EARLY PIONEER

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21521, 19 June 1933, Page 11

EARLY PIONEER

ME. E. TUBNOTS" CAKEfeft 90TH BIRTHDAY CELEBRATED

LINK WITH HONE HEKE

One of the oldest-born Aucklandefs, Mr. Edwin Benjamin Evans Turner, of Tranmere Road, Sandringham, yesterday celebrated his 90th birthday. He ia the only surviving child of the late Mr. Benjamin Turner, a whaling captain, who was informally elected as governor of the Bay of Islands by the members of the whaling colony before the establishment of official British rule. Mr. Benjamin Turner was making his second trip to New Zealand in 1820 when his whaler was wrecked in the vicinity of the Bay of Islands, and all except himself and another member of the crew were killed and eaten by the Maoris. Mr. Turner was saved in ,a romantic fashion. A daughter of Hone Heke, and a 6ister of the Hone Heke who later was to become a terror to colonists, was present when the shipwrecked crew was marched into tha pa. She took a fancy to Mr. Turner and selected him as her slave. He immediately became tapu, and he wa« allowed to have the life of one of hia companions spaied. Family Settles in Auckland

He later married Hone Heke'i daughter, but she died in 1838, and two years later he married a daughter of one of the first white settlers in the Bay of Islands. The family later came to Auckland, and Mr. Edwin Turner, the third son, was born in a cottage on the hill between Victoria Street and Durham Street.

Mr. Turner relates many-thrilling incidents of Auckland's early history. Ha remembers quitg well the hanging of the Maori, Maketu, *at the corner of Queen and Victoria Streets, for the murder of an Englishman and others at the Bay of Islands. Crowds of sightseers filled the township on the evening before the execution, find Barrack Hill, now Albert Park, was crowdejl with farm-carts and buggies from %s far away as Qtahuhu and Waiuku. At the age of 14 Sir. Turner ran away to sea, and reached London, where he was persuaded by Dr. Brown, of the firm of Logan Campbell and Brown, to return to his home. On coming to Auckland, he joined Colonel Nixon's troops, and for a time was engaged in earring mail through dangerous country to Pokeno. Later he went to Hamilton to build the Hamilton Hotel for his brother, and on completion took charge of the business. Farming Experiences

He was married in Hamilton, and in 1864 returned to Auckland. He later employed his skill as a horseman in Otago on sheep and cattle stations, and his next venture was a farm at Helensville, but while there a gun accident deprived him of his right hand. At one stage of his career he worked as a member of the crews of the paddle steamers Nevada, Nebraska and Decotah, running in the mail service to San Francisco.

Forsaking the sea, Mr. Turner «pent some years in Fiji managing nettle stations, and finally returned to Auckland in the 'nineties to take .up ..the m ork of contracting, which lie had relinquished 20 years before. His wifa died 21 years ago, and four years later he retired and took up his residence with one of his sons. One of his brothers was the late Hon. J. B. Turner, a well-known trader of Fiji, who gave the Auckland War Memorial Museum one of the finest Polynesian collections in the world.