WAKEFIELD

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 17 March 1928, Page 11

WAKEFIELD

“New Zealand News,” winch, is published to-day, draws attention to what it considers* an urgent matter. It is “a unique opportunity of removing a standing reproach to New Zealand.”

“It is an extraordinary fact,” says the editor, “ that the memory of the founder of New Zealand is not preserved in any adequate way whatsoever. His grave in Wellington is almost unknown. The only biography of him, written thirty years ago by an Englishman, has long been out of print. Up till now, the founder of New Zealand has received justice only from a few writers on the history of British colonial policy, which he did more than any other man to change.' “To remove tho reproach that no New Zealander has written the biography of his country’s founder, Dr A. J. Harrop, author of ‘England and New Zealand,’ has written ‘The Amazing Career of Edward Gibbon Wakefield,’ to form a memorial to the great reformer who saved Now Zealand from the disaster of French convict colonisation.

In an article in another part of ‘ ‘ The New Zealand News,” Dr Harrop gives •his reasons for writing the biography. In the course of this he says:

“The neglect of Wakefield is all the more extraordinary when one takes into account that his life was full of romantic incidents, tragic interludes, overwhelming triumphs, and bitter disappointments. The elopement which led to his first marriage, the disaster of his wife's death, the ambitious match-making plans of a gay circle' in Paris, the folly which led to the abduction of Ellen Turner, the ride to Gretna Green, the famous trial which held the attention of all Britain, the imprisonment in Newgate, the vivid scenes which Wakefield saw in that evil abode

NEW ZEALAND’S FOUNDER

—these are part of the first section of Wakefield’s life. "Tie second sees iim inspired with tie vision of a new age—and tie ability to bring it about.- He saw witi his own eyes tie horrors of indiscriminate capital punishment for minor offences and wrote such an indictment of the system as to make its early abolition inevitable. He turned his attention to convict colonisation the t only ‘ system ’ of colonisation England possessed at tlie time—and he wrote one of tie most important books ever written, if its results are taken into account—‘A Letter- from Sydney,' which set out, in its first rough draft, the Wakefield system of colonisation. Next year is the centenary of the publication of this work- —an additiontl reason for publishing a biography of Wakefield, and .one which has induced me to add thereto extracts from the ‘Letter/ which is now practically unobtainable anywhere. * ‘‘Wakefield’s later life is crowded with great events. After setting on foot .the colonisation of South Australia, he turned his attention to New Zealand, formed the first New Zealand Association in London, defied the Government by personally despatching the first expedition, and saved New Zealand from French convict colonisation. These bare • facts, however, can give no idea of the vast expenditure of time, money, and energy which Wakefield made to bring them about. His share in the Durham report, the foundation of Otago and Canterbury, the establishment of responsible government in New Zealand these are but a few of his claims -to fame. Those of his letters which remain give a good insight into the character of a man who did more than any other man. in the nineteenth century to make the present relations of the Dominions and the Motherland possible.”