with each Province had its own Provincial Legislative Council. New Zealand was thus divided into seven little separate colonies. It is rather important to remember this, because, as the constitution of the Episcopal Church of America was influenced by the formation of the Federal Constitution of the United
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States (some of the same men were engaged in the two transactions) so also, the final form of our constitution was influenced by the form of Provincial government.
The Canterbury Pilgrims arrived in 1850 and this brought so large an increase in the church population and number of clergy that Selwyn seized the opportunity to divide his unwieldy diocese and make way for the appointment of Bishop Harper. The time had come for more detailed organisation. Before the Canterbury Pilgrims arrived a Petition, signed by 270 churchmen, clergy and laity, was presented to Bishop Selwyn. The petitioners declared their “earnest conviction that a peculiar necessity exists for the speedy establishment of some system of Church Government which, by assigning to each Order in the Church its appropriate duties, might call forth the energies of all.” The petition went on to formulate a scheme for calling a convention “resembling in many points that which we are informed has proved beneficial to our brethren in America, and which we should all be satisfied to see adopted here.”
Selwyn acknowledged the Bishop of Sydney as his metropolitan and when he received notice of a conference of Australian Bishops he set off across the Tasman in his little ship Undine armed with the petition.
The bishops were only too willing to agree with the petitioners but they were held back by the fear that they had no authority to call together such a synod or convention for the purpose stated in the petition without first getting the permission of the Crown, by whose authority they held their appointments.
However Selwyn went ahead. He sent out a long pastoral dated St. John’s College, April 19th, 1852. This pastoral is one of the most important documents in the archives of the church of New Zealand for it contains the first draft of the proposed constitution. It is generally supposed that the actual drafting of the document was
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done by the Chief Justice, Sir William Martin, the SolicitorGeneral, Mr W. Swainson, and the Governor himself, Sir George Grey. At the Bishop’s request meetings of clergy and laity were held throughout the two dioceses to discuss this pastoral. In a second pastoral the different districts were invited to send in criticisms and suggested amendments.
Armed with the replies the Bishop set off for England to get permission from the British Parliament to proceed. Two unsuccessful attempts had been made to get Bills through Parliament on the question when the problem was solved by the opinion of the highest legal authorities in England that no permission from the British Parliament was necessary. It was obvious that the Church in New Zealand must have laws for its proper government. As New Zealand now had an independent Legislature, neither the Church nor State in England could have any authority to interfere in the making of these laws, and the members of the Church in New Zealand could come together by “voluntary compact” and decide on their own constitution. Selwyn returned in triumph and summoned a conference at Auckland which on June 13th. 1857, put forth the constitution of the Church of the Province of New Zealand. The Preamble begins “In the name of God. Amen WHEREAS it is desirable that the members of the United Church of England and Ireland in the Colony of New Zealand should be associated together by voluntary compact NOW THEREFORE, the Bishops, Clergy and Laity, in General Synod assembled, do solemnly declare and establish as follows: . . .” Then follow the five “Fundamental Clauses.” These make provision for the Church of New Zealand remaining in full communion with the Mother Church by never altering the doctrine, or departing from the use of the Book of Common Prayer and the Authorised Version of the Scriptures. Then follows the sixth clause “The above provisions shall be deemed FUNDAMENTAL, and it shall not be within the power
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of the General Synod, or of any Diocesan Synod to alter, revoke, add to or diminish any of the same.”
Whether the founders of the Constitution had either legal or moral right to bind their successors for all time in this way is a matter of opinion.
So everything was ready for the first meeting of General Synod which Bishop Selwyn summoned to meet at Wellington on March 9th, 1859. His presidential address was long and weighty, covering the whole history of the founding of the Constitution, and underlining all matters which he considered needed further attention. He also laid upon the table the terrier of more than 14,000 acres of land secured to the church by about 100 Crown grants, and devoted for ever to the support of religion and Christian education, “and under the powers vested in me, by an act of the last General Assembly, I say to this Synod, Take these properties and use them as you please, within the limits of the Trusts, and may God guide you to a right use of His bounty.”
Tucker, in his Life of Selwyn. describes this first General Synod. “The discussions of this Synod were conducted with a spirit of forbearance and charity, which confuted the forebodings of those who had declared that the clergy and laity would meet only for the fomenting and increasing of dissensions, and the Synod terminated by an Act which the Bishop thus described in a letter to a friend in England, ‘We had a delightful day on Sunday, April 3rd, when the four Bishops of New Zealand, Christchurch, Wellington and Nelson, consecrated the Bishop of Waiapu. We are most grateful to the Giver of all Good’.” The consecration referred to in this letter was that of William Williams, the first Bishop ever consecrated in New Zealand, and the service was held in our St. Peter’s. Everything looked bright for the infant church, but clouds were gathering in the south. The second General Synod was held in Nelson in 1862. Bishop Harper was present but there were no other clergy or laity present from the Christchurch diocese
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and this was no accident. The churchmen of Canterbury, especially the clergy, were not happy about the Constitution and at their Diocesan Synod, held at Christchurch in September 1862, the whole trouble came out into the open. Dean Henry Jacobs in his Church History has told us the whole story in detail, and he should know all about it, because he was in the forefront of the debate. They did not like the Fundamental Clauses: they objected to the dependence of Diocesan Synods on General Synod: in general they claimed that the Diocese and the Diocesan Synod was the unit round which the Church should be organised; and that each Diocesan Synod should have control of its own trusts and endowments. These were all matters worthy of consideration and could certainly have been settled by debate in General Synod, but these Canterbury men still had at the back of their minds, unconsciously perhaps, the dream of the Canterbury Settlement which was to make their Settlement different from all the others. So, still clinging to this fading dream, they added to their protests threats that unless the Constitution were altered they would separate themselves from the Church of the Province. They actually contemplated setting up a separate branch of the Anglican communion in Christchurch. A memorandum of all this was sent to Selwyn who reserved his reply till the third General Synod which met in Christchurch. This synod of 1865 was a momentous occasion. In his presidential address Selwyn spoke very severely about the attitude of the Christchurch Synod and called on them to come down out of their “cloud cuckoo land”. But he ended on a conciliatory note and appealed to them to discuss the matters in dispute as reasonable men. The Rev. J. Wilson of Christchurch brought forward a motion to the effect that as the Diocese of Christchurch had associated itself with the General Synod under a misapprehension they should retire from their present connection with General Synod. This motion failed for want of a seconder
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and the Synod settled down to revise and amend the Constitution Deed.
The most important alterations concerned the independent rights of Diocesan Synods. The old Deed said that “A Diocesan Synod shall be formed in each Diocese.” The revised Deed recognised the independent existence of Diocesan Synods. It was pointed out that the right of a Diocesan Synod to manage its own property could be granted by the State Legislature through an amendment to "The Religious, Charitable and Educational Trusts Act, 1856.” Such an amendment was made to the Act by the General Assembly and Diocesan Synods were given the right to appoint their own Trustees.
The most important result of all this was that Selwyn’s idea of a unified central government of the Church was largely lost. In comparison with other religious bodies the Church of England is a rather disjointed organisation with seven synods and seven bishops, each very jealous of its own diocesan rights and independence. However, the dioceses are more and more working together and the success of the Provincial Board of Missions and the increased importance of the meetings of the Standing Committee of General Synod, and the changing position of the Archbishop, now received as an official visitor in all the dioceses, point to a new awareness of the unity of the Church of the Province.
In 1928 the Church of England Empowering Act was placed upon the Statute Book. The act aimed to overcome the position imposed upon our church by the Fundamental Clauses. There has long been a desire to see certain alterations made in the prayer-book and the compulsory use of the Authorised Version of the Scriptures. This Empowering Act, with very strict safeguards against hasty and ill considered action, enables such alterations to be made without imperilling the tenure of the Church’s property. The General Synod of 1955, for the first time, put in motion proposals under the authority of this Act.
Chapter 8
PIONEER DAYS IN WELLINGTON
When henry williams and Hadfield visited Port Nicholson in 1839 the place was inhabited by only the native Maori people and the little band of newly arrived agents of the New Zealand Company. The hills around the harbour were covered with fern, tussock and scrub and the valleys with heavy bush. There were, of course, no roads and with the exception of a few rough tracks the only means of communication was by canoe across the harbour. The Maoris numbered about five hundred and they lived in palisaded villages around the waterfront from Te Aro to Petone. They occupied their land on sufferance of the great Ngati Toa Chief, Te Rauparaha, and they seemed eager for the protection which a white settlement would give them. The advance party of the New Zealand Company arrived in the Tory on September 20th, 1839, under the control of Colonel William Wakefield, a brother of Edward Gibbon Wakefield, who remained in England to direct the affairs of the Company. Colonel Wakefield found little difficulty in concluding with six Chiefs an agreement for the sale of all the land around the harbour visible from Petone. The purchase was made with goods, mostly blankets, muskets and tobacco to the value of less than £4OO. The terms were supposed to have been interpreted to the Maoris by the whaler, Richard Barrett, and the written document on which the Chiefs made their marks included the condition that one section out of every ten should be reserved for Maori occupation. The founders of the Company had investigated the Indian Reservations in Canada. These
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large reservations left the Indians herded together in their primitive state with little chance of bettering themselves. By mixing the sections reserved for the Maoris with those to be occupied by the settlers, it was expected that the Maoris would be helped to adopt the more civilised habits of their neighbours. Colonel Wakefield was certainly too hasty in concluding this vast purchase of land. He did not understand the difficulties of Maori land tenure; he placed too much reliance on Barrett as a capable interpreter; but he was pressed for time by the knowledge that the immigrant ships were already on the way.
The Company had at its head Edward Gibbon Wakefield who was recognised as the first authority on colonisation, and there can be no doubt, that if his plans had been fully carried out and his ideals realised, there would have been little room for criticism. As a matter of fact the achievement of the Company deserves more praise than it has yet received, especially from the Church. Wakefield raised in England £2,000 towards a bishopric endowment and promised more. The provision they made for native reservation, for religious, educational and public purposes were, on the whole, generous and wise.
At first they planned to build the settlement on the eastern side of the harbour where Petone now is. The town was to be called Britannia and a plan was drawn in London and a survey actually commenced. The plan suffered from the mistake made by the London surveyor in thinking that the Hutt was a navigable river like the Thames. However, after the experience of a flood and several stiff southerlies, Colonel Wakefield decided to shift the settlement to the other side of the harbour. The trouble was of course that there was not much level land, for in those days, the beach came up to Lambton Quay; as late as the nineties it was no uncommon thing to hear old people speak of shopping “on the beach” when they meant on Lambton Quay. There was not much room to get round the point where Willis Street now meets Lambton
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Quay so the beach was divided into two parts, Te Aro and Thorndon. The beach was soon occupied by business premises and residences were built on Thorndon Flat, at Te Aro and on the Terrace. When Henry Williams arrived in 1839 the Company had already bought all the land. He was evidently upset by the way it had been done and the price paid and he did a very strange thing—he concluded a purchase of some forty to sixty acres of land where the city of Wellington now stands. Of course at the time this part had not been chosen as the site for the settlement. He made this purchase from a Maori who had been in his school in the north, one Richard Davis. He must have known that this land was included in the Company’s purchase and he must have known that the individual Maori from whom he made the purchase possessed a very uncertain title, if any title at all. Perhaps it was only a try on, on Williams’ part, to secure land for a mission station, and if the settlement had remained at Petone he might have got it. But when the township was surveyed at Te Aro and Thorndon the Company of course would not recognise Williams’ claim. On a later visit he discussed the matter with Colonel Wakefield and agreed to surrender it. In return the Company made a gift of two town acres in the very best situation, one to Williams and one to the Maori Richard Davis. Eventually the Archdeacon sold his section and applied the money as an endowment for the family’s private church at Pakaraka. Pakaraka is a long way from Wellington.
The first missionaries to the Maoris in Wellington were converts who drifted down from the northern stations. They brought with them odds and ends of literature from the Mission Press and gave such teaching as they could. The first Christian service held in Wellington was conducted by two Methodist missionaries, the Rev. John Bumby and the Rev. John Hobbs. The Methodist mission was originally established in the far north at Whangaroa. During Hongi’s war-raids the station was abandoned and
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the members of the mission found asylum with the C.M.S. station at the Bay of Islands. From there, a party under John Bumby and John Hobbs hired a vessel and set out to establish a station at Cloudy Bay in the South Island. On the way they visited Port Nicholson in June 1839, three months before Tory arrived. It was then that they held the first service, and took an option on a large block of land. This was afterwards transferred to the Company and in return they received another allotment.
When Tory left England one passenger at the last minute was prevented from coming. This was the Rev. Montague Hawtrey, a Church of England clergyman very interested in colonisation. He was to have been the chaplain to the expedition. Tory anchored in Port Nicholson on Friday, September 20th, 1839 and on Sunday, 22nd, a church service was held on board with a party of Maoris in attendance. This was the first Church of England service held in Wellington.
A Presbyterian clergyman, the Rev. J. MacFarlane, arrived on the ship Bengal Merchant on February 20th, 1840, and he conducted services for all the immigrants. A letter from one of the settlers published in Bishop’s Guide to Wellington thus described a service held in the open on Petone Beach —“It was a beautiful, calm day, not a cloud to be seen in the sky and the sun shone forth in its meridian splendour. The magnificent harbour of Port Nicholson lay before us, but not a breath of wind to ruffle the surface of the waters; and the laving of the tide upon the beach was the only sound heard in that direction, to break the stillness of the peaceful scene. To the left might be seen, anchored off Somes Island, the vessels which had been for months the temporary home of the settlers, and which had brought them in safety across the mighty deep, with the British Ensign hanging at their peaks. To the right, and about a mile distant, was the bush with its various and beautiful foliage. The nikau palm and the tree-fern being conspicuous in their beauty; and the
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woods were musical with the song of birds. The background consisting of tall flax and the feathery toi-toi, which was then in full bloom. Adjoining and a short distance from Petone beach there was a small clump of karaka trees, under the shade of which the settlers assembled to worship God. There was no sabbath bell to call the congregation together, but the song of the bell-bird could be distinctly heard above all the songsters of the grove. There were about thirty or forty persons present among whom I remember Mr Robert Strang, Mr George Hunter. Mr Wm. Lyon, Mr K. Bethune, Mr J. Telford. Mr Francis Yates, Mr Robert Kemble, Mr Buchanan and many more whose names I have forgotten.
“The greeting was most cordial as friends met and briefly related their several experiences to each other since leaving the Mother country. . . . The Rev. John MacFarlane, the only clergyman who accompanied the first expedition, officiated. When the reverend gentleman said ‘Let us worship God,’ every head was reverently uncovered and the small company joined with all earnestness in singing the Hundredth Psalm—‘All people that on earth do dwell.’ He then read a portion of Scripture, after which he offered a prayer. And there, with the canopy of Heaven for a covering, did they pour forth their thanksgiving to God for bringing them in safety across the mighty deep to their desired haven. Then was sung ‘O God of Bethel, By Whose Hand.’ After a short sermon the 23rd Psalm was sung. . . . And here I may mention that Sabbath services were afterwards regularly held in Bethune and Hunter’s Store on the banks of the Hutt and sometimes at Colonel Wakefield’s house at Pito-one."
The first Church of England clergyman to arrive was the Rev. John F. Churton who came on the ship Bolton on April 20th, 1840. The Rev. S. G. Butler was on the same ship. He had been in New Zealand before and was in fact the first ordained man Marsden sent to the Northern
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Mission. He came out this second time to serve as Magistrate with a commission from the Governor of New South Wales. Mr Churton did not stay long but, much to the disgust of the Wellington settlers, moved to Auckland to serve as Chaplain to the Governor and take charge of St. Paul’s Church. He was there when Selwyn arrived in 1842. Members of the Church of England were for a time dependent on the ministrations kindly extended to them by Mr MacFarlane of the Presbyterian Church. It was during this period that Hadfield used to ride down from Waikanae to do what he could to fill the gap.
Bishop Selwyn arrived in Auckland in May 1842 and in October of that year he left for his first visit to Wellington. He had sent before him two men whom he had brought out from England with him, the Rev. R. Cole and an ordinand, Mr William Evans. When the Bishop arrived in Wellington he found them both stricken with typhoid. Cole recovered but Evans died. Mr Cole took charge of church work in the settlement and he was therefore the first priest in charge of the church in Wellington.
In 1843, Selwyn called again at Wellington on his way to visit the South Island and in 1843 there is this entry in his diary. “December 17th, Sunday. At half past seven native service: 9 barrack ditto; half past ten and three English services; five (p.m.) native ditto.” This is the first record we have of Sunday services in Wellington.
On his return he stayed only one day in Wellington and the diary has the following entry for February 27th (1844) —“Presented Tuhawaiki and Tamihana [Te Rauparaha’s son who had been his guide on the southern trip], to the Governor (Captain R. Fitzroy). Afterwards went with the Governor to choose another site for the church, the first chosen being ineligible. Obtained a grant of the place 1 most wished for and hope soon to be able to raise a fund for beginning the Chancel. In the meantime a wooden nave will be begun immediately, funds having been left for that purpose by me in the hands of Mr Cole and other
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managers appointed by me; cleared up various matters of business and received numerous visitors; among others Mr Justice Chapman, the new Judge who spoke very co-operatively on church matters.”
The Bishop visited Wellington on January 29th of the next year (1845) and wrote “a large wooden chapel [all wooden churches were called chapels by Selwyn], had been completed since my last visit, and was now in use. The interior fittings are very neat and the accommodation sufficient for the present congregation. The site which is part of the land reserved for the residence of the Superintendent of the Southern Division [old Government House site] is particularly good.”
This building was the first St. Paul’s and when it was taken down part of it was used for the chapel which still stands in Bolton Street cemetery.
At the Te Aro end of the town the church of St. Peter was opened on a Sunday in September, 1848. This building became the nave of old St. Peter’s and was removed to Webb Street in 1879. The Rev. A. Stock took charge of the work at St. Peter’s. The clock which was in the tower of old St. Peter’s is still in use in St. Matthews’ Church. Brooklyn. Before either of these churches had been built the Rev. R. Taylor had, in 1843, built the first Christ Church, Wanganui, which he proudly claimed was the first church for pakeha worship built in the Cook Strait area. This does not take into account the small brick church (40 feet by 26) which Mason had built at Putiki for the worship of the Maoris. This church was destroyed by earthquake.
As the new settlement at Wellington grew the rough tracks which led out of the township gave place to roads of a sort. The first one formed was to the Hutt, which gradually extended up the valley. The next was the Porirua Road which gave access to the west coast. Tinakori Road led into the Karori Valley and looped through Makara and
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Ohariu to join the Porirua Road at Hawtrey or Johnsonville. Settlers built their homes on these roads and the Church followed the settlers. In 1841 a church was built in the Maori style at Aglionby on the bank of the Hutt river. This building was washed away in a flood and a church was built in Woburn Road and opened in 1849. This was the first St. James, and until recently a part of it stood in the church grounds and was used as a small schoolroom. The N.Z. Journal for June 10, 1849, records that at the opening ceremony the Rev. R. Cole preached to a congregation of 250 persons.
On February 5, 1853, an advertisement appeared in the N.Z. Spectator calling for tenders for the erection of a proposed church at “Taitai River Hutt.” This fixes the date for Christ Church Taita and makes it, after Rangiatea, the oldest church in the Diocese still in use. No record of its consecration has been found.
A church was built at Johnsonville in 1847. The N.Z. Spectator on Saturday, July 31st, of that year gave the following account of the opening. “On Thursday evening the church which has recently been built on the Porirua Road was opened for the first time for public worship. The service commenced at half past six o’clock, the Rev. R. Cole M.A. said the prayers and the Bishop of New Zealand preached to a very numerous and attentive congregation. The church which is about five miles from Wellington is a neat wooden structure and is capable of containing from one hundred and twenty to one hundred and fifty persons. The site seems to have been appropriately chosen. The church is built on a section belonging to the Revs. J. and S. Hawtrey who have devoted twenty acres of it to ecclesiastical purposes.”
The first St. Mary’s Karori was built in 1865 on the beautiful site which is part of a five acre section which was given by Mr Justice H. S. Chapman. The first church of St. Matthias was built two years later where the two
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Makara valleys join. In 1870 a small church was built in the Ohariu.
The circle of districts around Wellington, Karori, Makara, Ohariu, Johnsonville, Pauatahanui to the Upper Hutt, formed one large mission district. The Rev. T, Fancourt residing at Karori took charge of it from 1865-70 and the Rev. H. W. St. Hill rendered valuable service. The help of lay readers was required to maintain the services and Bishop Abraham paid a special tribute to the work done by Mr France of Ohariu and Mr Toomath of Karori.
J In the township itself, when St. Peter's Church was opened at Te Aro, it was difficult to maintain the services. The Spectator for June 13th, 1857, reproduces from a London paper, The Guardian, an interesting correspondence between Mr J. R. Godley and the Rev. R. Cole. Mr Godley had been in Wellington and Mr Cole had returned to England. In describing the church life of the new settlement Godley had complained of the “mutilated services” and Cole made the following reply; “When the second church in the town was opened 1 was still alone in the cure and, it being desirable to have a morning service in each church, it became necessary not to mutilate but to divide the service so that at one church at 10 a.m. we had Morning Prayer as it is usually taken when the Litany is not used, with a sermon; in the other, at a quarter to twelve, we began with the Litany—the Communion Service with a sermon, to the end of the Church Militant Prayer followed. The next Sunday the order of service was reversed—in effect for the town, there was the morning service entire on every Sunday plus two sermons. Mr Godley was in the habit of attending both services and a few others did the same. The afternoon and evening services were never taken in parts.”
So were St. Peter’s and St. Paul’s served until the Rev A. Stock arrived to take over St. Peter’s.
Efforts were early made to start church schools. The first was opened on January Ist. 1843, under the charge of Mrs
The Right Reverend Octavius Hadfield, Bishop of Wellington and Primate of New Zealand
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Buxton assisted by her husband. Schools were also opened at the Hutt and at Johnsonville. Bishop Abraham opened a small Grammar School for boys at Kaiwarrawarra. The first master was Mr W. L. Martin who was followed by the Rev. H. W. St. Hill. Under him there were fourteen boarders and two day boys. It was a brave challenge which awaits to be taken up again by the Church in Wellington. Early Days in the Wairarapa
The pioneer settlers at Port Nicholson soon saw that if they were to realise their dreams of owning farms of broad acres they would have to push out beyond the bounds of the hill-girt harbour. Exploration over the Rimutaka Range revealed that there was a large plain near at hand but difficult of access. The way round the coast proved impracticable and a rough road over the Range was put through in the fifties.
Bishop Selwyn, accompanied by the Rev. William Ronaldson, set out to cross the Rimutakas on New Year’s Day 1855. They visited the scattered settlers and Maori villages in the Lower Valley and the Bishop conducted services on the following Sunday. He appointed Mr Ronaldson to take charge of the work and make his centre in the Maori Reserve at Papawai.
Mr Ronaldson found the rough pioneer conditions very trying. In his diary he thus describes a late return to his home at Papawai. “One mile of bush takes me forty minutes walking. ... I could only tell I was in the road by keeping in the mud often up to my knees.” Note his nice choice of words, for he says that he was in the road not on it.
He was a C.M.S. missionary and of course the Maoris had the first claim on his services, but throughout his long ministry he worked hard and conscientiously and did much work amongst the pakeha settlers.
On December 21. 1860. Bishop Abraham opened the Maori College of St. Thomas at Papawai. There were sixteen scholars and Mr Ronaldson was warden and sole
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teacher. The venture was ill-timed: there were no funds available for its proper maintenance and the Maoris were very disaffected by the King Movement in the north. In four years both money and scholars disappeared and the school closed down. Mr Ronaldson left the mud of Papawai to carry on his missionary work from Masterton.
By this time the settlements at Greytown and Masterton were taking shape and in 1864 the Rev. D, Desbois came to take charge of the whole district, living in a vicarage which had been built for him at Greytown. Mr Desbois was only in deacon’s orders and was soon succeeded by the Rev. Amos Knell. Mr Knell was a most energetic and public spirited parson who did splendid work in the new communities. St. Luke’s Church, Greytown, was built in 1869. Additions were made and Bishop Hadfield consecrated it in 1876. The old original structure, built of real heart totara. forms part of the present church. In the original plans for the settlement of the Wairarapa Greytown was considered as the right site for the main centre. Its position was soon challenged by the northern settlement of Masterton. The vagaries of the Waiohine river compelled the railway engineers to by-pass Greytown with the line and as a result Masterton raced ahead and Greytown was left stranded.
Masterton was made a separate District in 1875. Before that time all four townships of the Wairarapa were under the care of Mr Knell who was stationed at Greytown. A vicarage had already been built in Masterton for Mr Ronaldson and a small church erected in 1867. Mr Ronaldson and Mr Desbois assisted Mr Knell with the work around Masterton until the Rev. J. F. Teakle was appointed vicar in 1875. The little church was enlarged in 1880 and replaced by a fine brick building in 1913. This was the church which was destroyed by the earthquake in 1942.
As the settlers pushed northwards from Masterton through the Forty Mile Bush and southward from the
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Manawatu river, townships sprang up at Pahiatua and Eketahuna which became centres for the districts they serve today.
The heavy bush of the Wairarapa meant very hard and arduous work for the pioneer settlers and it should be placed on record that the church shared the hardship, the joys and the sorrows of those early years in order that her children should not be bereft of the comfort and strength of her ministrations.
Part 2
THE BISHOPS
Chapter 9
CHARLES JOHN ABRAHAM, D.D.
The First Bishop of Wellington—1858-1870
When, in 1858, Octavius Hadfield refused the offer of the bishopric of Wellington, Selwyn offered it to his lifelong friend Charles Abraham who, at the time, was the Warden of St. John’s College and Archdeacon of Waitemata. He was then fortyfour years of age and had been in New Zealand for eight years.
At Eton he won a place in the Eleven and went on to King’s College, Cambridge, where he graduated B.A. in 1837 and M.A. in 1840, and succeeded to a Fellowship which he held till he left England in 1850. He was ordained deacon in 1838 and after serving a curacy at Headley Downs returned to Eton as an assistant master and Lecturer in divinity at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor. At Eton he became a great friend of Selwyn and when Selwyn accepted the offer of the bishopric of New Zealand Abraham was one of several friends who volunteered to accompany him. But at the time Abraham was very occupied in carrying out certain important reforms in the organisation of the school and he and Selwyn agreed that it was more important that he should remain at Eton until the work which he had in hand was completed. It was nine years before he followed Selwyn to New Zealand and throughout those years they kept up a correspondence in which Selwyn repeated his fervent desire to have his friend with him in this country.
The great bishop was undoubtedly the stronger man and it was evident that he nursed his friend all through his career, and when Selwyn accepted the See of Lichfield,
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Abraham at once resigned from Wellington to be an assistant in the Home diocese. We may therefore expect to find that during his episcopate as Bishop of Wellington he served mainly as a deputy for George Augustus New Zealand. He was a scholar, soundly grounded in the classics and with a very full and detailed knowledge of early church history. There is a little book in the Diocesan Library entitled The Unity of History with the legend “For the College Library of St. John’s New Zealand from the Author, Eton 1845.” The author was Charles Abraham and the book, if it does not provide much evidence of original and constructive thought, shows us that the author was a very gifted tutor and a most painstaking scholar. That is why Selwyn gave him charge of St. John’s College. One wonders what he thought of that rather primitive institution after his long residence at Eton. When he was appointed Bishop of Wellington he went Home to be consecrated at Lambeth under Royal Letters Patent. Hadfield, who had refused the bishopric, accompanied him as his chaplain. They returned to Wellington in time for the first General Synod and the new bishop took part in the consecration of William Williams, the first Bishop of Waiapu.
The first Diocesan Synod was held in Wellington in October 1859. “The Licensed Clergy and Synodsmen of the Diocese of Wellington, summoned by the Bishop of Wellington to attend the Synod on the 12th October, met in the Provincial Council Chamber, and were invited by the Bishop to proceed to St. Peter’s Church for Divine Service and the celebration of Holy Communion.”
In reading the report of that first Synod it is hard to realise that, for the members, it was a new and novel experience. It is obvious that, as beginners, they did everything very carefully according to the book. The Proceedings read very much the same as in the latest Year Book. Of course the Synod was much smaller. There were seven clergy present including one Maori: The Archdeacon of
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Kapiti, the Rev. H. W. St. Hill, the Rev. A. Stock, the Rev. A. Baker, the Rev. R. Taylor, the Rev. W. Ronaldson and the Rev. Riwai Te Ahu. The laymen were Messrs Battersbee, J. C. Crawford, Ludlam, Robinson, Capt. Smith, Messrs Stokes and J. H. Wallace.
The Synod lasted a whole fortnight and did everything in the accepted style of a synod of today. Two Petitions were received, one from the district of Te Aro and one from the district of Hutt with Taita, asking that they be constituted ecclesiastical parishes. The Petition of Te Aro was evidently granted and the Rev. A. Stock was appointed the first vicar of St. Peter’s which thus has the honour of being the oldest parish in the Diocese. The boundaries of St. Peter’s were, on the N.W., a line at right angles to Lambton Quay near the Scotch Church, for the rest, the Harbour front and Cook Strait. The Petition from the Hutt was held up because no clergyman was available to take the Cure. At the second Synod similar Petitions came in from St. Paul’s, Thorndon, and Christ Church, Wanganui. The stipends of the clergy were to begin at £lOO (later £150) and rise by £lO a year up to £3OO. The S.P.C.K. and the S.P.G. made generous grants towards the work of the new diocese.
The Bishop’s Presidential Addresses to Synod were scholarly and very lengthy and most of them dealt with interpretation of the new Constitution and its application to the organising of the Diocese. The address at the Synod before the first Lambeth Conference (1867) was a very lengthy one running to 27 pages and over 10,000 words. It was concerned with the heretical opinions of Bishop Colenso of Natal and the “notorious” book Essays and Reviews together with the controversy about ritualistic practices in the church at Home. These gave the Bishop a chance to spread himself and he made every post a winning post. During the whole of his episcopate the Diocese was very sparsely staffed. On the west coast it extended to Patea and on the east coast to Napier. Very
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often the Bishop himself served in vacant cures. The work amongst the Maoris suffered grievously because of the wars in Taranaki and the Waikato and from the Hau Hau movement but there was no actual fighting in our diocese and the West Coast tribes remained loyal.
When Selwyn accepted Lichfield, Charles Abraham resigned to go and assist him in the English Diocese. This prompt action confirms the impression that his contribution to the work of the Church in New Zealand was made as a friend and lieutenant of Selwyn. The Diocese was fortunate in having him as its first Bishop in the formative years because his relationship to Selwyn ensured the full and ready acceptance of the Constitution. He left behind the pleasant memory of a humble minded English gentleman, a scholarly bishop and a most painstaking and conscientious servant of the church.
The Archdeacon of Kapiti, acting as Commissary, paid the following tribute in his address to Synod —“1 never was more thoroughly impressed with any man’s conscientious anxiety as to what was right, than I was with his in all these occasions. I might venture to describe in one word the prominent feature of his character—it was straightforwardness. Whether he agreed with one or disagreed, there was never any difficulty in ascertaining what he meant. It would be presumptuous, on my part, to say more than this. Nor am I any better qualified to speak on another point which, however, is one I do not quite like to omit, because I have reason to think it was very imperfectly recognised or appreciated. I allude to his very superior scholarship. Few people, I believe, know that this Diocese had in Bishop Abraham one of the most finished scholars that an English Public School like Eton and an English University like Cambridge could produce.”
He accepted the Prebendal stall of Bobenshall in Lichfield Cathedral and a Residentiary Canonry. He spent the last years of his life with his only son, who was Bishop of Derby, and died in 1903.
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Chapter 10
OCTAVIUS HADFIELD
Bishop and Primate—lB7o-1889
Octavius hadfield was consecrated as the second bishop of Wellington on October 9th, 1870. He was then fifty-six years of age and had behind him the experience of twenty-three years of work as Archdeacon of Kapiti. His last years at Otaki were clouded by the withering of the work and the great unpopularity he incurred amongst the European settlers: for no one had denounced the war policy of the Government, nor vindicated the justice of the Maori claims in more devastating logic than Hadfield. His protests could not be ignored nor his statements left unquestioned. His friendship and close association with Wiremu Kingi laid him open to suggestions of treasonable conduct and in 1860 he went to Auckland to follow the proceedings of the General Assembly. The outcome of that visit has already been recorded.
When he visited England in 1857 he was the principal witness in the Bryce-Rusden libel case. The fact that his evidence did not save the case for Rusden nor his answers before the Legislative Assembly allay the public clamour does not necessarily mean that he was in the wrong. We, of this generation, are sufficiently experienced in the way war hysteria can vitiate the judgment of even good citizens and sway the actions of governments, to believe that in this controversy between the missionary and the public the protagonist for the Maori people was mistaken. In the end he came out of it with an added reputation as a just man who ever had the courage of his convictions to champion an unpopular cause in the face of public opinion.
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When he came to Wellington as Bishop a reaction had already set in. The manifest gallantry of the Maoris in so unequal a contest and the innate sense of justice in British hearts soon reconditioned public opinion. Hadfield was now remembered as the man who had ridden down from Waikanae to minister to the settlers at Wellington when none other was there. He was the great missionary who in face of sickness, nigh unto death, had carried on so heroically. He was the man who had won the confidence of the Maori people as no one else had ever done and who, in most dramatic circumstances, had saved the settlement from the raid by Te Rauparaha and his warriors after the Wairau massacre. He was the man who all through the wars in the north and the Hau Hau troubles had kept the West Coast Maoris loyal and peaceable, and saved a remnant for the Church. He had identified himself entirely with the pioneer life of Wellington and dedicated all his great gifts of mind and heart to the service of the infant church of the Province of New Zealand. We honour Selwyn because he first embraced the vision of a Church free and independent of all state control, organised and functioning as the Church of the Fathers. We honour Sir William Martin the Chief Justice, Mr W. Swainson the Attorney-General and Sir George Grey the statesman who embodied Selwyn’s vision in the framework of the Constitution. We must honour Hadfield as the great defender and guardian of the liberty thus won for us.
Hadfield had the gift of clear logical reasoning characteristic of a great constitutional lawyer. He would never have allowed such a muddle to occur as that which followed Dr Jenner’s selection for the new Diocese of Dunedin. When Selwyn, as Bishop of Lichfield, proposed that the Lambeth Conference should establish the Archbishop of Canterbury as the Patriarch of the Anglican Community and set up a final Court of Appeal in England, Hadfield was the first to point out, in no uncertain language, the inconsistency of the proposal. Again, when
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the Bishop of Lichfield proposed that permission be given to the Colonial Churches to omit the reference to the Queen’s mandate in the order of Consecration of Bishops, Hadfield at once pointed out that no such permission was necessary as provision for this omission already existed in the Constitution. It is interesting to see Hadfield putting the Bishop of Lichfield right in matters concerning a constitution for which he is honoured as the author. Still more characteristic is the way in which Hadfield dealt with a suggestion from Christchurch to debate a motion by Dean Jacobs it was proposed to move at their synod. The Dean’s motion was that the new Primate, Bishop Harper, should summon a Convention to revise the constitution and then resolve itself into the eighth General Synod of the Province. Hadfield’s reply was, “My great respect for Dean Jacob’s knowledge and judgment induced me to give the proposal the most careful consideration; but 1 was unable to attach any meaning to the proposal. ... I am not aware that the resolutions of the Diocese of Christchurch have any particular claims on the attention of this Synod.” During the twenty-five years of his episcopate he made reference to the constitution in nearly every address to his Synod. He watched every statement in English papers and church conferences and pounced on anything which suggested that the church in New Zealand was in any way under the control of the Mother Church. “It would be wise on the part of the Churchmen in England, as well as statesmen, if they would desist from using language in reference to the colonies which, though utterly impotent and meaningless for any practical purpose, is nevertheless, to say the least, more or less offensive.”
At the General Synod over which he presided as Primate a question arose about the interpretation of Standing Orders. Someone suggested that the President should be bound by the practice of the House of Representatives. Hadfield replied —“That is to say by rules of which he was not, as President, bound even to know the existence.
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Such an assumption I felt it my duty most decidedly to resist. The Synod has its own Standing Orders by which its order of business is regulated and which distinctly lay down that it is the duty of the President to interpret these. The rule is ‘All questions of order shall be decided by the President’. Apart from these the President can only be guided by the custom of Metropolitans when presiding over Provincial Synods, custom which widely obtained in the Church centuries before parliaments and their mode of conducting their secular business were even dreamed of.”
After his resignation from the Primacy and the See of Wellington, when he was in his eightieth year, he concluded his letter of farewell to the Synod with these words, ‘if I have had any misgivings in laying down my office of Bishop of the Diocese and Primate of the Provincial Church, it has been lest there should be any indifference as to the value and importance of the present ecclesiastical constitution of the Church, or any lack of energy in maintaining it.” The word constitution must have been engraven on his heart.
