IN REMINISCENT MOOD

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19066, 11 January 1924, Page 14

IN REMINISCENT MOOD

Mr Archibald Anderson was one of the earliest settlers in New Zealand, and one of his sons, Mr J. Crawford Anderson still resides in the Clutha district, where he has been a prominent citizen for many years. “1 think my father was the first man to bring sheep to this district,” said Mr Anderson, .n the course of a chat with a Daily Times representative. ‘‘He first took up land at Terawhiti, near Wellington, but the Maoris paid him such unwelcome attention that he decided to seek his fortune elsewhere. He had some 1500 sheep at Terawhiti, and one morning his shepherd said that about 200 Maoris had invaded the place, fully armed with the weapons in use at that time. The shepherd got such a fright that he vacated the hut with no clothes on except his shirt, m which he had been sleeping. He made tracks for Wellington, and it is believed that he never slackened speed till he got there. Two years elapsed before ray father got possession of the place again, and, strangely enough, there were exactly the same number of sheep on it as when the shepherd was chased away. The cattle and sheep which my father brought i.jK- from Wellington in two schooners re.nhod Otago Heads six days before the arrival of the John Wiokliffe. My mother and two sisters came at the same time, and I was born at the Maori Kaik the night of their arrival. On arrival in Otago the live stock were grazed round about Dunedin, and were finally taken to Saddle Hill, where Mr Win. Jaffrny. afterwards a well-known resident of Otago, was shepherd for my father for several years. We then came further south, and my father had a run which extended from Tuakitoto as far up the river as he cared to go. A shipment of sheep which my father imported from Sydney proved a source of trouble and expense after their arrival here. Unfortunately thej' were scabby, and the process of getting them free from this disease was both tedious and costly. This was bad enough in itself, but to make matters worse of these sheep in later years got anfbngst the neighbours’ flocks and infected them, with the result that my father was faced with the task of eradicating the disease from the sheep of practically the whole countryside. At that time the country was magnificent for sheep-raising, there being an abundance of blue grass, barley grass, annise, and everything else that was required m the way of pasture, though the growth was, perhaps, rather dense. At that time the sheep in the country were a very fine type of Merinos, some of the wethers weighing up to lOO’.b. The wool was .ill brook-washed, and I think it realised up to 26d per lb. Of course, the cost of transport was much heavier than it .s to-day and high prices were required to enable the farmer to get a reasonable return for his trouble. In those days the shepherding was performed in a very perfunctory manner, and as a rule the sheep wandered all over the country 7, with the result that the number of what were known' as “stragglers” was very large at every shed. The settlers were extremely honest, however, and if a sheep was accidentally shorn by a man who did not own it. it was immediately branded on the back of the head or in some conspicuous place, so that the owner would know where it was shorn, an adjustment being made afterwards. “Occasionally great fires were experienced, and' these were the source of a great deal of anxiety. Sometimes the outbreaks were seasonable, but at others they were not. At times the fires would rage day and night over an area of perhaps 15 to 20 miles up the river, and on these occasions the shepherds experienced considerable difficulty in getting the flocks out of the danger zone, as the flames travelled very rapidly and the sheep were in grave danger of being overwhelmed. The sight of such a fire, however, was a magnificent one. Some of these fires extended from Lake Tuakitoto about 20 miles up the country. “One morning, after a very heavy fall of rain had been experienced, my father and Mr Jafiray came out of the house at Saddle Hill, and beheld an extraordinary scene. The whole of the Taieri plain was under water, nothing being visible but the tops of the cabbage trees, which were 10ft or 12ft high. We also had some respectable inundations at Inchclutha in the early days. I remembered that when I climbed* trees as a youngster I discovered signs of floods in the forks of the trees at least 12ft from the ground. It should be remembered, however, that in the early days the vegetation was so dense that the water blocked to some extent, and was retarded as a consequence. “Shearers were scarce in the early days of the settlement, and as a rule they had to be brought from a distance. Sometimes they were paid by the day from the time they left Dunedin until their work was finished. In one season, when my father had a shed at Lovell’s Flat, the weather w 7 as so bad that the shearers were on the place for six weeks without shearing a sheep. “For some time the question of cartage was a serious item. All the wool kad to be carted overland, and as there were no bridges the task of crossing the rivers was a very awkward one. TTactically half the value of the wool was ,absorbed in transport charges, so that the profit was not very great. My father once jiaid £SO for the cartage of a load of wool from Beaumont to Dunedin.

