WHATAUPOKO RUN

Gisborne Times, Volume LXVI, Issue 10473, 31 December 1927, Page 12 (Supplement)

WHATAUPOKO RUN

RENT OF £2OO FOB USE OF 19,000 ACRES.

TALK WITH SON OF ORIGINAL HOLDER.

Hale and active. Mr. William Parker. ci' Mang.ipapa, still smiles at ■‘Father Time.'’ He was the eldest son of the late William Parker, one of the original run-holders of Poverty Bay. the subject of this notice was a youth of 14 when lie arrived here with his parents in 1867. He resided with them at Makaraka until the day of the Massacre, Nov. 10, IWiS, when lie was sent to Napier to school. Mr. Parker well remembers how his parents and the family had thy good luck to escape murder at the Rands of followers of Te Kooti. They crossed the Taruheiu river at -a point about half a inilo above what was then known as the Iloseland Gardens and came in to Turanga (Gisborne). At Makaraka. his parents resided on a property owned by the late Alt'. Espie, father of Mr. J. E. Espie, a wellknown resident to the present day. Air. Parker, senr., was the original holder of the whole of the A) hataupoko block, which comprised about 19,000 acres and on which he depastured some 6000 sheep. He had been a settler in Hawke's Bay and was induced to come to Poverty Bay by leading local chiefs who went to Hawke's Bay in search of Europeans to occupy their lands. He. occupied Whataupoko for some time betore the Alassacve without any Ural t ile, paying the Natives an oeinpat on rental of about £2OO per annum. Their home at Alakaraka was just opposite their wool-shed and station yards and a canoe was Used to truss to and fro. Tins canoe proved must useful ou the morning <>t' the Mu saerc, for it enabled not only the family hut also some shearers and others to make their escape. On the arr.val oi the party at what was known as •'The Point,” near the site of the present William Pet tie bridge a crossing wiis made to the rc-

doubt on Kait i side by means of another canoe. At the redoubt that morning many incidents occurred which, he says, would make interesting reading. Jn those days, what is now the town of Gisborne, did not come much into iho reckoning; Hie Flats were the centre of most activity. As a lad he used to tide in regularly from Alakaraka for the mail. One morning, he remembers, the few then residents of the town were in a great flurry because a man had been murdered there the previous night. It was in 1868 and be saw the body lying in a boat tied up at Capt. Bead s jetty. 'Flic unfortunate man bad been a billiard marker at the Albion Hotel. Nobody was brought to trial. Poverty Bay, according to Air. Parker .was a pretty rough place to live in at that time. There wore no titles to any lands occupied by Europeans

and nolle of site* Natives had titles that there was some sort of a tit'e to the Mission Station of about 400 acres at AVaerenga-a-Hika. ft was not until tile Poverty Bay Grants Act 1860 was passed that any Court sat here to determine titles in this district. Under that Act a number of early settlers were able to obtain grants to lands occupied by them. The Natives obtained utles to the host of their lands with the aid of the same Act and they came forward ■ and gave particulars of leases and sales they had made to pakehas. Shortly after the passing of the Act the Government had the town of Gisborne laid out and, after making reserves for various purposes a sale by auction took place. The 'mb', as far as he could .ecnll. would be held about 1870. Thus the first opportunity was given to Europeans to acquire

lands in the town of Gisborne by purchase direct from the C rown. Thetownship was surveyed by a Mr. Alunro, who lmd as his assistant one Samuel Begg, a clever voting fellow from Napier, who subsequently left New Zealand and became a leading artist oil the “Illustrated News’' (London). The first sale of town lauds at Napier had taken place as early as 1855. and there had been salts of pastoral lands iii Hawke's Bay even atan earlier date. Mr. (afterwards Sir) Donald .McLean was the first Lands Purchase Dili ■•or in Hawke’s Bay who brought land there for the Grown. When, however, bo came to Povertv Bay on a similar errand be failed forsome reason not generally known. And so Poverty Bay remained in a backward state for many years, so faras settlement was concerned. Air. Parker, who was an officer inthe Hawke's Bay Lands Olli-e about the time of the first sale of Gisbornetown lands and for many years.,lifter, holds that Gisborne is a vorv much better laid out town than Napier, the narrow main street of which (Hastings Street)) compares very tin-, favorably with Gladstone Bond, tho main thoroughfare here.