When he began his episcopate the Diocesan Synod consisted of twelve clergy and twelve laymen. After a celebration of Holy Communion at 11 o’clock at St. Paul’s, they assembled in the afternoon in the Diocesan Room (the present Library) for the opening business. There amongst them was the veteran missionary Richard Taylor from Wanganui; Arthur Stock the first archdeacon of Wellington who served so faithfully for 32 years as Vicar of St. Peter’s and a young man named Thomas Fancourt, who after five years’ service in the Karori-Johnsonville District, was then in charge of the parish of St. James, Lower Hutt. We can imagine them sitting in that small room listening intently to the Bishop’s weighty addresses often running to 9,000 words.
In addition to the inevitable reference to the Constitution three subjects again and again recurred: the proposed
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system of State secular education, the rising tide of freethought and rationalism, and the spirit of parochialism in the Diocese.
Today the majority of the members of Synod have themselves and their children been through the State secular schools. Many have cause to feel grateful for this free system of education which has opened for them a way to a University degree. Whatever its defects may be it does not appear to them to be an evil thing. It was different in the days when it was first established. Men then remembered our Lord’s words “He that is not with me is against me” and they saw in a system of secular education not an influence which was neutral towards religion but something which was against it. So Hadfield spoke to his synod. “I will merely impress upon you that the duty of the Church must ever remain the same, which is to afford a religious education to all who have been admitted into it by Holy Baptism.” “There is no intermediate position between religious education and irreligious education.”
“But the time cannot be far distant when the flagrant injustice of what is now proposed will be self evident to every careful thinker that the law if enacted will have to be repealed. Take for instance the case of Roman Catholics alone. Whatever may be now thought, it cannot long be deemed just or fair to tax them for the support of what they cannot conscientiously avail themselves of”.
When protests and petitions to Parliament were of no avail Hadfield exerted himself to encourage and improve the work of the Sunday Schools and later in fostering the growth of the Wanganui Collegiate School into a large boarding establishment for the sons of churchmen. There is little doubt that the rising tide of free-thought and rationalism was largely responsible for placing the Education Act on the Statute Book.
Hadfield often entertained the synod with references to this new trend in human thought. “There is moreover a strange inconsistency into which many of such people fall:
The Right Reverend Frederic Walli
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they call themselves ‘free-thinkers’! But they, as far as their opinions are expressed, appear to be pantheists. They identify themselves with the world. They regard themselves, body and mind, as mere parts of the universe—not independent of it, but parts of it governed by what they call natural laws. According to them . . . every thought of the mind, every desire—l was going to say every volition but they deny the existence of free-will—is a link in the process of nature, a consequent to a necessary antecedent. But this is utterly inconsistent with the designation they have adopted in calling themselves ‘free-thinkers’; for where is the freedom of one whose every thought is a mere link in the chain of the necessary processes of nature? Can any misnomer be more glaring? The true free thinker is the Christian who asserts the freedom of the will and the freedom of thought, and legitimately infers from these facts and candidly admits his responsibilities to his Creator for all his actions and all his thoughts.” It is interesting to compare this passage with the chapter on Naturalism in Mr C. F. Lewis’s book Miracles.
In 1869, the year before Hadfield’s consecration, the Hawke’s Bay district from Woodville to Napier was transferred to the Waiapu Diocese and later Wellington took over South Taranaki from the Auckland Diocese. A review of the progress of the Diocese during Hadfield’s episcopate was given to the Synod in 1893 by the Commissary Archdeacon Fancourt —“When the late Bishop was consecrated the number of clergy in the Diocese was 12, as compared with 32 at the present date; the number of English cures was 8 as compared with 21. Large areas of country where there are now flourishing towns and cultivated farms were masses of standing bush. The population has increased enormously, even within the last few years in the country districts, while Wellington, which in 1870 was a quiet town of some twelve thousand inhabitants, has developed into the busy populous city we now see.”
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This rapid development posed a great problem for the Church to find men for the cures and money to pay them. Originally there had been a Diocesan Fund supported by donations and subscriptions. The amount obtained this way was entirely inadequate and in 1879 the Synod reorganised diocesan finance by passing the General Church Fund Act. In addition to subscriptions this Fund was much strengthened by assessments laid on the parishes and districts covering at least part of the clergyman’s stipend and also all pew rents were to be paid into it. Pew rents were then almost universal and were considerable (St. Paul’s and St. Peter’s were each between £4OO and £5OO a year). This was originally the main source of revenue of the Diocesan Fund.
The clergy stipends were paid quarterly not by the vestries but from the Diocesan Office. It has been the proud boast of the Diocese that no man has ever left with his stipend in arrears.
Hadfield threw all his energy and wisdom into fostering this new plan of diocesan finance. He went to the root of the matter and drove home the teaching that the diocese and not the parish was the unit of church life for every loyal member of the Church. He constantly protested against parochialism and called on his beloved Bingham’s Antiquities, a book he seems to have known from cover to cover, to support his opinions. His words might still be heard today with profit to all. clergy and laity alike.
“I will venture to make a few remarks from Bingham’s Antiquities. The only point to be carefully borne in mind to understand these is, that in the primitive church the diocese was always regarded as the unit, the modern parish being unknown. . . . Whatever tends to contract or narrow the Christian’s view of his duty towards the Church is not only prejudicial to it, but injurious to himself. . . . Churchmen ought to realise more than they habitually do, that the Church to which they belong is not a mere aggregate of isolated congregations of worshippers
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but is part of a great organised visible body, whose existence as such can be traced back to the times of the Apostles; and that they have duties to discharge to such part of that Church as is accessible to them.” Thus was the General Church Fund established and so important was it considered that the Rev. Thomas Fancourt was taken from the cure of St. James, Lower Hutt and made the organiser and secretary of the Fund and afterwards Archdeacon of Wellington.
C The Bishop once said. “1 shall continue to deem my episcopate a failure so long as I shall fail to stir up and enlist more zeal for extending the ministrations of the Church to all the outlying districts of the Diocese.”
He frequently paid tribute to the work of the lay readers mentioning by name Mr Toomath of Karori, Mr Haynes at Greytown, Mr Sherwill of Feilding, Mr J. C. Small at the Upper Hutt, Mr Flux at Pauatahanui, Mr W. France at Ohariu Valley, and the Rev. Mr Andrew in the Wairarapa. The last named was a scholar and vicechancellor of the University. He gained a great reputation as a bullock driver in virtue of being able to swear at his team in Greek. “Parson” Andrew was an ordained man.
At the General Synod of 1889, Hadfield was elected Primate. The senior bishop was the Bishop of Nelson and he questioned the validity of the election. After many telegrams had passed between Nelson, Wellington and Christchurch, Hadfield resigned and was elected a second time at a special session of General Synod held in Wellington.
He resigned the Primacy and the Bishopric of Wellington in 1893. The aged Bishop, on his retirement, lived at Marton. There in the quiet of the countryside he was spared to enjoy eleven years of rest and peace. His mind remained clear and active to the last and he must have had cause for many happy reflections in looking back over a life so long, so adventurous and so useful.
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The small fragment of his Journal, which we have been given the privilege of publishing for the first time, shows how deep were the foundations of his religious faith. There was nothing second hand about it. From his youth up he had a real sense of the reality of the unseen and the presence of God beside him sustaining and guiding him in all his ways.
His wife died in 1901 and three years later, on December 11 th, in his ninety-first year, his own call came. He was buried beside his wife at Tutu Totara, Marton. The history of the whole Province cannot show a greater missionary, a wiser Bishop, a more devoted servant of the Church than Octavius Hadfield. He must ever be accounted one of New Zealand’s greatest men.
Chapter 11
FREDERIC WALLIS—1895-1911
Bishop hadfield gave notice of his resignation on May Ist, 1893. Archdeacon Fancourt presided over a special session of Synod held in the following July. Synod resolved itself into two parties: one contending for a man from England to fill the vacant see, the other maintaining that it should be someone with colonial experience. The former, in which the laity predominated, won the day and the Synod delegated the selection of a suitable man to the Archbishop of York and the Bishop of Durham. The Archbishop of Canterbury (Tail) was deliberately passed over because it was believed that he was not in favour of the complete independence of the colonial churches but favoured a plan for setting up a patriarchate and bringing them to some extent under the control of Canterbury. A year passed during which time three men refused the See. This gave the Auckland churchmen a chance of making the gibe that the See of Wellington was being hawked around England. To which Wellington replied that the cause of the delay was the very high qualifications demanded by the Wellington Synod. The answer seemed justified when the announcement was made that the offer had been accepted by Frederic Wallis, D.D., a recognised Cambridge scholar who had taken a double first in Classics and Theology and was a Fellow of Gonville and Caius.
He and his wife arrived accompanied by Bishop Wordsworth of Salisbury who preached the sermon at the consecration service in St. Paul’s on January 25th, 1895.
It would be difficult to find a greater contrast between
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two men holding the same office than that between Octavius Hadfield and his successor to the See of Wellington. One was familiar with colonial life from the earliest pioneer days and inured to all its hardships and makeshift ways; the other had spent most of his life in the cloistered colleges and halls of an ancient university: one had been denied the fellowship in learning which a university alone can give and had trodden alone, unrecognised and unknown, the paths of philosophy; the other, with an examination brain, had gained the highest prizes and honours a university could give. One had mixed with all sorts and conditions of men in the rough and tumble of pioneer life and had gained a remarkable insight into the motives which rule their actions: the other had experienced little of the world outside college halls and cathedral cloisters. One was independent and always prepared to back his judgment with a vigour which made him suspect of autocracy; the other deferred to the guidance and opinions of others and seemed endowed with a naivete which was sometimes embarrassing.
But after all, these differences count for little compared with what they had in common. It was as true of the new bishop as it had been of the old that he had a sincere and passionate love for the Church which he had been called to serve and his religious faith was based on a deep personal spiritual experience and devotion to his Lord. Although he was so great a scholar his sermons and addresses, especially those to confirmation candidates, were adorned with a simplicity as the faith of a little child. Many of his leading laymen never understood him and this often caused him great sorrow. At a certain session of Synod some of the laymen pressed for a change in the manner of keeping the diocesan accounts. Formerly some of the accounts had been kept in business offices in the city and looked after free of charge by certain laymen. Some trouble had arisen over one of these accounts and the proposal was that all diocesan accounts should be kept in the Diocesan
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Office by a Diocesan Secretary. This was of course very reasonable and inevitable as the work of the Diocese increased. But the Bishop opposed it for the understandable reason that to do so would cast a slur on, and show a lack of gratitude to, the men who had given up so much time to the work. One layman then got up and threatened legal action saying, “My Lord, if you will not be honest, then I will make you honest.”
This was the kind of misunderstanding which hurt the Bishop and made his episcopate, from his point of view, not a happy one. However that may be it was surely the hand of Providence that sent him to the Diocese at a time when he was able to supply, as few others could have done, one of our greatest needs. When he came to us the staff of clergy had got into a bad state. As the settlements pushed into the backblocks there was a constant appeal for clergy to go and minister to them. Bishop Wallis found an inadequate staff at his disposal and there was no source of supply available in New Zealand. But he was in close touch with the great universities of England and he had many friends amongst important churchmen at Home. He visited England three times during his episcopate and thus he succeeded in bringing to the Diocese a great company of young enthusiastic men who not only went into the new backblock cures but also raised the general scholastic standard of the Diocese. Many of these men came from Oxford and Cambridge with honours degrees. We may concede Auckland her Selwyn churches, Christchurch her cathedral and Dunedin what you will, but in the past at any rate, Wellington could lay claim to a high standard of scholarship amongst her clergy.
This is perhaps the greatest debt we owe to Frederic Wallis. To him also belongs the credit for starting the Cathedral Scheme. We can well imagine how he felt coming straight from England with the Bishop of Salisbury at his side when, from the ship, he caught his first glimpse
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of his Cathedral Church. Spurred on by Bishop Wordsworth, he at once launched his scheme for a cathedral. In this year 1957 we may smile as we read the words the Bishop spoke sixty years ago, “We have set our hands to a work which, God helping us, we do not mean to leave until it is completed.”
They raised £4,000 and bought land in Taranaki Street and this was the nucleus round which the Cathedral Fund has been built. When Bishop Wordsworth had gone back to Salisbury (having left £lOO for the fund), the Bishop began to see his work in a better perspective and saw that the Diocese had needs more urgent than a cathedral. Salisbury, the most completely English of all the great cathedrals, took fifty years to build in days when there was neither inflation nor a forty hour week, so we may not do so badly after all; and the delay so far has been a blessing in disguise for, had a Cathedral been built in those early days, it certainly would not have been adequate or worthy of the great city Wellington is today.
In 1898 the Bishop secured the services of Mr James Moore to conduct a branch of the Flying Angel Mission to Seamen. At first the services were held in a shed lent by the Harbour Board but later Mrs Williams gave a section and a building for the Mission.
In 1899 a house was taken over in Owen Street, Berhampore, to serve as a Home of Refuge for fallen girls. It was placed under the care of Sister Emily and to begin with it could accommodate only five girls. Under the leadership of Mrs Wallis this branch of social service was developed and a large house with two acres of land was purchased at Karori and St. Mary’s Guild was formed. The Home at Karori was opened on September 13th, 1900. Sister Emily was the first Matron and the Chaplain was the Rev. A. L. Hansell, vicar of St. Mary’s, Karori.
A Chinese catechist who worked on the West Coast in the Nelson Diocese visited Wellington occasionally. As the Chinese population on the gold fields of the West Coast
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decreased, more and more came to work in the fruit trade in Wellington. Mr David Wong was persuaded to open a mission to the Chinese in a room in Taranaki Street. The work was put under the control of a committee with the vicar of St. Mark’s as chairman: the Diocese guaranteed a stipend of £l4O and so began the Mission to the Chinese in Wellington.
The beginning of these social service organisations were not the only signs that church life was very much alive at the beginning of the century. The Church Chronicle, the official Diocesan Gazette, of those years was a very worthwhile publication. The format was dignified; the subject matter was such that the two or three thousand church homes which received the paper were kept very well informed about the activities of the whole Diocese. There were very able articles on church history and theology; and it contained a series of Sunday School articles and lessons for each month on which the Diocesan examinations were based. Every month there were notes on the Church in other Dioceses and news from the Church at Home. There was a lively correspondence column subdued by very small print.
When Bishop Wordsworth was visiting here he recommended to the notice of the clergy. Illingworth’s Bampton Lectures, Personality Human and Divine. It was promptly put into the syllabus for the Grade examinations. This called forth a protest from Marton signed O.H. The old Bishop entered the fray with a solid attack of heavy philosophy. He saw that the old views of inspiration and revelation were at stake. A writer signing himself “S” ventured to differ from the Bishop but he was obviously pulling his punches. The new Vicar of St. Paul’s, the Rev. T. H. Sprott, also took exception to the book being on the syllabus, not because he agreed with O.H. about the faulty philosophy, but because he considered the students would not be capable of understanding it. He also suggested that there were others who did not understand it and produced
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a very interesting argument to prove that one of the correspondents, none other than Mr Richard Coffey, the Vicar of St. Mark’s, could not have even read the book. This called forth from “Hot Coffey” a very characteristic reply which may be paraphrased thus. “As one Trinity College man to another, your fine argument, Mr Sprott, is all humbug. You knew that 1 had not read the book.”
The reports of Synod were given in considerable detail and the Synod sermons in full. Several times they were described as “Interesting but too lengthy”. On one occasion the preacher for some reason saw fit to traverse at considerable length recent significant events and happenings. Before the sermon ended a number of clergy got up and went out. When next day the Archdeacon questioned them about so unseemly a happening they excused themselves by explaining that they were staying at the Hutt and Petone and that the last train left at 9.30. With a twinkle in his eye the Archdeacon said, “Did you leave before or after the sinking of the Titanic?” When he was told that it was before, he said, “You would have missed the train.”
On the whole it seems that the sixteen years of Bishop Wallis’s episcopate covered the most interesting period in the first century of the Diocese. Wellington was now a city of 40.000 people with the amenities which follow in the wake of electric power; many of the larger settlements were now prosperous townships. There was communication by rail throughout most of the Diocese and the bush lands were being pushed further and further back. All fear of trouble from the Maoris had disappeared. Large tracts of country land were cleared of stumps and logs, and fine homesteads and farm houses appeared amidst well kept pasture lands. The railways brought supplies within easy reach of the settlements; roads and bridges had been built linking the settlements together and bullock teams were seen only in the back country. The opening of creameries and cheese and butter factories and the export of frozen meat gave an assurance of prosperity and a great impetus
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to the improvement of the farm lands. The whole Province was moving forward on a flood-tide of confidence and hope.
The Bishop was able to visit most of his Diocese by train. His visit for a confirmation was a great occasion for the country parish. The Vicar would set to work and wash his gig and polish up the harness. The old horse would get such a grooming as it had not known for many a day and all because the Bishop had to be met at the station and driven round the outlying places. If it rained, travelling in an open gig was none too pleasant and wading through mud and taking service in school-rooms and halls was not reminiscent of services in a college chapel. But all the inconvenience was more than made up for by the warmth of the welcome and the hospitality he invariably received from his people in the back blocks.
In one part of the Diocese he experienced real pioneer conditions. The Main Trunk railroad was nearing completion. The last section, between Mangaweka and Raurimu was the most difficult of all. There were large camps where the contractors assembled their workers and it was at these camps that the Railway Mission operated. The Bishop paid one visit to these camps and received a great reception. Another such visit is described in the Church Chronicle for November 1907.
“For the past five years the construction of the Main Trunk line has been almost entirely within the limits of what is now known as the Taihape parochial district. . . . For a great part of that time much of the country now traversed was an almost impenetrable forest, surrounded by the high, snow-capped mountain peaks of Ruapehu, Tongariro and Ngaruhoe. These rise from two great plains, trackless and inhabited only by wild horses, cattle and pigs. With the advent of the railway these days are past and the great Waimarino Plain is inhabited by hundreds of workmen and their families. Along a fine
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arterial road, are spaced camps with huts, whares, tents, accommodation houses, billiard rooms and grog shops.
“That once fine viaduct bridge over the Mongonui-a-te-ao which is reputed to have cost the Ballance Government a sum approaching twenty thousand pounds, still remains—useless and almost rotten. No cart has ever passed over it, for there is no road constructed to it. Further up this appalling gorge the giant Makatote Viaduct is stretching its immense iron spans as some unearthly forest creature, seeking to bridge the chasm. That which a short time ago was a peaceful primaeval bush is now a hive of industry, over which the splendid workshop and gantry —houses of Messrs Anderson Bros, seem to rule.
“Taihape parish is known to many as a wild spot, full of adventure, lawlessness and mud bound roads. Much of this is very true, but it will succumb to civilisation as the march of competition and population press upon it. The most dangerous work of the Line is within the bounds of this parish, from the Mangaweka Viaduct northwards . . . till we get to bleak Waiouru, the highest station on the whole Trunk line. On again for a short distance and then still further across the plain to the sulphurous Wangaehu river. Entering the bush we take coach for four miles to Ohakune. After breakfast we set out again by coach for the northern railhead, over torrent swept streams, rough and steep roads, through dense bush; the jolting, jostling of the coach, as it lurches on, causes you to hang grimly to its sides. Passing the viaducts in course of construction we pass through Horopito and on to Makatote; and then on up to Erua and Waimarino and then down to Raurimu.
“We are welcomed by Mr Weller, the Missioner, and feel glad to be at our destination. Mr Weller’s home, composed of huts and tents joined together, is a model of neatness. At night time there is a concert and a reception in a huge tent with enormous blazing fires. Excellent talent is found amongst the workers: a jolly tar taking a respite from the sea. a music hall artist, also men of travel and
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experience, good training and degree. The Vicar’s speech is cordially received and everything goes with a swing and coffee and cakes are served before we part.
“It is a wild night, with torrents of rain, but there must have been about one hundred present. This tent is also used as a reading room and for the services on Sundays and it is maintained by the Church.
“On Sunday there was a celebration of Holy Communion at 9 a.m., and a goodly number of communicants attended. By the doctor’s aid we manufactured our own wine. In the afternoon about 60 scholars attended Sunday School and a baptism was held in the workers’ hall. At night it was still pouring with rain when the vicar preached to a good congregation on ‘Loneliness.’
o c c “The great spiral is nearly finished and by the time you read this Raurimu will be about deserted and the camp of 1.000 people will have vanished. The parish extends 20 miles further north and 85 miles south; but this northern portion, with Raetihi and Ohakunc, is being made a separate charge under the care of the Rev. G. A. T. Rickaby. Mr Weller holds services for all these workers and we appeal to all church people to help him and support him in his work.”
But in most other parts of the diocese the parishes and districts were beginning to take proper shape and schoolrooms were being replaced by proper churches. During this episcopate no fewer than forty-three churches were built. One of these churches is of particular interest. It is the church of St. Mary the Virgin, at Nireaha, in the Eketahuna district. It is dedicated in the name of St. Mary the Virgin “in reparation" for a church of the same name at Morley in Yorkshire. The story is this. The original church in Yorkshire has a tradition dating back to Paulinus in pre-Norman days. The foundation was twice mentioned in Doomsday Book. In the time of the Commonwealth the church then in existence was taken over by the Independents and at the Restoration in 1662, although it
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nominally reverted to the Church of England, the Independents managed to retain it for their own use. Eventually it came almost entirely into the hands of the Congregationalists who, in 1875, erected a large new church on the site and they retain it to the present day — the one instance in England of an ancient Catholic Foundation remaining in the hands of the Dissenters. The Church Chronicle of November 1902 states “The writer and his friends are founding a church dedicated to St. Mary the Virgin in the Forty Mile Bush, as some reparation for this one having gone astray.”
In 1904 an effort was made to erect a memorial to Bishop Hadfield. The form the Memorial was to take was a Theological College and Hostel for university students. A site was bought on Kelburn and a building erected and opened on May Ist. 1908. The Hadfield Memorial College was placed at some distance from Victoria College on the coldest, bleakest spot on Kelburn, known in those days as Siberia. This largely contributed to its failure. The first Warden was the Rev. A. W. H. Compton, M.A.
In 1904 a band of missioners from England visited South Africa, A book giving a report of this Mission came into the hands of the Vicar of St. Paul’s, the Rev. T. H. Sprott. He was to preach the Synod Sermon that year and his sermon proved to be the most blessed utterance ever made from a pulpit in New Zealand for from it resulted the General Mission of Help, the greatest evangelistic effort New Zealand has ever seen. The following passage from this famous sermon gives the central idea which made this mission different from all other missions ever held by the Church in New Zealand. It was preached to the Wellington Synod in 1906 from the text “Come over and help us.”
“Merely local missions are to my mind almost useless, and 1 think that experience bears me out. I do not think, e.g., that a mission held in my own parish alone, or in Wellington alone, would amount permanently to anything.
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For this reason. We are essentially social beings, mysteriously dependent on one another, not only physically but intellectually, morally and spiritually. Experience shows that the average man does not permanently rise much above the level of the community to which he belongs. There is an almost irresistible tendency to a general uniformity of thought and feeling and conduct. Raise the spiritual level in this parish alone, and it will almost inevitably sink down again to the level of Wellington as a whole. Raise the level of Wellington alone and it will almost inevitably sink back to the level of New Zealand as a whole. I do not deny that the Divine Spirit has direct and mysterious access to the individual spirit, nor that great instances of a reverse process may be quoted. But God has made us social beings, and his ordinary working does not seem to override this our constitution. There is a national ethos, a national atmosphere, a national climate, a national level, to which we all tend to conform, and which, it seems to me, can be permanently changed only by some force working on the nation as a whole. A mission to be a permanent value must be a National Mission. There must be the effort to uplift the whole community simultaneously.
“The thoughts of the whole community must be simultaneously directed to the subject of religion.”
This was the seed which brought forth the rich harvest of the General Mission of Help. The Wellington Synod sponsored the plan which was taken up enthusiastically by all the other dioceses of the Province. The missioners were to come from England representing different schools of thought. There was a Canon of Canterbury and a Canon of York; there were evangelicals and two members of the Community of the Resurrection, Mirfield.
Six months before the mission began two forerunners, Canon Pollock and the Rev. H. Kennedy came and visited all the parishes explaining what must be done by way of preparation for the mission. A special Mission Hymn Book
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was published and sold throughout the country. Specimens of it can still be found in most choir vestries. Sixteen missioners in all came from England and the method was to begin in the largest cities with mass meetings. In Wellington the Town Hall was taken for a week and packed out every evening for services conducted by Canon Stuart assisted by Bishop Julius from Christchurch. Special services were held for men and women separately and all drew large congregations.
This effort at the centre was followed by a four or eight days mission in the parishes. Picked men from other dioceses assisted in these parish missions so that the whole diocese could be covered. The mission made a great impression on the public of New Zealand. The Church of England, that prim and proper old Matron, really let her hair down over this effort and revealed a heart full of longing to gather her children, all sorts and conditions of men, into her fold.
The parable of the sower which our Lord spoke to his disciples warns us that in spiritual sowing much of the seed and the labour, however good it may be, will be wasted and we must never be disappointed with the harvest. There is no doubt that in the Mission of Help much seed fell on good ground and the harvest is still being reaped in the lives of faithful men and women who cherish memories of those days. Only the other Sunday I heard a preacher quote words spoken by Canon Stuart in the Wellington Town Hall services.
It was fitting that when the General Synod met in Wellington in 1910 it coincided with a visit by the Rev. H. S. Woollcombe. a missioner from England for the Church of England Men’s Society. A great men’s meeting was held in the Town Hall on the Sunday afternoon and the platform was graced by a row of Bishops and dignitaries from the Synod. Harry Woollcombe was probably the greatest missioner to men the Church in this country has ever had. He had a most engaging personality
The Right Reverend Thomas Henry Sprolt
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and inspired many a young man with new ideals of churchmanship. Standing on the stage of the big hall he grinned at the audience and said that being a Sunday perhaps he had better take a text. The text he chose was some advice which was given by an old Devonshire groom to his master, who was buying a new horse. The master asked the groom what he thought of the prospective purchase and this is the reply he received—“ Well, Sir, I always says with ’orses it’s as it is with wimmen. If you wants them for good 'ard work, you mustn’t mind their looks.” The preacher then began to appeal to his audience to get the stiffness and starch out of the Church of England and let the people know that it was not all gas and gaiters. Looking at the array of gaiters on the platform he said these were all right in their place but what the church needed was something more suited for hard work. H. S. Woollcombe lighted a fire in the hearts of many young laymen of which the embers still glow in greybeards of today.
C C J J Bishop Wallis gave notice of his resignation sixteen years from the date of his consecration. His health was failing and his doctors advised lighter work. He accepted from his brother-in-law, the Bishop of Salisbury, the offer of the Archdeaconry of Wiltshire.
His sixteen years amongst us were probably not as happy for him as they should have been. He came here at a time when the rising tide of democracy in politics was changing the atmosphere of parliament. Labour was suspicious of the church and maintained an attitude of mistrust and antagonism towards it. The Boer war helped a little in removing this misunderstanding, but the barriers were not really broken down until the common sorrows of the two great wars brought all the people together.
Bishop Wallis had to fight the Government over the Porirua School Trust Endowment. This endowment had been given to Bishop Selwyn to further his plan for estab lishing a college of the Holy Trinity to be for the south what St. John's was in the north. The church had not been
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able to establish such a college and the Government tried to take the Trust lands away from us. When the Court of Appeal decided against us, Bishop Wallis took the case to the Privy Council and the decision of the New Zealand Court was reversed in very emphatic terms.
While at sea after his departure, the Bishop wrote, “Perhaps the saddest of all was when on the evening of Ascension Day, nearly a week after we had crossed the Equator, I saw for the last time the Southern Cross standing upright in all its beauty above the horizon and knew that I should no longer look upon that precious reminder of my life and work in New Zealand.” Of course he was a sick man when he wrote those words but it seems strange that his spirit was not more joyous in the recollection of all that had been accomplished during his episcopate. By the generosity of his widow we have a memorial to his work amongst us in the Frederic Wallis House at the Hutt. This was a beautiful private residence and Mrs Wallis left it to serve as a house for retreats and conferences on religious and social matters. It is in great demand. Frederic Wallis has left behind in the Diocese the memory of a scholarly bishop who was always very humble in all his learning and simple and sincere in all his teaching. As a father in God to his clergy and a shepherd of souls to his people he served his high office conscientiously and with a deep devotion. He was an English gentleman of never failing courtesy, and as the Rule of St. Francis says, “Courtesy is one of the qualities of God . . . the sister of Charity and keepeth love alive.”
Chapter 12
THOMAS HENRY SPROTT 1911-1936
A special honour attaches to the appointment of /\ a bishop by his brother clergy in a Synod of which X A.he is a member. When he was chosen as Bishop, Thomas Henry Sprott had been Vicar of St. Paul’s and a member of the Synod for nineteen years. They knew him whom they had chosen. He was an Ulsterman who, after a brilliant career at Trinity College, Dublin, and service in England, came out to New Zealand in 1887 to take charge of the parish of St. Barnabas, Mount Eden, in the Auckland Diocese. He made a great success of his work in that parish and there was no surprise when in 1892 he was offered and accepted the cure of St. Paul’s Cathedral Church in Wellington.
During the nineteen years that he was Vicar of St. Paul’s, by his preaching and lecturing, he justly won the reputation of being the greatest apologist for the Christian religion in the city. At that time when biblical criticism and the theory of evolution with all its implications, were becoming popular subjects for discussion and unsettling the faith of many people, the sound learning and clear thinking of the Vicar of St. Paul's held many thoughtful young men and women firm in the faith. For some years, at the invitation of the Students’ Christian Union, he gave courses of lectures at Victoria College during the long vacation. At these lectures and at retreats for the clergy, where he was free from the restriction of the pulpit, he was at his best. His intellect was hollow ground, razor sharp. He developed his argument with all the care and precision of a great
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surgeon in the operating theatre. He would lay aside this issue and that, tie up all objections and eventually lay bare the fallacy and establish the truth in question. It was this strictly logical process in all his reasoning which made him so superb a teacher and made it easy to keep notes of his lectures. One course of Lenten addresses at St. Paul’s, at the request of many who heard them, he expanded into a book entitled Inspiration and the Old Testament. The book was published by the University Press and was most favourably reviewed. The Hebrew Professor Emeritus of Cambridge, Professor Cook, wrote “there is a distinction about it” and quoted it freely in his book The Truth of the Bible. This little book is still a classic in its field and deserves a place in every clergyman’s library. He was a very complete Hebrew and Greek scholar and when his University awarded him the D.D. (honoris causa) the honoris seemed inappropriate. But he excelled most in the field of philosophy. He was outstanding as an original thinker with a prophetic instinct which gave him an insight into the affairs of life beyond that of other men. When he spoke on national or social problems his words were always very fully reported in the press and weighed carefully by all thoughtful citizens.
Apart from his addresses as President he did not speak much in Synod. His judgment was held in such esteem that when he had spoken it generally settled the matter under discussion; a very legitimate way of doing it in so democratic an assembly as Diocesan Synod. Let it not be thought that Synod in those days was a collection of meek and mild gentlemen with the docility of boys in school. Synod was in fact a much greater occasion fifty years ago than it is today. To begin with there was nothing hurried about it. Most of the country members travelled by train and were prepared for Synod to last for eight days. This gave more time for debate and more time to enjoy the amenities provided by the generosity of the Wellesley Club and other social functions. Synod Sunday was a great day. The
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country clergy were invited to preach in the city pulpits, which was an experience both for the clergy and the city congregations. In the Synods of those days there were outstanding personalities who could always be counted on for some lively exchanges which were enjoyed by no one more than the Bishop himself. With one or two leading lawyers like Mr E. Hadfield, business men like Mr J. Henderson and Sir George Shirtcliffe and clergy who would submit neither to the tactics of the lawyer nor to the bluff of big business, the Synod was a very live affair. The Bishop believed in giving free rein to discussion but he never allowed it to get out of hand.
The First World War with all its problems came early in this episcopate. The Church made a fine effort in supplying not only Chaplains but also recreation huts and institutes in all the camps. The Church Army huts became famous and the C.E.M.S. was also active in the work.
The Synod of 1917 was a memorable one because it produced the revival of the Cathedral Scheme. The Rev. C. F. Askew, the new Vicar of St. Mark’s, roused the Synod to such a state of enthusiasm about building a cathedral that the debate ended with everyone standing and singing the Te Deum. Over twenty years had passed since Synod had undertaken to build a cathedral. Now in 1917 there was a sum of £17.000 in hand including the value of the site in Taranaki Street. Mr Askew brought forward the proposal to build on the site of St. Mark’s Parish Church. He suggested, that if built on this site, the very valuable Coffey Bequest for rebuilding St. Mark’s would be available for building the Cathedral. It was also proposed to link the Cathedral with a National War Memorial by including in the plan a Military Chapel in which would be commemorated the names of all men and women of the New Zealand forces who had given their lives in the war. A committee was set up by Synod, an appeal was made for funds and water colour pictures of a very grand building in the Gothic style were obtained.
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Mr Askew produced out of his pocket an elderly architect named Mr Frank Peck whom he highly commended to the committee.
Although there was great enthusiasm for the scheme, nevertheless from the beginning, there was a party in opposition. This consisted of those who clung to the idea of having the Cathedral at Thorndon end of the town. When the war ended Mr Askew made a fatal mistake. He went to England hoping to arouse interest at Home and collect funds for the Memorial Chapel. He succeeded in getting a letter in The Times and collecting an interesting bundle of war trophies, flags and pieces of stone from famous cathedrals, but of money, very little. While he was away the enthusiasm had waned and he came back to find that little or nothing had been done in his absence. The feeling had grown that the whole plan was too ambitious. He went to his last Cathedral committee meeting with the offer of the Deanery of Nelson in his pocket and after the meeting his acceptance of the offer was soon in the mail and the Cathedral Scheme was put into cold storage for another quarter of a century.
At the beginning of this episcopate a number of the older parishes celebrated their jubilees and some of the older wooden churches were replaced with larger buildings in more permanent material. Such were St. Matthew’s. Masterton, All Saints’, Palmerston North, St. Mary’s. Karori, and St. Matthias’, Makara. New brick churches were built at Kelburn, Kilbirnie and St. James, Mokoia. Together with the passing of the old churches went the passing of the last of the old pioneer clergy.
Richard Coffey was one of the outstanding priests in the early days of the Diocese. He came from County Cork and graduated with distinction at Trinity College, Dublin. After a short ministry in Dunedin he came to Wellington to take charge of the new parish of St. Mark, which had hived off from St. Peter’s. The prospects of the new parish
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were so poor that the man to whom it was first offered came and looked at it and departed. Richard Coffey was made of sterner stuff. He began his work there in 1876 and the first seven years were difficult years indeed. There was a time when his churchwarden, Mr Kenneth Wilson, Headmaster of Wellington College, had to appeal from the nave of the church for better support to enable the Vicar and vestry to carry on. But Richard Coffey worked unceasingly until St. Mark’s became one of the leading parishes of the Diocese and its Vicar one of its most outstanding clergy. Mr Coffey was always most outspoken and uncompromising in all his views. He was a strict disciplinarian. If the candidates in some of our modern confirmation classes could be transported back to a class in St. Mark's in those early days they would wonder what they had struck. The classes for preparation lasted a full three months and during that time all candidates were forbidden to attend dances, parties, concerts and even a school sports meeting was questionable.
Richard Coffey served at St. Mark’s until his death on March 14th, 1907, after a ministry of thirty years. This ministry was marked by many acts of generosity and in his will he bequeathed his estate, subject to his wife’s life interest, to the parish for rebuilding the church. This Coffey Bequest is now a very large sum.
Arthur Young Towgood was another of the early clergy who lived to a great age. His long ministry was confined to the Rangitikei district. He was responsible for building St. Stephen’s, Marton, on the site of the old military redoubt. In all he spent thirty-nine years as Vicar of Marton and concurrently sixteen years as Archdeacon of Wanganui. He came out to New Zealand for his health in 1866 and died in 1925. He was a good classical scholar and a great character, with a propensity for writing religious verse, which the editor of the Church Chronicle for many years made a habit of publishing. He was a great figure in Synod being a keen and emphatic debater with
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a good sense of humour. The story is told that at one Sunday evensong he made the announcement, “The choir will now try and sing an anthem. I use the word ‘try’ advisedly. They think they can, I think they can’t.”
James McWilliam died on January 29th, 1907. He was ordained in St. Paul’s in 1867 and served for a year a curacy in the parishes of St. Peter’s and St. Paul’s. When Hadfield left Otaki, McWilliam was sent in his stead and there he entered on a lifelong ministry among the Maori people. This ministry extended all along the west coast from Porirua to the Manawatu. It meant much arduous and dangerous riding across unbridged rivers, swamps and bush tracks. He became an accomplished Maori linguist and won great influence over his people. He shares with Hadfield the credit of keeping the west coast Maoris loyal and in remaining undismayed during the “withering” of the Mission work. His wife shared much of his work at Otaki and won the affection of the people who called her mother of them all. We must not allow the glory of Hadfield’s work at Otaki to obscure the great work done by James McWilliam. His name stands in a place of honour amongst the names of the faithful clergy who served the Maori people at Rangiatea.
