MEMORY HONOURED

Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 114, 16 May 1941, Page 9

MEMORY HONOURED

EDWARD GIBBON WAKEFIELD

CEREMONY AT GRAVESIDE

"We have come here to honour one of the great men of New Zealand," the Acting Prime Minister (Mr. Nash) said this morning when representatives of the Government, the Historical Committee, the Early Settlers' Association, anr' the City Council met at the grave of Edward Gibbon Wakefield in Bolton Street. Cemetery to place a wreath provided by Lord Bledisloe. The ceremony was the outcome of an endowment made by Lord Bledisloe to provide for the floral adornment of the grave on the anniversary of Wakefield's death.

Those who had studied- the history of New Zealand, said Mr. Nash, had placed Edward Gibbon Wakefield in the first rank of the founders of New Zealand. The ceremony they were attending had been made possible by two other men who had taken a great interest in colonisation. Lord Bledisloe had sent through Lord Willingdon £100 to help to keep the memory of Edward Gibbon Wakefield green. Mr. Nash said he did not think that such a ceremony was necessary to remind people of what Wakefield had done; Wellington City itself would do that. Another memorial to his genius was the Town Belt, which had been marked off for the benefit of citizens in perpetuity.

Mr. Nash also referred to Wakefield's genius as an economist and said that his apprisal of Britain's needs as a growing industrial country was the best that could have been made in his time. Wakefield had seen how Britain would grow and had realised what colonies would mean to her. ■

Mr. Nash thought it* was fitting ■that he should place Lord Bledisloe's wreath on the grave because he was representing Hutt, the district that Edward Gibbon Wakefield had represented in the Provincial Council and the General Assembly.

Mr. Nash apologised for the absence of Miss Wakefield, the founder's granddaughter, and of Miss Irma O'Connor, great-grand -daughter, both of whom live in Auckland.