MURIHIKU

Evening Star, Issue 12257, 26 July 1904, Page 3

MURIHIKU

SOME OLD-TIME EVENTS. . [Bt Robebt M'Nab', M.H.B.] No. 16. —Bass Strait Scalers Exploit South New Zealand in 1803. — There is no doubt that the publicity given to the question of the South New Zealand fishery concession by Base’s negotiations directed the attention of sealing merchants to the shores of Dusky and the vicinity of the South Cape. That was inevitable, and we are not borrowing much from our imagination when we suppose that advantage was taken of Bass's absence to exploit the location of. the concession mentioned in our last article. Bass Strait was up to that time the great pealing ground of Australia. Seals had keen taken in New Zealand, but chiefly by large vessels calling there while trading to distant ports. Tt was to Bass Strait that the regular sealing craft owned by Sydney men went. These craft consisted of small •loops and schooners of from nine to thirtyright tons burthen, and eleven arc mentioned in February, 1804, as trading to , Bass Strait. As early as December, 1802, the Now South Wales records show reports from King’s Island that the reals, from continual harassing, appeared to lie. forsaking tho island, and it was anticipated that the sea elephants would follow them. The French Commodore Gaudin, of the Geographc and Naturalists, rent out by Napoleon at the end of 1802, wrote from King's Island to Governor King in there words: “ They (the seals) are becoming scarce already, and if you don’t issue an order you will soon bear that they have entirely disappeared. ” This condition of tho seals forced upon tho traders the necessity of going further afield. The most energetic traders were R. Campbell and f,‘o,, Simeon Lord, Palmar and Co., Kami, Kable, and Underwood—all of them names that were to be known hereafter in New Zealand history. A paragraph occurs in the narrative “of the voyiges of the French vessels mentioned above, which visited Sydney in 1802. which suggests that Palmer and Go., at that early date, had a, sealing fleet engaged on (he New Zealand coast. The paragraph is thus • rendered by Pinkerton;—“At a spot called ■ by tho natives Wallomvola is the charming * dwelling of the Commissary-General of Government, Mr Palmer. Here it is that Mr Palmer causes those small vessels to be built he emplovs in the whale and seal fishery off New; Zealand and in Bass Strait.’’ The statement is a very general one, and the records show that Palmer had only three vessels at that time, all of which were engaged in the Bass Strait and coastal trade, and none are mentioned ns trading to New Zealand. Palmer himself had onlv been eighteen months in the colony. The mention of his whaling receives no support from the colour's records. Turnbull, too. who visited Sydney in 'the latter end of ]B°3 milv mentions Ba.v Strait as the scene of the Sydney sealing. Ho describes the gangs located on the islands, and being moved from place to place by attendant craft an the seals became scarce. Nothing is said about New Zealand sealing. In the second edition of bis work, published in 1813, Turnbull introduces the New Zealand sealing thu-: * When the sealing flagged in some degree in Bass Strait, they (the sealers) turned their thoughts to the neighboring island of New Zealand, where the seals were known to abound. Every 'bay, creek, and river was examined bv them in guest of these objects, and tho fruit of their lalbors mogt amply recompensed them. A most constant and friendly intercourse, mutually advantageous to them and the natives, took place.” It must be taken to mean that the whaling was off New Zealand, the scaling at Bass Strait. The first firm to tackle the wild New Zealand coast with the small craft of that day appears to have been Kable and Underwood. The Sydney returns show that Kable and Underwood had two schooners at this time in the seal trade in Bass Strait, the Governor King, of 38 tons, and the Endeavour, of 51. The Endeavour was the pioneer vessel of this little fleet, having been registered in 1801, while the Governor Eng was registered in 1803. The Endeavour was also the pioneer in