ODD CHAPTERS FROM NEW ZEALAND HISTORY.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 3, Issue 229, 27 September 1878, Page 3

ODD CHAPTERS FROM NEW ZEALAND HISTORY.

{From the New. 'Zealander.] THE NANTO BORDELAISE COMPANY. Though, perchance, somewhat out of chronological order, the. attempt to form a French settlement in the Middle Island may follow, pertinently in-rthese papers, the narration of the intention to found a semi-French kingdom in these Islands. That the French Government had serious intentions of establishing colonies in the South Pacific, and a penal colony in New Zealand, is apparent from the angry debates in the French Chamber of Deputies on the 27th, 28th, and 29th of May, 1844, when M. Guizot, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, declared that after v repeatedly repudiating the sovereignty of New Zealand, the British Government was induced, by the proceedings of a rich and powerful company (the New Zealand Oompany), to adopt measures by which the acquisition of that sovereignty had been completed, at a time when vessels from . France .were on their voyage to .New Zealand for the like purpose." M. Guizot was, however, misinformed, as the sovereignty was proclaimed prior to ihe despatch of the vessels mentioned.

In August, 1838, 'fejj Captain L'Anglois, the master of a whaler, purchased, he asserted, from the natives on Banks Peninsuhv& block of land defined in the claim as follows :—" All Banks Peninsu'ii, in the Middle Island of New Zealand, with the exception of the Bay of Hikuraki and Oihoa on the south, and Sandy Beach north of Port Cooper; the I supposed contents ..0,000 acres." The block included the whole of the head of the Akaroa harbor and the site of the present town. Two deeds exist in the French language purporting to convey this cession of land, but they were probably not executed—but of this there is no certainly — until the return of Captain L'Anglois and M. de Belligny in 1840, after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi; neither was there any evidence, either native or European, that such a purchase had been completed in 1838, save that of one, George Fleuret, who disposed to the belief, " than an agreement was then made by Captain L'Anglois for the purchase of some quantity of land." Fleuret was desirous of remaining on the Peninsula, when the Cacheloe—the vessel in which he was serving — went away ; but on the Captain's remonstrance with him, that he could not stay there alone, and that he the Captain, intended to return, he continued the voyage, and returned with the other immigrants in the Comte de Paris in August, 1840. On his consenting to return, on his first voyage, the Captain showed him " a paper, which he said was a contract or agreement, signed by a native named Chigarry (?) for the disposal of, or promise to dispose of, land to him, Captain L'Anglois upon, his return to New Zealand." He also added in his evidence, that he saw the Captain " give some pantaloons and cloaks to the native Chigarry, and others; which I understood was on account of the payment he had promised the natives for land." The full amount of the purchase money, in kind, was to have been £240, of which amount only £6 was paid by the. Captain, in 1838. Upon the Captain's return to France, he ceded his right and title to his reputed purchase to a company consisting " of two mercantile houses at Nantz, two at Bordeaux, and three gentlemen of Paris, who formed a company called the Nanto Bordelaise Compagnie, reserving to himself an interest to the amount of one-fifth in the said Company, aud giving up the deed of sale from the natives, as his subscription of 6000 francs to become a partner to the amount of one-fifth in the company. " There is a certified copy of this deed, which is some length, to be found in the proceedings of the " Ne\y Zealand Company," but it carries no native signature o. mark, as would have been the case had it been completed. We are told by M. S. de Berlingy, who styled himself the* Company's sigent, that, the object of the expedition was " the colonisation of the Middle Island of New Zealand, and for fishing upon its coasts;" and that the Company was formed before it possessed the slightest knowledge of the intention of the English Government to take possession of the said Island. " A similar amount of ignorance, however, was not manifested on the English side of the Channel, as the New Zealand Journal in February of the same year, prior to the departure of Captain L'Anglois on his second voyage, remarks :—" If the French Government should send her political prisoners to British New Zealand, let it he clearly understood that they are free the instant they set foot on British land. France can exercise no jurisdiction over them there, and supposing the projet should ever ripen into action, which is very improbable ; should the sons of France accept the hand of friendship, which we are quite sure will be held out to them, the New Zealand community will be the better of their peculiar intelligence and skill." This, it should be remembered, was a comment on an article in the Journal dv Havre on the question whether the Middle Island was a suitable place for the deportation of criminals, the company having agreed to cede to the Government a portion of their acquired territory for this purpose— it being in "an excellent position for defence as' well as climate." The Company had a capital of one million francs (under £42,000), a sixth of which was only paid up, but the company had agreed to cede to the French Government one fifth of its territory " to establish a penal settlement," Accordingly, the ship Compte de Paris sailed from Rocheford, commanded by Capt. L'Anglois. Louis. Philippe was an interested party in the Company, and. gave " a grant of money and picked men from the Royal Navy as a subsidy to the expedition. The emigrants,,who were 63 in number, although stated in the Journal dcs Debate to number 100, comprising 30 men, 11 women, and 22 children, complained while on board, and after arrival, of the treatment they received on, their passage—as other imriiigrants have since that early date so frequently done. But those French pioneers had certainly a considerable reason for thus murmuring, for although the good ship Comte de Paris had a complete whaling crew, men enough to man four six-oared boats and work the ship at the same time, the captain made the emigrants work in the same mariner as the crew, with the exception of their not being compelled to go aloft and furl or make sail. The immigrants' on landing were to have been " furnished with the necessaries required by the climate, and the implements necessary for the carrying out the mission they were commissioned to fulfil, and to have provisions to serve for twelve months, counting from the time of landing, and five acres of land per adult. These conditions it appears were not .carried out in their integrity."

