FIFTY YEARS MARRIED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19765, 12 October 1927, Page 14

FIFTY YEARS MARRIED.

MR. AND MPS. W. 8. LEYLAND. A ROMANTIC BEGINNING.

INTERESTING RETROSPECT*

To-day Mr. and Mrs. W. B. Leyland, of Auckland, celebrate their golden wedding, and one of the events of the day will be a presentation from the Royal Naval and marine veterans who, for many year*, have received the hospitality of Mr. Leyland on Trafalgar Day. Having "been persuaded to give an interview yesterday Mr. Leyland laughingly remarked that but for plans that went a little wrong -in Wigan 50 yeara ago, the anniversary would have fallen ,on Monday. The fact of the matter is that because the young sailor's fiancee was only 19 years of age, parental consent was withheld, and they set about getting the knot tied without it.

The first registrar to whom application for a licence was made sent the pair packing. Then they tried another, this time letting it be inferred that the bride-to-be was JJI, the young man carrying off the situation a* well as he could by ridiculing the excessive amount of inr formation sought. He remembers asking the official if he wanted to know the size of the' girl's gloves and so on. Authority for a special licence had to come from London, but again there was delay, which mado it necessary for the couple to take an aunt into their confidence. instead of a licence the registrar and a policeman arrived. The registrar demanded two shillings, the cost of the telegram, no doubt. "I paid it to your clerk," said young Leyland. •' Well," said the registrar, " the clerk has died in a fit, and there is no entry." The special licence came and the marriage took place but not at the home churqh. The licence cost £3 and it took the combined resources of the bridegroom and his chum to pay it.

San Avay to Sea. This was not the first occasion that young Leyland had found it necessary to challenge fate without parental blessing. At the age of 14 he had run away to sea and after going through a naval training ship had served three and a-half years on the American and West Indies station, his first vessel being the corvette Racoon. He had left the sea a little time before he married and thereafter lived in Wigan where, without realising it, he laid the foundations of his success as a timber man in .New Zealand, by learning to measure timber. He had long had a desire to come to New Zealand, but did not mention it to his wife until a year after the marriage. Happily, she was eager to go, having herself been favourably disposed toward life in this colony through the knowledge she had of it through her uncle, the Rev. Nathaniel Turner, who had landed at the Bay of Islands in 323 with the Rev. John Hobbs to open the " Wesley an mission. Worked the Passage. Immediately, Mr. Leyland looked up the shipping lists and found that a barque, the Lebu, of 720 tons, was to sail for New Zealand from London. She was a Balfour-Williamson ship. He wrote to the captain offering to work the passage for himself, his wife and their baby, and was informed that if he were of good physique this could be arranged. So away to London they went and Mr. Leyland signed on at one shilling a month. Their total resources when they sailed -amounted to £2 8s lOd. The vessel was under-manned and the stormy voyage that lasted four months was one of constant toiL

" A one-eyed Scot aad myself ivere the only Britishers in the forecastle," said Mr. Leyland. "In my watch there was a negro who we thought was shamming sick. Me proved that he had been sick by dying when we reached Auckland. Day after day we worked 16 hoursOften we had" to put a becket on the wheel while we hauled the ropes. However, it ended safely and the captain was prepared to take me back with him. I was to live aft and Bit for my mate's ticket. I had decided on New Zealand, however, and we came ashore- with £2 Bs, plus the four shillings I had earned in the four months. The tenpence missing from our capital had been spent on a tin of jrarmalado."

First Deal in Wood Mr. Leyland's first job was helping to discharge the Lebu for which one shilling an hour was paid. He relates how he and his wife hunted for a cheap house in Auckland, finally being directed to one in Hayden Street. "As soon as we got in there," said Air. Leyland, " I made my first deal in timber. It consisted of threepence worth of tea-tree for firing and 1 carried it home under my arm." Mr. Leyland soon got a job in the railway goods shed and then became a guard, the southern rail terminus then being at Ohaupo. The train used to leave at 7 a.m. and get back at 7 p.m. or at any time thereafter. He left the railway to work as order man for the Auckland Timber Company, going later to Messrs. Jaggar and Parker's timber mill as foreman. In 1888 the Kauri Syndicate commenced to buy up kauri interests in various parts of the province and he was engaged under Mr. Holdship to take over stocks and stores. This was before the Truck Act and every mill had its own store. " Among the sawn timber stocks taken over were two and a-half million feet in the Union Sash and Door Company's yard at Mechanics' Bay, & similar quantity at Tairoa and five million feet at Aratapu. When this job was finished Mr. Leyland commenced business on his own account in partnership with Mr. J. J. O'Brien, who remained in the firm until 1912. Success and Happiness. At the age of 74 Mr. Leyland is fit and well and still in harness. His life has been crowned with great success and ppiness. Of a family of five sons and five daughters, eight are living and the clan can now muster about 40. One son was in the Landing at Gallipoli. Mr. Leyland has served on the Harbour Board, wa3 president of the National Defence League from its inception and is a member of the executive of the Patriotic and War Relief Association.

In 1905 he Brought the naval veterans together. It appeared that the Trafalgar centenary might pass without ceremony, rl through Mr. Leyland's initiative a flagstaff was erected in the metropolitan grounds and Nelson's signal was hoisted. Every year since a reunion has been held on the anniversary, but the ranks of the old naval veterans are now very thin.