the New Zealand trade. On Monday, April 18, 1805. the Endea vour, Captain Oliphant, sailed for BassStrait. In she days after leaving Port Jackson she arrived at the Sisters, and, after landing the people, weighed for Dusky Bav, which she reached on the 9th.of May. Finding few seals there, she visited Breaksea and Soknder Islands. At an island near Breaksea she had the misfortune to lose one of her men. A boat’s mew was endeavoring to land in a high sea, when the stern of the 'boat was suddenly whirled round on a ledge of rocks, and the boat, immediately upset. Two men saved themselves by means of the oars, and two cithers got on the keel and vere rescued. One man was drowned. The boat was afterwards gob on shore with her stem post staved. , Although right in the vicinity of Fovea ax Strait, Captain OHphant seems never to have suspected its existence. He was an observant man. too, and thus reported his experiences; “On the south side of the West Cape four entrances were discernible, u-hich be concluded to he the mouths of harbors, between the two northernmost oi which is a small island, white and' apparently chalky. Off the South Cape Mr Oliphant experienced mnch bad weather, and one heavy gale, which continued several hours, and arose in the forenoon, ium to_ lay tho vessel to. At two in tho afternoon an island was seen at only three miles distance, lying by observation in latitude 70deg 58min S. and longitude 166deg 30min E„ 'bearing south-west by south from the South Cape. Being in want of wood and water, they sent a boat on shore, but found it to be barren and dry. They afterwards put into Launching Cove, where the vessel anchored, and a party went in quest of seals, but with kittle euoce®. On shore they suffered much from severe cold and incessant falls of snow, hail, or ra£n Her freight consists of 2,200 skins, all of which ™ th extrcme difficulty and There is reason to believe that the instrucnous given to Oliphadt to go to Dusky were given without intimation to the sealing gangs. _ The firm’s sealing gang, for instance, at Knights la.and did not know of her movements because wo read in the ‘Garette of May 15, 1805, that the Good latent Lad just arrived from that island, and that the Endeavour bad not arrived ■when she left. When she left tho Endeavonr must have been heading for Dusky the Endeavour returned to Sydney on October 7 1803, after an absence of Z months. At whafc place Captain Oliphant fell m with natives ts not stated, but in the bydney Gazette’ of October 16, 1805 ho reports the natives of New Zealand to be very friendly, and ready to render every assistance he could possibly require.” +bJ h l: abOVC ‘ P a l K:r also states that the skins procured, amounting to 2 COO aJI P nrchased b 7 Captain M'Lennam fLr P 1 * 80 ™** by being salted-a method resorted to, as the ueather .and other circumstances preven+ed their being cured in the usual way, “and has long since been established as an excelknb succedanemn. Report declares them to be in high estimation at Home, and consequently gives new stimulus to the war against the pups and wigs, who rejoice hut J ' ul< ? a* a ship in sight.” The next issue of the Syduey paper informs us that the price of the purchase was four shillings aid sixpence each. It is most unfortunate that when returns of arrivals and departures were prepared by the naval officer at Sydney for transmission to England no notice was taken of the schooners and sloops locally owned. We are indebted solely to the Press of the day for information of the local craft; and as the sealing trade with which they were connected had its headquarters in Ba® Strut, one would Mippore that the Enedavour’s course wns lo.lowed by other vessels. We, however, cannot say what vessels of the Bass btra. if any, visited New Zealand after this date, on account of a vagueness which gathers around shipping to New ZeaDnd through the fact that the island in Bass Strait was the first port of call. a nß u t i ViS i L** 0 Dus ky « recorded under date Apn! 1. 1804. On tho 30th of March a ™ ved ia S - vdne y a whaler a ***** 343 tons, ' o<MM oanded by Captain Dagg. She hadi