The reputation of the climate of New Zealand (when the truth was not so widely known), was a great boon to the Church. Thomas Fancourt was born at Malvern, Worcestershire, on January 22nd. 1840. He was educated at Lancing College and St. Augustine’s, Canterbury. From there he went as a lay-missionary to India. An attack of cholera sent him back to England where the doctors advised a move to a warm, temperate clime; so he came to New Zealand. He was ordained deacon in old St. Paul’s by Bishop Abraham and put in charge of the district of Johnsonville with Karori and Makara. It was he who chose the fine sites for the churches in these places. His work involved a lot of riding and he once was nearly drowned in the flooded Makara stream.
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On the day set down for the consecration of the old St. Mary’s, Karori, the Bishop failed to turn up. A large crowd had assembled so Mr Fancourt held a service and preached what he could remember of the last sermon he had heard the Bishop preach. At the postponed consecration service on the next Sunday the Bishop duly arrived and preached the same sermon. In 1870, Mr Fancourt was put in charge of the newly constituted parish of St. James’, Lower Hutt. In 1884 he was made Secretary of the General Church Fund and four years later made Archdeacon of Wellington.
For a time he combined the work of Diocesan Secretary with the care of the District of Johnsonville. From then till the date of his death he was a familiar figure throughout the Diocese and the right hand man and adviser of three bishops. In his Synod address Bishop Sprott paid a fine tribute to his memory as a man who had that greatest of all the gifts of the spirit, “a right judgment in all things”. Canon A. W. Payne, the editor of the Church Chronicle, wrote a memorial epitaph.
In Memoriam
DE BONO MILITE CHRIST! JESU
Defessus miles certamen et arma relinquit Virtutis referens praemia pauca manu;
Munera sed laudis meruit melioraque dona. Pax übi regnabit, non peritura, Dei.
In the next number the following translation appeared from the pen of Mrs Young, of Palmerston North:
“The wearied soldier quits the field and lays his armour by;
Few, few, rewards he bears away for all his courage high; Yet has he won a meed of praise and better gifts than they,
Where peace shall reign, the Peace of God, that shall not pass away.”
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Archdeacon C. C. Harper left the Diocese at the peak of his career. His departure was a great loss for he had deservedly won a great reputation as an organiser and a parish priest. He was a man of strong personality and tireless energy and exacted strenuous service from all who worked with him. He served as Vicar of All Saints, Palmerston North for ten years and did splendid work, including the founding of the Children’s Home.
In 1910 he was appointed Vicar of St. Peter’s, Wellington, where he remained until his departure for England in 1915. His influence remained in the Diocese through the work of the men he had trained as curates.
HIV " vy I IV V/ 1 111 V 111V11 UV IIUU 11 UWIV/U UJ VUI UlbJ. In 1923 the Bishops of the Province invited Mr James Moore Hickson to visit New Zealand as part of a worldwide Mission of Healing. It took in America, South Africa. India and Australia. Bishop Sprott confessed to having had some difficulty in deciding whether or not to join in the invitation. He feared that Mission services on a large scale would produce unwholesome excitement; that a wave of disappointment might follow it and that it might antagonise the medical profession. With his usual insight the Bishop had put his finger on the weakness of the Mission. The method followed entailed much work for the clergy, but little for the Missioner. For three months clergy held preparation services in the parish churches for all who wished to attend the big services. No one was allowed to attend the big healing services without a certificate showing that he had been prepared. The actual services at which the Missioner was present for the laying on of hands were held only in Wellington and Palmerston North.
There were two days for the services at each place. Crowds of sick and invalid and crippled people, the blind and the deaf, journeyed to these centres by special trains. Marquees were erected in the church grounds and nurses in uniform were in attendance. At the services in Wellington and Palmerston North over 3,000 patients attended. The Missioner told them not to be disappointed if healing
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were delayed and commended them to the after care of the clergy. The results were the same throughout the Province. There was much excitement at the big massed services and there was much disappointment when it was all over. The genuine cures were insignificant and few and far between. The greatest good came from the work done by the clergy at intercession services held in the quiet of the parish churches, both before and after the Mission services. The experience of this Mission suggests that if ever the Church is to regain and exercise the ministry of healing it will certainly not be by means of big massed services.
Just prior to the 1914 war a great effort was made by the Bible in Schools League to get the Government to submit the question to a referendum. The movement, led by Canon Garland, was full of promise until the war descended and blotted it out.
This left a feeling amongst many churchmen that we must establish our own church schools. A Church Schools Board was set up and an organising secretary appointed. Schools were opened at St. Mark’s Wellington. Marton, Masterton, Hawera, Wanganui, and Taihape. The following full-page quarto advertisement appeared in the Church Chronicle in September 1926.
WELLINGTON CENTRAL
CHURCH PRIMARY DAY SCHOOL
It has been decided to build a Central Church Primary Day School for Greater Wellington. The accommodation is to be for 400 to 500 children.
The cost of the site. Buildings and Equipment is estimated at £25,000.
Already £2,500 is promised or in hand, £25,000 is required.
It is thought that church people will take a pride in making this great project a success.
WILL YOU SUBSCRIBE LIBERALLY?
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This was certainly a statesmanlike project and it is a tragedy that it did not succeed. What an asset it would be today if they had done nothing more than secured a site.
This is the most serious effort the Church in this Diocese has ever made to establish its own day schools; although these schools flourished for a while, and some still remain, the effort was in vain. It was soon evident that the Church had not the financial resources to compete effectively with the State Schools. But finance is not the only difficulty. If there were a church school in every parish there would still be the problem of staffing them with men and women whose first interest was in the teaching of the Faith. Church schools soon tend to lose their raison d’etre unless there are teaching orders in the Church to staff them.
C Bishop Sprott reminded the Synod that in Australia our Church was adopting a policy of concentrating on secondary schools. Reading between the lines this was the policy of a silent section of the Synod. They established a big boarding school for girls at Nga Tawa, Marton, and Marsden School at Karori (mainly for day girls). Wanganui Collegiate provides for boarders, mostly the sons of country churchmen, but in Wellington there is no secondary school to which churchmen can send their sons; and what an opening there is for one if only a suitable site were available.
With the growth of the city of Wellington and the general increase of population there arose the need for organised Social Service work. St. Mary’s Home. Karori, for women and girls, fostered by St. Mary’s Guild, was well established and was enlarged to accommodate younger girls and children. A Home for boys was opened at the Hutt and a fine Home for boys and girls was built at Palmerston North. A Home for babies was founded at Khandallah. All these Homes were maintained by the alms of the people.
The appointment of the Rev. T. Fielden Taylor
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as City Missioner, in charge of what had been St. Peter’s Mission, under the control of the Vicar of St. Peter’s, led to a rapid development in this branch of Social Service. Mr Taylor had served with distinction as a chaplain at Gallipoli. His war injuries necessitated his discharge from active service. He took up his residence in typical Taranaki Street quarters and with a genius for appealing to boys and men. he soon made friends of many lads and down and outs. He established clubs, a night school and Bible classes. On Sunday evenings he held a Mission Service. He was a very lively speaker and when he moved his Sunday evening service to the King’s Theatre, he soon had the place packed out. This gave the Missioner a strong lever in support of his work. The Mission came into its own during the slump years. It became the centre of relief work in the city. Food, clothing and beds were provided either free or at a nominal charge and a men’s shelter was provided which accommodated 150. To provide funds the Missioner organised large and successful fairs which won the support of the whole community. In addition to this relief work the Missioner was the leader of the Bible Class Movement. Some of the leading clergy in the Church today were first won through Fielden Taylor’s Bible classes.
Another bright spot in the church work of the twenties was a great revival in the interest in Foreign missions. The Diocesan Missionary Committee, under the leadership of the Rev. J. Hands, the Rev. C. H. Isaacson and the Rev. W. J. Durrad, organised a big Missionary Exhibition in the Town Hall. Amongst the speakers were Archbishop Julius, two Australian bishops, the first native bishop of India, Bishop Azariah of Dornakal, and Canon Bickersteth from England. The exhibition was visited by at least 10,000 people and it undoubtedly created a new and lasting interest in the missionary work of the Church. Smaller exhibitions, on the same lines, were afterwards held at Masterton, Palmerston North and Wanganui.
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During the twenty-five years of Bishop Sprott’s episcopate the work of the Diocese increased and developed with the increasing population and settlement. New churches and schoolrooms were built. As the suburban areas around Wellington developed, old parishes were sub-divided and new parishes and districts formed. In the country the horse and gig gave place, first to the motor cycle, and then to the parish car.
This involved the vestries and clergy in new and heavy expenditure for travelling expenses. From the beginning the Bishop showed great wisdom and consideration for his clergy under these changing conditions. He deliberately closed down on all unessential expenditure until the stipends of the clergy were raised to a reasonable minimum. Many a clergyman in difficulties through sickness received help through his Bishop and always Mrs Sprott could be counted on for help wherever it was needed. She and the Bishop continued to the clergy the generous and sincere hospitality which they had extended when at St. Paul’s. They never sought the limelight but their care for the clergy and their families evoked a deep trust and affection in many hearts. As a leader the Bishop was a Nestor in the camp rather than an Achilles in the field of battle, and, amongst many of the older clergy there are still some who call him “The Master”, and in whose libraries are treasured volumes of notes of lectures and expository addresses which they have used all through their Ministry, Last Easter (1955) a preacher from the pulpit of a church in Christchurch made reference to Bishop Sprott's teaching on immortality. After the service an old man came into the Vestry with a face glowing with pleasure to thank the preacher for that reference. He produced a bundle of typescript (why he was carrying it about with him is a mystery), which contained a very complete copy of confirmation addresses he had heard long years ago from the Vicar of St. Paul’s, Wellington. Teaching must be very precious to be treasured like that.
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He resigned the See in 1936. At his farewell gathering he spoke very humbly of the great progress made in the Diocese during his episcopate in which he had confirmed 28,089 candidates. He said, “I do not intend to attempt to estimate the progress (if any) made by the Church in the Diocese during the twenty-five years 1 have had the honour of presiding over it. I imagine that all dioceses have made progress during those twenty-five years. Some churches have been built but I have not built them. I dare say the same number of churches were built during the same time in other dioceses. Some schools were established, and with the management of three of them I have been closely associated, but I can claim the honour of initiating only one of them, the Diocesan School for Girls at Marton.”
After his retirement he lived at Brooklyn till his death in 1942 at the age of 85. The last time he spoke to us was at a clergy school at Marton in 1940. He began a study on the first Epistle of St. Peter but. as his custom was, he did not get much beyond the 3rd verse:
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away.”
Chapter 13
HERBERT ST. BARBE HOLLAND 1936-1946
Herbert st. barbe Holland was fifty-four years of age when he accepted the Bishopric of Wellington. He was then rector of Hampton Lucy and Archdeacon of Warwick. He came to us as a man of wide experience in parish and administrative work and with a fine record of a successful ministry as Sub-Dean and Vicar of St. Michael’s, Coventry. He was a graduate of University College, Oxford, and during his college days he formed an intimate friendship with one Clement Attlee.
It was soon obvious that the new Bishop was a man of boundless energy, and was what our American cousins call, a good mixer. The Bishop’s car was soon as well known on the roads of the Diocese as the chariot Jehu drove so furiously, and the country parsons soon began to regard with suspicion a cloud of dust coming up the drive. His warm-heated friendliness with Maori and pakeha alike soon made him well known throughout the Diocese. If his confirmation services were too long for his country congregations (he often gave two addresses—one to the candidates and one to the parents and god-parents) he left no doubt about his concern for the young people.
This genius for friendship extended beyond the borders of the churches. The Bishop, being a personal friend of Mr Clement Attlee, the great Labour leader in England, was able to establish friendly relations with the leaders of the Labour Government in New Zealand. For the first time
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the Government no longer regarded the Church as belonging to the Opposition. This bore fruit in helping us with the Cathedral plans and in dealing with the Maori Educational Trusts,
With his intimate knowledge of diocesan organisation in England the Bishop soon set about making some changes. He placed great emphasis on the office of Archdeacon. The Archdeacons met with their Bishop before every meeting of Standing Committee. He instituted a service of admission for Churchwardens at which the Archdeacon presided and delivered his annual charge to the Archdeaconry. A Faculties Committee and a Sites and Buildings Commission were set up to safeguard the building and adornment of churches, vicarages and schoolrooms. He was well fitted to take a leading part in the establishment of the Inter Church Council on Public and Social Affairs and in the formation of the National Council of Churches. He lent his support to the change from a diocesan review The Church Chronicle to the newspaper Church and People. There is still a difference of opinion, from a diocesan point of view, as to the wisdom of this change.
But his great undertaking was the campaign for the Cathedral and the Bishop’s Fighting Fund. This work was laid upon him by Synod. The first immigrant ships arrived in Wellington in 1840. In 1935 Synod decided that the Church should do something to mark the centenary of the settlement of Wellington and set up a committee to report back to Synod. The report of this committee came before the 1937 session of Synod, which was the first over which Bishop Holland presided. The committee recommended that the beginning of the Wellington Cathedral and the laying of the foundation stone should be part of the observance of the centenary and that there should also be established a new central fund, supplementary to the General Church Fund, for the endowment of parishes. The Bishop in his presidential address gave his enthusiastic support to both these proposals. This was the origin of the
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Centenary Cathedral and the Bishop’s Fighting Fund Appeal.
The first important move in the campaign was the purchase of the new site for the Cathedral on the corner of Hill Street and Molesworth Street. Including the loss of the Coffey Bequest, this involved an expenditure of £lOO,OOO, but the site, overlooking Parliament grounds, was obviously so eligible that it forestalled all criticism. Thanks to the earlier efforts the Cathedral Fund was in credit to the extent of £96,000. The centenary appeal was for £300.000, of which £200,000 was for the Cathedral and £lOO.OOO for the Bishop's Fighting Fund. The Bishop himself led off with a gift of £l,OOO. Canon (now Archdeacon) D. B. Malcolm, was appointed organising secretary; committees were set up; the Bishop and Canon Malcolm visited the parishes and many individual churchmen and at the end of the first year £69,000 had been gathered in. Then came the war years, and although the appeal was never dropped and gifts continued to come in, the campaign of necessity slipped into the background until peace came in sight. Then the campaign was renewed under a Peace Thanksgiving Appeal. But post war conditions made it impossible to lay the foundation stone and begin the building. The need for houses and the shortage o c c and cost of building material again postponed the work.
Furthermore the Church was soon fully occupied with the problem of meeting the needs of the new housing areas. It was particularly acute in the Hutt Valley. The old Parish of St. James’ was subdivided into four cures, St. James, Taita, Nae Nae and Waiwhetu. Under the wise guidance of the Vicar of St. James, Canon J. C. Davies, this new development was carried out with great success, but the Church Extension Fund was hard put to it to help these and other new suburban districts to provide the bare essentials for their work.
During the war years the Church and the Bishop were much occupied with the work of the Military Affairs
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Committee, which was responsible for providing chaplains and maintaining recreation facilities in the camps. At one time ten clergy were away as chaplains.
The newly formed National Council of Churches undertook in 1942, a united campaign for Christian order. The Roman Catholics stood out but all the other larger denominations took part. The idea behind the campaign was to bring home to the people the need of bringing Christian ideals right down into the political, commercial and domestic life of the nation. There was a spate of preaching; over the air, from the pulpits of all the churches, but apart from the feeling of fellowship engendered amongst the churches taking part, any lasting results were not obvious.
One of the most difficult problems Bishop Holland had to tackle was the settlement of the Maori Educational Trusts. The negotiations between the Maoris, the Government and the Church called for much diplomacy on the part of the Bishop. A serious attempt was being made to take the Trusts away from the Church altogether. What he achieved is told in full in another section of this book. The Bishop was not a young man when he came to the Diocese and his health would not stand up to the strain of the pace he set himself. On his way to speak at the Anzac Service at Feilding in 1938 he had a serious motor accident, and although he insisted on fulfilling his engagement. the delayed shock was more serious and at Synod the Vicar General gave the address. The Vicar General was Archdeacon W, Bullock. The Bishop was, through ill health, unable to attend the next two Synods and the Vicar General presided at both. William Bullock had come to New Zealand as the organising Secretary of the C.E.M.S. He was later appointed to St. Matthew’s, Masterton and from there succeeded Archdeacon H. Watson as Vicar of St. Peter’s. He became Archdeacon of Wellington and Bishop Holland appointed him Vicar General. He had a wide knowledge of diocesan affairs and was well able to
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preside over Synod. He was a student all his life and with a first rate brain, he became one of the best read men in the Church. As a speaker, preacher and debater he was lucid and forceful and his matter was never dull. With a full, organ-like voice added to his gifts, he became a most acceptable and popular broadcaster. It was a tragedy that his eyesight at last entirely failed, but the courage with which he faced operations and fought his infirmities till the end, won the admiration and respect of the whole Church for a great man who had served his Church so capably in so many ways.
In June, 1942, a very heavy earthquake shook the Diocese and two churches were seriously damaged and one of them completely destroyed. St. Matthew’s, Masterton. which had been completed in 1912, when Canon H. Watson was vicar was so broken that army engineers, on the insistence of the Borough Council, hastened to complete the task with 60 lbs. of gelignite which did more damage than the earthquake itself. St. Michael and All Angels, Kelburn. was the other brick church which suffered. It is interesting to note that this happened one hundred years after the first little brick church Mason built at Putiki was destroyed by earthquake.
During this episcopate two obituary notices appeared of men who deserve to be remembered by the Diocese. One was the Rev. Thomas Fielden Taylor, the City Missioner of whom we have already written. Another was the Rev. Canon A. W. Payne who came to us from Trinity College, Dublin, one of the most finished classical scholars we have ever had. He began his ministry in this Diocese as curate at Palmerston North and ended it as editor of the Church Chronicle. In between he had been Warden of Hadfield Hostel, Warden of St. John’s College. Auckland, and Vicar of Kelburn. While he was vicar the new church was built. He had great gifts as a tutor and many who had the privilege of studying under him remember him wfith
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gratitude. When Archdeacon Bullock died the Bishop made Archdeacon F. H. Petrie the Vicar General.
The next Synod (1946) was the last over which Bishop Holland presided. His health could not stand up to the pace at which he worked. He had undergone four surgical operations and it was evident that he would have to retire from the strain of diocesan work. In 1946 he accepted the offer of the Deanery of Norwich and announced his resignation from the bishopric. In his farewell address he spoke of the objects he had tried to achieve; the creation of a closer and more friendly relationship between the Church and the leaders of our political life: the formation of the National Council of Churches in New Zealand and the Inter Church Council of Public Affairs. The task of raising funds for the Cathedral and the Advancing Church Fund had not been of his choosing but had been proposed before he came to the Diocese. Six of his ten years as bishop had been war years during which, in addition to his diocesan work, he had thrown himself into the turmoil of the war effort. He had no cause to apologise for not accomplishing the tasks he had undertaken but thus he spoke in Synod;
“Now I look back on ten years’ service in the Church of the Province of New Zealand. ... I have wanted to see in our new cathedral a place where the Christian faith of this City, the Diocese and this Dominion can be expressed in the traditional dignity and friendliness of the Anglican Church. Some have taken fright at my words and fear that we seek a ‘glorified Town Hall’. That is as near a libel on my intentions as any statement could be. I love my own Church so well that I hope to see the glorious practice of English cathedrals firmly established in this country and the great Festivals of the Christian year and the administration of the sacraments celebrated with a proper dignity and devotion in the finest setting which we can make with the greatest music which we know —never forgetting the place of religious drama in
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modern life. And not only shall we celebrate the Saints Days and Sundays, but those great occasions hallowed by the history of our country when the broadness of the national and citizen interest reaches beyond the confines of the Church, and those within and those without, together can worship without any compromise of principle. . . . Alas, I have not completed my task. But for the war I believe the foundations of the Cathedral would ere this have been laid, nay, even the building itself erected. Like many another, I have to pass on an unfinished task to my successor. But we have gone a long way. In fact if it were not for the shortage of houses, material and labour, I believe we would be justified in starting the building now.”
When on the sunny January morning in 1954 we watched Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth lay the foundation stone, it was a joy to see on the platform, the man who by his energy and devotion, had done more than anyone else to make that great occasion possible.
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Chapter 14
REGINALD HERBERT OWEN 1947
His grace, the Most Reverend Reginald Herbert Owen, our present Bishop and Archbishop of New Zealand, was consecrated in the Cathedral Church of St, Paul on March 9th, 1947, by Campbell West-Watson, Archbishop, assisted by the Bishops of Dunedin, Auckland, Nelson and Aotearoa.
Archbishop Owen came to us from England and Oxford where he had been serving as Fellow and Chaplain of Brasenose College, and as an old Rowing Blue, a coach of the University Eight. He had been a scholar of Wadham College from which he graduated with honours in 1910. After serving as Fellow, Tutor and Dean of Worcester College, in 1916, he accepted the responsible position as Headmaster of Uppingham School. He remained there for eighteen years. In 1934 he resigned his headmastership and returned to Oxford as Fellow and Chaplain of Brasenose College. During the war he received leave of absence to serve as chaplain in the Royal Navy. So he came to us as our second schoolmaster bishop: Bishop Abraham being the first. In England it is no uncommon thing for a clergyman to become a schoolmaster and in the course of his career to accept a headmastership. William Temple, the late Archbishop of Canterbury, was for a while Headmaster of Rugby. Bishop Owen was ordained in 1917, after he had become Headmaster of Uppingham, so in his case the process was reversed. It is given to few men to achieve such high honours in two professions.
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As we have said he was not the first schoolmaster to become Bishop of the Diocese: Bishop Abraham had been for many years a house-master at Eton and a memorial to him has been erected in that great school. They say that once a schoolmaster always a schoolmaster, and like most of such sayings this is only half a truth. When at Synod we heard the crash of the gavel on the President’s desk it may have reminded us of some of the less happy moments of our school life, but we realised that it was only part of the very necessary tightening up of the discipline of Synod.
The Bishop has some very sound ideas about committees and committee work. In his first address to Synod he pointed out that his predecessor had been chairman of 54 committees, and made it quite clear that he did not intend to emulate such an achievement. In a later address he pointed out the danger of too many committees. “The trouble about committees is that they may deprive people of the time for doing things that really matter in the way that they should be properly done; they may even take us away from what is our primary duty. There is always the danger that people may think that when they have set up a committee about something, they have thereby relieved themselves of a responsibility for it. and that when they have attended a meeting and passed a resolution they have necessarily accomplished something.”
The Bishop himself has a genius for chairmanship; at Standing Committee and at Synod he has succeeded in cutting down the discussion to absolute essentials, much to the relief of weary members. Standing Committee has been known to finish at half past nine and Synod which used to run into a second week now gets through its business in three days. In one address the President thanked and congratulated the “silent” members of Synod. Of course this can be overdone in a body founded on such democratic principles as the Church of the Province of New Zealand.
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The style of Bishop Owen's addresses as President of Synod introduced something new into the procedure. His keen sense of humour added a thread of colour to the usual sombre weave to which we were accustomed. To give an example: in speaking of the notices on church doors he said, “I was passing through a town recently in which 1 had preached three weeks before. The notice that I was going to preach there three weeks ago was still on the door of the church. The impression I got was that the visit of the Bishop had put an end to any idea of a service being held in that church again. I want, too, to suggest that the church notice board should not contain the name of a vicar who died ten years ago, or that anyhow his address should be altered.”
In contrast to this waggishness the Bishop’s addresses have been characterised by repeated appeals to clergy and laity alike to realise the paramount need of the personal witness of the Christian life lived in obedience to and in fellowship with Christ as Lord. “If we Christians can show more clearly and more boldly what Christ means to us in our daily lives and the transforming effect that He has on us in our dealings with our fellow-men. the world will be more ready to revise its judgment about the relevance of Christianity to the problems of today. We know that God in Christ is with us all the days, not only to be known and loved, but also to be obeyed, and the more we love Him and the more we obey Him, the more conscious we become of that divine strength which alone can enable us to spread among our fellows the knowledge of His saving power.” This appeal for evangelism by personal example was combined with an appeal for a more instructed laity. The Bishop has no faith in stunts to win men back to the Church. “I have not supped with revolutionaries.” and therefore he will not countenance innovations in the services or even the language of the Book of Common Prayer. Instead he organised a Teaching Mission throughout the Diocese. This began with a school for clergy held
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at Nga Tawa in May 1951 at which the Bishop of Canberra and Goulburn gave a series of addresses on the Bible. Later the Bishop paid a visit to each archdeaconry and held a service and addressed the clergy. Each vicar was free to conduct the Mission in his parish on his own lines. In reporting to the Synod of 1952 the Bishop reviewed the Mission as follows—“It is impossible after engaging in a great spiritual adventure to summarise its results, its successes or its failures. It attempted much and I believe it achieved much; how much it achieved will be seen in the life and work of each parish in the future. . . . It will have been successful if now and in future years there are more men and women and children saying their prayers, reading their Bibles, attending church regularly and continuing their education in the Christian faith. From what I have seen for myself, and from what I have heard from many, the Mission aroused an interest and even an enthusiasm which exceeded even our hopes and prayers.”
Being an Englishman the Bishop saw at once the need of a cathedral but very wisely he saw also that there were other more pressing needs, especially in the new housing areas, so his first appeal was for the Advancing Church Fund. The old parish of St. James Lower Hutt was to have three parochial districts cut out of it and schoolrooms, which could serve as churches, and vicarages had to be built. As most of the houses in the new areas were newly built government houses and the parishioners mostly young married people outside help had to come from somewhere. The appeal for this church extension was for £lO,OOO and in six weeks £11,477 was received. Of course there were other areas outside the Hutt Valley and much more was needed. The Synod of 1951 undertook another appeal for £20,000 to form a permanent Home Mission Fund from which money could be lent to the new Districts. The appeal produced £15,000.
At the Synod of 1948 the Bishop asked for an amendment to the Cathedra! Chapter Act which enabled him to
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appoint, with the consent of Synod, Canon D. J. Davies as the first Dean of Wellington. The Dean’s Welsh eloquence has made the pulpit of St. Paul’s well known throughout the country.
The year 1950 was marked by two notable events. On March 18th an assemblage of 4,000 Maoris from all over New Zealand together with pakehas from many parishes took part in the opening of the restored church of Rangiatea. The Governor-General, the Prime Minister and other public men were present and, sitting almost unnoticed at the back was one, perhaps the most important visitor of all, Miss Amy Hadfield, daughter of the great missionary who brought about the building of the church.
At the end of the same year the Archbishop of Canterbury visited New Zealand to take part in the Canterbury Centenary. On his way there he visited Wellington and all the clergy were given an opportunity of meeting him. His friendliness and good humour warmed the hearts of all who met him. His simple earnestness and sane outlook was an inspiration to the whole community. It made us realise that we are in truth a living part of the Mother Church and that the Archbishop of Canterbury belongs to us as well as to the Church in England.
At the General Synod held in Christchurch in 1952, Bishop Owen was elected Primate and Archbishop of New Zealand. As bishop of so large a diocese as that of Wellington it was very obvious that he would need adequate help. So the appointment of an assistant bishop was proposed. General Synod agreed to pay part of the stipend of such an assistant. After a long discussion the Diocesan Synod of Wellington agreed to the proposal and the Archbishop announced the appointment of the Yen. Archdeacon Eric John Rich as his assistant and he was duly consecrated in October of that year. Before his appointment it was made clear that he is an assistant to the Archbishop and Bishop of Wellington and in the event of the present
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bishop resigning then Bishop Rich’s appointment would automatically cease.
Eric John Rich is a graduate of the University of New Zealand and gained a Licentiate of Theology from St. John’s College, Auckland. He was ordained in 1919 and served a curacy at St. Thomas’ Wellington. Afterwards he had charge of the cures of Berhampore, Taihape, Masterton and St. Peter’s Wellington. He was appointed Archdeacon of Wellington in 1945 and Vicar General two years later. Since his consecration he has won the goodwill and respect of the whole Diocese, clergy and laity alike, for he has thrown himself into the work with an enthusiasm and devotion which cannot be denied. The Archbishop came to us without any experience of parish work and it was feared by some of the clergy that he would not be able, with the best will in the world, to understand their difficulties or from experience to guide them. Bishop Rich has been a parish priest in every type of parish: in the country, the provincial town and the city. So with the Archbishop it makes a perfect combination for the work of the Diocese.
The Diocese of Wellington covers a large area and the population is increasing so rapidly that the burden of a Bishop’s work is becoming too great for one man. The year books show that the number of confirmation services reaches to ninety in one year, so it appears that, apart altogether from the Primacy, the time has come for an assistant bishop. Until recent years the position of the Primate had not been nearly so arduous as it is today; he was little more than chairman of General Synod. But a change has come about. The Church of the Province is moving towards greater unity: the Archbishop is accepted in all the other dioceses as the Metropolitan and his visits are not only welcomed but expected. Now with the new status given to the missionary dioceses of Melanesia and Polynesia these visits will be more arduous. The Archbishop has already visited both these dioceses. In 1953 he
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visited Fiji for the consecration of the new cathedral and in 1954 he visited Melanesia for the consecration of the new bishop. The consecration took place in All Saints’ Church at Honiara on the island of Guadalcanal in the presence of 3,000 mostly native people. This was the first time that a Bishop of Melanesia had been consecrated within the Diocese in the presence of his people. The Archbishop gave a full and most interesting account of his visit to the Synod in 1954.
As the honour of the prophet is not appreciated in his own country by his own people, so the measure of a man is often hidden from his own contemporaries. Therefore we venture to say little about the men who passed from the Diocese in recent years. But they must not be forgotten. The obituary notices at Synod are very comprehensive and for the memorials of most men we must leave it at that.
There you will find special tributes to four men— Archdeacon Arthur L. Hansell was an Oxford man and a very complete English gentleman. He was a man of very sincere and simple faith with a spiritual outlook on life which hid from him most of its sordidness. He served in only two parishes, St. Mary’s, Karori, and St. James’, Lower Hutt. He was Archdeacon of the Wairarapa from 1922 to 1934 and then for five years Archdeacon of Wellington. In the parishes, he and Mrs Hansell were greatly loved.
Archdeacon F. H. Petrie graduated from Aberdeen and first served the Episcopal Church of Scotland. His great work in the Diocese was done from the cure of Feilding where he was vicar for 25 years, in the early days he took a great interest in the work of our Sunday schools but of later years he had the more responsible work as Archdeacon and Vicar General. He exercised a great influence on diocesan affairs, very quietly, almost from behind the scenes.
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Canon H. Watson, in his prime, was one of the best preachers in the Diocese and when Vicar of St. Peter’s, drew large congregations. He served for a time as Archdeacon of the Wairarapa but ended up as a Canon serving as Diocesan Missioner. In that position he did most valuable work and left behind the organisation of the Fellowship of Prayer.
And then of course there was Harry Squires, but of him we write elsewhere in this book.
The three city churches in Wellington are all old buildings and although the associations with the past make them very dear to many people, the day is not far distant when they will have to be replaced. The old church of St. James Lower Hutt was burnt down in 1946 and plans were at once made to replace it. It was an undertaking of great interest to the Church in Wellington. When Canon Bretton became vicar, the plans for the new church were changed and a campaign launched to finance the building. It was to cost £75,000, a figure unheard of before in New Zealand for a parish church. St. Mary’s, Timaru had cost only £20.000 and All Saints’, Palmerston North, had been built for £lO,OOO. However, by the faith of the vicar and the generosity of the parishioners, the work was done and the building completed. The design of the church is something entirely modern the like of which has not been seen in this country before. Some people admire it very much, some do not; but whoever is right the church stands as a witness to all of what the Church of England can do if it really sets its hand to it.
During her visit to Wellington her Majesty the Queen laid the foundation stone of the Cathedral. This memorable day dawned a gloriously fine summer morning and a great assemblage of people gathered in Molesworth Street. The accommodation was rather cramped and the clergy wives were very peeved, when in all their festal array, they found themselves tucked away out of sight behind the
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Salvation Army Band. All of the bishops of the Province were present; the Prime Minister and the Mayor of Wellington were on the platform and everyone was pleased to see Bishop Holland amongst them. The service was taken by the Archbishop who also gave an address of welcome and thanks to Her Majesty and the Duke of Edinburgh on behalf of the Church in the Diocese. The Queen laid the stone and this happy, sunlit service ended with their departure amidst the cheers of the crowd. The Archbishop remained behind to receive gifts amounting to over £2,000 laid on the foundation stone.
The completed Cathedral will consist of sanctuary, lady chapel, choir, crossing including in the north transept a war memorial chapel, nave of seven bays, and west end including on the north side a Maori chapel and on the south side a baptistery. In the lady chapel, which extends at right angles to the sanctuary, it is proposed to incorporate part of the present St. Paul’s Cathedral Church, and thus preserve some of the timber work within the concrete frame of the chapel.
With over £225,000 immediately available, apart from a further £lB,OOO reserved by the donors for the west end, tenders were called for the erection of the east end, including the lady chapel, and the lower walls of the crossing and of one bay of the nave. A tender of £186,000 for this work was accepted in July, 1956, and work began in the following month.
During 1956 the Wells Organisation, which originated in America, was invited to place its methods before the parishes throughout the Diocese. While the Organisation works on the parish level, its canvassers stress the need for contributing also to diocesan and missionary work, and under the auspices of a diocesan canvass committee by the end of 1956 some £161,000 had been promised for the Cathedral. This gives good hope that when the present building contract is completed in 1958, it will be possible
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to enter into a further contract for the building of the greater part of the remainder of the Cathedral.
The Cathedral scheme initiated in 1937 included the provision of a Synod Hall and Diocesan Office in a separate building on the Cathedral site, but so far means of erecting this much needed building are not available.
The Most Reverend Reginald Herbert Owen, Bishop of Wellington, Primate and Archbishop of New Zealand
Chapter 15
RETROSPECT
In the days of childhood and youth one hundred years is an almost inconceivable length of time. To the schoolboy in the history class the tales of Nelson’s sailors and Wellington’s men, of Trafalgar and Waterloo, of Lord Melbourne greeting the girl Victoria as Queen, seem as tales from another world. As we grow older time seems to contract and we look back over history with a telescopic lens. This is because we measure it with the years of our own life which, when we look back to the beginning, seem but as yesterday. Recently I heard of the death of a distant relative in his one hundred and first year. He was alive when Bishop Abraham was consecrated and was almost old enough to have been present at the service.
The centenary which we celebrate covers little more than one life time but what changes those hundred years have wrought.
When our story began it was the story of an undeveloped country with its forests still standing, it’s plains trackless wastes and its inhabitants an uncivilised warlike race of native people scattered throughout the land, together with a few whaling stations and white settlements clinging to the coasts. And in the north there were a few mission stations where men laboured very unsuccessfully to convert the Maori people.
Today we have large, overcrowded cities where people enjoy all the amenities of modern life, sea ports busy with overseas shipping which brings to us the trade of the world and takes away the rich produce of our land; the rivers
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have been bridged and highways and railways carry constant traffic from city to city; good roads reach into the remotest districts; the forest has been cleared to make room for country townships, prosperous farms and pleasant homesteads; there are schools, colleges and churches everywhere.
We can in imagination picture something of all the work that has been done to accomplish all this: the builders of our cities, the workmen forming our roads, the engineers building the bridges, the farmers felling the bush; but the more we think the more the wonder grows and the feeling that our land today is a monument to the courage, industry, perseverance and labour of our fathers. Where else in history shall we find a land in which so much has been done, such great changes brought about, in so short a time?
And what of the Church? Has the Church kept pace with this development in material affairs? Of course there is a material side to the Church’s work. Churches, vicarages and schoolrooms have been built; the whole Diocese has been brought under the parish system and every district has its resident parish priest. At the first Synod held in Wellington in 1859 there were seven clergy present, including one Maori; today the number on the licensed clergy list is eighty-four, including five Maori clergy.
We can get an idea of the development of this side of our work by comparing the mortuary chapel in the Bolton Street cemetery, which was part of the original St. Paul’s built in 1844, with the Cathedral being built in Molesworth Street today. But these material things are only the outward and visible signs of the real work of the Church which is spiritual, even the building of the faith in the hearts of the people. This cannot be seen or assessed by man.
