HUNDRED YEARS OLD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20402, 2 November 1929, Page 14

HUNDRED YEARS OLD.

CAPTAIN C. H. WELCH, VARIED SEAFARIMG CAREER. The oldest member of the New Zlealand Company of Master Mariners, Captain Christopher H. Welch, of- Port Chalmers, will celebrate his hundredth birthday next Tuesday. Captain Welch, who has hud many thrilling experiences in practically every corner of the globe, was born in 182:5) at Great Yarmouth, England, where bis father was collector of customs. On one occasion he was second officer "on a ijhip on which the captain was murdered by the mate, who liitor committed, suicide, leaving Mr. Welch, then only, 22 years old, in chargo of the :>hip, which lie sailed Home from the A,hdama:iit Ishuids. On a lator occasion he semid oa the whaling ship Splendid. Although 45 years at sea* Capita in Walch never had an accident. To-day, oi;cept for slight deafness, he is in possession of all his faculties and takes a keen interest in everything. He. possesses a keen memory and can recall th' 9 d6aifcjla ®.ing William IV., which took place when he was a boy, while he also remembers having seen the Duke of Wellington, Captain Welch weis apprenticed at the age of 14 in the Olruer Laing Line in the ship Pascoo Grenfell, which plied to the West Indies in the copper ore trade. After many voyage;! before the mast he > gained his master's certificate acid at New York purchased a three-masteql. schooler, the Elizabeth Phelter, which he sailed out of New York Harbour jusli after the first battle in the American Civil War of 1860.

After voyages to Capetown and London in 1861 and thou to Soderhnm, m the Gulf of Bothnia, the Elizabeth Phelter made a voyage of % davu from Soderham to Sydney, where she was chartered to carry 488 gold diggers from Sydney to Otago. She sailed from Sydney in the early part of 1862. Subsequently Captain Welch was master of a barque engaged in the sugar trade between the Philippines and Sydney, At various periods Captain Welch had command of about twelve intercolonial traders, including the -- barque Union, which was owned by a Dunediu firm, the brigantine Thomas and Henry, which is now doing duty as a coal hull: at Port Chalmers, and the barque Duke of Edinburgh, in which vessel ne traded between almost every port from Auckland to Bluff. u

Captain Welch was married' in New York in 1862 to Miss Christina Ha:mm. With his family he went to liws at Port Chalmers in 1874. He completed his sea career over 20 years ago and ever since has lived in a trim little cottage at the water's edge in Carey's Bay. Mis. Wolch died some years ago. There were, isix children, of whom five* fire s'lill living. Mr. Norman Welch, of Shakespeare Road, Milford, is a son.