FIFTY YEARS TO-DAY

Auckland Star, Volume XLVI, Issue 66, 18 March 1915, Page 3

FIFTY YEARS TO-DAY

SINCE THE FOUNDATION OF BOMBAY. - JUBILEE CELEBRATIONS. OLD COLONISTS' RE-UNION. To-day is the jubilee of the arrival in Auckland in 1865 of. the ship Bombay, from London, and of. the foundation of I tbe settlement of the same name. Great 1 preparations were marie for the occasion, and, apart from the sports meeting and a dance in the evening, an old colonists' re-union, at which it was expected there ■would be present about 1,000 of the early pioneers of the district and their descendants, was arranged for the afternoon. It is to be hoped that the proceedings were not hampered by such unfavourable weather as was experienced in the city for the best part of the day. Upwards of 500 pioneers and their descendants at the present time reside in the Bombay district, while many others are scattered all over the Auckland province. The ship Bombay, under the command iof Captain Sellars, left London on November 22, 1864, with about 400 souls on board, and arrived in Auckland on March '18 of the following year. The voyage was not without incident, one of the most unpleasant experiences being that which happened when the ship was about 400 miles from the coast of New Zealand. She here encountered a terrible storm, which demolished the bowsprit and the foremast, and on . the following day the mizzen topmast and the mainmast also were carried away. On the 10th, when the storm had exhausted itself, the crew took the opportunity of rigging a jury I mast, and in this plight the Bombay was I discovered by the barque Constance, on tbe way from Hobart to Auckland. ' The damaged vessel was then taken in tow, but the hawsers broke, and the Constance had to stand by until the next morning, the captain signalling then that it was going to be calm, and.that he would go on and report the condition of the Bombay to the agent in .Auckland, so that a tug could be sent out to assist. Before the I tug arrived, however, H.ALs. Curacoa took the vessel in tow and brought her safely to port. On dry soil once more, the emigrants were conveyed to Onehunga in drays, and thence to Drury by boats, some of them taking nearly three days to make the passage owing to sticking on the sandbanks. The journey to "Williamson's Clearing, as the Bombay district was then known, was completed by drays. The district in tlieee days was covered with dense bush, with; : the excxeptjon of a strip a few chains Jn width on each side of the Greaf South RoaiT, along which the bush had been felled to facilitate the works of the troops during, the war. Each, male passenger by the-Bombay received a free grant of 10 acres.. of .this dense bush, and the first work of the new arrivals was tfiat of clearing roads through it at 5/ a day. In charge of the work was the late Mr. James Mellsop. At a meeting of settlers convened for. the purpose of deciding upon a name for the settlement, the name of the good ship which had brought them safely through storm and tempest to their destination was chosen.