Some time ago an American preacher published a book of sermons in one of which he spoke a parable of the happy valley and the forest on the distant hills. I can
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remember only the general idea of the parable which went something like this. In the far west there was a fertile valley inhabited by a prosperous, happy farming community. There were pleasant homes echoing with the laughter of children. There was a good school, church, community hall and all the other amenities of a prosperous district. The valley was fertile because it was watered by a placid flowing river which never flooded in the spring, nor ran dry in the summer months. In the far distance were the hills where the river had its source, but nobody paid much attention to them. Sometimes of an evening, when they glowed golden in the setting sun, or were draped with the blue veil of the autumn mists, someone would be arrested by their beauty, but for the most part they gave them never a thought. The years passed by and the sons took over the farms and the orchards and a great change came over that valley. Its prosperity vanished. Buildings were in disrepair, fences left broken, many families sold out and moved elsewhere, the school was half empty and they could hardly rake up enough to pay the parson’s stipend. Altogether it was a sad state of things, and they blamed it all upon the river. It was no longer a placid stream but it flooded in the spring and washed away acres of the best land, leaving behind great stretches of shingle. In the summer it dried up into a chain of almost stagnant pools and left them at the mercy of the drought. What could have happened? It took them a long time to realise that the source of the trouble was in the far distant and forgotten hills. A city company had taken a timber concession and sent their men in and stripped the forest from those hills leaving them bare and open to the weather. This changed the whole nature of the river. Instead of flowing gently down the valley rippling into pools where the great brown trout lay, it was now either a raging torrent or a half dried up watercourse trickling under beds of shingle. If any reader should doubt the truth of this part of the parable he should walk up the Waikanae river for a mile above the bridge
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and then talk to someone who fished it forty years ago. When the forest covers the hills it attracts the rain which, caught by the foliage, trickles down into the bed of leafmould underneath and seeps away gradually into the soil forming hidden springs from which the river receives a steady and constant supply. But when the hills are bare the rain-storms cause erosion; the soil is washed off the face of the rocks and the muddy torrents rush down the hillsides raising the river to high flood in the spring and leaving dry the springs to feed it in the summer. And the parable is this: The Church fulfils the function of the forest on the hills. Its branches spread out over the land, lifting their leaves to heaven. The prayers of parish priests and the worship of the faithful call down the outpouring of the Holy Spirit of God on all believers and thereby finds its way, as from hidden springs, into the hearts and lives of other men keeping life fresh and green and saving it from disaster and corruption.
In every community where the Church of God gathers two or three together for worship, prayer and sacrament, the Holy Spirit of God comes down upon them and goes forth with them to well up into the lives of other men. So everywhere, unseen, unknown, unnoticed, the Church of God exercises an influence on the life of the community preserving it from corruption and making it clean and green and fragrant in love and joy and purity.
No man can measure this.
For one hundred years the Church has been at work in this Diocese: faithful clergy have served God in their generation and passed to their rest, busy men and women have given up their leisure hours to serve as Sunday School teachers, lay readers, churchwardens, vestrymen, choristers and members of guilds. This great band, like the forest on the hills, has been the instrument by which the Holy Spirit has done the work of God. If the forest were cut down, if the work of the Church were to cease, puzzled men and women everywhere would wonder why so great
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a change for the worse had come over human life. In some parts of the modem world we can see it taking place. That it has not taken place in this country should be, on this our centenary, the primary cause of our rejoicing and thanksgiving. We will remember our bishops and leaders, but we will not forget the great band of the faithful laity and clergy whose names are not in this book, but will be recorded in the Book of Life.
In one of his addresses to Synod the Archbishop said, “The comradeship of the laity is a very precious thing.” The clergy present who have served long in this Diocese must have felt how true were his words. There may be other dioceses with a stronger church tradition, with better churches, richer endowments, but we will give place to none in our claim to this great treasure “the comradeship of the laity.” Some years ago a famous churchman wrote a book entitled The Impatience of a Parson. It invited a reply with another book entitled The Patience of the Laity. Here, in this Diocese the laity are patient indeed with these strange men called the clergy. They often cannot understand them, with their strange outlook on life, and what often appears to be a lack of common sense, but they just shrug their shoulders and decide to stand by them air the same and show their comradeship by continued acts of kindness and goodwill. This comradeship of the laity is indeed a very precious thing and for one hundred years it has been an outstanding characteristic of the church in the Diocese of Wellington.
Part 3
DIOCESAN ORGANISATIONS
Chapter 16
DIOCESAN ORGANISATIONS
All of the work of the Church is not done by the clergy, nor is it all done in our churches on Sundays. LH you were to look at a Diocesan Year Book, which records the business of Synod, you would find a large part of it taken up with reports of various organisations, trusts and committees. These reports are too many to be considered in detail by the Synod so committees are set up to report on the reports, giving the gist of them and drawing the attention of Synod to matters of special interest. If action by the Synod is necessary, resolutions are attached to the reports. If an attempt were made in this section of the book to give a detailed account of all these organisations with dates and statistics, it would probably be as unread as the reports laid on the table of Synod. But just to pass round and have a general gossip about them would be to do an injustice to the splendid work done by many in the past and to that which is still being carried on today. So let us try “to keep the mean between the two extremes, of too much stiffness in refusing, and of too much easiness in admitting.”
The Mothers’ Union
The Mothers’ Union was founded in England by Mary Sumner in 1876. The movement became very popular and has spread all over the world wherever the Church of England exists. In this Diocese alone there are 59 branches and 2,500 members. It is not difficult to see the reason for the success of this organisation. It provides a means for churchwomen to give expression to their desire for fellowship as members of the Church. The badge is a symbol not
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only of their achievement of the crown of womanhood but also of their membership of the Church of England, and they are proud of it. It has a very simple rule of life and a very clear and definite objective, to maintain the Christian ideal of marriage. This objective is the more effective because it is challenged in the modern world and the women feel that theirs’ is no sham fight but that they are defending the faith at a point where it is being seriously attacked. Furthermore the organisation is simple and its service books, with a form of admission and forms of service, are first-rate. In its wisdom it has made itself essentially a parish organisation and there are no free lance branches. The vicar generally takes the monthly service and the meeting which follows is taken by the women themselves. A good deal is made of co-operation with other branches. A branch in New Zealand may be linked with a branch in England. They pray for each other, correspond, and during the war our branches sent food parcels to their linked branches in the war areas.
Once a year, on Lady Day, there is a Diocesan Festival held in Wellington or Palmerston North. This is made the occasion for a great display of banners, a large communion service followed by a community luncheon and a meeting afterwards.
Successful as it is it has one weakness. Older women whose families are grown up have more time for attending meetings and so the membership tends to a majority of older women. In many parishes this has led to the formation of groups for younger women in a Young Wives’ Fellowship or some similar organisation. These do not compete with the Mothers’ Union but serve rather as feeders for it.
In addition to its own particular work the Mothers’ Union in many parishes makes itself a maid of all work. If the vestry want supper served at the annual meeting or a special job of cleaning done in the church as likely as not
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it will be the Mothers’ Union that will do it. So many a vicar has said. “God bless the good old Mothers’ Union.”
Church of England Men's Society
The Church of England Men's Society was founded in England at the beginning of the century and was meant to be a fellowship of communicant men of the Church of England who were prepared to engage in some form of active service for their church. The first branch in this Diocese was founded at Petone in 1905 by the vicar, the Rev. J. D. Russell, afterwards Archdeacon Russell and always known affectionately in the Society as “Father Russell”. The Society was given a good send off by two visitors from England, the Rev. H. S. Woollcombe and the Rev. J. Watts-Ditchfield. The former became Suffragan Bishop of Whitby and the latter the first Bishop of Chelmsford.
In the beginning the Society was a very aggressive body and in the cities on Saturday, the late night in those days, they held evangelistic services in the open air on the lines of the Church Army. Branches sprang up in many parishes, the clergy were very enthusiastic and the membership was so high that it was difficult to assign jobs to all the members. It looked as if it were going to be something very big in the Church but it has not yet fulfilled the promise of those early years. This has not been the fault of the members for from the beginning there was a weakness in its foundations. Its objective was never clear. In contrast to the Mothers’ Union it did not undertake to defend the Church at any point where it was being attacked nor advance it at any definite point where it was weak. The clergy soon found that it was only another organisation to run which instead of pushing things along in the parish had to be pushed along itself. The first enthusiasm waned and when the First World War scattered the members many branches disappeared.
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Small things sometimes bring unexpected results. In the early days of the society the wearing of the C.E.M.S. badge was an important factor of membership. The badge was worn on a watch guard suspended boldly in the middle of a man’s waistcoat; but you cannot wear a badge on a wristlet watch nor on many modern suits so the good effect of the badge is lost. The adoption of the term “brother” as a title of membership undoubtedly put some men off. It sounds too exclusive for the Church of England where we are all “dearly Beloved Brethren.” However in its darkest days, to their credit, the stalwarts of the Society never gave way to despair. They always managed a Dominion Conference with always considerable publicity and an imposing photograph with Church dignitaries present. But conferences are like faith, dead without works. At one time the Society helped with work amongst immigrants and has consistently done good work in visiting hospitals. But such works, laudable though they are, cannot be made the objective of a Society for universal fellowship amongst churchmen. Since the Second World War there have been signs of a renewed interest in the old Society and we read reports of the formation of new branches. At a recent Dominion Conference held in Wellington one of the speakers is reported to have appealed for an overhaul of the whole organisation. Why not in humility ponder on the reason for the success of the corresponding women’s organisation in the Church? Consider the definiteness of its objective, the excellence of its service books and above all the way it identifies itself with the parishes and is content to find scope for service in the humdrum activities of the parish. If all the vestrymen, choirmen, lay readers, youth leaders, qualified for membership what a fellowship we would have and what a power it might be. not only in the Church but in the whole community. The C.E.M.S. is the body which could achieve this and may it yet found a fellowship of churchmen worthy of its motto, “All in One”.
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Lay Readers
Every Sunday there are more services undertaken than the clergy can themselves conduct. In widespread country districts and in parishes where there are a number of branch churches, the vicar cannot cover all his Sunday obligations and he therefore calls to his help the lay readers. From the earliest days these men have rendered yeoman service to the Diocese, very often with scant response from the people to whom they have ministered. Most of them have taken their service seriously, very carefully preparing for their work and in some cases making themselves so efficient that they have put the parson in the shade. But generally they have been devout and humble men who have been prepared to travel long distances to take a service at which only a handful were present. A lay reader must be licensed by the Bishop before he can take up his work and care is taken to test and examine each applicant for the office. General Synod has put forth from time to time collections of sermons for their use for only in exceptional cases is the licence granted for a man to preach his own sermons. In this Diocese there is a Lay Readers’ Association which meets annually for a conference under the guidance of Archdeacon J. R. Young.
Chapter 17
THE SOCIAL SERVICE WORK OF THE DIOCESE
The Girls’ Friendly Society
The G.F.S. is the oldest of our organisations for social service work. Lady Jervois came to New Zealand in 1883 and she was much concerned about the welfare of the girls and young women who were arriving from the Old Country as immigrants. She called a meeting at Government House in July 1883 and a lodge of the G.F.S. was formed. The following officers were appointed: President, Lady Jervois; Vice-President, Mrs O. Hadfield; Hon. Secretary, Miss Battersbee; Treasurer, Mrs Harcourt.
At first the work done by members of the council and associates was confined to meeting the girl immigrants and finding temporary accommodation for them, but in 1884 a lodge was started with Miss Rix, as matron, who stayed in that position for twenty-five years. Her successor, Mrs Gleeson, served for thirty years. At first the tariff was 47weekly, with three meals a day: bed and breakfast was Bd. Those were the days.
In 1928 the hostel in Vivian Street was rebuilt at a cost of £6,500 and it was recently sold for £37,000.
The work is now continued in two hostels, one in Murphy Street which accommodates 25 girls, and the other, Bishop Bennett House, in Fitzherbert Terrace with accommodation for another 25. This was intended originally for Maori girl students at the Teachers’ Training College. Now, while the Maori students are given a priority, the vacancies are open to European girls. Thus for seventyfive years of the century the G.F.S. has carried on its work quietly and steadfastly caring for young women who have
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left their homes to find work in the city, its purpose being “to give glory to God by bringing girls and women into the full life and fellowship of the Church, and by helping them to know, love, and serve our Lord Jesus Christ.”
St. Mary’s Guild
St. Mary’s Guild was founded by Mrs Wallis in 1898 and in the course of over fifty years has enrolled in its service the names of many churchwomen worthy of remembrance. It began as an institution to care for fallen girls. The Guild rented a small house in Newtown which accommodated a Matron and four girls. The next year it was able to purchase a much larger property at Karori with a larger house which was opened in 1900. Subsequently two other Homes were built on the property to accommodate girls of younger ages. In 1929 the Homes were accommodating 104 children and young girls. The change in social conditions brought about in recent years by the war and the Social Security legislation of the Welfare State has compelled the Guild to restrict and change its activities. Young women at an early age now so easily find employment at high rates of wages that they will not stay in the Home. This rise in wages and the high cost of living has also involved the Guild in insuperable difficulties in staffing and financing the institution. The big house has been leased as a hostel for university women. The Edith Sprott house has been converted into a home for aged women and the Duncan Home is the only one now used for young children.
In 1911 the Wellington Boys’ Home Society was founded and began its work by opening a small home for boys at Lower Hutt under the care of Mr and Mrs Hescltine. Their long and efficient service laid a good foundation for the institution. A larger property of eight acres was bought accommodating 65 boys, and then later the Sedgley Home was bought in the country near Masterton. The older boys are drafted into this home and there they
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are able to learn practical farming and yet be within reach of a good secondary school.
St. Barnabas’ Home for Babies was founded by the Rev. T. Fielden Taylor as part of the work of the City Mission, in 1918. A property was bought at Khandallah where provision was made for the care of babies whose mothers for some good reason could not take charge of them. This home has done splendid work and although it has sometimes been hard pushed financially it has come through successfully and is now established in a fine home at Seatoun.
All Saints’ Home, Palmerston North. In 1906, the Rev. C. C. Harper had undertaken to find a home for an orphan boy. All the other homes being full the vicar found a solution by getting the Parish of All Saints’ to provide one itself. This Home differs in its constitution from other Homes in the Diocese, in that it is not controlled by diocesan authority, but is the particular responsibility of All Saints’ Parish. By 1930 the old Home was out of date and inadequate so a new Home was built. Mr Hugh Akers gave a magnificent site near the Show Grounds and £ 1,000 towards the cost. A fine building was erected to accommodate 30 children. In addition a holiday house was built at the parish farm at Kahuterawa. About 600 children have passed through this Home.
In recent years the call for social service has changed its emphasis. Fifty years ago the call was to meet the needs of the indigent of all ages; the unemployed, the down and outs and orphan children, children of unmarried mothers and children from homes broken by sickness or divorce. Our Homes were not large enough to meet the needs of those days. As soon as the State gave children’s allowances the number of orphans seemed to fall off and our Homes began to empty. Then the State Department for the Welfare of Women and Children extended its work and today places many uncared for children in private
Archdeacon Thomas Fancourt
The Rev. Richard Taylor
St. Peter's Church
The Right Reverend Eric John Rich,
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homes and supervises them with its officers. A good, respectable home is a better place for a child than the best of institutions. So the need today has largely shifted to the care of the aged. Social Security supplies their daily bread provided that they have lodging. In these days of housing shortage it is often impossible for them to get this lodging. The Church in the Diocese is trying to meet this new need. It has converted one of the Children’s Homes at Karori, the Edith Sprott House, into a home for the aged and the City Mission has tackled the problem on a large scale with the Harry Squires’ Hostel. Of course the Childrens’ Homes are still carrying on.
The City Mission
The City Mission which now plays so large a part in the social service work of the Diocese began in a very small way as one of the organisations of St. Peter’s Parish. It was then called St. Peter’s Mission. In 1904, the Rev. G. P. Davys, then vicar of St. Peter’s, added to his staff a young man from England named Mr W. H. Walton, to start a mission in the Taranaki Street area of the parish. Mr Walton had served with the Church Army in England. The mission began without even a hall of its own. An upper room, really a loft, was hired above the premises of J. J. Powell, a coal merchant in Taranaki Street. A Sunday School was started with 40 children on the roll. The first mission service was held by Mr Walton on August 26th, 1906. The premises were not sufficient and a property was bought higher up Taranaki Street. In 1907 the foundation stone of the Mission Chapel was laid by Lord Plunket and Archdeacon T. Fancourt took the first service in the new building on December 12th of the same year. In those days an important part of the missioner’s work was done for the Wellington Church Immigration Society. He was appointed the official agent of the Society and met all ships from England, welcoming the immigrants, giving them such advice and help as they needed and
A. M
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commending them to the vicars of the parishes in which they planned to reside.
Mr Thomas Ballinger and Mr R. L. Button gave much help to the Mission in its early days. Mr Walton resigned after six years’ service and his work was taken over by the Rev. W. Raine. In 1917 the Rev. T. Fielden Taylor took charge. He was a curate on the staff of St. Peter’s until in 1929 the Mission was legally separated from the parish and became a diocesan institution.
We have elsewhere in this book paid a tribute to the character of Thomas Fielden Taylor. With his war record and war injuries, his love of boys and knowledge of men, his ability as a speaker, and his indomitable courage, he made himself one of the outstanding personalities of the city. But in addition to all this he was a man of vision. We know the Mission as it is today: consider these words which Fielden Taylor wrote nearly thirty years ago. “From the very first I had a vision of a Mission which would carry out the city social work of the Church, and I felt that the first great need was to increase the Mission property, so bit by bit we bought the land and buildings between the Mission Hall and Wigan Street and in a few years had paid for them. As we bought property we made use of it for Mission purposes. The Boys’ Club occupies one section, the Boys’ Hostel occupies two houses, the Missioner lives in one house, the Jumble Shop occupies another house, while two houses are still let to tenants. The total amount paid for the property was roughly £lO,OOO. During the last two or three years a start has been made with the gathering together of a building fund and at date we have £6,000 in hand for this purpose. All this sounds extremely material, but we were placed in the position of being forced to get the property on which the work could be carried on, and we are still faced with the necessity of raising another £lO,OOO for the building fund. We want a good Boys’ Institute, which will house our hostel and include decent night school rooms and a gymnasium; we want a proper
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Jumble Shop and store; we want an office from which we can do all our work for employment and do all the odd business which men and women bring to us; we want quarters for decent men who are temporarily out of work; and somewhere in Wellington or suburbs in the future we want a Home for the Aged and Needy, and a Girls’ Hostel. This may seem a hefty programme, but we suggest that every item in it is essential, and that the Church to which we have the privilege to belong is well able to give us that help which will enable us to see our vision a reality.” Such was the measure of this great Missioner. His faith was not misplaced for his vision has been fulfilled.
Fielden Taylor’s mantle fell on Harry Squires, who not only maintained the high tradition he received but added to it. Five years after he had taken over, the Synod Report states during the year (one of the war years) at the Mission Chapel there had been 40 baptisms, 36 persons confirmed and 3,553 acts of communion. To the Missioner’s other work there had been added, at the Government’s request, that of Marriage Separation Conciliator, and during the year fifty per cent, of the cases dealt with had resulted in reconciliation. Eighty old people had their daily mid-day meal provided for the small charge of fourpence. An Old Age Pensioners’ Club provided them with warm, pleasant surroundings in which to spend the hard, cold days of winter. A Christmas party entertained 400 children whose fathers were serving overseas and a real Christmas dinner was provided for 100 old folk, and special camps in the country provided a holiday for 136 boys and girls. And all this was founded on a zeal for the spiritual welfare of all who received help. The Missioner wrote:
“I feel that we have nothing to fear so long as the Mission activities are thoroughly alive, and the work of helping people and winning them for our Blessed Lord takes first place. We endeavour in all our activities, whether it be in feeding the old age pensioners, or sheltering the
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homeless, or dealing with our many problem cases, to serve our Blessed Lord in all things.”
When we read of these things and bring to mind our own knowledge of the little man, we can understand how he won the hearts of the people of a great city. His devotion to his work, the sincerity of his great charity, the deep religious life behind it all, the cheerful optimism born of faith in man and God, made him a man beloved. When the unexpected news of his death spread throughout the city, men resolved that they would honour his memory by completing his great project of a Home for the Aged. A committee of citizens was set up and with the generous support of the Press a sum of £75,000 was raised so that the Harry Squires’ Memorial Hostel could be opened free of debt. And opened it was on Sunday, October 12th, 1955.
The Mission now has two memorials to men whose work should never be forgotten.
The Missions to Seamen
Work amongst the seamen visiting the Port of Wellington was begun in 1898 when the Missions to Seamen Society of London sent out Mr James Moore as reader or missioner at Wellington, Mr Moore took up the work with great energy, at first in a wharf shed lent by the Harbour Board and later in the old Art Gallery Building, but he was greatly handicapped by lack of a permanent and suitable building. In 1903 Mrs W. R. Williams, the widow of a sea captain, bought a site in Stout Street, Wellington, and at her own expense built a fine institute, which she then vested in a trust board of her own appointment to hold for the use of the Mission. The reports to Synod speak in glowing terms of the work, spiritual and social, carried on there under Mr Moore’s direction. In 1911, however, he suffered a complete breakdown in health and. after returning to England, resigned his appointment in
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Wellington, whereupon the Home Society appointed a successor, who arrived in 1912.
Unfortunately Mrs Williams was a Congregationalist whose well-merited confidence in Mr Moore was apparently equalled only by her distrust of his Church. When therefore Mr Moore, in defiance of the Home Society, returned to Wellington in 1913, she demanded that the missioner then in office, Mr Cocks, should be displaced so that Mr Moore might be reinstated. As he had ceased to be an agent of the Society, neither the local committee nor the Home committee could agree to this proposal, and Mrs Williams took legal action to enforce her wishes. The Courts upheld her claim, and, though appeal to the Privy Council was advised, eventually in view of Mrs Williams’s age and the other attendant circumstances a compromise settlement was reached by which the Society relinquished its claim to use the Institute during Mr Moore’s lifetime. He thereupon established an undenominational body called the Sailors’ Friend Society and the Missions to Seamen work remained in abeyance until his death in 1932.
The work was resumed on a regular basis by Mr B. J. Williams (shortly afterwards ordained) in 1934 and taken up by him with great devotion and success. During the war as many as 18,000 men made use of the Institute in one year. Mr Williams was transferred to the Chaplaincy at Adelaide in 1950 and was succeeded as Chaplain by the Rev. M. P. Cowle, and he in turn was succeeded by the Rev. O. J. Matthews in 1955. These two Chaplains continued to carry on the work in all its aspects with ability and general acceptance.
The Mission is greatly assisted by the Harbour Lights Guild, an energetic band of women who collect books, raise funds and assist at social functions. In general the Mission serves as a club where in healthy surroundings visiting seamen can find a home while in port. There is a library and facilities for writing; arrangements are made
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for outdoor sports as well as indoor games and entertainments. Most of the guests are British seamen, but many come from foreign ships. Scandinavians, Indians, Dutch and Greeks all find their way there.
The chapel services on Sunday consist of a celebration of Holy Communion and an evening service suitable for men of any denomination. Occasionally a marriage, a baptism or a funeral is conducted by the Missioner.
The expenses of such a Mission are heavy and are met by local subscription and generous gifts from the shipping companies and the head office in London. The good work being done is certainly worthy of support.
Chapter 18
THE EDUCATIONAL WORK OF THE CHURCH
The Sunday Schools The first settlers in Wellington soon felt the need of schools in which to educate their children. Three private schools were opened and the teachers’ salaries and other expenses were paid by public subscription, government subsidies and fees. These schools were “under ecclesiastical control” and were practically church schools.
When the legislature got down to establishing an educational system the Church fought for the inclusion of religion in the syllabus. Hadfield and other Church leaders took up the position that education must be either religious or irreligious. A secular system could not be neutral. But it was soon evident that the secularists were going to win and education become the function of the State and not of the Church. Two influences were at work on their side. One was the rise of the tide of rationalism under the influence of the evolutionary philosophy and the other was the disunity of the churches. There was no State Church: all the different religious bodies were on the same footing and their differences made it impossible for them to produce an agreed syllabus of religious teaching. This was not what they wanted in any case but rather subsidies to run their own schools. They would not subscribe to the idea that education was the function of the State.
As soon as it was apparent that there was little hope of establishing church day schools the clergy concentrated on making the most of the Sunday Schools. No pains were spared to foster the work and make it as efficient as possible. All down the years we read of the clergy making
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efforts to help and encourage the teachers; conferences were held, organisers appointed and manuals published. Over a long period lessons for every Sunday in the year were printed in the Church Chronicle, an examination on these lessons was held in many of the schools, and the results published. The impression gained from reading the old Chronicles is that the attendance at Sunday School was better in earlier days and that more older and more responsible members of the Church found a field of service in Sunday School work. The changed conditions of modern life which have arisen since the coming of the motor car, the weekend habit and the breakdown of the old ideas of Sunday observance have all helped to make our Sunday School work more difficult.
In 1947 Synod set up a Commission to inquire into and report on the Sunday School work of the Diocese. In this report we read: “A very small percentage of Church children receive instruction in Church schools; most of them share the Scripture teaching given in the State day schools; some doubtless are taught in their own homes; but apart from this the only instrument available for the instruction in the Faith of children of the Church of England is the Sunday School.
“We have the children in our Sunday Schools for an hour on about forty Sundays of the year; the teaching is given by voluntary workers, most of whom are untrained in the art of teaching: the work is generally done under conditions which are most unfavourable in halls and rooms used for many other purposes, and in most cases many classes have to be held at the same time in the same room. Remembering these things it seems unreasonable that the Church should expect a high standard of work from its Sunday Schools. The wonder is that they accomplish so much, and, if anyone is feeling despondent about the Church, we recommend him to sit down some Sunday morning and in imagination picture the loyal band of men and women all over the Diocese who, in little country
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schoolrooms and in big city parishes are at work trying to teach our children; and let him remember that they do it week after week and year after year in sincere love and devotion to our Lord and His Church.”
The first resolution attached to the Commission’s report was: “That Synod calls on all Church people throughout the Diocese to consider that the Sunday School is the only instrument we have to teach the Faith to our children, and urges them to make an effort to create a new sense of obligation on us all, clergy and laity, to support, by our personal service, our prayers and our alms, the work of the Sunday Schools.”
The latest statistics available show that 13,959 children are attending our Sunday Schools and that there are 966 teachers. This does not include Bible Classes.
In our large Diocese there are Church families living in places from which it is not possible to send children to Sunday School. These cases are met by the Church Mail Bag School. Lessons are sent by post to these families and the older scholars send back written work which is corrected in Wellington. The Diocese owes a debt of gratitude to Mrs C. R. Buckingham, who organises this work, and to all the workers who assist her in carrying it out.
The Anglican Bible Class Union
To the Wellington Diocese belongs the credit for providing the inspiration and initiative which led to the formation of the New Zealand Anglican Bible Class Union. It has a romantic origin, for although born in Taranaki Street it was conceived far away on the island Lemnos in the Aegean Sea. The Rev. T. Fielden Taylor was a chaplain in the New Zealand Forces which landed on Gallipoli. One night on a little bare, stony hill on Lemnos, to which some of the fragments of the N.Z.E.F. had been withdrawn to rest and refit, some thirty or forty young men gathered. Fielden Taylor had announced that a prayer meeting would be held on the hill. He was surprised at
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the response and on asking who these fellows were he was told that they were B.C. men. On asking what B.C. meant he was told about the Presbyterian Bible Class movement, then at its peak in New Zealand. “We must have one in the Anglican Church” was his immediate comment.
When he returned to New Zealand Fielden Taylor was placed in charge of St. Peter’s Mission, now the Wellington City Mission, and here he gathered round him a band of boys and young men who were inspired by his magnetic personality. So it came about that on one fine Saturday afternoon there met in the Missioner’s residence representatives of the three Bible Classes which then existed in Wellington. During that meeting they hammered out a draft constitution and the New Zealand Anglican Bible Class Union was born.
At that time there was little organised youth work in the Church of the Province. When a boy left Sunday School there was nothing to hold him to the fellowship of the Church. Fielden Taylor had a vision of making the Bible Class Union a Dominion-wide youth movement to quicken in the young people a loyalty to their church and inspire them with the Christian ideal of life.
Then as now the Diocesan system tended to disunity in the Church of England. Instead of one Church uniting all its members from the North Cape to the Bluff, it seemed at times as if there were six separate churches, each one intent on its own affairs. The Bible Class Union aimed to remedy this. At its camps and conferences young people from every Diocese in the Province were to meet together and made to realise that their church fellowship was wider than the fellowship of the parish and the diocese. From small beginnings the Union grew rapidly and it owed no small measure of its success to the energy and inspiration of Mr Fielden Taylor, who for the first few years of its existence, travelled to various parts of the country addressing Bible Class rallies and similar gatherings. The first
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camp and conference of the newly formed Union was held at Carterton from December 26th, 1921, to January sth, 1922. The report presented at that conference showed that there were 37 classes affiliated to the Union in the Dioceses of Wellington, Christchurch, Nelson and Waiapu.
Four years later there were 118 affiliated classes representing every Diocese in the Province and having a total membership of 1,800.
Side by side with the young men’s movement a similar organisation developed among the young women of the Church and the Anglican Young Women’s Bible Class Union was established in 1923. Year by year these two organisations continued to grow and their annual camps became a feature of church life. In 1947 the two unions amalgamated under the name of the N.Z. Anglican Bible Class Union.
In more recent years the Australian Young Anglican Movement has been adopted in some dioceses as the official young people’s movement, but in this Diocese the Bible Class Union has retained the loyalty of the young people of the Church. The 1955 Year Book shows that there are 45 affiliated classes in the Diocese with a membership of 1,850. The Union provides two bursaries of £l5O a year each: one for the training of a candidate for Holy Orders and the other for the training of a woman parish worker.
The Bible Class Union has proved its worth over the past thirty years for holding young people past Sunday School age loyal to their church. Many candidates for Holy Orders have come from its ranks, who are now occupying important and responsible positions in the Church of the Province.
The Diocesan Youth Council
The Diocesan Youth Council was set up to centralise and co-ordinate the youth work of the Diocese. It has its own office in Wellington and is financed by a 2 per cent, levy on the parishes. It takes under its wing both Sunday
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School and Bible Class work. It provides classes of instruction for leaders and refresher courses for Sunday School teachers. It recommends a syllabus of work and conducts an examination for schools taking the course. It makes available literature suitable for the work, and members of the staff visit Sunday Schools and Bible Classes in the parishes.
The Church Schools Board
This Board was set up by Synod in 1917, an organiser was appointed and a serious effort was made to raise funds to establish Church day schools. Some generous subscriptions were received. Mr A. Martin, of the Wairarapa, gave £lOO each year until the time of his death. A few schools were established but the only ones which remain today are St. Mark’s, Wellington, St. Stephen’s, Marton, and one which the late Canon J. R. Higgs recently opened at Christ Church, Wanganui. St. Stephen’s, Marton. has continued right through and St. Mark’s has always prospered. It has a wide area and population to draw upon and has been given the generous, expert service, enthusiasm and devotion of Miss Holm and her sisters.
Our Secondary Schools
We have been more successful with our secondary and boarding schools. The Pan-Anglican Congress of 1908 voted £2,000 to New Zealand for Church education. Bishop Wallis who was at the time in failing health made no claim on this grant but it roused Bishop Sprott to make an effort to establish a Diocesan School for Girls at Nga Tawa, Marton. Two other dioceses also made claim on the Congress grant so only £666 was available for this Diocese. The Bishop associated himself with Archdeacon Fancourt, Sir George Shirtcliffe and Mr W. J. Birch and went forward with the project. It so happened that Miss M. Taylor had transferred a girls’ school to Marton and was desirous of selling. She had begun negotiations with
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Miss M. Barker of Christchurch, who was quite willing that the Church Trustees should buy the school and she be the headmistress. Miss Barker did a great work and continued headmistress until her death. The esteem and affection in which she was held is manifested by the beautiful chapel built in her memory to which the Old Girls contributed generously. The old wooden building was burnt down in 1924 and the trustees erected a fine modern building in its place. It has all the amenities associated with such a school and is beautifully situated, overlooking the Rangitikei plains, with Mount Ruapehu in the background.
Miss Barker was followed as headmistress by Miss F. H. McCall (1921-1933), Miss H. K. Mitchell (1934-45) and Miss P. Evans (1946-1951). The present head is Miss B. L. Bruce and the roll recently stood at 173 of whom 15 were day girls.
The centenary of Samuel Marsden’s first visit to New Zealand was in 1914 and full celebrations were curtailed by the war. The Diocese honoured the great missionary in no unworthy manner. As far back as 1870, Mrs M. A. Swainson opened a boarding school for girls at her home in Wellington. In 1907 this school was taken over by Miss Baber, who made a great success of it. In 1920 it occupied three large houses in Fitzherbert Terrace. In that year the Diocese bought the school which became the Samuel Marsden Collegiate School for Girls. A generous gift was made by Mr Vivian, Mr Dan and Mr Eric Riddiford of a site for the school at Karori, just opposite the Parish Church, and in 1924 the school was built on this site. As Miss Baber was prepared to continue as headmistress under the new administration the success of the school was assured. She remained there until 1930. Situated within the city boundaries the school naturally serves more as a day school. The recent reports show that of a roll of 435 there were 86 boarders. The Vicar of St. Mary’s acts as chaplain. Miss Baber was succeeded by Miss Meyhew,
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1931-1945, Miss A. I. S. Smith, 1946-1950, Miss R. D. Neligan, 1950-1956. The present headmistress is Miss M. Ogle.
The Diocesan School for Boys at Croydon, Day’s Bay, has been leased to Wellesley College and, apart from the Wanganui Collegiate, the only boys’ schools we have are St. George’s, Wanganui, and the recently acquired preparatory school at Huntley, Marion, which has been declared a Church School within the meaning of the Church Schools Act. At Masterton, St. Matthew’s Collegiate School for Girls, is a very flourishing institution which provides both secondary and primary education. It is controlled by a local Trust Board. In 1954 a Primary School for boys was established.
The Wanganui Collegiate School
The Wanganui Collegiate School is really a provincial foundation and it has already celebrated its centenary. It is recognised as one of the leading schools of the Church in New Zealand which have succeeded in establishing the tradition of the great English public schools in this country. In the earliest days of Wanganui the Church was the only body that made any effort to provide education in the new settlement and when Bishop Selwyn applied for a grant to expand the work Governor Grey made a grant of 125 acres to him as sole trustee. There was also a promise of money but this grant was never made. A school was built in 1854 and the Rev. C. H. S. Nicholls was put in charge. The school was to be for “the education of the children of our subjects of all races and of other poor and destitute persons being inhabitants of islands in the Pacific Ocean.” Selwyn’s idea was to found an industrial school for both Maori and pakeha children under a rule similar to St. John’s College, Auckland. Part of the scholars’ time was to be employed in manual labour on the school property. This appealed to neither Maori nor pakeha and when a fire destroyed part of the building the school closed down for
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five years. In 1865 it was restored and Mr Godwin took charge. During this period for a short time girls were admitted. Mr Godwin was followed by Mr Saunders but the school roll of 50 fell away again and it became obvious that some radical change was needed to save the school.
This change came about in 1882 with the appointment of the Rev. B. W. Harvey, who had been vicar of St. Paul’s, Wellington. New buildings were added and Mr Harvey reorganised the whole school on the lines of an English public school. He was a man of deep religious convictions and religious teaching was given a first place. In 1887 a chapel was built. To quote Mr H. G. Carver’s history: “After five years of office he left it in an exceeding flourishing condition with a fine range of buildings, a chapel, a gymnasium and a roll of 150 of whom 84 were boarders.”
Mr Harvey was followed by Mr Walter Empson, a truly great headmaster whose name will never be forgotten; who for twenty-one years made the school his own and established the customs and traditions which have made the school great. The worth of a school and the greatness of a headmaster can well be assessed by the feelings in the hearts of the Old Boys. When Mr Empson retired he asked that the farewell gift proposed to be made to him should be given towards a new chapel fund. The Old Boys subscribed £2,000 within 24 hours and eventually built the fine chapel which is there today, provided an organ, and recently have given the beautiful oak panelling as a war memorial.
In 1906 a Royal Commission was set up by Parliament to enquire into the whole question of the Wanganui Collegiate Trust. The finding was in favour of the school and the constitution of Board of Trustees finally determined.
In 1911 the school was rebuilt and shifted to the present site. The fine buildings, the spacious playing fields, are a worthy monument to the self sacrifice, the zeal, and
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vision of the men and boys of the past, and a precious heritage for the generations to come.
Hadfield Scholarships
The Diocese had for a short time its own training college for ordinands known as Hadfield Hostel. The founding of the hostel had three objects in view. It was to serve as a memorial to Bishop Hadfield, it was to be a college where ordinands could be prepared for Holy Orders and it was to provide a hostel for university students. It was decided to throw it open to students other than ordinands and to students other than those who were members of the Church of England. In theory this sounded very wise and liberal but in practice it did a good deal to upset the place. The hostel was opened in 1908 and the first warden appointed was the Rev. A. W. H. Compton. He was a good scholar but a poor disciplinarian and the life of the hostel became very disorderly.
Canon Payne replaced Mr Compton and under his guidance and most proficient and expert tutorship the place regained some prestige but the war came and it had to be closed down for lack of students.
The largest contribution towards the cost of the hostel had come from the Harington Trust, a trust fund under the control of the Bishop. The building had proved very unsatisfactory and the site was bleak and unattractive so in 1914 Synod gave permission for the property to be leased or sold. It was at first leased and finally sold and the income, together with the income of certain associated funds, applied to the granting of scholarships for ordinands. At first it was proposed to send our ordinands to some college in England but now the bursaries are mostly taken out for College House, Christchurch.
The Church and the University
The author of the history of the first fifty years of Victoria College in choosing a patron saint finds himself faced with the unenviable choice between John Stuart Mill and Jeremy
St. Paul's Cathedral Church
The High Altar of All Saints’, Palmerston North
St. Mary the Virgin, Nireaha
St. John's, Feilding
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Bentham. This suggests that for the first fifty years we must not expect to find that the Church and the University had much in common. Bishop Wallis was a member of the first College Council but he was the last bishop to be accorded such a place. As we have said above Hadfield Hostel was established partly in the hope that it would enable the theological students to associate with the undergraduates to the mutual benefit of all. It was a forlorn hope from the start.
