The Church in the Early Days of Ahuriri.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 5488, 29 March 1889, Page 2

The Church in the Early Days of Ahuriri.

[to the editor."]

A few remarks on a portion of a very curious letter, written to the Editor of the " Datee Tkmigraph" Napier, from "St. Paul's Pareonage, Murrurundi, N.S.W.j" toy •'the Incumbent the Rev. W; 'Marshall." 1 'Quoniam quidem multi conati sunt ordinare narrationem rerum: visum. est et mihi, assecuto omnia a principio dUigenter, v ex ordino tibi acribere " LtTCAM I, " I pray you in your letters, : When you shall these unlucky deeds relate, Speak of me as I am ; nothing extenuate, Nor set down aught in malice." Shakbsp., Othello. Sir, —My attention has been repeatedly drawn to a peculiar letter from the Rev. W. Marshall to you, of January sth., and published by you in your paper of the 19th. of last month. I should have publicly noticed it before, only my 2 months summer absence in the woods (at* Christmas and the New Year), and subsequent illness on my return to Napier prevented me. It is rather late now, I allow, to remark npon it; bnt I feel constrained to do so for several reasons, —some of which may, perhaps, toe rightly inferred from this letter to you,— my chief ono, however, being to • leave a true historical record of a few significant and important matters which happened here at Napier (then Ahuriri), during , the early timo mentioned by Mr. Marshall— and for many years before. I being then resident here and fully acquainted with them all. Moreover I may also say, that I feel the more inclined to do this from tooth the manner and the words of Mr. Marshall's , letter ; in which, at the opening he says:— " In alluding to the work of the church in the early daye in Napier, and the part I was privileged to take in initiating her services, an omission was made," whioli', might mislead some, and which" for the sake of accuraoy, I think it may bees vroll for mo to supply." Now I purpose to fol-J low Mr. Marshall's leading, and what, he has overlooked forgotten or omitted, I hope to supply ; and all from original documentary sources. My letter must, therefore, necessarily be a long one, but I hope it may prove both, interesting now and useful hereafter! ' J Mr. Marshall goes on to say :—(1) "In the year 1852 I: arrived in Napier (then called Ahuriri) from Wellington: (2) afc that timo there was no house—only Mr. Alexander's store: (3) no sound was heard except the cry of the sea-gull, and the song of the Maori as he paddled his canoe: (4) Two months after my arrival in Ahiiriri Bishop Selwyn paid the district a visit, — and he appointed me lay-reader: (5) I hold my first service in the raupo (rush) building in Domett's gully, where public prayer was offered up on the inland for the first time. (6) Afterwards I conducted; : service in the school-room (afterwards - : burnt down), which then occupied the site i whereon now stands Newton's store." : ; In the autumn of 1852, Bishop Selwyn paid his usual Episcopal visit to the district; he came overland from Wellington on foot, .-.; and stayed several days at my house at Wai-. tsngi; where some hundreds of Christian 1 Maoris from neighboring villages in, Hawked Bay had assembled to meet him. ,, [Note. —Aβ I am writing chiefly on Church matters, it may not be considered amiss for me to mention, in a note, that on this occasion the Bishop Confirmed 229 adult Maoris at the Mission Station, and 19 aged persons ■; at Tangoio on our way North ; and these, with many others, were subsequently Communicant's : {besides several whom he had . also Confirmed at the various large Maori villages on his way North from. Wellington.) On a former Episcopal visit he had also Confirmed 136 adults at this Mission Station, and 10! on his journey through the district under my charge. All had been gathered from Heathenism in these part* ; during the previous 7-8 years! it was a ", memorable time, and the Bishop was highly pleased.] On his leaving for the North 1 travelled with him (both of us ott foot) to the Kiver Waikari, where the Rev. J. Hainlin from Wairoa met him. Mr Marshall never saw the Bishop during that visit; which, of course, was his only one for that year. Moreover I find, from a letter, that Mr Marshall was residing, at Wellington in October, 1852. Again, in the autumn of the following y< ar, 1853, (on March 30th,) Bishop Selwyn was again here in Hawke's Bay. On: that occasion there was a larure party of English g-entlemen travelling with him (all mounted), including the Governor Sir G. Grey, Mr. Tollemache, Mr. Valentine Smith, and tho Rev (now Archdeacon) 8. Williams. The; pany had sopped at Hanuku's (village) i near Pakowbai the preceding night and parts ; of that day; and late in the evening they halted at Kenata's pa Te Pokonao, on the banks of the river Ngaruroro ; whence od. the next morning (March 31st) they ceeded towards Petane and the North ; probably on that occasion Mr. Marshal', an £ others saw Bishop Selwyn at Ahuriri, in his passing through, though the trf 4Ve iij n g party made no stay there. ■ ■ Here I should state that my la- f ge dwell-ing-house at Waitangi had ur ,fortuuately been burnt down with all its contents on the Sth January, 1853. [Note ._jt may he worthy of a short Note to rf .mark, that this rery day (January Bth) was the one on which all the Maoris r»ound about were gathered together at Ah uriri (including my own male domestics), to 'receive the stipulated payment for Scindo T.eland (now Napier); heuoe, too, it was that I was well-nigh left alone at tho Mission Station at Waitangi, when, at noon, the fire took place;-the wind, at tho time, was one of those si rong Westerly . hurricanes, so that nothing could bo saved ! The oonfltgration was soon seen and known by them and the Europeans at Napier,—■ who climbed to the top of the hill, from tho house in I>omett'e Gully—to lament over it. J At that time of their visit I was obliged to reside in my small unlined weatherboarded store in the adjoining field, without fire, etc., —although the wholn flat country had been recently deeply flooded, and was then very deep in mud and water! insomuch that the party of visitors had some difficulty in. ■'! getting their horses through the mire on to tho outer beach, in the absence of roads.

