NINETY YEARS OLD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20331, 12 August 1929, Page 10

NINETY YEARS OLD.

PIONEER'S RECOLLECTIONS.

RESCUE BY MAORI MAIDEN. A DRAMATIC RECOGNITION. [BY TELEGRAPH. —OWN CORRESPONDENT.] TE AROHA, Sunday. An old pioneer who will celebrate his ninetieth birthday this month is Mr. R. Pentecost, of Mangateparu, Thames Valley, who says he has not bad a day s sickness in his life and that he is a rigid non-smoker.

Mr. Pentecost was born at Brixton, London. His father, who was a dairy farmer in a small way, decided to emigrate to Christchurch, and the family arrived in New Zealand in 1856 after a rough trip in the Joseph Fletcher. The voyage occupied six months and Auckland was the first port of call.

Disembarking at Lyttelton, the family walked over the Port Hills to Christchurch, where the first night was spent in a tent pitched on the site where the cathedral now stands. At that time there were four acres of oats where the White Heart Hotel is now situated. Mr. Pentecost, sen., decided to take up land at Rangiora and the trip was made from Christchurch in a bullock waggon. Mr. R. Pentecost became successful as a shearing and fencing contractor, and a few years later took up sheep farming at Nelson.

When in Canterbury he had an experience that rivalled tales of fiction. One day he was driving a team of bullocks along an isolated road when a party of Maoris ambushed him. Killing the animals they marched him off as a prisoner to the native pa at Kaiapoi. There ho was closely guarded. However, he attracted the notice of a young Maori girl, who released him one night, and he lost no timo in reaching his home in Rangiora. A sequel took place at a stock sale many years afterwards near Hawera, when Mr. Pentecost was joyfully accosted by a plump and middle-aged Maori woman, who made herself known to him. He recognised in ber his rfescuer of tho past. Before leaving the South Island Mr. Pentecost tried his luck on (lie.gold diggings, but without success. He then came north to Taranaki, where he farmed successfully for many years. Next ho acquired land in the Bay of Islands district and farmed there until 1914, when his wife died. 110 then retired to his present home. He has a family of seven, who arc all living.