THE TOWNSHIP OF BEALEY

Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21461, 1 May 1935, Page 17

THE TOWNSHIP OF BEALEY

«——^—— A- Forgotten Site NEW WAtMAKARIRI BRIDGE Within the next fortnight or zo the neat white huts of the Public Works Department's camp on the southern bank of the Waimakariri at Bealey will be removed across the river, and the work of constructing the northern approach to the bridge will begin. Excellent progress had been made., on the northern approach., which stands high above the river-bed. Three concrete piles, driven experimentally into the shingle, denote the spot from which the bridge is to be built. The Government's decision to construct the bridge at Bealey marks an important anniversary in the history of Canterbury and Westland. It is just 70 years since the opening of the West Coast road, that narrow highway which, from the sixties onward, beokoned men westward with "a linger dioped in gold." For nearly a quarter of" a century the only road across the Southern Alps has awaited its final connecting link between east and west; and, strangely enough, the new site for the Public Works' camp, on the spot now called Klondike, will be identical with that cf an old mountain township, the last traces of which have long since disappeared. The Town of Bealey

When, in August, 1365, Thomas Trip-' hook, under instructions from Cyrus Davie, Canterbury's third surveyor-m----chief, laid out the town of Bealey on the tussock flats at the junction of the Waimakariri and Bealey rivers, he little thought that within a very short time his work would resolve itself into nothing more than a scrap of paper. His plan is ,all that remains of the township to-day; a beautifully drawn, water-colour plan, showing 208 town sections, with a town belt, and public reserves which ran across the Bealey river to beyond where the railway quarry now stands. A sudden flooding of the Waimakariri river made short work of his ferry reserve; but the town belt and the police reserve still survive, though the former is clothed in dense beech forest and the latter is covered with a thick growth of v/ild Irishman, the "matagowrie" of the early settlers. Eight streets ran through the township. Those going north and south bore the names of the four patron saints of the British Isles—St. George, St. Andrew, St. Patrick, and St. David; while those running east and west were Albion, Caledonia, Erin, and Cambria streets.

As planned, the little town of. Bealey was to be reminiscent of the Homeland, even .though it was set in the wild grandeur of an antipodean mountain, region. A Forgotten Township In 1865 the Canterbury Provincial Government held a sale of sections of the new town of Bealey. Only three buyers appeared. William Kentish McLean, merchant, bought a section, and other purchasers were William Dearsley and George Drayton, blacksmith. Later, Mr McLean bought two additional sections, one of which he leased to Jones and Riddell, who opened a store thereon. Very soon afterwards came a telegraph office, an hotel, a blacksmith's shop, and police barracks. These last were indispensable, for in those days criminals from the West Coast were brought over to; Chrislchurch for trial, and some kind of half-way Jioujpe wss necessary for their detention overnight. Again, the gold escort required Government accommodation on its hasty journeys from the Coast. Thus Bealey township grew, so that when in October, 1865, Sir Julius von Haast went over the; road, he reported! that more than 100 people were already living in the settlement. This populaton was considerably augmented, from day to day, by the numerous wayfarers of the road—by diggers making their way into Westland, by surveyors, by bank officials, by tramps and pedlars, by pretty ladies going to seek their fortunes in the West Coast dance-halls. It was a motley company of men and .women which passed in pageant through this tiny, township, nestling on the tussock flalis beneath the sheer wails of the dark beech forest. j The Sunless Winter " I Eighteen months after his original: visit to Bealey, von Kaast passed over the road again—to find that with the exception ojj the telegraphist and the police sergeant not a single inhabitant of the town remained. In planning his ideal township amid some of the grandest scenery in New Zealand, Thomas Triphook had not realised that for four months of the year the sun would not shitte on the log and weatherboard houses of its citizens. A single winter at Klondike had sufficed the dwellers in Albion and Erin streets, and the proud St. George's terrace, The hotel had been shifted across the river to the southern bank, which cap- ! tured every hour of sunshine; the ; blacksmith, finding his business not | remunerative, had departed; the store ; was no more. Tji- original purchasers of the Bealey sections had let their i deposits go, and had not even troubled to uplift the titles. Later the telegraph office and! the police barracks and gaol were added to the buildings I on the south bank of the Waimakariri, and Bealey's las':, hopes as a half-way township between east and west had vanished. Albion street and St. An- | drow's street hadi gone back to tussock j and matagowric; beech forest con- ; tinued to clothe the town belt, and i the Bealey river had washed away pa:.-t of St. George's terrace. So came to its end the little town. To-day, of the original Bealey township nothing remains save a little cemetery under the beeches of Klondike hill. At least two tiny children lie buried there, as well as several adults. On a small headstone may still be seen the name of one of the few permanent inhabitants of old Bea'iey. The cemetery, in

its setting of wild mountains and shingly river-bed, is surely one of the most picturesque in all New Zealand. The lUon-Ukei Hal After the abandonment of the township, a hut was maintained for the use of wayfarers wishing to make their way across the Waimakariri, on the road from the West Coast to Canterbury. It was the business of the keeper of the hotel to ferry such folk across the river and a subsidy was paid him by the Selwyn County Council for that purpose. Did the traveller possess means, he was expected to pay his ferry fare; were he penniless, he must be put across the river just the same. He could apprise the hotelkeeper of the fact thathe desired to cross the river by means of a signal flag run up on a staff erected on the north bank. Sometimes it happened that a wayfarer would arrive at the hut in darkness, in which case the hut, with its 1 blankets and its pots and pans, would offer warmth and the means of cooking a meal. There is a tale told of such a traveller, who arrived late at night, and who, on finding the bunk in the hut occupied by a sleeping figure, turned in beside him and slept soundly until morning. His horror oh awaking to find that he had shared ' the bed with a dead Chinese may be imagined. The Chinese had been j drowned while trying to ford the I river. The police sergeant had recovered the body and had placed it in the hut while he had gone off to j make arrangements for its removal. A Link with the Past Many tales are told of old Bealey, as, indeed, they are still told of the new Bealey, seated in the sunlight of the southern bank of the river. For instance, a roadman's hut once stood on rather a charming bend of the road, not far from Cass. Fqr years the roadman and his wife lived there contentedly, all unknowing that their kitchen was built over the grave of an early traveller who had fallen a victim to the greedy Waimakariri. But there are gentler stories. One concerns a little, old lady who travelled from Auckland to Bealey recently, in order to recapture some of the scenes of her youth. As a young bride, the wife of an early Bealey telegraphist, she had gone to the mountain settlement, there to begin her married life. That was in 1873, before the telegraph office had been shifted across the river. Strangely .enough, : her outstanding recollections were not of the sunless winters at Klondike, but of the i warmth and fragrance of the Waimakariri valley in summer and in the lovely, dry autumn. She walked over the old township site, trying to [identify remembered spots; but Erin street and Cambria street, and even the site of her old home, were lost among the tussocks and the rampant matagowrie. Save for 'the little cemetery under the dark beeches of the hill there was not a sign that on the shingle fan at the junction of ; the Waimakariri and Bealey rivers a township had ever stood.