FOUNDATION OF THE CITY.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 20087, 17 November 1930, Page 13

FOUNDATION OF THE CITY.

DEBT TO WEST OF ENGLAND. ''lt's thanks to the West ot lingland that Christchurch exists. declared his Excellency the GovernorGeneral (Lord Bledisioe) at the reception given to him and Lady- Bledisloe bv the Canterbury West ol England Society on Saturday evening "We ol ibe Western Counties mn.-t be proudly conscious," he added. "that Chi'isiehurcli, with all it* boastfuluess and well-founded pride, was conceived by Edward Gibbon Wakefield and born on the Malvern Hills, well in sight of the city of Gloucester and the borough of Cheltenham. "in 1817—-as you all know, or ought to know—three people sat, so the legend goes, . basking in the tsun on

i\w Molvoni Mills, niid decided Untti Cliristohureli should exist in a barren, tar-off plain, then of nothing but tus-it-cks. The first of those three people v.-sis Kdivard Gibbon Wakefield—m spite of his ' youthful delinquencies a lireat .man, to whom the Empire owes much, and A'ew Zealand, one can say, nil. A worthy monument, by the way. •has yet to lie erected in New Zealand t</ that- far-sighted Imperialist. By Wakefield's side were Lord Lvttelton, :i resident of the district and a wel;liiiown Anglican Churchman, and John Robert Oo:lley, known to you all as the founder of Christchurch by flic statue that stands in your Square.