I may, also, observe, that I iiover before

heard of Bishop Selwyn having appointed Mr. Marshall as lay-reader at Ahuriri; though, as Mr. Marshall says so, I do not doubt it; but he could only have filled that office for a very short time—a few weeks at most; —for it was during that same autumn, and in about a month or so after the Bishop had passed on, that Mr. Marshall himself with Mrs. Marshall and two pupils, also left Ahuriri for Mr. Guthrie'a station at Castle Point, where he romained for three (or more) years as tutor te Mr. Guthrie's rising , family. I haveparticularly good reasons for remembering: this (my tirst acquaintance with, Mr. Mar-■ shall), ac Mr. Marshall with his travelling party on foot brotight-up unexpectedly at "my small and cramped.weather-boarded store" on tho first evening and night on their journey from Ahuriri. Some years after this, on Mr. Marshall's return to Hawke's Bay from Castle Point (I believo in tho year 1857), he resided at Olive; where during another very nevero flood, both he and Mrs. Marshall narrowly escaped drowning, being saved with some difficulty from the roof of their schoolhouse in a boat! In due course, however, Mr. Marshall came back to Ahuriri, (then rising Napier ! with its fihope, hotels, public offices, mugitjtrates, &c, &o.,)—but then the transformation had taken place nnd Napier was firmly i established. And it is worthy of notice

that it was during those very years of Mr. Marshall's long absence (after his first brief residence) that the large influx of early respectable settlors took place ; men determined to stay, and to bravo the many discomforts inseparable on first settling and colonizing; men who have mainly constituted "tho backbone" of Napier, and of tho District; —who have been the true

cause of tho " unearned increment" (falsely assumed by the Government). These remained, and they, or their descendants, ara here to this day.

In Napier Mr. Marshall dwelt for some time, but not very long, as he again, at the end of the year 1858, removed far off to Pohui, 27 miles W. on the hills, to a sheeprun he had there. It was,' 1 suppose, during this second short residence in Napier, that ho " conducted Service in the School-

room " ; but cortainly not down to the timo of its being burnt, nor for a considerable tirao beforo that event, as that duty was for a long time performed by the lato Capt. Newman until the arrival of tho Rev. Peter

Barclay, tho first resident Scotch Presbyterian Minister in Napier and Hawke's

Buy, who, from his arrival held Divine Service regularly iv that School-room. At Pohui Mr. Marshall remained for a few years; ultimately returning to Napier; where he oonducted a very respectable Boys' Day and Boarding School for several years the benefits of which to the then rising generation are etill remembered. (to be continued.)