Many of our clergy are graduates of the College but it is doubtful if many of them found in her a real “Alma Mater” because in the early days a spirit of naturalism and agnosticism pervaded many of the lecture rooms.
Where there are undergraduates it is natural to expect that there will arise in some form a Heretics’ Club but it is not so natural to find amongst the leaders and most enthusiastic members prominent figures from the professorial staff.
However, thanks to the Students’ Christian Union the Church has never quite lost touch with the College. From time to time bishops and other clergy have been invited to give lectures and addresses. Bishop Sprott, when Vicar of St. Paul’s, gave several memorable series of lectures during the summer vacations. In more recent times one of our clergy was appointed by the S.C.M. to be a chaplain, not to the College, but to the S.C.M. in the College, and he did much good work which has led to much better relations.
There are many signs that the old spirit of antagonism is passing, and the wisdom of a purely secular educational system is coming under fire from several quarters. The University has recently made provision for the B.D. degree and we may yet see a chair of theology established at the College.
The Chair of Philosophy is now occupied by a priest of our Communion and everything points to the lifting of the fog of agnosticism and materialism from the Old Clay Patch on Kelburn.
A. 12
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In spite of their differences throughout the past years the Church and the University have observed the courtesies. The relationship can be typified by an incident which took place one Sunday evening in Bolton Street. The Vicar of St. Paul’s was on his way to take evensong when he met, coming up the hill, Professor Von Zeidlitz clothed in flannels and carrying a tennis racquet. The Professor, in his best Oxford manner, “And shall we have the pleasure of hearing Mr Sprott tonight?” The Vicar of St. Paul’s, with a Trinity College Dublin twinkle in his eye, “Professor, I consider it extremely doubtful.”
Our Relations With Other Churches
In the missionary period Hadfield seems to have got on better with the Roman Catholics than with the Methodists and Presbyterians. These other Protestant bodies were very insistent on making quite clear that the Church of England was not in any way to be privileged in this new land as she was in England. There was a rare old row when the Church of England began to clean up and fence in its own portion of the Bolton Street Cemetery for the burial of members of the Church. Hadfield pointed out that there was nothing to prevent the other Churches clearing and fencing in their own portions as the Roman Catholics had done without any criticism from anybody. However the dispute was settled without leaving any serious scars. As the settlment extended and the townships of the Province grew larger the different religious bodies built churches and appointed men to look after them. The Church, without compromising her own position, has always been able to establish friendly relations with Methodists and Presbyterians and most of the other bodies. In later years when Ministers’ Associations have been formed in the larger centres, our clergy have often co-operated and the work of Bible teaching in State schools has brought the clergy of the different churches much closer together. This perhaps more than anything else paved the way for the
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formation in New Zealand of a branch of the National Council of Churches. This is a body which is working throughout the world for not only co-operation in the work of all the churches but for actual re-union. Amongst other things it sponsors conferences on Faith and Order at which the theological differences are frankly discussed. The great weakness of the movement lies in the fact that as the Roman Catholic Church stands aloof it becomes a pan-Protestant movement and the Church of England is in danger of losing its position as the intermediary of which it used to be very proud.
Archbishop Temple’s lead in forwarding the movement in England gave a great impetus to its progress throughout the Anglican communion and here in New Zealand Archbishop West-Watson followed his example.
The other organisation is the Inter-Church Council on Public Affairs. The Roman Catholic Church takes its place on this Council. When Bishop Holland established friendly relations with the political leaders they told him that in politics the church opinion carried little or no weight because it was so divided. If they united in support of some national cause the Government would give good heed to them. So this Inter-Church Council was formed. When some question arises which concerns them all they try to come to some decision which will be supported by the whole Christian church throughout the Dominion. Such an opinion cannot be lightly disregarded by any government. The usefulness of this body for the public good is safeguarded by its comprehensiveness.
Whatever may come from these organisations, one thing is certain. The old spirit of competition and mistrust between the churches has largely disappeared. We have our differences but we are now prepared to recognise one another with goodwill as friends working for the same end and are determined not to let our disunity defeat the cause of the Kingdom.
Chapter 19
DIOCESAN FINANCE
It has already been related how Bishop Selwyn announced at the first General Synod that he would hand over to the dioceses the lands vested in him, but, apart from the Maori educational endowments, these lands were either church or parsonage sites, glebe lands or burial grounds. There were no general endowments. In his first Synod address Bishop Abraham appealed to the laity to supply this deficiency. In response to this appeal several gifts of land were made in the course of the next few years. Mr J. H. St. Hill, the resident magistrate, gave seven separate town acres in Wellington, and three other gentlemen gave another four acres. Most of these lands have since been sold and the proceeds invested.
In the meantime the first Synod established what was called the Diocesan Fund, from which grants might be made towards clergy stipends, the erection of churches, the establishment and maintenance of schools and other such purposes, and with it another acre of endowment land was bought at Palmerston North.
At Wanganui an acre had been given by the New Zealand Company and at Masterton an acre was transferred to the Diocese by the old Archdeaconry Board, but these two acres have been treated as local endowments for the benefit of the neighbouring parishes.
The income derived from these endowments was small, rents received in 1879 being less than the administrative expenses, and the parishes were almost entirely dependent upon voluntary offerings, pew rents and subscriptions. With a view to systematising and augmenting the resources
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available for payment of clergy stipends and Diocesan expenses, the Synod in 1879 passed an act establishing the General Church Fund through which all stipends were to be paid quarterly. This Fund replaced the former Diocesan Fund. It is interesting to notice that in 1881 out of the Fund’s total income of slightly over £3,000, £786 was received from pew rents with another £512 of pew rents outstanding. For many years the Fund’s ability to augment the parochial assessments by way of grant-in-aid was dependent on special collections throughout the Diocese on two Sundays in the year and on special parochial subscriptions, and a too familiar feature of the annual balance sheets is the item “arrears of stipends.” But despite these distresses the principle had been established that the parish is responsible to the Diocese for the payment of its clergy and it was claimed that in no case had a departing vicar left without receiving his stipend in full.
The minimum stipend of a vicar up to 1895 was £l5O (though most were over £200) and even at the close of the First War a few were as low as £230. At this time the contribution from general endowments amounted to £6OO. With a view to increasing the stipends a Diocesan Organising Secretary was appointed, first the Rev. R. Franklin and then the Rev. H. J. L. Goldthorpe, whose task was both to persuade the parishes to increase their assessments and to collect moneys for the augmentation of the general endowments. As a result of their efforts over £B,OOO was collected for the endowment of the General Church Fund and this was supplemented by the gift of land and investments worth over £5,000 by a Mr Arundel Sanders. The minimum stipend was by these means increased to £3OO in 1920 and to £350 in 1927. During the depression years all stipends were reduced by 10 per cent., and the minimum of £350 was not restored until 1937. In 1948 the minimum was £425 and thereafter increases have been
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rapid. With the renewal of leases on more favourable terms the Diocesan Trustees were able gradually to increase their contribution until in 1956 it amounted to over £4,000, but an increasing proportion of the General Church Fund income has been from 1937 onwards allocated to administrative expenses and grants for non-parochial purposes.
The advent of the motor car involved a new item of parochial expenditure, and travelling allowances, paid at the option of the parish through the General Church Fund or direct to the vicar, first appear in the Synod estimates in 1926. Ten years later they were made part of the parochial assessment to be paid through the Fund, but even yet the amount paid was left very largely to the goodwill of the parish and in many cases the allowances were in fact quite inadequate. At last in 1953 the Synod took official cognisance of this and adopted definite scales and mileages which had the effect of increasing in one year the total of the travelling assessments payable from £5,500 to £8,500. At the same time Synod laid down that one-quarter of the allowance was to be retained by the Diocese to the credit of the vicar in a car replacement fund.
From the very early years of the Diocese the collections on particular Sundays in the year had been appropriated by Synod to special Diocesan or Missionary Funds, but a new feature was introduced by the Synod in 1946 when it passed an Act imposing a percentage levy based on their ordinary income upon all parishes and parochial districts for what was called the Special Assistance Account which was to be used for assistance to parishes and districts particularly in the new housing areas. This precedent was quickly followed by percentage levies for other purposes, viz., the Diocesan Youth Council, the Public Institutions Chaplaincies Fund, the Ordination Candidates Training Fund, the Pension Fund and the Assistant Bishop Fund". So has the machinery of the Welfare State been adopted by the Church.
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The establishment of the Bishop’s Fighting Fund, the Advancing Church Fund and the Home Mission Fund has been described earlier in this work. The income of the Shirtcliffe Endowment Fund of £3,000 —only one of several benefactions of the late Sir George Shirtcliffe —is available for similar purposes to the Bishop's Fighting Fund.
In 1923 the Synod set up a Diocesan Insurance Board to undertake the insurance of all Church property. The Board started its operations after obtaining guarantees of £6,300. By 1943 the guarantors had been released and the Assurance Fund built up to over £7,500 enabling thereafter one-half of the Board’s excess income to be placed at the disposal of the Synod.
No member of the Diocesan Synod could remain long unaware that there is a Clergy Pension Fund so often has the Synod amended the Pension Fund Act. The Fund was first established on an entirely unactuarial basis in 1861, and it was not until 1880, when the first of a long line of Pension Fund Acts was passed, that a fixed scale of benefits was laid down. Membership was made compulsory in 1929, and in 1941, after the Social Security Act had come into operation, provision was made enabling pensioners to commute so much of their pensions as exceeded the maximum permissible income under that Act. The actuarial valuation in 1911 showed a surplus and the Fund reached approximate actuarial solvency again in 1936, but this position was lost in 1951 after substantial increases had been made in the scale of pensions. Since 1950 reciprocal agreements for the transfer of pension rights have been arranged with the Church of England Pensions Board and with all the other Diocesan Pensions Boards in New Zealand. These agreements take the place as far as may be of a Provincial Pension Fund, the establishment of which had been first proposed as long ago as the 1860’s, and was again proposed in 1928, but has never been found practicable.
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The Diocesan Office
As far back as 1880 Thomas Fancourt, afterwards Archdeacon Fancourt, was appointed Secretary of the General Church Fund. In 1884 he was made Diocesan Secretary and continued this work while Vicar of Johnsonville from 1886-1895.
The first Diocesan Treasurer was Mr W. F. Kennedy, who was appointed in 1903 and resigned a year later. Mr F. J. Carter was appointed in 1904, and retained the title of Diocesan Treasurer although he did much secretarial work. He served the Diocese ably and faithfully for 34 years. When he resigned in 1938 Mr W. J. Millen was appointed with the title of Diocesan Accountant. At the same time the title of Diocesan Secretary, last held by Archdeacon Fancourt, was revived and Mr S. T. C. Sprott was appointed to the office.
The Maori Educational Trusts
In the early days of the Mission the Maori tribes were generous in their gift of lands for the endowment of schools. At Otaki a gift of 560 acres was made to the C.M.S., and a school was built in 1852.
Bishop Selwyn cherished the idea of establishing in the south a college similar to St. John’s at Auckland. Young Maoris who had seen St. John’s heartily supported the idea and the Ngati Toa tribe at Porirua gave about 500 acres on the peninsula for the purpose. This was the Porirua Trust. A letter to the Governor, signed by Te Rauparaha and seven other chiefs, stated that the gift was to the Bishop and his successors “to the end that religion or faith in Christ may grow.” The Crown grant issued by the Governor was in identical terms with all other such grants and recited that a school was about to be established at Porirua “for the education of children of our subjects of all races and of children of other poor and destitute persons being inhabitants of Islands in the Pacific Ocean”
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and declared that the land was to be held in trust by Bishop Selwyn and his successors for the use and maintenance of the said school “so long as religious education, industrial training and instruction in the English language shall be given. . .
Trinity College, Porirua, which Selwyn planned was never built and some of the Maoris came to cast eyes on the land which had belonged to their ancestors. In 1899 and again in 1900 the Trustees applied to the Supreme Court for a variation of the Trust. The Judge decided in favour of the Trustees, but the Solicitor-General appealed to the Court of Appeal and that Court held that, as the contemplated school had never been established, the property reverted to the Crown. With the approval of a special session of the General Synod, Bishop Wallis appealed to the Privy Council which very emphatically reversed the judgment of the Court of Appeal and so the Porirua Trust remained in the hands of the Church.
In 1905 the Government set up a Royal Commission to report on the Porirua, Otaki and other similar trusts. This Commission recommended that the Porirua and Otaki Trusts should be amalgamated in the hands of one Board of Trustees under the authority of the General Synod, and this was effected by the Otaki and Porirua Empowering Act, 1907. The new Board built a school at Otaki in 1908. This school, which was known as the Otaki Native College, was carried on successfully for several years, at one time having 80 scholars, but eventually the endowment revenue proved insufficient to maintain a school up to modern standards and the college was closed at the end of 1939.
The Maoris in the Wairarapa had also given land for education and two trusts in identical terms with those of the Porirua Trust were created covering 400 acres at Papawai and 250 acres at Kaikokirikiri. A boarding school was established at Papawai in 1860, but it had to be closed five lears later because of the disaffection of the Maoris due to the King Movement and the withdrawal
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of their children. In 1903 the Trustees established a boarding school at Clareville, known as Hikurangi College. This school at one time had 29 scholars, but it was destroyed by fire in 1932 and the resources of the Trustees were quite inadequate to meet the cost of rebuilding.
By the end of 1939, then, the Diocese had no schools for Maori children and it was obvious that some radical change must be made in the administration of the Trusts. So Bishop Holland entered into negotiations with the tribes concerned. The first proposal was to establish at Otaki one good college on the lines of Te Aute to be used by boys from both sides of the ranges. This proposal was brought to naught by the Wairarapa Maoris withdrawing their provisional approval and by doubts whether even the combined resources of both boards would be sufficient to maintain a really first-class school capable of competing with the Government colleges.
The two boards then promoted Bills in Parliament to enable them to use their income in providing scholarships at existing Church of England schools, but the Bills met with unexpectedly severe opposition in which the lack of opportunities for technical education at the existing Church schools was strongly pressed, and the Parliamentary Committee reported against the Bills being allowed to proceed. A prolonged and costly controversy then ensued during which it was apparent that the opposing interests were concerned to deprive the Church of anything beyond a nominal interest in the Trusts. Eventually, however, through the tireless efforts of Bishop Holland and the good offices of the Prime Minister, Mr P. Fraser, and the Minister of Education, Mr H. G. R. Mason, compromise legislation was passed. Under this the members of both boards are appointed by the Governor-General, but in each case half of the members, including one Maori member, are nominated by the Diocese, one of the remaining members is nominated by the Minister of Education and the rest are nominated by the Maori tribes concerned
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either directly or through the Maori Land Court. Twothirds of each board’s income is to be used in the provision of scholarships at schools conducted by the Church of England and the remaining one-third for scholarships at any secondary school approved by the board.
As the Church of England schools are all boarding schools, the boards have thought it right to provide that scholarships tenable at them should cover the whole or nearly the whole of the fees. Consequently it has not been possible to award nearly as many scholarships for Church of England schools as for the other schools. From the time when the new legislation was really brought into effect in 1947 up to 1956 the Otaki and Porirua Board had awarded 69 scholarships for Church of England schools and 140 for other schools and the Papawai and Kaikokirikiri Board had awarded 92 and 220 respectively.
These lands were originally given for religious education and religion as taught by the Church of England. Selwyn had envisaged at Porirua a college like St. John’s which would be a training ground for Maori candidates for Holy Orders. That through a variety of causes so much of the income is diverted to education in schools other than those conducted by the Church of England is regrettable, but we have reason to be thankful for what has been preserved and to remember especially Bishop Holland for the part he played in the negotiations with the Maoris and the Government. And it may be noted with thankfulness that the tribal feeling has been so far mitigated as to enable the Papawai and Kaikokirikiri Board in 1954 to consent to some of its income being used for scholarships for West Coast Maoris.
The history of these trusts has been recounted at some length because it well illustrates both the changing outlook of the Maoris and some of the difficulties presented by the prevalent secular temper.
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Chapter 20
THE MISSIONARY WORK OF THE DIOCESE
The Missionary Committee
The work of the Church for foreign Missions is organised provincially through the Board of Missions on which all the Dioceses are represented. The Provincial Board allocates a quota for each Diocese. The last quota (195657) for the Wellington Diocese was £10,575 and it sent in £13,343. Each year Synod elects a Missionary Committee which allocates the quotas for all the parishes and parochial districts and does all it can to help them reach them. It is a point of honour for each parish and for the Diocese to reach its appointed quota.
The Maori Mission
The history of the Maori Mission falls into three periods. First there is the missionary period which was dealt with in the opening chapters of this book; the story of Hadfield, Mason, Taylor, Samuel Williams and James McWilliam.
The second period covers the years when the Diocese was divided into Maori pastorates and Maori clergy licensed to minister to their own people under the superintendence of a pakeha priest.
The work of the Rev. A. O. Williams as Superintendent of the Maori Mission and later of his son, the Rev. W. G. Williams, was done by men who understood the Maori mind, could speak the Maori language and maintain an effective link between the pakeha and Maori members of the church.
The third period began, when during the slump, funds were not available for the maintenance of a superintendent and the work was thrown back on the Maori Mission Committee and the Maori clergy themselves. The Com-
214
MISSIONARY WORK
mittee is elected by Synod and while Canon W. G. Williams was secretary of the Committee the control of the work was fairly effective. Bishop Holland made the archdeacons responsible for the oversight of their several archdeaconries. The archdeacon is generally a busy parish priest in charge of a large parish and an extensive archdeaconry. He is not chosen for his knowledge of Maori affairs and, with all the goodwill in the world, he cannot give much time to the Maori work.
Once a year the Bishop, the archdeacpns, the Maori clergy in charge of the pastorates and lay representatives meet to consider the affairs of the Mission in an informal kind of synod. It is called the Maori Church Board.
There are five pastorates in the Diocese, the clergy being mostly young men. The increase of the Maori population, the drift of so many of the young people to the towns, and their inability to understand their own language, pose very difficult problems for the Mission to solve. Some think that sooner or later the Maori Mission will be absorbed in the pakeha church. So many young Maoris work and play all the week on equal terms with pakeha companions that there seems no reason why they should not worship together on Sundays. As a matter of fact many of them do and it is a common sight to see Maori people in our parish churches. Nevertheless the spirit of nationalism is abroad in the world today and in recent years it has frequently found expression in the utterances of Maori leaders so that any move to unite the Maori and pakeha in Christian worship must come from the Maoris themselves.
Some tribute must be paid to the women workers in the Mission. To begin with the Maori children were educated in the Mission schools but now of course most of them are taught in the secular State schools. At the beginning of the century Mission houses were established in the dioceses. We had two in this Diocese, one at Otaki and one at Koriniti on the upper Wanganui. These houses were staffed by women workers who undertook amongst
215
FROM AGE TO AGE
the Maori children and women Sunday School and Bible Class work and such social service as they were able to do. Miss S. M. Lee began the work at Otaki in 1919 and, assisted by Miss Hilda Kenworthy, continued at her post for fourteen years, when she was succeeded by Miss Olive Morgan. The Mission house at Koriniti was built in 1925. The first worker was Sister Beswick, a qualified nurse. After five years her place was taken by Sister Elsie Smith who was recently especially congratulated and thanked by Synod for her long and devoted service in this remote part of the field, and who after her retirement in 1954 has continued to live at Koriniti.
The Diocese owes a debt of gratitude to the Williams family for its continued help to the Mission since Henry Williams brought Hadfield to Otaki. Besides the active personal service given by Samuel Williams when Hadfield was ill, and by his sister Mrs Hadfield and the members of the family in more recent years, the Mission has received great financial help from the H. & W. Williams Memorial Trust which was established by Archdeacon Samuel Williams in memory of his father Archdeacon Henry Williams and his uncle William, the first Bishop of Waiapu.
The Chinese Mission
The Chinese in New Zealand are mostly engaged in market gardening and the fruit trade. In earlier days they found a great attraction in the gold fields of Otago and the West Coast. At the beginning of the century when the gold rushes were over many of the Chinese left the West Coast and the Bishop of Nelson felt himself free to offer Bishop Wallis the services of his Chinese evangelist to establish a Mission amongst the Chinese living in Wellington. This evangelist was Mr. David Wong. A site was purchased in Frederick Street and a building erected in 1907. Mr Wong died the following year and for a time the work was carried on by his widow who continued to give splendid service to the Mission for twenty-five years.
216
MISSIONARY WORK
The work of the Mission has followed a fairly regular plan. A service was held on Sunday evenings followed by an instruction class for adults. During the week homes were visited and educational classes held. As the work developed the children were gathered into Sunday School and Bible Class, social functions were held and a monthly communion service added to the Sunday services. The work of the Mission has not been confined to Wellington, but as time permitted, the Missioners have visited Chinese communities in other towns both north and south.
It was not till 1916 that the first convert was baptised and from then onwards more and more have joined the Christian Church. In 1923 the report states that from 90 to 160 were attending the services. There were heavy losses because so many converts returned to China and in 1932 there were only 14 Chinese members of our Church in Wellington. This was the time of the great depression and an agreement was drawn up to combine with the Baptists to carry on the Mission under joint control. The Baptist evangelist was appointed Missioner and subsequent appointments were to be made alternately by the Anglican and Baptist committees. In 1940 we appointed the Rev. Mak Pei Tak (Peter). His work showed great promise and the committee felt warranted in buying a house to serve as residence for the Missioner. Mr Mak died after a short ministry of seventeen months and the Baptist Committee generously waived its right to the next appointment and through the offices of Bishop Hall of Hong Kong we secured the services of the Rev. Cheung Wing-Nok. Mr Cheung was a graduate of Hong Kong University. He was a talented draughtsman and water colourist and he was in priest’s orders. Under this enthusiastic and able youns Missioner the work at once began to prosper.
Although excellent relations existed between the Baptists and Anglicans it was soon evident that the double control was not satisfactory so, under the terms of the agreement.
217
FROM AGE TO AGE
in 1948 the two committees agreed to separate and the Mission returned to its original independence.
Mr Cheung was a man of great energy, ability and vision and soon aroused enthusiasm for the extension of the work. He set out to pay off the mortgage on the Missioner’s house and to establish a fund for a new Mission building. He organised an exhibition of his pictures and the sales amounted to £450 which he gave to the Building Fund. This was followed by a sale of work which produced another £BOO. Donations brought the fund up to £1,500. The mortgage of £6OO was paid off the Mission house and the balance credited to the new hall building.
C The accommodation in the old building was entirely inadequate and had not the City Mission lent some of its rooms for the youth and social activities the move forward would have been greatly handicapped. At this critical point in its history the Chinese Mission received great help from the H. and W. Williams Trust. The trustees offered £6OO a year for five years provided that the Chinese raised £4OO a year themselves. Mr Cheung sprang to it. He held another exhibition and sale of his pictures in Christchurch which produced another £4OO and canvassed widely throughout the country and brought the Chinese contributions up to £3,000. At the end of his five years’ term of service Mr Cheung returned to China. He did wonderful work and deserves to be remembered for his own generous contribution of £l,OOO towards the Building Fund.
The new Missioner was the Rev. John Yan Laap Chung and he and his assistant the Rev. Timothy Mak are carrying on the work very efficiently. The foundation stone of the new hall was laid by Bishop Rich on May Bth, 1955, and it is now in full use.
Since the restrictions placed on missionary work in China make it impossible for us to send missionaries into that country the work of the Chinese Mission assumes a new importance. The converts we make here, when they return to China, will be our missionaries.
Decorative Work, St. Paul’s, Putiki
The Altar, Rangiatea
Wanganui 1844
St, Mary’s, I evin. 1936
The first church . . . anil the last Old Bishopscourt
Part 4
THE CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
A. 13
THE CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
ARCHDEACONS
Archdeaconry of Kapiti
The Yen. Archdeacon O. Hadfield 1849-70
Archdeaconry of Wellington
1870 A. Stock
1934 A. L. Hansell
1940 W. Bullock
1888 T. Fancourt
1945 E. J. Rich
1919 A. M. Johnson
Archdeaconry of Wanganui
The Ven. Archdeacon A. Towgood 1893-1909
Archdeaconry of Rangitikei
1909 C. C. Harper
1947 H. W. Monaghan
1915 A. S. Innes Jones
1951 H. S. I. Kenney
1934 F. H. Petrie
Archdeaconry of Waitotara
1909 J. A. Jacob
1925 R. Creed Meredith
1912 J. R. Cassell
1932 J. R. Young
1915 H. Reeve
Archdeaconry of the Wairarapa
1919 H. Watson
1940 E. J. Rich
1945 H. S. I. Kenney.
1922 A. L. Hansell
1951 G. M. McKenzie.
1934 W. Bullock
Archdeaconry of Belmont
1951 D. B. Malcolm
DIOCESAN CHANCELLORS
The Worshipful James Gordon Allan Bar.-at-Law 1868-1885
The Worshipful William Henry Quick Bar.-at-Law 1885-1911
The Worshipful Thomas Frederic Martin Bar.-at-Law 1911-1929
The Worshipful Ernest Frederic Hadfield Bar.-at-Law 1930-1946
The Worshipful Herbert Edgar Evans, C.M.G., Q.C. 1946.
181
223
FROM AGE TO AGE
THE MAORI MISSION
The supervision of the Mission was in the hands of the Yen O. Hadfield from 1839 until his consecration in 1870.
The Rev. A. O. Williams had the supervision north of the Rangitikei River (later including the Rangitikei District) from 1885 until he became General Superintendent in 1905. He held this office until 1921.
His son, the Rev. W. G. Williams, became Assistant Superintendent in 1913 and General Superintendent in 1921 and held this office (on an honorary basis from 1931) until 1940. when the superintendence was transferred to the Archdeacons.
The Maori Mission Fund Act of 1935 recognised the constitution of Pastorates and the Maori Mission Act of 1944 provided for the election of Vestries in each Pastorate,
Until 1935 the Maori clergy were licensed as Assistants to the Superintendent and for the period before that year it is possible only to give the general designation of the area in which each worked.
The following is a list of the Maori clergy who have held office in the Mission.
From 1859 to 1935
R. Te Ahu, Otaki, 1859-66
R. Te Wanui, Otaki, 1872-82
H. H. Te Herekau, Manawatu, 1873-88
A. Te Hana, Wanganui, 1877-01; Otaki, 1901-07
P, Te Mahauariki, Wairarapa, 1877-95
E. Te Ngara, Wanganui, 1888-09
T. Te Paerata, Otaki, 1894-01; Wairarapa 1901-17
H. M. Kereru, Wanganui, 1899-09
F. A. Bennett, Wanganui, 1899-04
T. Tokoaitua, Wanganui, 1900-08; Otaki, 1908-33
I. Tamaiparea, Wanganui, 1901-06 and 1908-13; Otaki, 1906-08
H. Keremeneta, Wanganui, 1909-35
T. H. Katene, Wanganui, 1911-18
P. Temuera, Wanganui, 1913-17; Otaki, 1933-35
M. Aomarere, Otaki, 1916-18
P. Kokiri, Wairarapa, 1916-33: Wanganui, 1933-35
P. H. Leonard, Rangitikei, 1922-35
From 1935
Rangiatea Pastorate
P. Temuera, 1935-52; H. Taepa, 1952.
Rangitikei South-Manawalu Pastorate
P, H. Leonard, 1935-43; M. A. Bennett, 1946-52; A. B. Kena. 1952
183
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
Wainui-u-rua Pastorate
H. Keremeneta, 1935-40
Wairarapa Pastorate
K. M. Ihaka. 1949-52; W, Vercoe, 1954
Wanganui-Rangitikei North (Now Aotea-Kurahaupo) Pastorate
P. Kokiri, 1935-47; A. B. Kena, 1948-52; K, M. Ihaka, 1952
Wellington Pastorate (with Wairarapa until 1949)
H. Taepa, 1939-52; M. A. Bennett, 1952
PARISHES AND PAROCHIAL DISTRICTS
Note; C signifies that the consecration of the church is recorded in Diocesan records.
C.R. Church Room; P. Parish; P.D. Parochial District,
THE ARCHDEACONRY OF WELLINGTON
Berhampore P.D.
V icars.
1921 E. J. Rich
1942 T. F. Fagg
1950 H. G. Boniface
1924 N. S. Barnett
1935 F. A. Tooley
1952 P. E. Sutton
Berhampore was constituted a parochial district in 1921
Previously it had been worked from St. Thomas’s. From 1933 to 1941 Lyall Bay was included in the district. St. Cuthbert’s is the only building for worship in what is now a thickly populated but small area.
Church: St. Cuthbert’s.
Brooklyn P.D.
V icars:
1936 W. Tye
1909 R. H. Hobday
1941 C. L. Dobbs
1917 G. W. Dent
1920 A. W. H. Compton
1948 W. A. Pyatt
1952 G. B. Stote-Blandy
1927 P. Houghton
1932 G. K. Moir
1955 E. W. Burgin
Brooklyn was originally part of St. Peter’s Parish and services were held there from 1897. Brooklyn was then a country village
225
FROM AGE TO AGE
and people carried storm lanterns to see their way to church. It is now a thickly populated suburban area and part of the city.
The church of St. Matthew was built in 1900 and Brooklyn became a separate parochial district in 1909. In 1955 a section was bought in Ohiro Road at the cost of £2,500 as a site for a new church.
Church: St. Matthew’s C.R
Island Bay P.
Vicars:
1909 W. Fancourt
1937 J. R. Neild
1912 C. W. I. Macleaverty
1941 F. O. Ball
1915 J. G. T. Castle
1946 J. S. Holland
1919 G. C. Blathwayt
1954 W. E. D. Davies
Island Bay is a pleasant seaside suburb four miles south of Wellington. It gets its name from Taputeranga Island which shelters the Bay from southerly gales and provides safe anchorage for the fishing launches. Originally Island Bay was worked from St. Thomas’s Newtown. It was made a separate parochial district in 1909 and St. Hilda’s Church was built. Perhaps St. Hilda was chosen as the Patron Saint because the coast is similar to that part of Yorkshire where she founded Whitby Abbey.
The district was made a parish in 1933. The chancel has been enlarged, a chapel and a porch were added as a memorial to those who fell in war. Recently the interior has been beautified and refurnished.
The parish also serves Houghton Bay, Ohiro Bay and Happy Valley.
Church: St. Hilda’s.
Karori and Makara P.
Vicars:
1872 W. Ballachey
1914 G. Y. Woodward
1882 A. Dasent
1929 F. M. Kempthome
1897 P. L. M. Cameron
1951 H. A. Childs
1900 A. L. Hansell
The heavily timbered Karori Valley was so conveniently situated that the early settlers soon sought it out and when the timber was cut out it was soon settled with farms. Church services were held in private houses and a small church room. A fine five acre section was given to the church by Mr. Justice Chapman and in 1866 a beautiful little wooden church was built in the Gothic style with
226
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
a bell tower. At first services were held by the Rev. T. Fancourt who served at the same time Makara, Ohariu and the Porirua Road. Karori and Makara over the hill were constituted a separate parochial district in 1872, with the Rev. W. Ballachey as the first vicar; and a small church was built at Makara. These two old churches have been replaced by new buildings on the original sites.
Karori is now one of the largest suburban parishes and has more Easter communicants than any other parish in the Archdeaconry of Wellington. Marsden School stands opposite the parish church.
Churches: St. Mary the Virgin C. (First Church) Aug. 12th. 1866; St. Mary the Virgin C. (Second Church) Aug. 27th, 1916: St. Matthias, Makara (Second Church) C. Aug. 27th, 1921.
Kelburn P.
Vicars:
1938 G. M. McKenzie
1917 A. W. Payne
1925 G. F. Petrie
1940-46 J. F. Mayo (acting Vicar).
Kelburn originally formed part of St. Peter’s parish. In 1905 services on alternate Sunday evenings were held in private residences. The first place of worship was erected in 1906. In 1917 Kelburn was declared a parochial district and the Rev. A. W. Payne was appointed Vicar. Under his energetic leadership St. Michael and All Angels' Church was built; the first services in the completed church being held on St. Michael’s Day, 1921. In the previous year the parish had purchased its first vicarage.
Unexpected difficulties with the foundations of the church increased the cost of building by some £1,500, so that the church was opened with a heavy debt on it. During the incumbency of the Rev. G. F. Petrie, the debt was reduced to £1,300. The work was continued energetically by the Rev. J. F. Mayo when he was acting-vicar during the War years, 1940-46. By 1942 the debt had been cleared and the building was ready for Consecration. Unfortunately Wellington had two heavy earthquakes that year and before the Consecration, the parish was faced with the rebuilding of the nave and the strengthening of the other portions of the building at a cost of £2,400. By 1947 that additional amount was fully paid off.
The present church is only the first portion of the original design. It is hoped that the time will not be far distant when the building may be completed.
Church: St. Michael and All Angels’ C. March 28th, 1943.
227
FROM AGE TO AGE
Wadestown and Northland P.D.
Vicars:
1903 T. G. B. Kay
1938 L. N. Watkins
1911 J. G. S. Bartlett
1948 M. Peaston
1914 A, D. Mitchell*
1952 A. J. Stewart
1914 C. H. Harvey
1955 M. R. Pirani
1917 H. W. Thomson*
1957 H. C. Arnold
1918 J. E. Ashley-Jones
* In charge
The old church of St. Luke Wadestown, now a small parish hall, was built in 1878. It was replaced in 1909 by a brick church. Until 1904 the district was part of St. Paul’s Parish, The church has a fine three-light window erected in memory of those who fell in the Wars and a good two-manual organ. A spacious parish hall was built in 1928.
Northland is included in the parochial district. In 1904 the population of Northland was 56. A small band of stout hearted churchmen built the church, which was opened for public worship in 1905. This church of St. Anne has a very attractive interior and is beautifully furnished. In 1952 an apse was added to the church. The Jubilee was celebrated in 1955 and it was made the occasion for laying the foundation stone of a new hall-church in the district of Wilton.
Churches: St. Luke’s C. March 28th, 1909, Wadestown; St. Anne’s, Northland.
As from late in 1957 this parochial district is to be divided into two parochial districts named respectively Wadestown and North-land-Wilton. The Rev. H. C. Arnold remains Vicar of Wadestown and the first Vicar of Northland-Wilton is the Rev, R. H. Easton.
Kilbirnie P.
Vicars:
1905 J. A. McNickle
1935 D. J. Davies
1938 W. Langston
1910 H. G. Blackburne
1915 J. H. Sykes
1948 D. B. Malcolm
The suburb of Kilbimie was constituted a separate parochial district in 1905 and was raised to parish status in 1929. Its fine brick parish church was built in 1928 and has seating for 400. Its easy access to the city has made it a very closely settled area.
Church; All Saints C. Nov. 11th, 1928.
187
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
Lyall Bay P.D.
V icars:
1933 N. S. Barnett
1943 J. A. Jermyn
1948 J. H. Watson
1935 F. A. Tooley
1941 A. F. R. Parr
1951 W. L. Bell-Booth
From 1933 until 1941 Lyall Bay was included with Berhampore. In 1941 the large increase in population made it a separate parochial district. St. Jude’s Church was consecrated in that year. It has a seating accommodation of 130 which has to serve a District with 500 church families.
Church: St. Jude’s C. May 18th, 1941.
Miramar P.D.
Vicars:
1922 A. T. B. Page
1946 V. W. Joblin
1937 C. E. Willis
1951 P. M. Keith
In 1922 Miramar, with Seatoun and Lyall Bay, was constituted a parochial district and the next year the church was reopened on its present site. In 1946, owing to the rapid increase in population of the area, Miramar was separated from the other districts, a vicarage was built and the schoolroom moved and enlarged.
p, c In 1956 the church was renovated and enlarged to serve a population of about 12,000 people.
Church: St. Aidan’s.
St. Barnabas, Roseneath P.
Vicars:
1915 R. Franklin
1921 A. S. Innes Jones
1919 F. H. Petrie
1934 E. M. McLevie
Roseneath was originally part of the parish of St. Mark; a Sunday School was opened in 1898 and services were held in the district in the same year.
It was constituted a separate parochial district in 1915 and obtained full parish status in 1946. The present church was consecrated in 1924 by Bishop Sprott.
It has always been a difficult parish because the centres of Oriental Bay, Roseneath, and the northern ends of Hataitai and Evans Bay have few common community interests. Modern conditions have not made the work any easier. The encroachment of the city and the replacement of homes with flats has brought new problems.
Church: St. Barnabas’s C. Aug. 19th, 1924,
229
FROM AGE TO AGE
Seatoun-Strathmore P.D.
Vicars:
1946 W. H. Walton
1948 J. B. Rushworth
This District was part of St. Thomas’s, Newtown, till 1905 when the parochial district of Kilbimie and Miramar (including SeatounWorser Bay) was formed. This was divided in 1922 to form the new parochial district of Miramar, comprising Miramar, Lyall Bay and Seatoun. Lyall Bay was joined with Berhampore in 1933, the remainder becoming the parochial district of Miramar-Seatoun. On February Bth, 1946, the fourth and final subdivision was made, the parochial district of Seatoun-Strathraore achieving its present status.
