OBITUARY.

Feilding Star, Volume I, Issue 198, 22 February 1907, Page 4

OBITUARY.

A colonist with an exceptionally interesting career and record passed away at the home of his granddaughter (Mrs Carter) in Daniel street on Wednesday, in the person of Mr Wm. Reeve, who was 97 years of age, and a resident of New Zealand for over sixty years. Mr Reeve, who leaves a large family — five sons, four daughters, and 250 grand and greatgi and-children — was active and sensible up till the last, and his illness began only on the day before his death. He first went to sea in 18:30, and until he settled down in Foxton in 1869 he was always responding to the call of the deep. The greater part of his life at sea was spent in hunting the whale, his cruises taking him all over the waters of the South Pacific, and away into the extreme of JBehering Sea and the coast of Alaska. When trading between Sydney and New Zealand at the end of the thirties, Mr Reeve's ship was wrecked at the Chatham Islands, and there he settled amongst the natives until 1844, broken only by a voyage to Wellington, where he n-arried and returned to the Chathams. A trip to Tahiti, with a view to settling there, resulted in a whaling voyage of eighteen months, as the French were found to be in •possession, and Mr Reeve cared only for the Union Jack. In 1846 he was in Wellington with his family; and he had been only a fortnight in possession of a piece of land at Johnsrnville when all settlers in the district were called into Wellington for safety, owing to the Maoris proving troublesome. When peaceful times returned, Mr Reeve- went out to Johnson villo again, and resided there until 1869, in which year he settled in Foxton, which town he left eleven years ago to live with his relatives in \\ ellington. — Post.