had an eventful voyage. She sailed from England with a letter of marque on the 24th of June, 1803, with fourteen guns and thirty-two men. She captured, before reaching St. Helena, two French whalers, which did not know of tho war then raging. About the beginning of December, 1803, she sailed from St. Helena to New Zealand, and in Dusky Day secured some sealskins. When she arrived in Sydney she had on board 4,759 skins, 20 barrels of sperm oil, am' 18 tons of salt.

In October, 1804, the seal islands in Bi Strait were visited by two American se; ing vessels, the Perseverance and the Pil grim, under the comand of Captain Amosa Delano. At Kent Bay disturbances took place between the Americans and the sealing gang of Kable and Underwood. The account given by the man in charge of the sealing gang makes the Americans out to be tho greatest scoundrels unhung, while the report of the American captain would indicate that tho gallows were too good a fate for the Sydney soakers. Delano publishes an account of his travels, and from it we find that on October 24 ho sailed from tho islands for the South-west Cape of New Zealand. He made the Snares on Novcm ber 3, and says, after mentioning Vancouver as the. discoverer: “ I know of no other n.an except him and myself who has ever seen them.” In this Delano was mistaken as Captain Raven, when returning to Sydney in the Britannia in 1793, sighted the islands. Delano did not try the islands to; seals, although he thought they might be procured there, as some were visible swimming about. He considered that there was no safe shelter for a vessel, unless perhaps, on the south-eart side of the largest island faking everything into consideration, be thought that tiro seals would be difficult to procure on there islands. Delano counted in all seven islands, and found that Vancouver had correctly pic oC'l them. From the Snares he made for the Bounty Islands. In the Sidney ‘Gasctto’ of Sunday. Anril 14. 1805, occurs the following advertisement “ Notice. “Two small boats haring been left at New Zealand by Mr Oliphant, master of the Endeavour, in January last, all masters of vessels and others frequenting or occasionally touching at Dusky Bay or its vicinity or. the said coast arc hereby strictly cautioned not to take away, or in anv manner soever damage, either of the said boats, as they will otherwise become responsible to the owners for any act contrary to the tenor of this notice.” The following Sunday the advertisement was changed to read “master of the Contest” in place of the Endeavour, and the date “Sydney, April 13” was added. The Contest was a schooner of 45 tons, carrying six men, and had been registered in July, 1804, and added to Kable and Co.’s fleet, bringing it up to four vessels. The writer thinks that Oliphant, who had all along commanded the Endeavour, took the Contest for her pioneer trip. 'This is borne out by an advertisement in the Sydney papers of October, 1804, for a new captain for tho Endeavour, then returning from Bass Strait. With tins larger boat. Kable and Co. again attempted the New Zealand sealing trade, and on that voyage she had called at Dusky, where she left two boats; that the first “ad ” was wrong, and was corrected the following issue. The words “frequently or occasionally touching” seem to imply that Dusky was visited bv some vessels regularly to catch seals, and by others -who called in when whaling or—in the case of Raven—when bound for a distant part of the world. The Contest was on February 28, 1807, wrecked a few miles to the southward of Port Stephens, near the mouth of the Hunter. Her crew fortunately was savfd, but all property was lost in the tremendous surf. On April 26, 1805, Kable and Co. despatched .their largest sailing vessel—the Governor King, of 75 tons—to New -Zealand. It is not stated to Dusky Bav, but Dusky was Kable’s sealing station. Another colonial scaling vessel, the sloop Speedwell, 18 tons and six men, owned by Andrew Thompson, sailed for the coast of New Zealand in the second week of August. This vessel had formerly been owned by John Grono, who in 1809 is recorded as sealing in Foveaux Strait. While owned h-v Grono she was wrecked in October, 1804, and successfully got off by Thompson in December. r

At this stage in the newspaper narrative a lull takes place in, reference to New Zealand South. The Penantipodes comes into notice. From its geographical position it would seem almost certain that vessels going there touched about the South Cape. However, we are accepting no romance, and merely mention the fact that in 1805 the Penanfpodes seal trade was opened up by Campbell and Co. with the Venus, under the command of Captain Stewart—a man who is later on to figure in our narrative very conspicuously. We now come to the labor regulations of the year 1805 dealing with the sealing e - . Owing to the distress which prevailed m tho sealing gangs of Kable and Co. and Qunpbell and Co. in Bass otrait, regulations were made compelling the owners to provide food depots. In September of that year no colonial vessels were allowed to leave Sydney without entering into a bond to secure tire above-mentioned provision, and limits wore specified within which the colonial craft had ■ d confine themselves. These limits prevented them visiting the south of New Zealand, for what reason the writer has been unable to ascertain. It seems all the more strange when we consider the rich harvest there within the colonists’ grasp. Sir Joseph Banks, in some comments on Australia, dated June 6. 1806, says;— “Tho island of Van Diemen, the southwest- coast of New Holland, and the southern parte of New Zealand, produce seals of all kinds in quantities at present almost innumerable. Their stations on rocks or in bays have remained unmolested since the creation. The beach is encumbered with their quantities, and those who visit their haunts have less trouble in killing them than the servants of the victualling office have who kill hogs in a pen with a mallet.”

The next reference to these limits comes up in connection with Imperial legislation. Shortly stated the following were the circumstances : —The early seal trade had been a China one. In 1805 the first vessel, the Lady Barton, brought out a cargo of oil and skins, which were seized by the officers of the Customs and the East India Company and delayed for four months. Campbell and, Co.’s agent applied for permission to land the cargo of the Sydney, expected to arrive during the latter part of 1806. This was granted by the Board of Trade. The next month a Bill was before the House of, Commons, and Banks’s comments upon it are available for our information. The Bill itself is not available, bnt the comments cf Banks upon it show that it contained tho same limit excluding South New Zealand from the sealing trade. Banks called attention to this in the following words: “ Why any southern boundary should be set to the enterprise of our successful scalers does not appear. The limit proposed by the Bill will prevent them from visiting tlie south part of New Zealand, where treasures of seal skins aud oil have been accumulating for ages, and tiro little isle of Penantipode, which has furnished 30,000 of the seal skins and a proportionate quantity of the seal oil laden on board the expected ship (the Sydney), which their Lordships have been graciously pleased to admit to an entry here, to the no small encouragement of the southern fishery.”

The Speedwell again appears in the New Zealand sealing trade, being recorded as returning to Sydney on September 21, 1806, from a successful sealing cruise on the New Zealand coast. She had, however, the misfortune to lose three of her men through the upsetting of a' boat. The year 1807 is a veritable blank in Murihiku history. 7'he next article will deal with the discoveries of Foveaux Strait, Port Pecasn-, and other events of the first decade of tho century.