Services were first held in the Worser Bay Kiosk in March, 1898. The churchroom was built on land purchased for £45 with a 60 ft. frontage to Worser Bay and was opened on Palm Sunday, March 26th, 1899.
As far back as 1896 a site in Seatoun of 3 roods, 24 perches, had been given by A. D. and C. J. Crawford, who owned and farmed Miramar. As there were few roads, access to this land across the sandhills was difficult.
In 1911 a vestry was added behind the entrance porch and in 1912 the church was dedicated to St. George, By 1924 the growth of population made a move to this more central position necessary. In August of that year the church was moved bodily to its present position and was reopened for services a few weeks later. The following year saw the completion of the two-storey vicarage in brick with roughcast exterior. A further addition to the church of an annexe on the north side was made in 1930. In 1949 this was incorporated as an extra aisle in the church.
The parish hall was opened in 1953. Towards the erection of the new St. George’s Church the sum of £lO,OOO is in hand. Church; St. George’s Seatoun C.R.
St. Mark’s Wellington P.
Vicars:
1976 R. Coffey
1923 H. E. K. Fry
1908 A. M. Johnson
1933 N. F. E. Robertshawe
1911 C. F. Askew
1954 T. V. Pearson
St. Mark’s parish came into being in 1874 from a subdivision of St. Peter’s. Church officers were elected in 1875 and a church was built and consecrated in 1876. The district was constituted a parish in 1878. The parish then served Kilbimie, Roseneath and Newtown. The rapid growth of the city made it necessary to enlarge
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
230
the church and in 1888 the western end with the tower and baptistry were built. Situated high on a terrace with Wellington College grounds behind it and the Basin Reserve in front St. Mark’s became the most outstanding of the city churches. The new parochial district was offered to the Rev. E. H. Grainger who accepted the appointment but resigned before the church was built. The vacancy was filled by the Rev. Richard Coffey who became the first vicar and remained in charge until his death in 1907: a ministry of 32 years. He established a grand tradition in the parish and left a large endowment known as the Coffey Bequest. St. Mark's has the distinction of having the most successful church day school in the Diocese and of having been considered as a site for the Cathedral. The record of the parish down the years is indeed a proud one. Today like many city parishes it has to face the difficulties arising from the encroachment of business premises and the replacement of homes by flats and boarding houses. At present plans are in hand to rebuild the parish church.
Church: St. Mark’s C. May 21st, 1876.
The Cathedral Parish of St. Paul Wellington
Vicars:
1859 A. Baker
1882 R. J. Thorpe
1860 W. P. Tanner (Temp.)
1885 J. Still
1861 F. Thatcher
1892 T. H. Sprott
1865 P. H. Maxwell
1911 A. M. Johnson
1868 W. H. Ewald
1929 P. E. James
1871 B. W. Harvey
1938 D. J. Davies*
* Dean 1948
The history of St. Paul’s goes back beyond the history of the Diocese. The first church of St. Paul was built at Selwyn’s behest in 1844 on the site which was later part of the grounds of the old Government House. This served till 1866 when a new church was built in Mulgrave Street on part of the land given by Bishop Selwyn, Sir George Grey and the Hon. A. S. Tollemache. The Rev. F. Thatcher who was vicar from 1861 until 1865 was an architect as well as a parson and he was mainly responsible for the plans of St. Paul’s. Although St. Paul’s was not constituted a parish of the Diocese until the second Synod in 1860 there were ministers of St. Paul’s before that date, the first being the Rev. R. Cole whom Selwyn placed in charge of the whole settlement.
St. Paul’s has long been known as the Pro-Cathedral and in the Cathedral Chapter Act of 1925 it was called “the Cathedral Church of St. Paul until such time as the Diocesan Cathedral has
231
FROM AGE TO AGE
been established." The chapter was to include a dean “(when the Bishop in the exercising of his discretion from time to time shall have appointed one)”. This discretion was not exercised until the appointment of the present dean in 1948.
St. Paul’s has therefore served throughout the years as something more than a parish church. It has been the scene of many historic services; the consecration of bishops, the funerals of public men and the celebrations of great national occasions: and all the time it has been the parish church of generations of devout churchmen and churchwomen. It is not surprising that now this historic church is nearing its end many feel that it deserves in some way to be preserved. It is planned to embody part of the structure of the old church in the Lady Chapel of the new Cathedral.
Church: St. Paul’s Old Church, 1844; Present Church C. June 6th, 1866.
St. Peter's Wellington P.
Vicars:
1859 A. Stock
1915 H. Watson
1889 W. C. Waters
1930 W. Bullock
1903 G. P. Davys
1945 E. J. Rich
1910 C. C. Harper o n/n n AAnrtit
1952 O. W. Williams
St. Peter’s was constituted a Parish at the first Synod held in the Diocese in October 1859 and therefore has the honour of being the oldest constituted parish in the Diocese. The first church was built in 1847, three years later than the first St. Paul’s. To begin with the services were taken by the Rev. R. Cole who also ministered at St. Paul’s. When it was made a Parish, the Rev. A. Stock was the first vicar and he stayed at his post for thirty years and was made the first archdeacon of Wellington.
The early settlement of Wellington was divided into two parts. Thorndon and Te Aro. St. Peter’s was the church of Te Aro. Since those early days it has undergone many changes. Before the business area of the city spread the parish contained the homes of many staunch and loyal families where now are flats and boarding houses. The tower contained a peal of bells which rung hymn tunes. On calm Sunday evenings the bells could be heard as far away as in the Karori hills. Time has not onlv silenced the bells but also changed the family life of the parish by the clamour and bustle of a great city. On broadcast Sundays manv old lovers of St. Peter’s listen in by the fireside dreaming of olden days.
Church: St, Peter’s. First church 1847; Present church C. Dec 21st, 1879.
232
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
St. Thomas’s, Wellington South P
Vicars:
1896 J. de B. Galwey
1924 C. V. Rookc
1898 O. Fitzgerald
1942 K. D. Andrews-Baxter
1902 J. Walker
1947 J. C. A. Cole
1910 E. T. W. Bond
1912 W. Fancourt
1951 N. Williams
This Parish was originally a part of St. Mark’s Parish, and services were first held in a mission room in 1882. The church was built in 1895 and it was constituted a parochial district in 1896, including Berhampore, Island Bay, Miramar, Seatoun and Worser Bay.
It is now a busy city cure in the centre of a thickly populated area and was granted parish status in 1946. A detailed history of the parish has recently been published.
Church: St. Thomas’s C. Dec. 20th, 1895
THE ARCHDEACONRY OF BELMONT
Eastbourne P.D
Vicars
1911 E. I. Sola
1934 C. R. Kreeft
1946 P. A. Stanley
1917 O. M. Stent
1951 I, H. McCaul
1927 H. L. B, Goertz
1956 E. Giles
1929 W. Raine
The Eastbourne parochial district was formed from the Lower Hutt parish in 1911. The first Anglican service on East Harbour was held in 1902 in a disused store, with a congregation of 11. Thereafter occasional services were held and more regularly from 1907. St. Alban’s Church was opened in May 1910, The house bought as a vicarage was later sold and the present vicarage was built on the church property in 1923. The brick Sunday School followed in 1927 and extensions to it were planned for 1956.
The little square churchroom of St. Martin at Day’s Bay was built in 1922. Earlier services were held in the gymnasium of Croydon School. A chancel and sanctuary were added to St. Martin’s in 1952 as a memorial to old boys of Croydon School, Wellesley College and others from the Day’s Bay district who fell in the two World Wars. The boys from Croydon School and later from Wellesley College have worshipped regularly in the churchroom.
Occasional services were held in Lowry Bay from 1916 on and regularly from 1931. Earlier, services were held in private homes, later in a garage and then in an old rented cottage. The latter
233
FROM AGE TO AGE
property was bought in 1935, and served for Sunday School, worship and meetings until replaced in part by a new building in 1948. The new churchrooxn has clear glass windows in the sanctuary and a view of the harbour towards the Wellington heads. The name St. Columba’s was given to the old building in 1942. The rest of the old cottage was replaced in 1955 by an addition which gave another room, a kitchen and vestry. St. Columba’s is on a striking site at Point Howard and serves the growing Point Howard-Lowry Bay area.
Church: St. Alban’s C. Oct. 25, 1936,
Khandallah P.D,
Vicars
1906 E. W. J. McConnell
1929 E. M. Cowie
1911 H. F. Wilson
1938 W. J. Durrad
1920 W. J. Hands
1946 C. R. Kreeft
1924 R. G. Finch
1950 P. Wiltshire
1927 O. M. Stent
In 1905 Khandallah finally severed its connection with surrounding districts and was constituted a separate parochial district. There was then a small wooden church in existence which served the district for twenty-two years. A new church was partly built in 1922 and finally enlarged and completed in 1954. Khandallah is now a populous suburb of the ever bulging city and the scope of church work increases year by year.
Church: St. Barnabas’s.
Johnsonville P.D.
V icars:
1935 C. J. G. Samuda
1859 H. W. St. Hill
1886 T. Fancourt
1942 B. R. White
1895 H. L. Monckton
1946 W. F. Bretton
1950 J. B. Arlidge
1909 F. H. Petrie
1919 C. H. Isaacson
1954 J, S. Holland
1925 H. A. Walke
In the 110 years since Bishop Selwyn first preached at Johnsonville it has passed through the several stages from bush clearing and military outpost to a populous suburb of Wellington.
The Church of St. John the Evangelist is a fine building situated on the hill overlooking the township, on the original site given by the Hawtrey family. It is built of concrete in the Gothic style reminiscent of an English village church. It is the fifth church to
234
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
be built on the site, three previous churches having been destroyed by fire. The two other churches, Holy Trinity, Ohariu Valley and St. Michael’s, Newlands, are both older than the Parish church.
St. John’s seats 200 but the growing population is demanding increased accommodation.
A detailed history of the early days of the District was written in 1952 by the Rev. J. B. Arlidge.
Formation of P.D. 1911
Churches: St. John the Evangelist C. (Old Church) July 15th, 1883; (New Church) July 29th. 1922; Holy Trinity, Ohariu; St, Michael and All Angels, Newlands.
St. James, Lower Hutt P.
V icars.
1863 J. E. Herring
1933 H. E. K. Fry
1870 T. Fancourt
1943 J. C. Davies
1884 E. S. Cross
1950 W. F. Bretton
1886 Joshua Jones
1956 W. A. Scott
1914 A. L. Hansell
St. James’s, Lower Hutt, is one of the four oldest parishes in the Diocese. It’s early registers contain the records of baptisms taken by Bishop Selwyn. The first building for church services built in the Maori style at Aglionby was swept away by flood. A small church was built in Woburn Road, part of which until recently was in use as a schoolroom. The second church was built in 1880 and was destroyed by fire in 1946. A fine new church in a striking modem style was built at a cost of £75,000 and dedicated on December 21st, 1953. When the Hutt Valley became the main centre for industrial factories and new housing schemes, the mushroom growth called for drastic measures. Three parochial districts were carved out of the old parish leaving still 1,500 church families around the parish church. Easier communicants have numbered 714, which is second only in the archdeaconry to Paraparaumu.
Church: St. James’s (Old Church) C. March 21st, 1880; (New Church).
Nae Nae P.D
Vicars:
1947 L. M. King
1954 J. W. Walton
1950 A. F. Spence
235
FROM AGE TO AGE
Nae Nae is one of the new cures in the mushroom building areas of the Hutt Valley. It was separated from the parish of St. James and constituted a separate parochial district on August Ist, 1947, The estimated population is 18,000 consisting mainly of the homes of young married people. Splendid work has been done in this new cure and there are between five and six hundred children in Sunday Schools and Bible Classes. Services are held in St. David’s and in the Church of the Good Shepherd, Epuni.
Churches: St. David’s, Nae Nae; Good Shepherd’s, Epuni.
Ngaio P.D
V icars
1946 E. W. Hancock
1949 W, L. Low
Ngaio is one of the newest of the parochial districts having been constituted in 1946. There is one church seating 200 and there are 384 church families in the district. In the 1956 Year Book Easter communicants are recorded as 192 and there were 183 children in Sunday School.
Church: All Saint’s C. June Ist, 1941.
Paraparaumu P.D,
Vicars:
1908 J. E. Ashley-Jones
1937 H. L. B. Goertz
lyuu j ■ m—,. i jjiiicj June. 1918 G. V. Kendrick
1946 R. G. Rickells
1949 O. W. Williams
1925 H. F. Wilson
1936 J. R. Neild
1953 E. I. Hoult
This parochial district has been built round the historic centre of Waikanae but there is little or no trace now of the early days of the great mission station. The very site of the Ngati Awa pa where Hadfield lived is lost and the great church, nearly as big as Rangiatea, has been devoured by the sands.
This district is a very difficult one to work because it includes the seaside holiday resorts all along the coast from Packakariki to Waikanae. Its Easter communicants number 735, the second highest in the Diocese. Yet at the ordinary Sunday services the little churches are not overtaxed. Church rooms have been built at all the beach resorts where services are held regularly.
Churches: St. Luke’s Waikanae C. Oct. 18, 1906; St. Paul's Paraparaumu; St. Peter’s Packakariki; St. Andrew’s Reikorangi.
St. James, Lower Hutt
St. Mary’s, Karori
Private Chapel. Moawhango, Taihape
Christ Church, Taita
238
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
Pauatahanui P.D
V icars.
1913 C. H. Isaacson
1937 R. B. White
1916 W. H. Walton
1942 L. F. Owen
1920 C. W. Solomon
1944 P. Wiltshire
1923 D. B. Malcolm
1950 M. R. Pirani
1924 W. F. Stent
1952 I. C. Edwards
1927 A. C. Swainson
1954 P. J. Munton
1934 N. E. Winhall
1957 F. C. Pearce
The parochial district of Pauatahanui, situated some 18 miles north of Wellington, covers an extensive area including Pauatahanui, Paremata, Plimmerton and Pukerua Bay. Constituted a parochial district in June 1911, it originally included Porirua, Titahi Bay, Linden and Tawa Flat. This southern portion was constituted a separate parochial district as from April Ist 1950.
In the early days, Pauatahanui, a populous farming and timbermilling district was the centre of parish life. The Church of St. Alban, consecrated June 17th 1898, stands on an historic site in the centre of the village. The remains of the trenches dug by British soldiers in their stand against the Maoris can still be seen to the rear of the church.
Paremata, Plimmerton and Pukerua Bay, all situated on the west coast north of Wellington, were in the first place small holiday resorts with few permanent residents. However over the years the population has greatly increased and these areas today are mainly residential.
St. Andrew’s church hall, Plimmerton, was built and dedicated in 1916. Plimmerton is now the largest community and has become the centre of the parochial district, the vicarage being situated a few yards from the church.
For many years Paremata Anglicans worshipped in the little inter-denominational church on the hill. At a later date this small building was given to the Church of England. Shifted to a more convenient site on the flat, repaired and renovated, it was dedicated under the name of St. Philip on Saturday, October 30th, 1954. Plans are being prepared at the moment with a view to extension in the near future.
A new church hall is nearing completion at Pukerua Bay and will be dedicated on 30th June, 1956. This new hall of St. Mark will serve a real need in this growing district. Upon its completion every part of the parish will have its own centre of worship and activity.
Churches: St. Alban’s C. June 17th, 1898; St. Philip’s Paremata: St. Andrew’s C.R. Plimmerton.
A. 14
239
FROM AGE TO AGE
St. Augustine’s Petone P.
Vicars:
1897 J. D. Russell
1932 G. V. Gerard
1911 G. B. Stephenson
1936 H. S. I. Kenney
1916 H. T. Stealey
1945 A. C. F. Charles
XX * V XX) JL ) OkWUIVJ 1919 H. A. Walke
1948 J. A. Jermyn
1953 H. G. Bowyer
1922 F. S. Ramson
The Church of St. Augustine stands in the centre of a highly industrialised borough, a square mile in extent, and with a population of more than 10,000. The parish includes at Koro Koro a small section of the western hills that bound the Hutt Valley.
Petone, at first called Britannia, was the original site in the Wellington Province chosen by the settlers of the New Zealand Company in 1840. However, owing largely to the flooding of the Hutt River, the settlement was abandoned within a year in favour of Thorndon.
Prior to 1881 services were held in private houses in Petone, which was then included in the parish of St. James, Lower Hutt, and the fact that St. James’s Church was not more than two miles from any part of Petone made the provision of a place of worship unnecessary in those early days. In 1881 a church room was opened in Petone, where services were held regularly by clergy from Lower Hutt. This building, now a pram factory, still stands.
Petone was constituted a parochial district on November 4th, 1897, and the Rev. John Delacourt Russell was appointed its first vicar. The vigorous ministry of this much-loved man lasted fourteen years, during which time the Church advanced from strength to strength. On April 2nd, 1903, the first service was held in the present St. Augustine’s. Although the population of Petone was then less than 3,000, the church was built, at a cost of £2,530, to seat 450. Its fine, hundred-foot spire was visible from Wellington, and was, until it was taken down in 1954, the chief landmark in Petone. The church was consecrated by Bishop Sprott on 22nd February, 1921, and Petone became a parish in 1925. Since 1930 the population of Petone has been stationary, but in recent years the settlement at Koro Koro, where a site for a church has been acquired, has been growing steadily.
Church: St. Augustine’s C. February 22nd, 1921.
240
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
Porirua P.D,
(Known as Porirua Road until 1881)
Vicars:
1859 H. W. St. Hill
1901 J. Vosper
1909 F. H. Petrie
1865 T. Fancourt
1870 W. D. R. Lewis
1950 W. P. B. Gamlen
1952 N. C. K. Tichener
1875 J. A. Newth
1896 J. W. Chapman
The church life in Porirua goes back to the early days when it was known as Porirua Road. The gap in the above list of clergy is caused by the fact that the district was merged with Pauatahanui from 1911 to 1950. The district now includes the rapidly growing new housing areas of Porirua, Tawa Flat, Linden and Titahi Bay. The development of the district has left the church on the outskirts of the town but centrally situated sections have been secured for another church.
Churches: St. Anne’s, Porirua; St. Christopher’s, Tawa Flat, C.R.; St. Peter’s, Linden, C.R.; St. Matthew’s, Titahi Bay, C.R.
Taita P.D
Vicars:
1950 W. R. Cunliffe
1957 A. W. Sutton
1954 J. B. Arlidge
The parochial district of Christ Church, Taita, with St. Philip’s, Stokes Valley, is an offshoot of St. James’s, Lower Hutt, and came into being in 1950. Taita is now a state housing area with a population of 7,500. The old church of Christ Church is on the outskirts of the district and across the railway line. A vicarage and schoolroom have been built on a one acre section in the centre of the housing. The district includes Stokes Valley, with a population of 2,500. Here a church, St. Philip’s, is being built in riverbed stone by voluntary labour. Christ Church, Taita, with its little graveyard is of great historic interest because it is the oldest church building in the Diocese still in regular use. Built in times when builders could pick and choose the best its pit-sawn timbers are still sound. Its maintenance has been taken over by “The Christ Church Preservation Society” formed in 1956.
There has been a good deal of argument about the actual age of the church, but the question of the date seems now to be settled. A letter was received by the Rev. John Arlidge from Mrs. Margaret Alington (nee Miss Broadhead of the Turnbull Library staff) written from London. Going through some old S. P. G. papers she found in the S. P. G. Report for 1855 pp. cxli-ii a letter from
241
FROM AGE TO AGE
the Rev. T. B. Hutton. After reporting on his monthly visits to the Wairarapa he goes to say:
“On the Ist January 1854 the new church at a place called Taita in this district was opened for Divine Service.”
She goes on to add that she found no mention of it in Selwyn’s sketchy letters to the Society. However that is understandable as he was away from New Zealand from December 1853 to mid year 1855.
There is no record of its consecration.
Church: Christ Church, Taita.
Trentham P
(formerly included in Upper Hutt)
V icar:
1955 W. M. Smallfield
The parish of Trentham, as at present constituted, is a recent creation but church work in the district goes back to the early sixties of diocesan history when it was known as the Upper Hutt.
The church property of over four acres was conveyed, by Mr George Palmer to the diocesan trustees in 1863 at a consideration of £2l. During the same year the first part of the church was built. Additions have been made throughout the years, and recently about £4,000 was spent in making it worthy and adequate for its new standing as a parish church. The history of the parish lies in the future and it gives every promise of being a very prosperous one.
Churches; St. John’s C. Dec. 17th, 1865; St. Mary’s C.R Silverstream.
Upper Hutt P.D.
(included Taita until 1863)
V icars.
1861 J. E. Herring
1903 C. J. Smith
1909 J. H. Sykes
1915 A. D. Stratford
1919 N. S. Barnett
1924 G. V. Kendrick
1937 N. E. Winhall
1947 W. M. Sraallfield
1955 E. B. Algar
IOUI J • A—t • iiblliug 1863 A. Knell
1865 T. Abraham
1868 D. Desbois
1870 C. H. S. Nicholls
1882 J. E. Blackbume
1887 J. M. Devenish*
1894 P. L. M. Cameron’
1898 P. T. Fortune*
* Also in charge of Pauatahanui
The history of the present parochial district of Upper Hutt is closely connected with the present parish of Trentham, where St.
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
242
John's was the mother church of the whole Upper Hutt valley. Later for a time it was associated with Pauatahanui. From the early sixties services were held in various halls. A site for a church was given in 1897 and St. Hilda's was consecrated on November 29th, 1914. The increase in population made it necessary to separate the district from Trentham and the Upper Hutt was constituted a separate parochial district in 1955, on St. David's Day, March Ist.
Church: St. Hilda’s C. November 29th, 1914
Waiwhetu P.D,
Vicars:
1946 W. E. W. Hurst
1949 E. K. Norman
1948 W. L. Low
1952 E. C. Barber
Waiwhetu came into being as a separate parochial district in 1946 under the plan for subdividing the parish of St. James. The new cure includes the Wainuiomata Valley. The Hutt Church Extension Committee purchased a new site on which a fine vicarage was built and on which it is proposed to build a church. A new parish hall has been erected by voluntary labour.
A church hall was erected in Wainuiomata and dedicated to St. John the Divine in 1951. There are about 1,000 church families in the district and much work lies ahead.
Churches: St. Paul’s C.R. Waiwhetu; St. John’s C.R. Wainuiomata.
THE ARCHDEACONRY OF WAIRARAPA
Carterton P.D.
Vicars:
1875 W. Booth
1898 R. Young
1926 W. Raine
1881 W. T. Western
1883 R. T. Batchelor
1929 W. F. Stent
1887 W. Ballachey
1950 D. V. de Candole
Carterton is one of the four original towns of the Wairarapa settlement. The parish church of St. Mark was consecrated on May 3rd, 1876, and rebuilt in 1882. There is accommodation for 200 and there are 300 church families in the district. Outside the township services are held regularly at Longbush and Ponatahi.
Church: St. Mark C. May 3rd, 1876. Rebuilt church C September 17th, 1882.
243
FROM AGE TO AGE
Eketahuna P.D.
Vicars:
1898 J. Walker
1936 L. Ives
1903 V. H. Kitcat
1941 G. E. Williams
1942 J. C. W. Mutter
1910 H. A. Walke
1947 M. R. Pirani
1917 J. C. Davies
1950 T. F. Fagg
1922 B. R. White
1954 L. G. Shetlander
1926 G. Watson
In the olden days Eketahuna of “the Bush District” with its bad weather and worse roads was not regarded as one of the most eligible parishes of the Diocese. In those days of travel by horse vehicle and motor bicycle the parson had no easy task. It goes back into the hills to Alfredton and down to Mangamohoe and serves also Nireaha, Hukanui and Rongomai. As recorded elsewhere in this book the church at Nireaha has a very interesting history. There are now over 250 church families in the district.
Churches; St. Cuthbert’s, C. March 19th, 1900; St. Aidan’s, Alfredton, C. Aug. 31st, 1902; St. Columba’s, Mangamahoe, C. March 23rd, 1905; St. Mary the Virgin, Nireaha, C. March 16th, 1909.
Featherston P.D.
Vicars:
1914 J. G. S. Bartlett
1938 J. T. Holland
1946 B. R. White
1922 R. G. Finch
1953 R. G. L. Keith
1924 E. A. Gillespie
1925 W. J. Durrad
Featherston had a separate synodsman from 1880 but it did not have a vicar of its own until 1914. Before that it was worked in conjunction with Greytown.
The township of Featherston took shape in the early days of the Wairarapa settlement. It nestles at the foot of the eastern side of the ranges and is exposed to the full force of the nor-westerly gales which sweep down the gullies. The present church was dedicated to St. John the Evangelist on March 2nd, 1902, but the original church was situated under the hills near the main road. It has since been moved and now serves as a parish hall.
There is another little church, All Saint’s, Waiorongomai, built in memory of the pioneers of the district.
The parochial district is shaped like a wishbone with Featherston joining the two arms and Lake Wairarapa in the centre. One arm reaches for 25 miles out to the coast. Since the new tunnel was
244
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
opened there has not yet been any marked development but considrable expansion is expected. A building programme is in hand including a new church.
Churches: St. John the Evangelist, C. March 2nd, 1902; All Saints’, Waiorongomai, C. March 9th, 1930.
Greytown P.D.
V wars:
1880 H. V. White
1920 G. W. Dent
1883 W. T. Western
1923 G. K. Mon-
1887 W. Ballachey
1925 W. F. Stent
1887 J. Hewson
1929 D. J. Davies
1890 E. H. Wyatt
1932 C. H. Isaacson
1893 A. V. Grace
1937 J, H. Sykes*
1899 A. M. Johnson
1942 J. C. Abbott'
1905 E. T. W. Bond
1946 H. A. Walke*
1909 A. T. B. Page
1949 R. G. Richsells
1914 A. W. H. Compton
1951 G. P. Cook
* in charge
There were clergy working at Greytown before 1880. Greytown was originally planned to be the main centre of the Wairarapa settlement and a vicarage was built there in 1864 and occupied by the Rev. D. Desbois, who had charge of the whole Wairarapa area. He was followed by the Rev. Amos Knell. St. Luke’s Church was consecrated by Bishop Hadfield in 1876 and some of the original timbers are in the present church. Greytown is now one of our smaller country cures with only one church and about 200 church families.
Church: St. Luke, Greytown, C. June Ist, 1876,
Martinborough P.D,
Vicars:
1908 E. T. W. Bond
1926 F. E. Fleury
1910 G. W. I. Maclaverty
1936 F. 0. Ball
1912 E. T. W. Bond
1941 J. R. Neild
1916 J. C. Abbott
1947 C. J. G. Samuda
1920 W. Raine
1954 N. F. E. Roberstshawe
Martinborough is one of the two parochial districts covering the coastal areas of the Wairarapa. It was made a separate parochial district in 1908 but the Church of St. Andrew was built in 1885. Services are also held at Hinakura, Pirinoa, Tuturumuri and Ruakakapatuna and altogether there are nearly 300 church families in the district.
Church: St. Andrew’s, C. April 19th, 1885.
245
FROM AGE TO AGE
Masterton P.
Vicars:
1875 J. F. Teakle
1915 J. Walker
1881 W. E. Paige
1922 W. Bullock
1894 A. C. Yorke
1930 E. J. Rich
Io7*t W. 1 UlhC 1897 P. C. W. Earee
1945 H. S. I. Kenney
1905 A. M. Johnson
1952 V. C. Venimore
1908 H. Watson
The pioneers who founded the town of Masterton arrived in 1854; the first recorded service was held on January 13th, 1856, by the Rev. William Ronaldson, who began work in the Wairarapa in that year. In 1865 he took up residence in Masterton, because he “could easily visit over 200 natives at their Pas, and could as readily radiate to other parts of the District better than from any other spot.” Services were held in the school in those early days, but in 1864 a small building was erected.
In 1875 the district of Wairarapa was divided, and the district of Masterton established, comprising the northern Wairarapa, with the Rev. J. F. Teakle as vicar. During his ministry a church was built, the original building being incorporated, and was consecrated on May 2nd, 1878.
On St. Matthew’s Day, 1913, another church, a lofty and imposing edifice in brick, was consecrated. This was so severely damaged by the earthquake of 1942, that its demolition was carried out. On February 12th, 1956, the Archbishop of New Zealand laid the foundation stone of a new St. Matthew’s to be built to earthquake resistant standards chiefly in ferro-concrete. This will include a chapel commemorating the first hundred years of the work of the Church in Masterton.
Within the town is a daughter church, the Church of the Epiphany, and in the country at Taueru stands the Church of St. Alban. There are also churchrooms at Upper Plain and at Bideford; the latter dates back to 1875 and at one time was used also as a school and community hall.
Associated with the parish are two schools, controlled by the St. Matthew’s Collegiate School or Schools Trust Board. Their forerunner, originated when the Rev. H. Watson was vicar, was conducted in the old parish hall. The present college for girls comprises both primary and secondary departments, while the preparatory school for boys was established in 1954.
Churches; St. Matthew’s. Old Church C. May 2nd, 1876; Second Church C. September 21st, 1913; St. Alban’s, Taueru, C. March 24th, 1906; Church of the Epiphany, Kuripuni, C. September 21st, 1915.
246
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
Pahiatua P.D.
Vicars:
1893 T. Phillips
1924 G. W. Fenwick
1929 G. V. Gerard
1893 H. J. Davis
1896 H. M. B. Marshall
1932 V. A. Bianchi
1902 H. S. Leach
1935 H. F. Wilson
1907 C. H. Isaacson
1938 K. F. Button
1913 L. H. Fenn
1946 J. R. Young
1918 H. W. Monaghan
1951 M. J. S. Wheeler
1924 E. A. Gilliespie
Pahiatua, which now includes Mangatainoka, is on the north eastern end of the Diocese bordering on Waiapu. It is the centre of a rich dairying district, with sheep stations back in the hills. The church property on which the church and vicarage stand is beautifully situated in the centre of the town. There is also a church at Konini which has just celebrated its jubilee and, of course, the old parish church of St. Mark’s, Mangatainoka. There are several out centres where services are held regularly. In all there are nearly 700 church families in the district.
Churches; St. Peter’s, Pahiatua, C. June 29th, 1906; St. James the Great, Konini, C. June 30th, 1906; St. Mark’s, Mangatainoka, C. November 4th, 1911.
Mangatainoka P.D,
(now with Pahiatua)
Vicars:
1902 H. M. B. Marshall
1910 R. Hermon
i n. ivi. d. mdiMiaii 1906 A, W, H. Compton
1921 C. J. H. Dobson
Church; St. Mark’s, C. November 4th, 1911
Pongaroa P.D.
Vicars:
1932 P. Wiltshire*
1906 J. Humphreys
1939 L. F. Owen*
1942 G. P. Cook*
1909 G. B. Stephenson
1911 C. E. O’Hara Tobin
1943 T. V. Pearson’
1915 J. C. Davies
1946 I. C. Edwards*
1917 T. Gardner
1946 R. M. Gourdie*
1922 F. E. Fleury*
1952 K. Elliott
1926 E. W. Burgin*
1955 R. J. K. Sanders
* With Mangatainoka
Pongaroa is the most inaccessible of the parochial districts of the Diocese. Across the Puketoi Range it joins Dannevirke of the
247
FROM AGE TO AGE
Waiapu Diocese in the north and runs out to the east coast at Akitio. Pongaroa is still a small township surrounded by fanning districts and sheep stations. The roads joining them up are still often difficult and the vicar needs a strong car to cover his work. The district now includes Makuri, where a very pleasing little church has recently been built and opened for service. The parish has recently held very successful jubilee celebrations which showed that through the past fifty years the strenuous and devoted service of past vicars has won a deep loyalty to and affection for the Church.
Churches: St. John the Baptist, Pongaroa, C. Feb. 11th, 1923; St. Mark’s, Makuri.
Tinui P.
Vicars .
1901 J. H. Sykes
1935 N. S. Barnett
1909 J. T. Phillips
1938 C. L. Dobbs
1912 W. J. Hands
1941 W. Tye
1915 B. D. Ashcroft
1947 A. J. Stewart
1927 H. Whitby Janies
1951 H. C. Arnold
1932 J. C. Abbott
1957 E. M. Dashfield
The beginning of both civic and church history in the parish of Tinui is marked by a monument which stands on the coast a few miles north of Castlepoint, “Wharepouri’s Mark,” erected to commemorate the treaty made in 1839 by the Wairarapa and Wellington tribes when they came under Christian influence. William Williams and Colenso were driven ashore at Castlepoint in 1844 and four years later the first settlers landed at the same place.
Today most of the inhabitants of the parish live in or near the basin of the Whareama River and the tiny township of Tinui lies where the road inland crosses the river. Below Tinui the valley is more closely settled and there is a church there, St. Andrew’s, Whareama, built in 1904. The parish Church of The Good Shepherd at Tinui was built in 1902. Services are also held in ten other places extending twenty miles north to Mataikona and fifty miles south to Flat Point.
Although no churches were built in the nineteenth century the district kept its separate identity through an arrangement whereby one of the settlers, the Rev. J. C. Andrew, exercised an occasional ministry. At the end of the century the Whareama (later Tinui) parochial district was formed out of the Masterton East Coast Mission and the Rev. J. H. Sykes was appointed vicar.
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
248
A new vicarage was completed in 1943 and the parishioners made history by applying successfully to become the first entirely rural parish in the Diocese.
Churches: The Church of the Good Shepherd, Tinui, C. March 20th, 1904; St. Andrew’s, Whareama, C. January 28th, 1906.
THE ARCHDEACONRY OF RANGITIKEI
Bulls-Rongotea P.D.
Vicars .
1882 W. Ballachey
1919 F. S. Ramson
1923 H. A. Walke
1884 J. C. Dodwell
1886 J. E. Blackburne
1925 H. E. Jones
1890 A. S. Innes-Jones
1928 B. R. White
1893 J. D. Russell
1937 N. S. Barnett
1898 R. T. Matthews
1950 G. P. Cook
1908 E. I. Sola
1951 G. J, King
1911 J. E. Blackburne
1954 J. R. Neild
Rongotea (joined with Bulls 1932)
■ juiiivu nun uuii.l 1907 H. F. Wilson
1920 B. R. White
1912 P. T. Fortune
1922 W. S. Tremain
1918 C. W. Solomon
1928 W. Kelly
The parochial district as now constituted was formed in 1932 by the union of the two districts, Bulls-Sandon dating from 1882, and that of Rongotea which had been separated from Foxton in 1907.
There are four churches in the district, the earliest dating from 1877 and the latest from 1895. Within the boundaries of the parish is the Air Force station at Ohakea. This is a large establishment and although there is generally a resident chaplain he is not generally of our Church and this adds to the responsibility of the vicar.
Nine miles from Bulls is Flock House Farm Training School where some fifty boys are in residence. Church services are held there twice monthly.
The large list of vicars suggests that it is a difficult cure to work. This is not so much because of the travelling involved but rather because there is no real centre but a number of country churches loosely linked together which have nothing much in common.
Churches: St. Thomas’s, Sandon, C. November 4th, 1877; St. Andrew’s, Bulls, C. March 28th, 1885; St. Martin’s, Greatford, C. January 22nd, 1885; St. Simon and St. Jude, Rongotea, C. October 28th, 1895.
249
FROM AGE TO AGE
Feilding P.
Vicars:
1879 Joshua Jones
1921 F. H. Petrie
1887 A. Flermon
1946 F. O. Ball
1893 A. S. Innes-Jones
1955 G. B. Stote-Blandy
The parish of Feilding in fairly typical of many country parishes of a comparable size in New Zealand, in that it possesses a large and thriving parish church situated in the main centre, with several small churches, in some cases as old as the parish church itself, serving the scattered farming communities on which the economic life of the main centre hinges. In fact, about 90 per cent, of the church population is served by the parish church, and the remaining 10 per cent, by the three country churches; and some of the members of these country districts, in these days of increasing facility of transport, are able to supplement the infrequent services held in their own church by visits to the parish church.
The siting of St. John’s Church is geographically unfortunate, since it is to one side of the borough, and most of the new housing lies in another direction. Because of this it was considered desirable, some 40 years ago, when the parish hall beside the church was burnt down, to replace it with a building nearer to the centre of the town. The disadvantage of having no hall near the church has become increasingly apparent, and it is hoped that it may soon be possible to rectify this; but the policy of having buildings suitable for Sunday School purposes in different parts of the town has proved useful, particularly for the younger children. There is already one church room situated over a mile from the church, and a section for another such building has been purchased recently.
Churches; St. John the Evangelist, C. February 15th, 1882; St. Michael and All Angels’, Stanway, C. May 2nd, 1895; St. Andrew’s, Colyton, C. November 30th, 1899; St. James’s, Halcombe, C. July 25, 1881 (demolished 1950 and being rebuilt).
Foxton P.D.