“Very little cropping was done for some years. One reason for this was that the kakas and pukakis dug the grain up as fast as we could sow it. They even pulled the thatch off the buildings so that they could devour the remnants of grain in it. Kakas were n pest for a time, and on occasions we had plagues of parrakeets and grasshoppers, which did considerable damage. “The country was overrun by wild dogs in the early days, many of them being encountered nearly everywhere. Fortunately there was an abundance of food for them—young pigs, Maori hens, grasshoppers—and they did not often make raids on the newly-born Jambs, with the result that our lambing percentages were generally good. Some of the dogs were extremely vicious. One of them attacked a shepherd named William Dawson, whose arm was so badly injured that he was unable to use it for about three months. The wound was healed by the use of boiled onions as a poultice. These were not easily procured, however, and a man had to be sent to Dunedin for them, the journey both ways being made on foot. “My father laid off the land on which the township of Stirling is built, and place was named after his birthplace in Scotland.

“In the olden days we experienced some very hard times, and the conditions were anything but pleasant, but we got through with a minimum of complaint. (Jn several occasions our supplies of tea, sugar, or Hour would run out, and we had to struggle along as best we could until fresh supplies of stores came to hand. At times it was impossible to get cattle, or sheep across from the run to Inch ■Chitha where we lived, and when this occurred we had to subsist on game, which was very plentiful, and potatoes. We grew some wheat, and we had a little steel mill, in which we ground it into flour. The flour would appear somewhat coarse nowadays, but the bread made from it was nourishing, and the people who lived on it grew into sturdy men and women. Though the food was at times rough there was always plenty of it. “Prior to the erection of bridges there was a ferry boat over the Clutha Paver where Balclutha now stands. This service, which was started by Mr James M‘Nei’l, was a boon to travellers, who were fairly numerous. A charge of 6d per head was made for passengers, and if a traveller had a horse it was unsaddled and towed behind the boat. The price for towing a horse across was Is. Eventually the Provincial Government put a punt on the river. It was badly 'constructed, just a box with two sloping ends, and was hung to a cable across the river. It was a dangerous affair, however, and was continually capsizing, several people and

HISTORY OF THE EARLY DAYS.

teams of horses being drowned as a result. If anyone had' conceived the idea or utilising two pontoons with a platform across them these accidents might have been averted. When cattle had to be got across the river they were generally driven into the water by stockmen and forced to swim over. As a rule they got across safely, very few being drowned.

‘•The flood in 1862 was not a very bad one, but that which occurred in 1878 was very severe. When the latter flood occurred Mr Pillans and I were put in charge of a ship’s lifeboat which had been sent from Dunedin, and we had a busy time in carrying out rescue work. That flood lasted "for a long time—in fact, we had two floods in one—and we spent about six weeks in the boat, during which time we rescued a large number of people and stock. The problem of attending to the wants of the sufferers by the flood was a big one, but the people generally came to their aid with a spirit of true hospitality, but I believe that a few were sufficiently mercenary to utilise the occasion for monetary gain. During the flood there was a large volume of water right over to Kaitangata, but considering the extent of the country affected the damage was not really heavy. Some of the people in Balclutha, however, would have fared very badly but for the assistance which the boat enabled us to render. A Than named Reyberg and his wife had a remarkable escape from death by drowning. Their house in Balclutha was washed away, and floated down the river. The house, in which there was also a cat, by the way, was submerged as far as the eaves. The occupants were faced with two dangers—one of striking an obstacle in the river, in which event the house would probably have capsized, and the other of being washed out to sea. They managed to clamber on to the joists, and Mr Reyberg knocked a sheet of iron out of the roof, and clambered on to the top of the house. 1 ortunately his cries for help were beard, and a rescue was effected as quickly as possible. Another man spent three days on the roof oi his house in Balclutha. before he was rescued.

“The flood of 1878 was responsible for the ‘making’ of Inchclutha. Before it took place the ground was very uneven, the tussocks standing up so that ploughing was practically impossible. The flood waters brought down a lot of silt, which levelled up the ground, and a great deal of the old vegetation died out, so that cultivation became quite easy. In the silt there were some valuable chemical ingredients which enriched the land to such an extent that magnificent crops were grown. For months after the flood waters receded sand drifts were very prevalent. There was far more damage done during the flood in 1919 than there was in 1878. The cost of repairing the damage on my farm in 1919 amounted to about £2OOO.

“The protective banks have now been raised to such a Height that I think it will take a very big flood to get over them unless something unforeseen happens. I think this part of the country is now afirly secure against floods.” Air Anderson went on to remark that the intake of the Matau branch of the river was being gradually silted up with drift gravel and that a much greater volume of water was now going down the Koau branch than was formerly the case. He went on to express the opinion that if nothing was done in the direction of opening up the intake, of the Matau branch that portion of the river would, in. the near future, be nothing but a chain of lagoons.

Mr Anderson concluded the conversation by a reference to the whisky stills, the owners of which did a tremendous trade in the early days. The whisky, he mentioned incidentally, would kill at lullO yards. It “had been stated that when the manufacturers ran out of sugar or malt, they resorted to chopped-up cabbage trees, and the liquor which was distilled from these would keep a man drunk for a week. One man had a still in the vicinity of Mount Stuart, above Lovell’s Flat, and another man had one in the South Molyneux bush, both of them doing good business.