THE STORY OF AUCKLAND.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 215, 11 September 1928, Page 6

THE STORY OF AUCKLAND.

BEGINNINGS OF SETTLEMENT. EARLY LAND PURCHASES. (By JAMES COWAN.) NO. VIII. In the last article reference was made to the purchase by the Government from the NgatiWhatua tribe of three thousand acres, the site of Auckland City. The list of articles accepted in payment for this then waste land tells us what then constituted some of the most desirable commodities in Maoridom. All that the chiefs received in "gold money" was £56—it wasn't much use to them then. More valuable were the goods that were landed from- the pakeha's schooner and laid before them on the village marae. Fifty blankets, twenty pairs of trousers, twenty shirts, ten waistcoats, ten caps, four cases of tobacco, a box of tobacco pipes, a hundred yards of "gownpieces" for the wahines, ten "kohua" or threelegged iron pots, a Dag of sugar, a bag of flour, and twenty tomahawks. Observe, no guns or gunpowder. The New Zealand Land Company's heads at Wellington were less scrupulous about giving firearms to the native vendors of land. They handed out scores of muskets and much powder and lead; the Ngati-Awa owners of the Port Nicholson shores desired guns above anything else, to defend themselves against their old foes on the West Coast and in the Wairarapa. Suca was the manner in which the pakeha acquired the land on which many millions worth of property now stands—land worth in parts probably as much per foot as the whole of the sovereigns which Kawau and Tinana and Te Reweti tied in the corners of their blankets after the transaction. Campbell's Isle of the Sea. This immensely important deal in "real estate was not, however, the first sale of Waitemata territory to the pakeha. That historic little island Motu-Korea, or Brown's Island, was purchased many weeks before the first land-buving agents of the Government sailed into the harbour. Sir John Logan Campbell, the youn~ doctor without a practice, and bis mate Brown had bought the island from tl >e Hauraki chiefs and were chopping away at 'heir canoe log in the forest of Waiomo a full month before the Governor came to make his first reconnaissance of the Waitemata shores.

Where Auckland's Suburbs Spread. tw' u^t T oi V* other P ri ™pal purchases of Tamaki isthmus lands in the early 'forties may be recorded here. In June, 1841, the Government bought from the chiefs of the Ngati-Whatua tribe a large block of land linking up with the first L™ C iTU 0f , m s iD i and ter rito g ry. P The area S£ cerned extended from Hobson Bay to Maungataekie, and thence westward to the Whau portaee waters. The northern boundary appears to have fen. V "I, 0 ' ?°^°. n B *y from (below Parnell and Brighton Road) to the eastern side of the bay, near Orakei Basin. Besides the old warrior chief, Apihai te Kawau, the sellers included his son Te Hira and his nephew Paora Tuhaere, afterwards such a. well kWn JK> Auckland City. The GovernmSt sentative who signed the deed was J. J. Symonds • another signature was that of H. H. Turton. The price paid for the block was £200 in gold four hlJ^S 5 - J >U « * 1841 was the Kohimarama block, which Mr. George Clarke bought for the Government from Puhata, of the Ngati-Paoa?trib£ and several other chiefs. The purchase price tor teS'SSt W? f £ !°° i" caßh ' *"» larS boat with sails, two hundred blankets, a hundred Md the **"* nn °»bcr of shirte f«™.£ 1 $ e8 * man rtren « ta "ould be grandly uniformed for the next church parade), ten niecea print and forty shawls for the wah£ 5£ casks of tobacco, ten pairs of boots, some flJur and sugar and two crosscut saws and two pit iSJV 1 T n «*«* timber men? and loaded ships with kauri at Waiheke and Coromandel) That.afterwards noted man" MaoTi tores?' ' witneßßed tlw <***■' signl-

Remuera and Ohinerau. frnJ^^^ 1 ! to P?" of extending H » bßon to J the ** at th 3 eastern >ide hi. H ™L ?f y a ? d *° the Parew » or Orakei Si?' FZLP* "^f 0 * of l ««*iM in 1844 and the track leading to the Tamaki past the foot of th«' mountam and stretching thencVdown for some way towards the Waitemata was purchased by the Government agents from Epiha Putini and others for £50. This chief, b£ the way, was quamtty named. His Maori' nine was drop^d »ifii!, Wa A ba Pl i9ed ** the visionaries, ana he was burdened with Jabez Buntimr, of which Fnihl Pntinifc the Maorified forn7*Mr* aSttfft !*££?- gentleman in England! a great supporter of missions to the pagan Thence ™h P? 1 * "im in the lanTof tattoo of Remuera land, an area bearing the noeUc name Ohinerau, "The Place of Man? gSsCb sea tm w a .° f n th \ Blo £r, betWeen Mt - Hobson and The" purchased for £150. This land of lovelv and shrubs, with here and there overerown cnhU vjtmns, was sold by the Ngati-Whatua^efa lof1 of

.^j 1 ? 8 ""eMaori owners, headed by old Hawaii £ JS"£2JK mn - d*• Whaniortagf pS of the district now known as AvoJS.iT 8 strip of land extending toX" £™au,Vg<> * pakeha officii 2f" Vario ? B "actions by the ana expand, with numerous small farm* o»TYL outskirts to help feed the T 1 ! on the Ranges and the the Wauroa

Along the Coast. in *Jf BB ' ** «"!*>» "lands Lmtt S» P«*e»«y attracted the Government v£S\ M one i° f purchases (April! ™i? T^L 1 ? 18 ? block of buih land at Menu! EZ. M**?* " BevenU of «>e Hauraki tribes had interests. The principal items in the payment for this tract of terras JJe w£T «i * mmher ? f * iowsrß of Highland ongin-were £300 in gold, four hundred blankets, and as much elothinl tobacco -oforth aa would have owners certainly seem to have^cSved Buying, the Hauraki Islands. Motutapu was the first of the gulf, islands to teke tteeye of m .Crown buyer. The this C£m"«.* James Maxwell. He Mn£?«™ ldand * * Motutapu, Motuhurakia, 'ISS^2T 1 5. ai g °£& f ° r *» in H™ *^i. til «3 a 5 , "d Wndred tribes. ™L S ??■ i firßt . time «re»nns figure in the record of articles given in payment. Four double barrel guns and eighty blankets were the d£ tSKJSZ* **? tw * n *y <«rtoucb3 boxes, SJ rbCle " ° f for *• "***% *v X «"*" aome y«ara later, in the 'fifties that «*ngitoto Island, estimated area 4518 J~llTo be oontftmad.)]