Vicars:
1893 G. Aitkens
1933 H. S. I. Kenney
1896 R. Young
1936 E. W. Burgin
1899 H. S. Leach
1940 G. B. Stote-Blandy
1902 H. F. Wilson
1943 J. H. Datson
1907 G. Y. Woodward
1948 M. J. S. Wheeler
1914 W. Raine
1952 P. D. Kingston
1920 W. H. Walton
1952 H. G. Boniface
1932 G. A. Young
1956 G. M. Smallfleld
250
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
Europeans first settled round about Te Awahou (later called Foxton) in 1844, and in 1845 a small township had sprung up. A central site for the church was bought by Captain Francis Robinson for one hundred pounds in gold. The Maoris sold the land on two conditions. 1. That the land should be used for a church. 2. That the site of the grave of Pationa, a Christian son of the famous chief Taratoa, be respected and kept in order. All Saints’ Church was built on the site and consecrated on December 13th, 1876. It is thus one of the oldest churches in the Diocese. Christ Church, Taita, St. Paul’s and St. Mark’s, Wellington, being older.
Foxton was first worked from Otaki and from 1880 to 1892 was part of Bulls. In 1892 it became a separate parochial district. In 1933 owing to lack of finance during the slump it joined with Shannon, The districts were separated again in 1955.
Church: All Saints’. C. December 13th, 1876,
Hunterville P.D.
V icars.
1897 J. M. Devenish
1934 A. C. Swainson
1899 J. L. Dove
1937 A. R. Wallace
1903 C. H. Roe
1939 P. Wiltshire
1907 J. E. Blackburne
1944 W. L. Low
1948 R. W. Culpitt
1912 C. H. Grant-Cowen
1953 J. S. Martin
1915 W. F. Grove
1919 C. V. Rooke
1956 D. A. Pullar
1925 C. R. Kreeft
Hunterville was joined to the P.D. of Pohangina until 1897 w hen the two districts first had separate vicars.
Until the early 1880’s, when the extension of the Main Trunk railway northwards from Marton was begun, there was no township of Hunterville; only bush and rough tracks connected the scattered settlers, and the district was then part of the parochial district of Marton.
Public worship in the young township was conducted by Archdeacon Towgood, Vicar of Marlon, and by lay readers. One of the two lay readers licensed then still serves the parish.
As early as 1888, a church was built near the present Hunterville railway station. In spite of being once enlarged, it was soon inadequate. At the turn of the century, the present vicarage, on a five-acre section, was bought, and the present church, built on the front of this section, was opened for worship on May 29th, 1907. The old church was rc-crected behind the new one and used
251
FROM AGE TO AGE
as a parish hall until destroyed by a wind-blown tree in 1934. In 1946-47 this hall was replaced by the present one, an ex-army hut.
Church: St. John the Baptist, C. February 11th, 1909.
Kiwitea P.D.
Vicars:
1901 J. R. Cassell
1936 F. E. Fleury
1907 J. F. Mayo
1948 N. C. K. Titchener
1952 R. R. Rickards
1928 P. A. Stanley
1934 L. A. Barnes
1955 R. B. Somerville
The Kiwitea parochial district of approximately 200 square miles, which lies north-east of Feilding, is a purely country parish with a population of about 2,200, composed mainly of sheep and dairy farmers with their families and employees. There are two small townships, Kimbolton and Apiti, and two smaller hamlets, Cheltenham and Waituna West. The other districts are Kiwitea. Beaconsfield and Bluff Road. Church of England families number 243.
The land, originally covered with bush, was opened for settlement progressively between 1876 and 1896. Anglican services were first held at Kiwitea in 1894 and later at other centres by the Vicar of Feilding, and from 1896 to 1901 by an assistant-curate residing at Kimbolton. The Kiwitea Parochial District was constituted in 1901, at that time stretching northward between the Rangitikei and the ranges to the source of the river. In 1910 the parish was sub-divided, Apiti and Rangiwahia with surrounding country becoming part of the newly-formed Mangaweka parochial district, but in 1932 Apiti was relinked, at its own request, with Kiwitea.
The vicar resides in Kimbolton, 1,500 feet above the sea, where a new vicarage, one of the finest in the Diocese, has just been built. Five districts have their own churches as shown on the list, and services have also been held for over 50 years in two other centres —at Waituna West in a Methodist Church and at Bluff Road School. A most excellent and detailed history of this parochial district has recently been written by the late J. F. Mayo.
Churches: St. Agnes’s, Kiwitea, C. February 25th, 1891: St. Saviour’s, Kimbolton, C. October 27th, 1898; St. Paul’s, Cheltenham, C. November 3rd, 1907; St. Mary the Virgin, Beaconsfield, C. June 6th, 1915; St. Luke’s, Apiti, C. October 29th, 1902.
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
Levin P.
Vicars:
1901 J. A. McNickle*
1918 W. F. Grove
1905 A. E. Worsley*
1922 J. C. Davies
1909 S. G. Compton
1943 G. B. Stote-Blandy
1913 H. T. Stealey
1952 E. K. Norman
1916 G. B. Stephenson
* With Shannon.
The first Anglican service was held in Levin about 1890 by Archdeacon Thomas Fancourt, who visited the settlement at the request of the residents. After the service a committee was elected to raise funds for a church and the Archdeacon suggested the site on which the church stands. The church was completed in 1897 at a cost of £3OO and was consecrated by Bishop Wallis on April 16th, 1899. Levin was separated from Shannon in 1911 and in 1934 became a parish.
A good two-storey brick vicarage was built in 1927. As far back as 1921 the parishioners began planning for a new church, but beyond raising £9,000 not much could be done until 1954. Under the leadership of the present vicar, the vestry were in a position to shift the old church to a site across the road and to let a contract for the new church,' to seat 400„ to be built in concrete at a cost of £22,775. His Excellency the GovernorGeneral Sir Willoughby Norrie, and His Grace the Archbishop, the Most Rev. R. H. Owen, respectively laid in the western wall of the church two stones, one from St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, and one from Canterbury Cathedral, England.
It is expected that by the time this is in print the new church will be opened free of debt. In addition to the parish church there is a beautiful little church at Ohau dedicated to St. John the Baptist.
Churches: St. Mary’s, Levin, Old Church C. April 16th, 1899: New Church, December, 1956; St. John the Baptist, Ohau, C. March 29th, 1905.
Mangaweka P.D.
Vicars:
1910 F. C. Thomas
1936 L. N. Watkins
1938 C. F. Webster
1913 H. W. Klingender
1942 C. J. G. Samuda
1917 G. V. Kendrick
1918 K. J. McFarland
1947 H. C. Arnold
1921 G. Watson
1951 L. F. Allison
1926 W. Langston
1953 D. S. Edmiston
1932 E. W. Burgin
252
253
FROM'AGE to age
Mangaweka township is situated in one of the most beautiful and picturesque sections of the Main Trunk Line. It is a hilly district and the roads are tortuous. This makes it a difficult district to work and it has had many vicars.
Mangaweka was separated from Hunterville and constituted a parochial district in 1910. It has good churches in three of the outlying districts and the little round East window in the church at Ohingaiti is a real gem of coloured glass.
Churches; St. Martin's. Mangaweka. C. May 3rd, 1914; St. Barnabas’s, Rangiwahia, C. December 4th, 1903; All Saints’ Ohingaiti, C. December 6th, 1915; St. Stephen’s, Kawhatau, C. December 13th. 1927.
Marton P
(formerly called Rangitikei)
V icars:
1870 A. Towgood
1934 W. Raine
1909 V. H. Kitcat
1945 N. Williams
1951 V. W. Joblin
1924 J. B. Reed
1927 B. D, Ashcroft
The parochial district of Marton grew with the gradual settlement of the Rangitikei. As settlers arrived and began to establish themselves so they were anxious to provide for the spiritual needs of the new community. For some years they were ministered to by missionaries stationed at Wanganui and lay readers, until the Rev. A. Towgood began his ministry in 1868. It was not until 1870 that the district was officially constituted and Mr. Towgood became the first Vicar of Marton. The foundation stone of St. Stephen’s Church, the mother church of the Rangitikei. was laid by Bishop Hadfield on October 26th, 1871. The church is still in use as the parish church, and with care should last for many years to come. (Bishop Hadfield is buried in the churchyard at Tutu Totara.) The first vicar had the care of settlements as far north as Taihape, and as far south as Bulls. In the course of time Taihape, Mangaweka, Hunterville and Bulls became separate parochial districts until today the parochial district consists of Marlon as the centre with a church or churchroom at Tutu Totara, Marton Junction, Mt. View and Turakina. Within the boundaries are the Diocesan School for Girls (Nga Tawa), the Diocesan School for Boys (Huntley), and Lake Alice Mental Hospital. St. Stephen’s Parochial Day School was formed in 1918. It has adequate grounds and buildings and should play an increasingly important part in the life of the Church. As with most of the
St. John's, Tutu Totar
Christ Church Wanganui
St. George’s, Patea
St. Mary's, Hawera
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
256
country towns in New Zealand Marton is steadily growing, and the Church is endeavouring to continue to expand its activities to keep pace with the spiritual needs of an increasing population.
Churches: St. Stephens, C. January 17th. 1885; St. George's, Turakina, C. January 15th, 1885; St. John the Evangelist, Tutu Totara, Old Church, C. January 20th, 1855; New Church, C. May slh, 1924.
Otaki P.D.
Vicars.
1900 C. T. Parciter
1932 F. S. Ramson
1905 H. T. Slealev
1936 G. Watson
I 7UJ 11. 1. JICUICJ 1908 C. J. Smith
1943 H. E. K. Fry
1913 G. F. Petrie
1950 T. V, Pearson
1925 G. K. Moir
1954 A. F. Spence
In the early years Otaki was the centre of the Maori Mission around the great church of Rangiatea. Its first name was Hadfield. The story of those years belongs to the story of the Maori Mission.
In 1895 Otaki was constituted a parochial district and included Manakau and Te Horo. Until 1900 it was partly ministered to by the Rev. J. T. McWilliam, C.M.S. Missionary to the Maoris. It has a fine brick church with a very good sample of modern glass in the East window by Messrs Powell Bros., Whitefriars, London. There is a consumptive sanatorium in the parish, and the beach is now a popular holiday resort. In addition to the large population of Maoris there are also many Chinese market gardeners. There are nearly 600 church families.
Churches; All Saints’, Otaki, C. November 23rd, 1932; St. Andrew’s, Manakau, C. April 27th, 1895; St. Margaret s, Te Floro, C. April 15th, 1956.
All Saints’, Palmerston North P.
V icars:
1875 H. Bevis
1911 H. G. Kosher
1879 J. A. Newth
1915 H. G. Blackburnc
1881 J. L. Keating
1924 W. Fancourt
1884 H, E. Coppinger
1929 G. Y. Woodward
1887 H. B. Harvey
1945 H. W. Monaghan
1895 H, F. Hunt
1951 H. S. I. Kenney
1900 C. C. Harper
When the first census was taken in what was then called Palmerston in 1868 there were 31 pakeha residents in the district.
A. 15
257
FROM AGE TO AGE
Palmerston North is now a city with 35,000 inhabitants. The life of the church has kept pace with the growth of the city. Before 1875 church services were held by visiting clergy from the older settlements of Foxton, Bulls and Marton. A small church was built in 1875 and the district was made a Parochial District with the Rev. H. Bevis as the first vicar. A second church was consecrated in 1882 and served until the present fine brick building was built in 1916. The old church still serves as a Sunday School. The Parish Church is the largest in the Diocese. It has a fine chancel which has recently been remodelled and furnished with beautiful kauri panelling and carved kauri stalls. Its finances have been carefully watched over by able businessmen and its endowments include a very profitable sheep farm.
A church was built at Linton in 1914 and the foundation stone of a new church at Kairanga was laid in 1950. The Rev. C. C. Harper opened a children’s home in 1906 and in 1930 Mr Hugh Akers gave a fine section on which the present building stands. It accommodates over 30 children. All Saints’ is now one of the greatest parishes in the Dominion.
Churches: All Saints’, Old Church C. February 16th, 1882 New Church C. October 29th, 1916; St. Columba’s, Linton, C May sth, 1914; St. Luke's, Kairanga, C. October 17th, 1954.
St. Peter’s, Palmerston North P
Vicars:
1924 J. C. Abbott
1936 F. S. Ramson
1932 D. J. Davies
1948 R, P. F. Plaistowe
1935 H. Whitbv-James
1953 L. M. King
St. Peter’s parish consists of rather less than half the city of Palmerston North and extends out a little into the country to the parochial district of Pohangina.
The church was opened in 1902 but for twenty years prior to this services had been held in a church room situated on another site.
Until 1924 St. Peter’s was a daughter church of the large parish of All Saints’, and at this date it became a parochial district with its first vicar. It became a parish in 1945.
From 1924 to the present date the parish has grown rapidly so that at the time of writing this description the church has become too small and steps are now being taken to raise funds to build another church in the near future.
Services are held at Roslyn where a fine church building was dedicated in 1953 to cater for a large new housing area. Milson
258
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
and Whakarongo both are provided with services once a month in local halls.
The parish has an assistant curate but on account of the tremendous growth of population and growing interest in the church, could well do with more help.
The many organisations within the parish provide interest and work for every kind of parishioner and of every age, and St. Peter’s is justifiably proud of its family life.
Church: St. Peter’s, C. May 4th, 1910.
Pohangina P.D.
Vicars:
1893 J. M. Devenish
1929 H. L. B. Goertz
1897 A. Neild
1937 A. J. Famell
1911 A. W. Payne
1948 I. H. McCaul
1913 W. Tye
1951 G. M. Smallfield
1919 F. M. Kempthorne
1955 K. Elliott
With its headquarters at Ashhurst and including Bunnythorpc this parochial district extends up the beautiful bush-clad Pohangina Valley with church centres on either side. Originally it was worked from Palmerston North and was made a separate cure in 1893. There are 300 church families in the district and there are five churches.
Churches: St. Mary Magdalene’s, Ashhurst; St. Barnabas’s, Bunnythorpe, C. December Bth, 1906; St. Aidan’s, Awahou, C. November 3rd, 1914; St. Cuthbert’s, Pohangina, C. November 3rd, 1914; St. Bartholomew’s, Kamako, C. March 16th, 1926.
Shannon P.D.
Vicars:
with Foxton
1911 C. Palmer
1933 H. S. I. Kenney
1918 H. A. Walke
1936 E. W. Burgin
1940 G. B. Stote-Blandy
1920 J. C. Abbott
1924 A. J. Famell
1943 J. H. Datson
1929 G. A. Young
1948 M. J. S. Wheeler
1955 A. H. Dryburgh
1952 P. D. Kingston
1952 H. G. Boniface
Shannon is a country parish consisting of the three districts of Shannon, Tokomaru and Opiki. It was formerly worked from Levin but in 1911 it was constituted a separate parochial district. From 1932 to 1955 although remaining a parochial district it
259
FROM AGE TO AGE
was worked from Foxton. Shannon and Foxton were reconstituted separate cures in 1955. The parish church is consecrated in the name of the Venerable Bede. When fifty-one years old it was shifted across the railway line to its present position beside the parish hall and the consecration took place in 1949.
Tokomaru, a small township eight miles north of Shannon, has a small wooden church dedicated to St. Aidan. At Opiki there is a community church managed by a district committee and available for use by any member of the National Council of Churches.
Churches: The Venerable Bede, C. September 4th, 1949; St. Aidan’s, Tokomaru.
Taihape P.D.
V icars:
1905 P. W. Clarkson
1935 J. C. Abbott
1914 W. F. Stent
1940 W. M. Smallfield
1924 E. J. Rich
1947 J. R. Neild
1930 H. M. Harris
1954 W. R. Cunliffe
1934 G. M, McKenzie
1956 I. H. McCaul
Taihape on the Main Trunk railway line is now a busy, prosperous town in the centre of a very prosperous farming district. The country around it is rugged and once off the main highway the roads make the vicar’s travelling strenuous. There are churches at Taihape, Mataroa and Utiku, a private chapel at Moawhango, and five other places where services are held. There are 550 church families in the district and a public hospital in the township so the parish is no sinecure.
Churches: St. Margaret’s, Taihape, C. March 29th, 1912; St. George’s, Mataroa; Holy Trinity, Utiku.
THE ARCHDEACONRY OF WAITOTARA
Aramoho P.D.
V icars:
1908 J. Humphreys’
1937 R. Godfrey
1910 J. Walker
1939 J. H. Datson
1943 A. F. R. Parr
1920 E. G. Mexted
1921 W. T. Weller
1948 H. G. Bowver
i /to it. vj. 1953 J, H. Smith
1930 W, G. Williams
* In Waitotara
260
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
Aramoho was separated from Wanganui and joined with Waitotara in 1906. It became a separate parochial district in 1910.
In addition to the parish church of St. Laurence, there is a church at Westmere. There are 461 church families in the district and religious instruction is given in five Government schools.
Churches: St. Laurence’s, Aramoho; St. Oswald’s, Westmere, C. November 3rd, 1929.
Eltham P.
Vicars:
1901 E. W. J. McConnel
1928 G. W. Whitacre
1906 H. C. Bourne
1932 W. Langston
1907 G. W. Dent
1938 H. A. Walke
1917 R. H. Hobday
1946 T. V. Pearson
1919 J. G. T. Castle
1950 L. M. King
1922 H. J. L. Goldthorpe
1953 J. E. Jones
1925 C. H. Isaacson
Eltham constitutes part of the northern boundary of the Diocese, bordering on Stratford in the Diocese of Waikato. It was originally part of the Auckland Diocese and was ministered to by clergy from Stratford and Hawera. Eltham was constituted a separate parochial district in 1901. The present church was consecrated by Bishop Wallis on January 13th, 1906.
Eltham is a pleasant town in the centre of a rich pastoral district and under the leadership of able vicars the church life of the parish has prospered and grown from strength to strength.
Churches: All Saint’s, Eltham, C. January 13th, 1906; St. Luke’s, Te Roti, C. November 14th, 1901.
Gonville P.D.
Vicars:
1921 H. A. Favell
1939 V, C. Venimore
1952 R. W. Culpitt
1924 D. B. Malcolm
1935 C. W. Solomon
The parochial district of Gonville is situated within the boundaries of the city of Wanganui and comprises almost a third of the city area. It is densely populated with two main parts, Gonville and Castlecliff, but building activity is such that the gap is rapidly being bridged.
In 1921 it was formed as a separate parochial district. The first services were held in the old Gonville Town Hall and at St. Luke’s churchroom at Castlecliff.
261
FROM AGE TO AGE
The year 1913 saw the erection of St. Peter’s churchroom, and, when the district was formed, this became the parish church.
After the formation of the new district, the vestry of the parent parish, Christ Church, Wanganui, offered to the vestry of St. Peter’s the historic parish church of Wanganui, as they had just completed a new building on a new site. The offer was accepted and the removal of the old building from its site in the centre of the city was accomplished, and it now stands on a commanding site overlooking the city. It was dedicated by Bishop Sprott and renamed St. Peter’s. This church was first erected in 1865 and was the second church built in Wanganui. Historic though it is, it is now causing much concern as to its future, and the parishioners have decided to replace it in modern materials.
St. Luke’s at Castlecliff has also had a chequered career, being first erected in the centre of what in the early days was the port settlement, but the main bulk of building took place along the beach frontage and left the church on the very fringe. A new section was bought, then in the centre of the building area, but again building extension was so rapid that in order to keep up with it St. Luke’s was shifted about six years ago to its third but final site. It now stands on the main street, and is on an area that will house a church and vicarage as well.
Churches: St. Peter’s; St. Luke’s, C.R, Castlecliff
Hawera P.
V icars:
1882 W. H. Root
1923 H. W. Monaghan
1928 J. R. Young
1888 W. H. Kay
1932 H. Whitby-James
1897 H. Anson
1902 J. A. Jacob
1935 D. B. Malcolm
1907 J. R, Cassell
1948 L. N. Watkins
1915 C. H. Grant-Cowan
1952 W. A. Pyatt
1920 R. Franklin
Rolling and flat grasslands broken by a series of deep gorges make up the sheep and dairy farms which bring prosperity to South Taranaki. In the midst of this country is the market town of Hawera, a thriving centre of about 8,000 people.
The parish of Hawera consists of both town and country areas, with about 800 church families in the town and 300 in the country. The parish is most fortunate in its buildings. In Hawera itself the parish church (St. Mary’s), set in fine and spacious grounds, is a brick building of pleasing design. It has recently been redecorated and reappointed. In the same grounds are the
262
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
new vicarage and a fine large hall which provides accommodation for the clubs, guilds and social activities of the parish. There are about 500 on the Sunday School roll and 100 in the Bible Classes.
Hawera has always been considered one of the most eligible parishes of the Diocese. One of its vicars, the Rev. Harold Anson, afterwards became Master of the Temple Church, London.
In addition to the parish church there is a very fine brick church at Mokoia, built by the Lysaght family, and an older church at Normanbv. These have always been strong church centres.
Churches: St. Mary’s, Hawera, C. April 14th, 1916; St. Paul’s, Normanby, C. September 10th; 1899; St. James’s, Mokoia, C. June 25th, 1905.
Manaia P.D.
V wars:
1909 W. F. Stent
1935 J. H. Sykes
1914 A. T. B, Page
1937 G. C. Blathwayt
1918 W. Tye
1939 J. S. Holland'
1921 A. C. Swainson
1946 I. C. Edwards
1927 C. W. Solomon
1952 R. M. Gourdie
Manaia is situated in one of Taranaki’s richest dairying districts just north of Hawera. It includes Okaiawa, Otakeho, Auroa and Kapuni where services are held. It has been a separate cure since 1909 and it has three consecrated churches and 320 church families.
Churches: St. Cuthbert’s, Manaia, C. September 23rd, 1894; St. John’s, Otakeho, C. March 14th, 1918; St. Aidan’s, Okaiawa, C. March 12th, 1918.
Ohakune-Raetihi P.D,
V icon:
Ohakune
1913 J. R. Anderson
Raetihi
1909 O. M. Stent
1915 W. T. Weller
1913 J. C. Abbott
1922 G. W. Fenwick
1916 J. W. Robinson
1925 P. A. Stanley
1921 W. S. Tremain
With Raetihi
1923 H. E. Jones
1929 L. A. Barnes
1927 J. H. Datson
1934 C. L. Dobbs
1938 M. L. Underhill
1945 A. J. Stewart
1947 W. L. Bell-Booth
1951 J. R. Young
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FROM AGE TO AGE
The Diocese of Wellington extends for 230 miles up the centre of the North Island, and Ohakune-Raetihi is the most northerly district. It is situated on the central plateau of the North Island at an average altitude of over 2,000 feet at the base of Mount Ruapehu. It covers a very wide area, and the vicar’s nearest clerical neighbour is over fifty miles away. A good deal of this area is uninhabited. The climate is rigorous but very healthy. There are two main centres, Ohakune, with its railway station on the Main Trunk Line, and Raetihi on a little branch line nine miles to the west. The population of each place is about 1,000. The plateau on which they stand was originally covered with magnificent native bush and in the first thirty years of the century the whole district roared with saw-mills. The church built at Raetihi in 1910 was burnt down in 1918 in the great “Raetihi Fire”. It was rebuilt in brick by contributions made by the parishes of the Diocese.
As the bush was progressively cut out the district was left with a notorious unshaven appearance, littered with logs and stumps. But in the early forties of the war years it was found that the soil was very fertile and grew excellent vegetables so the Government sent in tractors and bulldozers and cleared off the logs and stumps and in return the district supplied a large proportion of the vegetables for the army in the Pacific. So from a sawmilling area the district has changed to one of farming and market gardening.
As a parish to work it is an interesting though strenuous one, necessitating a great deal of travelling. The groups which gather for the services are small, but the warmth of the fellowship amply compensates for the absence of crowds.
Churches: St. John’s, Ohakune; St. Mary’s, Raetihi, C. April 28th, 1935.
Opunake P.D.
V icars:
1907 H. W. Klingender
1937 J. H. Datson
1913 O. M. Stent
1939 J. C. W. Mutter
1917 H. A. Walke
1942 K. Nicholson
1918 C. Palmer
1947 P. H. Warren
1953 C. W. Venimore
1923 C. W. Solomon
1927 D. J. Davies
1957 J. B. Arlidge
1929 A. J. Famell
This sprawling area at the foot of Mt. Egmont, is often referred to as “the last outpost of the Wellington Diocese.” Geographically, it is the furthest from Wellington, and is bordered on the north by the Waikato Diocese. Cheese factories are prominent, testifying to the productivity of Taranaki’s dairy herds.
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CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
The first stirrings of Anglican interest seem to have sprung from a visit to Opunake by Bishop Hadfield in 1883, when Opunake had just become part of the newly-constituted Hawera parochial district.
The first parochial records date from 1890, This is an account of a meeting which resolved to ask Bishop Hadfield to license an itinerant priest to hold services in Opunake once a month. Services had been held previously, but were infrequent. This request elicited a visit from Archdeacon Fancourt on June 7th, 1890.
In 1892, Opunake found itself part of the new parochial district of the Waimate Plains, and the challenge of church-building was faced. St. Barnabas’s Church, Opunake was completed in 1895, followed in 1901 by St. Mark’s, Kaponga.
By 1909 it was evident that the Waimate Plains parochial district was too unwieldy, and the present parochial district of Opunake came into being with the constitution of a new district based on Manaia. A house for a vicarage was purchased at Opunake, and the Rev. W. H. Klingender was able to minister more intensively to his smaller charge.
During the ensuing years the story is one of steady ministry with Opunake as the focus, with laymen and laywomen playing their loyal part. Many descendants of pioneer churchmen are worshipping today in the churches their forbears built.
Churches: St. Barnabas's, C. November 7th, 1898; St. Mark’s, Kaponga, C. August 20th, 1909.
Patea P.D.
Vicars.
1875 A. Dasent
1919 W. A. Allan
1882 i. L. Keating (Temp.)
1921 H. L. B. Goertz
1884 E. Whitehouse
1927 O. S. O. Gibson
1887 A. P. Clarke
1932 W. H. Walton
1943 G. P. Cook
1894 C. C. Harper
1900 R. Hermon
1950 J. E. Jones
1910 J, H. Deane
1953 L. F. Allison
1913 A. W. Payne
1957 C. W. Venimore
1915 N. S. Barnett
Patea was first known as Carlyle and it was on the border of what became the Diocese of Auckland and was the first church centre in South Taranaki. During the Maori Wars in Taranaki
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services were held mainly by Army chaplains. The first church was built in 1870 and Patea was constituted a parochial district of the Diocese of Wellington in 1875.
The present parish church was consecrated and dedicated in the name of St. George on March sth, 1885, by Bishop Hadfield.
At Alton there is a very beautiful little modern church which was consecrated by Bishop Rich on November 29th, 1953.
Churches: St. George’s, Patea, C. March sth, 1885; All Saint’s. Alton, C. November 29th, 1953.
Christ Church, Wanganui P.
V icars:
1859 C. H. S. Nicholls
1911 H. Reeve
1872 E. B. Nevill
1924 R. C. Meredith
1874 T. L. Tudor
1932 J. R. Young
1893 T. B. Maclean
1946 J. R. L. Higgs
1955 F. O, Ball
1908 J. A. Jacobs
The parish of Christ Church, Wanganui, holds the distinction with the parishes of St. Peter’s, Wellington, St. Paul’s, Wellington, and St. James’s, Lower Hutt, of being one of the four original parishes in the Diocese. It comprised the whole of the Wanganui Block as purchased by Sir Donald McLean. Its boundaries were later extended and since have been subdivided into six parishes.
The parish today, which comprises mainly the centre of the city, has several unique features. Within its boundaries there are four churches, each with its regular Sunday Services. The building which serves as the parish church, was erected in 1920 for a parish hall, to be used temporarily for divine service pending the erection of a new edifice as planned. It still serves as the parish church, and is still unconsecrated. Nevertheless, the present Christ Church is a fine structure of brick and roughcast in Spanish style with an interior that is dignified and restful. With seating accommodation for up to 500 the present building serves well as a parish church.
Half a mile from the parish church is St. John’s, built in 1887; half a mile further on is St. Chad’s on St. John’s Hill, built in 1928, and three-quarters of a mile further still is St. Agnes’, at Mosstown, built in 1908.
The parish maintains its own preparatory school with a roll of over 50 pupils from beginners to Form 2.
Churches: Christ Church (Second Church), C. July 17th, 1866; St. Agnes’s, Mosstown, C. June 19th, 1908; St. John’s; St. Chad’s.
CLERGY AND THE PARISHES
266
Wanganui P.D,
V icars:
1881 P. L. M. Cameron
1913 F. C. Thomas
1891 R. Hermon
1920 J. B, Reed
1900 H. P. Cowx
1924 W. Tye
1903 A. W. H. Compton
1936 W. M. Smallfield
1905 H. J. Deane
1940 E. W. Burgin
1910 W. G. Williams
1955 C. T. Marshall
The vicarage for this district is on Durie Hill, just outside Wanganui. It was constituted a separate district in 1881. It is a very scattered district covering a wide area. It has four churches, including St. Barnabas’s, Durie Hill, which was completed and dedicated by the Archbishop in 1956.
Services are held at six other places. Although it covers so large an area there are only 250 church families listed in it.
Churches: St. Mary’s, Upokongaro, C. July 20th, 1879; St. John’s, Matarawa; St. Mary’s, Fordell; St. Barnabas’s, Durie Hill.
Wanganui East P.D.
V icars:
1951 P. A. Stanley
1937 W, A. 800 l
1952 J. D. Orchard
1938 A. F. R. Parr
Priests in charge prior to 1951
1941 K. Nicholson
1923 C. R. Kreeft
1942 N. Williams
1925 I. Hobbs
1944 J. C. A. Cole
1947 N. C. K. Titchener
1926 E. W. Coles
1928 V. A. Bianchi
1948 F. A. Keay
1932 C. L. Dobbs
1934 P. A. Stanley
1936 G. H. Lawrence
1936 W. Lambert
The parochial district of Wanganui East was part of the parish of Christ Church until 1951. The church of All Saint’s was originally the old chapel of the Wanganui Collegiate School, which was a gift to the District and re-erected and opened on April 9th, 1912. Later the old organ of the Collegiate School was re-built in the church.
Services were first held in the district in the parish hall, which was opened on April 18th, 1909.
Church: All Saint’s.
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Waverley-Waitotara P.D.
V icars.
1895 H. C. Frere
1925 W. Kelly
1928 E. W. Coles
1897 C. A. Tisdall
1901 A. F. Smith
1932 S. R. Gardiner
1902 H. Watson
1936 P. A. Stanley
1910 R. Franklin
1946 D. V. de Candole
1915 W. J. Hands
1950 R. G. L. Keith
1953 L. W. Porteous
1920 H. F. Wilson
Heavy fighting took place in this district during the Maori Wars and it was not till 1868 that settlement went ahead in earnest. The district was at first worked from Patea and in 1895 it was included in an extensive district under the name of Waitotara. In 1910 the present district was constituted which extends from the coastal area to the upper reaches of the Wanganui River. Farming is the predominant occupation of the parishioners.
Churches: St. Stephen’s, Waverley, C. April f9th, 1896; St Hilda in the Wood, Ngamatapouri, C. March 13th, 1907; St Mary's, Maxwell, C. June 4th, 1933: St. Mark’s, Waitotara.
Part 5
THE HADFIELD JOURNAL
THE HADFIELD JOURNAL
A FRAGMENT
Octavius Hadfield kept a Journal for most of his life. For reasons known only to himself he destroyed all of it except this fragment which was preserved by his daughter , the late Miss Amy Hadfield. Before her death she gave permission for it to be included in this book where it appears in print for the first time. The original was sent by Miss Hadfield for safe keeping in the Wellington Public Library.
PAIHIA
SEPTEMBER
1839
Sep. 30. Left Waimate this afternoon having taken leave of all there, and arrived here this evening—have been so busily engaged all day that I have given scarcely any time to prayer and meditation—oh, may the Lord have mercy upon me for Jesus’ sake—the Com. have decided that I should go to Kapiti; I expect to start in about a fortnight—the Rev. H. W. purposes to accompany me—Oh! that I had more dependence upon God —
Oct. 1-2. Took a walk and had some conversation with the Rev. R. P. relative to the school and the mission generally—Went with the Rev. H. W. to look after necessaries to take with me to Kapiti —1 find I can procure but little here —Oh, may I remember that the Lord disposes of me in all things, may I therefore not only be submissive in all matters, but rejoice knowing that all is ordered in Covenant love; this is a difficult thing, never to be disappointed, but always to bear in mind that little
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things as well as great are ordered by God—Oh, that I had a more habitual sense of God’s love in Christ.
(2) Went early to Kororareka where the Rev. H. W. buried a child. Had some conversation with some persons over there, they desire to have a minister among them. Went to Mr Busby, dined with him; had some interesting conversation with him—told him I could not support his proposed school for half-caste children upon the British and Foreign School Society’s principles—he purposes altering his plan, Attended P.M. 24 Job. IV 21 etc. I have spent but little time in reading and prayer.
Oct. 3. Unable to proceed about business from the badness of the weather. Engaged in learning native—employed some time in reading and prayer. Alas! how cold I feel, how weak in faith. May the Lord quicken me by His Spirit.
Oct. 4-5. Did very little—engaged in learning native—read the scripture with some profit,—felt much comfort in prayer—was thinking about what I might want for the southward. Alas, what I most want is a heart dependent on God—(s) Lost the early part of the day —Went in the water and made some preparations for Kapiti, trust I shall get a few necessaries, oh! how little do I really want—Oh! that I felt more my spiritual wants —May the Lord fit and qualify me to minister before him in holy things —My heart has this day longed after God, but enjoyed but little communion with him —Would that I had a quiet place of retirement.
Oct. 6. Lord’s Day. Tho’ I have met with some hindrances I have enjoyed much of the Lord this day — Preached morn. Is.XXVIII.I 6 with considerable ease and comfort—in the afternoon John XIV. 18. My head failed me during the latter part —Administered the Lord’s Supper for the first time by myself, enjoyed a blessed feast, oh! 1 wonder when I may again meet with so many Christian friends around the Lord’s table—Expect to go shortly to Kapiti. Oh! I rejoice that the Lord will be with me there—
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Am this day twenty-five years old: Oh! how little have I got done for the Glory of God, and yet how gracious has the Lord been to me. May / redeem the time.
Oct. 7-8. Almost all the morn, enjoyed in talking about the concerns of the Mission and seeking information with respect to Kapiti. In the afternoon rode into Waimate with the Rev. W. W.—slept at Mr. Wade’s—Enjoyed sweet communion with God in the morn. Most of the day lost.
(8) Left Waimate and rode to Pakaraka, dined there, and came back to Paihia—studied native a little—Read with some comfort, and drew near to God in prayer, would that my soul were more devoted to God and more fully set on glorifying Christ.
9-10. Employed the morn, in writing, did but little the rest of the day—felt unwell towards evening and went to bed early. (10) Lost a great part of the day through the delay of others while engaged in procuring necessaries for my intended housekeeping at Kapiti. Not very well—learned a little native, uncertain when I shall proceed to the southward—Feel considerable deadness of spirit, but little love in my heart towards God when I consider the abundance of His rich grace exhibited towards my soul in my eternal salvation by Christ Jesus.
11-12. Lost nearly all the morn. In the afternoon wrote to the Bishop L. W. Coates. Believe I am going in the Columbine thus visiting Tauranga in our way.
(12) Went on board the Columbine and made some preparations—wrote some letters —lost some time in uncertainty what to be doing —Read native and enjoyed communion with God in prayer in the afternoon. Oh! that I were actively engaged in duty devoting every hour to God.
Oct. 13. Lord’s Day —Went to Kororareka. Preached in morn on 1. Pet. 111. 18. In afternoon Rom. VIII. 1. Baptised an infant the daughter of Capt. B —. Am doubtful whether I ought to baptise such persons —Trust the Lord was with me during the services. Have not this day enjoyed
A, 16
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much of God, thru’ my inability to retire for prayer. Have mercy O Lord upon a poor sinner for Jesus’ sake.
14. Lost a great part of the day in uncertainty how to proceed; not altogether my own fault—l do lament this waste of precious time—Went to Kororareka on business —Oh! that I were engaged in the work of the Lord —Oh! that my heart were more disposed to prayer.
15. Passed a little time in the forenoon in reading and prayer; studied native a little—Passed some time talking about the best mode of proceeding to Kapiti. In the afternoon went about making several arrangements for my departure —Oh! that I were more fully convinced that the best mode of preparing was by seeking direction from the Lord and making prayer to Him.
16-17. Went to the Kerikeri with the Rev. W. W. to obtain more stores —did not return till 10 o’clock. Felt worried and unwell. (17) Engaged in making preparations for sailing and employed some time in getting materials on board the Columbine for a future dwelling house. I have not had my heart sufficiently set upon God. Oh! how prone my heart is to cleave to this vain world and to allow its passing concerns to occupy my attentions and affections.
Oct. 18. Unable to go out in the mom. on account of the heavy rain. Wrote to George. Engaged in making necessary preparations: got thro’ some business—Have been but little in prayer, but have had my heart nearer to God than is usually the case—Oh! that I may be filled with the Spirit, and abound in love to the Lord Jesus Christ.
