DEATH OF A PIONEER.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLVIII, Issue 14, 17 January 1914, Page 3

DEATH OF A PIONEER.

DR SAMUEL HODGKINSON

Dr Samuel Hodgkinson, one of the pioneers of Southland, died at his residence, Richmond Grove, on Sattirday night, at the age of 90 years. The deceased gentleman had a very interesting history, and was well-known throughout the Dominion as an early colonist and a. keen advocate of the colonisation of the country, the great possibilities of which he foresaw even when it was in its infancy. Born at Morton Ga*ainge, Nottinghamshire, in 1817, Samuel Hodgkimson studied medicine at the University of London, and was, when.little-more than twenty years of age, successful in winning the honor of membership of the Royal College of Surgeons. In "1842, after practising in England for a short term, Dr Hodgkinson determined to go abroad, and. in 1842 he came to Nelson as surgeon-superin-tendent of the New Zealand Company's ship Bombay. He took ship to Valparaiso, and from there went to Chili, where he fell in with the American whaler General Scott, from which he landed at New Bedford, U.S.A., in June, 1843. - He travelled in the United States for some time, finding his way as far west as Chicago, and his diary of his travels there shows that at the time when he visited that great metropolis, -it was a small town of a few thousand in-

;. habitants. In .1847' he shipped a» : surgeon aboard the immigrant .ship David Malcolm, which was bound for sPort Adelaide. He went to Victoria

;.amd! spent four years there. He then 'v-eam© to New Zealand with a Mr .ikLofhart, bringing a shipment of stock -tp ijOanterbury. With the late Mr j Tmnter-BrowTi, of Nelson, he took ■Tup a run in Canterbury, and his '; homestead became known o.s "Birch

! Hollow." After three or four years ! liis health failed, and he returned to ; England, where he married. He ; returned to England in 1858, and i after a residence of something under [two years there he came south to i Dunedin. From Dunedin he rode I overland to Invercargill, and in 1860 | took up the Mount Fairfax Estate.----j There his travels came to an end, and

with the exception -of a short breaik of two years he remained on the: estate uiitil 1885, when he, retired and went to live in Invercargill.

! No one, perhaps, worked with ! greater energy in the work of j colonising the great tracts of country ; which to-day bear the abundant fruits ; of the labors expended upon them by i the early settlers than .-.did Dr Hodg-

| kinson. His writings include j pamphlets on the Province of CanterI bury, outlining its possibilities >, and i when one considers that this was published1 in England in 1854, when he was doing all in his power to promote

: emigration, it is at once apparent I that to such men as AD.r HodgKinsom j this country owes a good deal of the j prosperity which has rap rung directly j and indirectly from their early labors. I It was during one of his visits to the j Old Land that h© usedi his influence in such a manner as to indue© the late William Rolleston to settle in New Zealand. In 1864 Dr JJodgkimson becartt© a member of the Provincial Council of

Southland, and in the following year he joined the Provincial Executive. He was elected a Member of the House of Representatives in 1876, representing Riverton. Later on he

represented Wallace* He leaves two sons and two daughters. Mr. Harnlrl ■Jlodgkinsod is a farmer at Loohiel. aridj Mr A. Hodgkinson is a Government surveyor at Blenheim. The daughters aro Miss E. Hodgkincon and Mrs W. yon Tunzelmann, both of whom are residents of Invercargill.