OBITUARY.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXV, Issue LXV, 20 December 1913, Page 4

OBITUARY.

ALFRED SAMUEL HOBBS.

Mr A*. S. Hobbs was born in May,, 1831, at Swan Port, Tasmania, and wasthe third son of Commodore JamesHobbs, R.N., his mother being a, daughter of Judge Hone, of Sydney. She was a niece of the well-known jouir nalist William Hone, England. At the age of nineteen Mr Hobbs came to theSouth Island of New Zealand with thelate Mr Edwin Meredith, of Mastertotf,, and lor a few years the two young metL were quite pioneers of the interior of Otago and were the'first people to take*, sheep into the district, amid great hardships and privations. On leaving; New~ Zealand, Mr Hobbs went to'•.Souths Australia and was,for some time living op.. and managing a large cattle station, at. Mount Gambier, at that time a gathei>ing place of many young men of his own. age and tastes. There he first made th> acquaintance o the late Messrs D. Buchanan and D. McLean, also that of thenow celebrated A. L. Gordon.

In 1863 Mr Hobbs married Miss Low, of Hobart, Tasmania, and took a cattle^ station in the Keiwa Valley, North-east-ern district of Victoria, where most of" their Irfrge family were born. ... In 1877 Mr Hobbs with other squatters, feeling that the time of the large > landholder must give way to closer settlsment, decided to return to New Zealand, then a practically unsettled couh--try in some parts, but promising well' for farmers. In 1878, Mr and MrsHobbs arrived in Hawera, then a-little* frontier town and bore their part of the many disadvantages which had to befaced by early settlers, Mr Hobbs having acquired a beautifully situated native lease at Meremere, the family living in the township. About twenty yearsago the conditions of the native leases- | were so hard on the lessees that Mr Hobbs gave hia up and began milking for the factory, on the Palmer road, Kaponga; Lafterly he has been liyirigwith his eldest son arid a daughter at Stratford, and though for years a great sufferer from rheumatism, kept up most, of his actiye pursuits until a- few months ago, when heart failure, with bronchitis, set in and on Friday he** passed peacefully to rest, which neverwas more faithfully earned. A stauubh dhureh man, Mr Hobbs was for manyyears lay reader at the old church :<jf St, Mary's, Hawera, and also at vKaponga. His single-minded honesty gained him the respect arid Confidence* ot all classes. He retained a marvellous memory to the very last, day arid his children have the great comfort of knowing that he died as he had always* striven to live an upright Christian. -" The late Mr Hobbs leaves a family of six daughters and three sons—Mrs D. Wilson (Eltham) Mrs W. CaverhiH fEltham) Mrs G. Wilson. (Papakura), Mrs A Allhusen (Kanonga). and Miss; Hobhs, Messrs Harry Hobbs (Stratford), 'S"X. H/? bb? (Eltham), and GeorgeI Hobbs (Inglewood). The funeral toofcplace at Hawera Cemetery. •