In a country churchyard

Press, 21 February 1987, Page 21

In a country churchyard

The solid All Saints Church at Waiau, on the junction of the Waiau and Mason Rivers, was designed by Cecil Wood and built by Messrs Kier and Thompson of Rangiora. A third of the funds for the £3M9 church was provided by Mrs Mary Macfarlane of Lyndon, Waiau. In 1995, a site for the church and hall was bought; in 192* a building committee was established, a year after Mrs Macfarlane’s bequest Archbishop Churchill Julius laid the foundation stone in 1924 and the Bishop of Nelson, Bishop W. C. Sadlier, opened and dedicated the church the next year. All Saints is part of the Nelson diocese.

Above the altar is a beautiful window by Arnold Robinson of Bristol, presented by the sons of Mrs Macfarlane in her memory. At the west end is another impressive window given by the Northcote family of Highfield Station, Waiau, in of

three Northcote brothers, including the Rev. Hugh Northcote.

A lych gate was added in 1928 by the friends of Major James Northcote; a Waiau blacksmith, Mr Harry Sutton, gave the iron gate.

Many church chattels were the gifts of parishioners, including a vestry table made from a macrocarpa tree from Highfield Station by Mr F. Forbes and his son, Mr J. K. Forbes, builders of Waiau.

In 1947, the Bishop of Nelson, the Right Rev. P. W. Stephenson, consecrated the church.

Two new windows on the north wall were designed by Mr Graham Stewart of Christchurch and dedicated in 1984. One was the gift of Mrs Peter Fabian of Wellington, the grand-daughter of Mrs Macfarlane, and the other was presented by the Northcote family in memory of Mr and Mrs T. F. Northcote.

One of the first Europeans to explore the Waiau area was W. J. W. Hamilton, an officer with H.M3. Archeron that was surveying the coastline in 1849. An early settler and agent for the Provincial Government, Mr George Rutherford, selected a site for a bridge over the Waiau River and an accommodation house in 1892 which were to become the nucleus of the Waiau township. Most of the population worked on the neighbouring Lynden and Highfield sheep stations.

During the 1889 s, several more station runs were established and the settlers used the river crossing site at Waiau for their race meetings and cricket matches. Reserve land was set aside for a township consisting mainly of staff for the station runs.

By 1883, 21 ratepayers were contributing to the Amur! Road Board, which established its

office in the township. The Provincial Council had also built a courtroom and lock-up there.

A well-known character in the township for many years was Mr G. W. Schroder, who was the magistrate’s clerk and officiated iln many other capacities as well. Waiau became an important postal link for mail travelling north towards Kaikoura and several hawkers visited the township to sell their wares. -?

In .1873, the Coakley brothers established a store and frequently took their goods to sell on the Molesworth and Tarndale Stations. The river crossing could be quite an undertaking during floods, so sqcial and sports meetings tended to be organised around the same day to make the journey more worth while for people on outlying stations. Everyone would tend to gather in one of the hotels for a

dinner and evening entertainment, stay the night, and attend, say, an inter-district cricket match the next day. ■ With the opening of the bridge over the Waiau River there was more frequent contact among the local people. The opening of the Kaikoura coastal road did not significantly affect the traffic volume on the inland Kaikoura route via Waiau. However, the open-' ing of the railway line through Parnassus slowed the growth of Waiau. Until then it had been the most northern railhead. But as the sheep industry continued to grow in the district, Waiau became an important transport link for the trucking of sheep and wool. By 1919, more sheep were trucked through Waiau than through . any other New Zealand town or station.

By

TESSA WARD