19. Sent everything on board the vessel, am now ready to start. Felt somewhat of communion with God this day tho’ I feel unaccountably cold to spiritual things —whence this deadness —Oh for a more abiding sense of God's infinite goodness towards one—May I be prepared for the coming sabbath.
20. Lord’s Day. Have not felt that holy desire after the enjoyment of God that I could have wished—ln the morn, preached on Is. XL11.21 in afternoon on Sam. IV. 16. The
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congregation appeared inattentive: fear that I spoke with little love or warmth of soul. Went home with Mrs. P. after service, felt much refreshed at family prayer with her and Miss P. while singing “Salvation, Oh the joyful sound," and afterwards while expounding part of I Cor. I and in prayer.
21-24. (21) Engaged the greater part of the day in making preparations for ray departure. Took leave of all friends and embarked on board the Columbine at seven o’clock together with the Rev. H. W., Mrs. W., Mrs. C., and Mr. S. Sailed out of the Bay of Islands with a fair wind. Soon began to feel a little sea-sick. Retired to bed at about 12 o’clock after remaining on deck till I was very cold. (22) Rose in the morn and went on deck. Oct. 22-24. Taurcmga.
After remaining some time on deck during which time I felt very unwell I went below and retired to bed, felt exceedingly unwell, nevertheless could trust in the Lord and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.
(23) Felt very unwell, however the wind continued fair, and I lay patiently in bed till I was told at a quarter past 3 o’clock that we had anchored at Tauranga. The wind blew very fresh as we entered the harbour, and in a narrow part of the entrance the vessel was nearly drifting upon rocks; but the Lord preserved us. We landed at about seven o’clock and were met upon the shore by the Rev. A. B. and conducted by him to his house where we passed the evening, and I retired to bed at Mr. J’s not feeling very well, but rejoicing that I was on shore. (24) Not very well. I have been engaged in doing nothing but looking round the settlement and talking about matters here. Much prefer the Christian simplicity of proceedings here to those in the northern stations. Oh, may the gracious Lord carry on His own great work here to His own glory and the eternal welfare of his people. Have not had my heart so fully set upon the Lord as I could have wished. Oh! that I could redeem time, and when I have
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health and strength seek to gratify God and devote every hour to His service. Oh! May my soul experience more of the love of Christ towards my soul!
Oct. 25. Rose very unwell, found it necessary to take strong medicine and confine myself to the house almost all day. Engaged in reading, had some interesting conversation with Mr. J. If all is well am likely to proceed shortly to Kapiti. There is a body of about 1,000 natives in the neighbourhood who are set on mischief. Oh! may my task be ever in the Lord. What an unaccountable deadness of soul I feel and how little love is there in my soul to the Lord my God. Oh for Divine Help!
26-27. Not very well. Passed the day without much profit. I would that I were more disposed to seek the glory of God. Read native for some time —I want more application. (27) Lord’s Day. Attended the native service in the settlement. Gathered together a small English congregation at the Rev. Mr. B’s and preached on Zach. IX. 9-11. Purposed going to a neighbouring pa in the afternoon, but was unable to get across the river for want of a boat. Enjoyed a season of private prayer with comfort. In the even, partook of the Lord’s Supper with the other brethren here; felt refreshed tho’ my mind was in a wandering frame and state —May I live more under a holy conviction that my God sees and knows all my thoughts and words and deeds—Have mercy O Lord!
28-29. Had intended accompanying the Revs. H. W. and B. and Mr. C. to Wakitu where they are gone to endeavour to make peace between the Waikato and Rotorua natives, but did not feel well enough—did but little all day, however I trust I am gaining information respecting my work. (29) Have been engaged almost all day in preparing prescriptions for medicines. Oh, while I feel anxious for the bodily health of the natives who may be under my care—-may I above all seek their eternal health.
Oct. 30. Passed the day in making various notes of matters which I thought might be useful—intend starting
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276
tomorrow. Messrs. W. & B. & C. returned this evening from Wakitu. They were very nearly making peace—the Waikato natives were well disposed but the officious forwardness of the Ware Kura lads hindered it by representing to the Wakitu natives that the others were afraid.
31-7 Nov. Set sail about half past one o’clock from Tauranga after having taken leave of all friends therethere being on board besides myself the Rev. U. W. Mr. B. and W. S. Felt nothing of sea sickness, tho’ not very comfortable as is usual with me on board ship. (Nov. 1) Landed with Mr. Clarke at Motu some miles beyond Opotiki in the Bay of Plenty, where we left two Christian natives Samuel and Richard and their wives—the natives appeared savage, but very civil and kind. (2) Landed with Mr. Clarke and Mrs. Stack at Warokaika in the forenoon about twenty miles from Waiapu, when after taking leave of them and procuring a little ballast and fine sand we set sail. (3) Lord’s Day—the wind blew hard all day and night and quite foul so that we did not advance at all. (4) Fair wind passed Turanga and the Mahia—off the point of the Mahia we passed a rock a few feet under water under our lee, it lay about 4 miles north east of the southern point of the head and about 5 miles E. by N. of the southern end of the island off the point. Felt thankful to the Lord for guiding me safely thro’ these unsurveyed seas. (5) Sailed a little beyond Cape Tum-Again, having fresh breeze off the land. (6) Had a foul wind all night and mom. Blowing hard, with rain—went on deck in the afternoon for two hours, wind then fair, off Flat-point. (7) Wind fair. Rounded Cape Palliser in the forenoon and came to an anchor in Port Nicholson at about 3 o’clock— This is a beautiful harbour, having deep water and penectly surrounded, being thus secure from all winds; about thirty natives came on board, among whom was Dick from Waimate. It appears from their statements that the ship Tory has brought people from England who have bought this harbour and part of Kapiti, etc., etc., for a
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mere trifle—We purpose proceeding onwards tomorrow to the abode of Rauparaha —May the Lord be with us— Pardon O Lord the hardness and deadness of my heart the last few days and wash me from my sins in the blood of Jesus.
8-9 (8) Wind not favourable for leaving this place — Not at all well during the night and forenoon, my chest very painful. In the afternoon went on shore for two hours, found some plants which do not grow at the northern part of the Island—came on board somewhat better —Believe this is not Port Nicholson, but that that harbour lies round the next point, this is however a beautiful part. (9) Suffered considerable pain in my chest during the night. We got under way early in the morning; but as the wind soon headed us we ran away for Cloudy Bay. We anchored there about one o’clock—not being able to beat against a strong wind—we did not get into the proper anchorage and a Portuguese who has a whaling establishment came on board a few hours after and tho’ it rained and blew much we put in to a safe anchorage —We could not form a correct notion of the place from the badness of the weather.
10. Lord’s Day. I rose rather better in health, but not well. The Rev. H. W. went on shore to hold service with a party of natives and English —and after I had had service on board and preached from John 111. 14.15., I went on shore to the party of English who were with the Portuguese. It was a miserable place and the men looked in a deplorable condition spiritually —They assembled for service to the number of about twenty —and having read prayers I preached from John 111. 30 —some appeared attentive and one or two applied for the New Testament. The wind blew so hard that I and the master of the vessel were detained on shore for two hours; but as the wind abated a little and we had a good whale boat and good hands we put off and after taking some water in we arrived safe on board.
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11. Rose early purposing to go to Queen Charlotte’s Sound to see Col. Wakefield who has been out here purchasing land, but we heard that the Tory had sailed for Taranake —Went on shore and find that they have made a kind of nominal purchase of land not having been over it to define boundaries or having consulted all parties —Was pleased with the many enquiries for books both native and English, but was unable to supply many. We got under way in the afternoon but were obliged to anchor again for want of wind.
12. Passed a good night, felt better. Arranged matters the wind soon drew ahead, we went into Port Nicholson and anchored there in the afternoon —Lay in bed all day suffering from pain in my bowels.
Nov. 13. Determined to leave the Columbine and go over land to Kapiti. The Rev. H. W. and myself started with about 10 natives in the morn; we landed at a small pa on Richard’s (a native from Waimate) ground, and drew a plan of it; saw two native chapels, which have been lately built, but which are standing on ground which is now sold —went from thence to another Pa and after some conversation with the natives, we had prayers and Mr. W. addressed them and then went to bed.
14. Suffered all night from a severe attack of asthma which obliged me to sit up in my bed. At the dawn of day I fell off to sleep and had rest for about one hour. I had serious thoughts of returning to the vessel, having suffered such extreme pain in the night and feeling very great oppression still in my chest. But after prayer for divine guidance and for strength determined to start on my journey, as I rather feared remaining in Port Nicholson having felt considerable pain in my chest on my former stay there. We started at 9 in the morn, and walked all day with slight intervals of rest thro’ a thick and hilly forest. I suffered much pain in my chest but did not feel tired, and we arrived at a convenient resting place after having crossed 14 rivers at about 6 o’clock, when my
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tent being pitched and having eaten some potatoes I retired to rest. I seemed to be supported beyond my expectation all the day.
Nov. 15. Rose in the morn, much refreshed by a night's rest, free from that distressing pain arising from asthma. Oh, how forgetful am I of the manifold blessings I receive and how much the days of health have hitherto exceeded my days of sickness. Some natives who accompanied us having gone in the even, to Na-ngarau-tawiri, a Pa opposite the Island of Mana, early in the morn, some natives arrived from thence with food and a message from the chief Rangitakaroro requesting us to go over to see him and his people, we went there after breakfast, pressing thro" a wood for about 3 miles. It lies on a small point on the shore. After speeches from the chief and others, in the evening we had prayers and Mr. W. addressed them. They have for some time been in the habit of having prayers since the arrival of Richard. I was much pleased with the disposition of the natives to attend at least externally to divine things.
16. Left the Pa in the morn, and went with the chief in a large canoe with about 60 persons to Mana. It is an island situated about two miles from the land about 3 miles long and two wide, some hundred feet high and quite flat; there are sheep and cattle grazing on it. The natives of the Pa have lately also had service morn, and even. The chief, however, Rangihaiata, is opposed to the Gospel. He is the person who formerly accompanied Rauparaha to the southward in the Elizabeth when acts of the greatest treachery and atrocity were committed by them. We remained there some hours and they supplied our natives with abundance of food. On leaving the chief said that since he had seen Mr. W. he would attend to the Gospel. We left the island in the afternoon in a canoe and went to Hongoeka, a small pa on the mainland about 5 miles from Mana. There were but few natives there, I
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retired early to rest, the wind blew and it rained hard but my tent was comfortable.
17. Lord’s Day. Rose early in the morn, and after a sweet season of prayer went to Mr. W’s tent, had prayers and breakfasted there as usual —We then started to a pa about three miles distant; I remained in the pa. The natives assembled and George, a Ngapuhi native, read prayers and gave a good discourse, we then had school and 1 was much delighted with the attention of the natives and more especially with the earnestness and beauty with which the native Christian enforced on his countrymen the blessedness of receiving and believing the glorious truths of the Gospel —My soul rejoices in the work in which I have engaged. Afterwards went to two crippled men, and had prayers and expounded a chapter to them. They were attentive and well disposed. Mr. W. had even, service and preached and thus the day closed. O Blessed look down and prosper Thine own work!
18. Left Hongoeka at 4i in the morn, and after a rough walk of about 5 miles came to Pukerua where we remained some time with the natives and had breakfast. They were very desirous of obtaining books. We then proceeded past Paripari, Wainui, Pipapa, Wariroa, Waremoku and Paurui and then arrived at Waikanae about 5 having walked about 15 miles, the latter part of our road being hard sandy beach. The natives are at war only acting on the defensive. They met for prayers as soon as we arrived when the Rev. H. W. addressed them, there were near a thousand present. It was an interesting sight and I lifted up my heart to God with feelings of gratitude and prayed that His blessing might come down upon them. Oh, may I labour here abundantly to the glory of my God.
Nov. 19. Rose early. About 9 o’clock the chiefs began to speak. Moturoa, a very pleasing, interesting chief of Port N. began, and was followed by the old chief of the place Reretau-Wangawanga; others spoke in succession. About 2 o’clock crossed over to Kapiti to the place where
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Rauparaha lives. He was sitting in state ready to receive us. He certainly looked more like a chief than any man I have yet seen. He listened very attentively to what was said, and appeared much interested in the Gospel message. He has been one of the most bloodthirsty men in the land; may the Lord have mercy upon him, we had prayers with him and the natives there, and went on board the Atlas, Captain Mathew’s ship for the night, being invited by him.
20. The wind blew so hard in the forenoon that we could not leave the ship. Wrote letters to Mr. Wilson, Ford and Wade. In the afternoon went on shore and spent some time with Rauparaha, had but little time for private reading and prayer—not very well—
21. We slept on board and went early to a flat point of land on the island of Kapiti; saw a few natives; met some Englishmen at a whaling station belonging to Mr. Jones. Several of them with the foreman at their head treated us with great insolence. May the Lord have mercy upon them and give them light. Visited another party who were civil and well behaved. In the afternoon went and saw Rauparaha, purpose leaving on the Morrow (?), had some interesting conversation with a young American.
22. Rose early, had my horses safely brought over in a large canoe to Waikanae. We came across in my boat. After some conversation with the natives went up the river, walked over the ground where the late battle took place among the natives, saw the place where they buried 31 of the Ngatiraukawa —walked for some hours, there are many acres of land covered with grass, wheat, barley and oats mixed together, and fine trees—after prayers with the natives retired to rest.
23. Did not start early Otaki on account of the rain. Left Waikanae about 9 o’clock and walked on a sandy beach for about 11 miles, till we arrived at a small pa near Otaki called Pukakutu, where we stopped on account of the rain, being wet. There is here a large flat piece of land, well watered and abounding with wild ducks—after
282
THE HADFIELD JOURNAL
prayers had some conversation with the Chief of the Pa, Ruru and some others; They trace the war to one act of indiscretion on the part of Paul, a Wesleyan lad at Waikanae, some appear still disposed for war. The chief, who cannot yet read, repeated the even, ch: service, having learnt it orally. Here they have had no instruction but that of a few volunteer natives. Oh, may the Lord pour out His spirit upon this people and upon me, that 1 may come among them with the fulness of the blessing of the Gospel of peace.
24. Lord's Day. We walked with the natives of the small Pa Pakakutu to Rangiuru the large Pa at Otaki and there had Divine service. There were about 600 or 700 present, I was gratified to see so many present as I had been led to understand that most of the inhabitants of this place were disposed to reject the Gospel. We afterwards had school and I was surprised to find many acquainted with the catechisms we have in use. May the Lord look down to bless this people, and may my soul be refreshed with peace and may I be endowed with wisdom to fit me for the work in which I am engaged.
25. Moved from the small Pa to Rangiuru about 9 o’clock. They do not appear very desirous of peace; they will go tomorrow to arrange about it. Did not leave the Pa. Many of the natives here are disinclined to attend to the Gospel, some on the other hand are very attentive. The sons of the chief Watanui, Roha and Haua are interesting, enquiring young men, and can read a little. There were not many present at evening prayers—Oh may I be directed by the Lord as to where I should reside and how I should proceed. Increase my love, O Lord, and a sense of my dependence on Thee, for Christ Jesus’ sake.
26. Spent the day at Rangiuru, went about looking for a site for a small cottage to reside in occasionally. Much pleased with the young men Roha and Haua. They are the most interesting young people I have yet seen. Felt somewhat discouraged at the apparent apathy of the people;
283
FROM AGE TO AGE
but remembered that as a missionary it is my work to break up barren ground. Help, Lord!
27. Went with H.W. to a small Pa about 5 miles distant, called Waikawa, where there was a small chapel and then on to another about 2 miles distant called Ohau, to endeavour to make peace. The people here are very ignorant, one man very urgent for a book. Not very well, retired early to rest.
28. Left Ohau and returned to Rangiuru (about 6 miles) road very good at low waters. Was much interrupted by natives while endeavouring to read in my bed. Walked out to look for a site for a house, fixed on one that will I think do. The people here are not very attentive but few only assemble for prayers. May the Lord fill me with love and endue me with patience and every grace—Help me O Lord! Help me for Jesus’ sake!
29 & 30. Continued till about 3 o’clock in the Pa, then left the Pa to proceed with the natives towards Waikanae to endeavour to establish peace. The mob of natives soon joined us, having had prayers with them we left them and proceeded for about 4 miles, when it being very dark and raining we stopped, and having managed to pitch my tent in the sand, H.W. and myself lay from about 10 o’clock till three, when the mob consisting of about 200 natives with Watanui at their head joined us—They requested us to have prayers with them. We then proceeded all together after they had gone thro’ several native manoeuvres. They remained about two miles from the Pa, we entered it and after some speeches, they determined to establish peace— Matahau was sent out with conditions of peace and the hostile mob returned. The natives of Waikanae in the afternoon went thro’ various military exercises. Suffered all day from pain in my bowels, having caught cold being out at night.
Dec. 1. Lord’s Day. Received the Lord’s Supper with several of our natives. The congregation both in the morn, and in the even, consisted of about 900! In the even, they
284
THE HADFIELD JOURNAL
were particularly attentive, when addressed by the Rev. H. W. on the 3 last v. of Matt. Gos. I was much interested with the school—May the Lord be with me and pour out His spirit upon these people.
2. Have suffered the last three days with a severe complaint in my bowels, from living entirely upon vegetable food. Went to Kapiti—Procured several things from Cap. Mayhew for our trip to Wanganui as the Columbine had not yet arrived. About 100 natives met in the evening for instruction. It was on Mrs. D’s plan from Waimate. I did not like it. I shall stop it. Looked about for a spot for a house. Help me O Lord.
3. Not well, still suffering from my bowels, and remained all day at Waikanae. Walked out with Matahau to look for a place for a house, did not see any suitable place. Mr. W. addressed the natives (about 900). Sat up late talking to Mr. W.
4. Still unwell. Assembled in the chapel and Matahau was baptized by Mr. W. and called Joseph, He is not well instructed, having been a long time from the ministry of the Gospel, but is evidently dependent entirely on the blood of Jesus for pardon and his conduct is in every respect consistent with the profession that he makes—by him undoubtedly as the instrument all the good there is here has been effected. Witnessed the purchase of some land situated beyond Port N. for natives and also Richard’s at Port Nicholson, for the use of the mission. Left Waikanae purposing to proceed to Wanganui as the Columbine had not yet arrived. Reached Otaki, felt very unwell, my bowels much disordered ever since I was out at night with the mob of natives when peace was made. Went to bed as soon as my tent was pitched.
Dec. 5. Suffered all night from violent pains in my bowels, and asthma. Went about 3 in the morn, to Mr. W’s tent and took about 50 drops of laudanum and a little rhubarb, felt a little relieved. Made an attempt about noon to get up but was unwell. Determined having no particular
285
FROM AGE TO AGE
object in view not to proceed to Wanganui. Purpose proceeding when I have books. Mr. W. left me about 2 o’clock on his way thro’ the country —continued suffering continual pain all day.
6th. Felt rather better this morn. Left my tent about 11 and sat with Watanui and his son and wife in the warm sunshine. Returned and sat in my tent reading etc., for some hours. Went to evening service, very few natives assembled, felt cold in returning, which was soon followed by violent pain in my bowels. Took about 49 drops of laudanum and went to bed.
7th. Very unwell all day, my bowels in a very painful, disordered state. Took more laudanum and a little rhubarb (the only medicine I have with me), remained in bed all day. Somewhat annoyed by the ignorant curiosity of the natives. Cap. Mayhew and Brown came to see me. The wind blew so hard in the night that 1 was obliged to go out and fasten my tent. Was in fear lest it should be carried away. Have nothing to eat but boiled flour and biscuit and water, nevertheless felt thankful and satisfied.
Dec. 8. Lord’s Day. Felt somewhat better all day, but unable to move from my bed. somewhat annoyed by the rude noisy behaviour of the natives. Received a letter from my dear brother Charles of May the 6th. Thereby I learnt that all were well at home up to that time: felt thankful. Tho’ many vain thoughts distressed, read and meditated upon God’s word with delight. Thought how unworthy the sufferings of this present time are to be compared to the glory that awaits me: felt desirous to pray for the poor people among whom I live and among whom I hope to spend my few remaining days. O may the Lord bless me and them.
9th. Felt much better. Determined for many reasons to leave Otaki and go to Waikanae. Started with three natives about 10 and after being some time in the rain and much fatigued. I reached it, at least a quiet spot just by—l had some boiled flour for my dinner, and sat over a fire talking
286
THE HADFIELD JOURNAI
with natives—Heard that the Columbine had just arrived Fill my heart with gratitude to Thee O my God.
Dec. 10th. Felt better all day but not well—confined to my tent by the rain, read a little and prayed a little —have nothing but boiled flour which does not agree with me— Oh may I live more with my God.
11th. Went early to the Pa—There were some Englishmen there in trouble because X . . . having uttered an oath the day before the Chief Witi detained their boat. The chief would not attend to anything they said but went with me to the Columbine at Kapiti—Capt. Lewington says that he has met with very bad weather; went on shore and looked after my things. Felt still very unwell; took a strong dose of castor oil and went to bed on board at about 6 o’clock.
12th. Passed a good night, felt better. Arranged matters and left the Columbine. As soon as I landed the men came to me and asked me to intercede for the boat —I spoke to the chief and for a slight payment he allowed the boat to go. Fixed on a spot in the Pa for a site for a house for the present. The natives are very civil and disposed to assist me in any manner. O Blessed, may I look up to Thee for help and put my trust in Thee alone.
13th. My health a little improved, walked about noon towards Waikanae, stopped and talked with several small parties of natives. Learnt that a man had been murdered at Otaki; he was the brother of Joseph and was murdered by Puatara. Continued a short time in the Pa, saw a few preparations for my house. On account of the extreme heat of the sun went for a few hours into a native house and was covered with vermin. Felt my soul somewhat drawn towards God in thought and prayer, feel ready to endure anything for the honour and glory of Christ in His service, tho’ dwelling in a tent among these people with whose language I am still unacquainted, I would not change my lot with any person in the world.
287
FROM AGE TO AGE
14. Came early to the Pa and took up my abode with Witi, the principal chief, (son of the old chief Reretauwangawangu) is extremely civil. Occupied in various arrangements also in studying the language. Have mercy O Lord upon my manifold sins and infirmities for Jesus’ sake.
Dec. 15th. Lord’s Day. The service was conducted in the morn, by Cranmer, the Christian native who accompanied me. Afterwards we had school. In the even. I for the first time read the native service. Simon, a Christian native, gave an address from Cob. 11l 1-3 in a very able manner. Before service for several reasons 1 felt in rather low-spirits—a Wesleyan lad Paul has set up an opposition service in the Pa etc., etc., but during the service and even before when I saw the natives crowding to the chapel till many were obliged to stand and many to remain outside, I looked up with thankfulness to the Lord and gave thanks —Help me O Lord continually!
16th. Rose at half past four in the morn, and began school in the Pa after service. The sight was indeed pleasing. There were about 180 men and boys engaged in four different classes in learning to write on slates—we have but four able to teach. It was indeed interesting to see the old chief Reretau-wangawangu beginning to learn to write and read—and others as old. 1 have not yet devised a plan for the women. There were about 150 of them but having no teachers or slates, they were instructed only in the catechisms. O that I had help here. I trust shortly to get the school into good order. Went after breakfast over to Kapiti and brought more slates. Old Rauparaha came and attacked me and said that I had forsaken him and carried all my things to the other side. I gave him a testament and some small books—he used bad language and intimated to me that if I did not supply all his wants he would not favour the Gospel, and that many would be influenced and guided by him, he stated moreover that he would stir up another attack upon
288
THE HADFIELD JOURNAL
Waikanae. In fact I was much disgusted with him, and will be civil to him on account of his great influence but I can now see into his character and shall know how far to trust him. Felt unwell all day. May the Lord strengthen me. Paul attended school in the morn. As a teacher 1 said nothing to him, but he came afterwards into my tent and asked for a New Testament. I told him I had something to say to him and spoke to him of the impropriety of his conduct in making aspersions. He said he was willing to join me in everything but that those who went to him for instruction were not. I told him to consider and speak to them in the even, at service.
17th. Went to school before 5 o’clock, the numbers have increased since yesterday but I have not yet sufficiently ascertained their knowledge to classify them. Was much pleased and delighted with it. After breakfast rode to Otaki on the hard sandy beach and carried a few books in my pocket. Went first to Pakakutu and was much pleased with the chief Rura to whom I gave a Testament and some small books. He appeared very grateful; he is I trust really drawn to spiritual things. I then went to Rangiuru and sat for an hour and a half with Watanui and his sons. I gave him and one of his sons each a book. I learnt from some notes to natives that Mr. W. was at Rangitiki, having met a party of natives coming from Taranake to join these people; he remained there and persuaded them to return —I rode back to Waikanae.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Life and Episcopate of George Augustus Selwyn, Tucker
Te Ika a Maui, R. Taylor,
Past and Present of New Zealand, R. Taylor
Adventure in New Zealand, E. Jerningham Wakefield
Te Hckenga. R. A. McDonald.
Maori and Pakcha, Shrimpton and Mulgan
The City of the Strait, Alan Mulgan.
Early Wellington, L. Ward.
Life of Octavius Hadfield (Unpublished), R. G. C. McNab.
History of the New Zealand Church, H. Jacobs.
The English Church in New Zealand, H. T. Purchas.
Early Days in Whanganui, Chappie and Barton
History of Wanganui Collegiate School, H. G. Carver
Diocesan Year Books.
Church Chronicle.
Church and People.
289
INDEX
This index does not cover the names in the clergy lists nor the Had field Journal.
A
Abraham Charles, Bishop, 40, 41
73-76, 122
Aglionby, 65
Akaroa, 12
Allan, James Gordon, 181
Andrew, 85
Aramoho, 212
Archdeacon of Kapiti, 37-40
Archdeacons, 181
Askew, C. R, 103, 104
Atlas, 9
Auckland, 42, 87
Azariah, Bishop, 111
B
Baber, Miss, 159
Barrett, 59
Ballinger, Thomas, 148
Bengal Merchant, 61
Berhampore, 183
Beswick, Sister, 176
Bethune, K, 62
Bible Class Union, 155
Bickersteth, 111
Bingham’s Antiquities, 84
Birch, W. 158
Bishop's Fighting Fund, 115
Bolton Street Cemetery, 64, 132
Boys’ Home Society, 145
Bretton, W. F., 128
Britannia, 59
Brooklyn, 183
Broughton, Bishop, 5, 27
Buchanan, 62
Buckingham, Mrs C. R., 155
Bullock, William, 117, 118
Butler, S. G., 62
Bumly, John, 60
Button, R. L„ 148
Bulls-Rongotea, 205
Buxton, Mrs, 67
c
Carterton, 199
Carter, F. J., 169
Cathedral, 89, 103, 115, 128
C.E.M.S., 98, 103, 141
Cheung Wing-Nok, 177
Chinese Mission, 90, 176
Chung John Yan Laap, 178
Church Chronicle, 91, 93, 115, 154
Church Schools, 109, 158
Churton, J. F., 63
City Mission, 147
Coffey, R„ 92, 104
Cowle, M. P„ 151
Cole, R„ 63, 65
Compton, A. W. H., 96, 162
D
Davies, D. J„ 125
Davies, J. C., 116
Davis, Richard, 7, 60
Davys, G. P., 147
Desbois, D„ 68
Diocesan Fund, 84
Diocesan Youth Council, 157
Durrad, W. 1., 11l D'Urville Island, 12, 29
D'Urville Island, 12, 29
E
Eastbourne, 191
Eketahuna, 200
Eltham, 215
Empson, Walter, 161
Episcopal Church of America, 52
Evans, H. E., 181
Evans, William, 46, 63
F
Fancourt, Thomas, 66, 81, 83, 85, 106, 169
Featherstone, 40
290
246
INDEX
Fcatherslon, 200
Holland, Herbert, St. Barbe, Bishop, 114-120, 128, 165
Feilding, 206
Fitzherbert, 40
Holm, Miss, 158
Fitzgerald, 34
Homes, Church, 110, 145, 146
Fitzroy, 63
Hongi, 3, 11. 60
Flux, 85
Hunter, George, 62
Fox, Sir William, 39
Hunterville, 207
Foxton, 206
I
France, W„ 66, 85
Illingworth, 91
G
Inter-Church Council, 115, 165 10, 16
General Church Fund, 107, 115, 167
Island Bay, 61
General Mission of Help, 96
Isaacson, C. H., 11l
General Synod, 55, 57, 80
J
Girls' Friendly Society, 144
Gladstone, W. H., 43
lacobs, Henry, 56
Godley, J. R., 66
Johnsonville, 65, 192
Gonville, 215
Julius, Archbishop, 98
Gore Brown, 40
Goldthorpe. H. J. L„ 167
K
Govett, H., 66
Kaiapohia, 12, 13
Grey, Sir George, 34, 43, 46, 41
Kaikokirikiri, 171
Greytown, 68, 201
Kapiti, I, 6, II
Karori, 64, 184
H
Kemble, Robert, 62
Kelburn, 185
Hadftcld, Octavius, Bishop. 1, 7, 9, 13, 14, 19, 26, 35, 63, 73. 78-85
Kennedy, W. F., 169
Kennedy, H,, 97
Kenworthy, Hilda, 176
Hadfield Hostel, 162
Kereopa, 21
Hadfield Memorial College, 96
Hadfield Journal, 225
Kendall, Thomas, 2, 3
Hadfield, Catherine, 38
Khandallah, 192
Kilbirnie. 186
Hadfield, Amy, 38, 125
King, John, 2
Hadfield, E„ 103, 181
Hall, William, 2
King Movement, 15, 68
Hansell, A. L„ 90, 127
Kiwitea, 208
Knell, Amos, 68
Hands, J„ 111
Harrington Trust, 162
Harvey, B. W„ 161
L
Harper, C. C„ 108
Lay Readers, 142
Hawera, 216
Lee, Miss S. M., 176
Hawtrey, Montague, 61
Levin, 12, 207
Hawtrey, L, 65
Lichfield, 48, 73
Hawtrey, S., 65
Lower Hutt, 197
Haynes, 85 LJ Anrlaro/sn TomAL' 1 (1 \
Lyall Bay, 187
Henderson, James, 103
Lyon, William, 62
Herald, 4 Utytl-A/xM T \ 4 1 Afi
Hickson, J. M„ 108
M
Higgs, J. R., 158
Hikurangi College, 172
MacFarlane, John, 61
Heu-Heu, Te, 21
McWilliam, James, 106
Makara, 11, 64, 66
Hobbs, John. 60
Mak, Pei Tak, 177
Hobson, Governor, 31
247
INDEX
Mak, Timothy, 178
Palmerston North, 211, 212
Main Trunk, 93-94
Papawai. 67, 120
Manihera, 21
Palea, 219
Paualahanui, 66, 195
Malcolm. D. B„ 116
Mangatainoka, 203
Payne, A. W., 107, 118
Manawatu, 13
Pakaraka, 60
Mangaweka, 203
Paul, St., Church of. 64, 66, 75. 212
Marsden, Samuel, 1-5, 10
Peck, F„ 104
Marsden School, 159
Martin, Sir William, 46, 47, 54
Peter, St., Church of, 64, 66, 75
Petrie, F. H., 119, 127
Martin, A., 158
Martin, W. L„ 67
Petone, 58, 61, 196
Marlin, W. F„ 181
Pohangina, 213
Pollock, 97
Martinborough, 201
Marton, 210
Porirua, 12, 64, 197
Maori Educational Trusts. 117. 169
Porirua School Trust, 99. 170
Putiki. 18, 19. 25, 64
Maori Mission, 174, 182
Mason, John, 18, 19, 64
Q
Masterton, 68, 202
Matthews, O. J„ 151
Queen Charlotte Sound, 29
Maunsell, 4
Queen Elizabeth, 120, 128
Missionary Committee, 174
Quick, William Henry, 181
Missionary Exhibition, 111
Missions to Seamen, 150
R
Moore, James, 150
Morgan, Olive, 176
Raine, W., 148
Morley, 95
Ramsden, Eric, 38
Mothers’ Union, 139
Rangiatea, 16
Muaupoko. 11, 12
Rangihaeata, 12, 13
Rangitikei, 11
N
Rauparaha, Te, 5, 6. 9, 11, 12, 13, 34, 37, 170
National Council of Churches, 115, 117, 166
Relations with other Churches, 164
Newman, J. H., 43
Rickaby, G. A. T., 95
New Zealand Company, 7. 59
Rich, Eric John, Bishop, 125, 126
Ngaio, 194
Richmond, 40
Nga Tawa, 110, 158
Ripahau, 5, 6
Nicholls, C. H. S„ 160
Riddiford, 159
Nireaha, 95
Riwai, Te Ahu, 15, 28
Northland, 186
Ronaldson, 67
Rotorua, 4, 10
O
Rosenealh. 187
Ohakune-Raetihi, 217
Ruatara, 2
Ohariu, 65, 66
Russell, J. D.. 140
Opunake, 218
Orakau, 15
S
Otaki, 12, 26-35, 211
Owen, Reginald Herbert, Archbishop, 121-130
Sanders, Arundel, 167
Seatoun-Strathmore, 188
P
Selwyn, G. A., Bishop, 34, 36, 37, 42-49, 63, 65, 67, 80. 160
Shannon, 213
Pahiatua, 203
Shirtcliffe. Sir George, 103, 158
Paihia, 5, 6
293
INDEX
Small, J, C„ 85
W
Smith, Sister Amy, 176
Sprott, Thomas Henry, Bishop, 91, 96, 101-113
Wadeslown, 186
Wakefield, Edward Gibbon, 58, 59
Sprott, Edith, 112, 114
Wakefield, E. J„ 30
Sprott, S. T. C„ 15, 169
Wakefield, Colonel William. 7, 30, 58, 59
S.P.C.k.,’ 75
S.P.G., 75
Waitangi, 15, 31, 39
Squires, Harry, 149, 150
Waiapu, 4, 10
*t, iu Waikanae, 8, 12, 14, 26-35
St. Hill’, J. H.,’34, 166
Waikato. 4. 10, II
St. Hill, H. W„ 66, 67
St. Mary's Guild, 145
Wallis, Frederic, Bishop, 87-100
Stock, A., 64, 75, 81
Wairarapa, 11, 67
Strang. Robert, 62
Wanganui, 14
it Wanganui, Christchurch. 220
Stuart, 98
Sunday Schools. 153
Wanganui, East, 221
Swainson, M. A., 157
Wanganui, Parochial, 221
Wanganui Collegiate School. 82. 160
Swainson, William, 54
T
Walton, W. H„ 147
Waiwhetu. 199
Taihape, 214
Watts-Ditchfield. Bishop. 141
Taita, 197
Waverley-Waitotara, 222
Watson, H„ 117. 128
Taitai, 65
Tamihana. Te Rauparaha, 6. 28. 63
Wellington—
St. Paul’s Cathedral Church. 189
Taylor. Richard, 10, 18, 25, 38. 64
St. Peter's, 190
St. Mark’s, 190 C. I
Taylor, T. Fielden, 110, 118, 148, 156
St. Thomas’s, 191
Wellesley Club. 102
Teakle, J. F., 68
Weller, 94
Teaching Mission. 123
Wells Organisation. 129
Te Aro, 58
West-Watson, Campbell. Archbishop, 121, 165
Te Aute, 37, 172
Telford. J., 24, 62
Whi-Whi, Te, (Matene), 6. 28
Temple. William. Archbishop. 121, 165
Williams! A.’ 0., 174
Tinui, 204
Williams, H„ 1, 3, 4, 7, 9. 14. 18, 31, 45, 60
Tollemache, A. G.. 43
Williams. 5.,’36, 176
Toomath, 66, 85
Williams, W.. Bishop, 4, 7. 55
Tory, 58, 61
Williams! W.' G„ 175
Wilson. J., 56
Wiremu Kingi, 27, 39, 78
Wong, David, 91, 176
Towgood, A. Y„ 105
Treaty of Waitangi, 15, 31
Trentham, 198
Trinity College. Porirua. 171
Woolcombe. H. S.. Bishop. 98, 141
Wordsworth. Bishop, 87. 90. 91, 99
u
Undine, 53 I T U..»* ec. 1 HO
Upper Hutt. 66. 198
Y
V
Yates, Frances. 62
Young, Mrs, 107
Victoria College. 96, 162
Young. J. R.. 143
Permanent link to this item
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Bibliographic details
APA: Monaghan, H. W. (Harold Wyatt). (1957). From age to age : the story of the Church of England in the Diocese of Wellington, 1858-1958. Standing Committee of the Diocese of Wellington.
Chicago: Monaghan, H. W. (Harold Wyatt). From age to age : the story of the Church of England in the Diocese of Wellington, 1858-1958. Wellington, N.Z.: Standing Committee of the Diocese of Wellington, 1957.
MLA: Monaghan, H. W. (Harold Wyatt). From age to age : the story of the Church of England in the Diocese of Wellington, 1858-1958. Standing Committee of the Diocese of Wellington, 1957.
Word Count
80,607
From age to age : the story of the Church of England in the Diocese of Wellington, 1858-1958 Monaghan, H. W. (Harold Wyatt), Standing Committee of the Diocese of Wellington, Wellington, N.Z., 1957
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