Five days previous to the arrival of the Comte de Paris, H.M.S. Britomart arrived at the Peninsula, and took possession of the Island in the. name ,of the Crown; whether legally or otherwise is a moot point, as the French flag had been planted ou the Peninsula in 1838, by Commodore Cuille, of the Heroine. Three days later the French frigate L'Aube, commanded by Commodore Lavaud, arrived, and on August the 13th, two days biter, the immigrant's also, having been on Loard from the latter end of February. Among the stores brought were 6 long 24 pounders, which, upon Captain Stanley's remonstrating with Commodore Lavaud, were not allowed to be landed. Mr Robinson, who came from the Bay of Islands in the Cuille, was left there as Magistrate, and from the Gazette we learn that the commodore was particularly hospitable, and offered to send his carpenter on shore to build a house for Mr Robinson, and insisted upon that gentleman's living on board the L'Aube during her stay in the waters of the Peninsula, which offer, of course, was gratefully accepted until the completion of the magisterial residence. On the 19th the immigrants landed in " a sheltered, well chosen, part of the bay, where they could not interfere with anyone," and commenced, with the characteristic industry of the French workman, to erect houses and cultivate land ; and so successful was one of the cultivators, that the Constitutionnel of the following year, commenting on the progress of the Colony, stated that one of the colonists who had planted himself a league from Akaroa, had, with the aid of his wife, from two acres and a-half of land, cleared, in five months, 1500f., by the sale of vegetables. The English inhabitants of the Peninsula, at the time of the landing of the French immigrants amounted to 84 adults, and their children, 80 from this source the 1500f. would probably partially come. At the end of the year the immigrants had not procured any stock, but were living on preserved and salt meats, with what vegetables they could get from their " small gardens," while the commodore of the L'Aube had commenced building a store for them to protect their property!rom the weather. It must be remembered that the frigate stayed at Akaroa for a lengtheened period ; and the commodore therby rrogated to himself the domination of the settlement, but avowed most distinctly to Captain Hobson tbat he " disclaimed any national intrusion on the part of his Government, but he supported the claims of the company as private individuals, asserting this to be the only bona fide purchase of that district which had been made from the natives." It was at this time, November 1841, thatthe Governor made the proposal that the company should be given similar terms to the New Zealand Company, and put in possession of a block of laud in proportion to their outlay of capital in the extreme northern district of the North Island—" in the District of Kataia, where there is a good harbor, with an abundance of fine land with an undulating surface well adapted for vineyards." This proposal was not adopted, and early in the following year, 1842, Monsieur Mailleres arrived in England to make arrangements with the Government, with a view to the settlement of the claim and the company's title ; when the " Colonial Land and Emigration Commissioners " found that an expenditure by the company of £11,685 had been incurred, including, of course, the subsidy obtained from Louis Philippe. In 1845 Lord Stanley authorised an award should be given to the company of 30,000 acres, their claim not having been brought before the Commissioners appointed to inquire into land claims. This paper and narrative cannot be better concluded than by quoting a paragraph from Mr Mackay, in his sf cond volume c n Southern Native affairs: "The New Zealand Co. purchased the claims of the Nanto Bordelaise Company, and in virtue of other subsequent arrangements, whatever lands the New Zealand Company possessed have reverted to the Crown, but through all these proceedings the original question as to what extent the native title has been extinguished by the French Company has never been decided." After the cession of the territory to the New Zealand Company, the French Government offered to take the emigrants free of charge to Tahiti, and give them the same amount of property as they possesed in New Zealand, but they all declined the offer.