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Southland Times, Issue 21897, 24 December 1932, Page 6

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INTERESTING LETTER EXPORT OF PRESERVED MEAT . EARLY DAYS AT WOODLANDS (From Our Correspondent.) Time enhances rather than diminishes much of the interest and value of personal correspondence and a letter written in 1871, which was shown to the Woodlands correspondent of the Southland Times by Mr Charles Wyeth, of Woodlands, recently, has become a treasured possession. The letter was written by the late Alex. Shirreffs, of Gallowgate, Aberdeen, to his brother Joseph, maternal grandfather of Mr Wyeth. Joseph Shirreffs had come out to this country under engagement of the Australian and New Zealand Land Company in charge of a band of employees, mostly young women and girls in their teens, who had had experience in the meat preserving industry in Scotland and who were to be engaged in the then newly erected meat preserving works at Woodlands. It appears that it was a very risky experiment to have the responsibility of bringing out a band of young women in those early days, but one of the reasons that caused the company to undertake the venture was the experience it had had with men employed on its extensive runs being lured to the goldfields or other more promising places of employment. Moreover it had been the custom in such industries in the Old Country to have women employed in the kitchen cutting up, packing and cooking the tinned meat, while the men-folk did the tinsmith work and butchering. Demand for Food Supplies. The late Mr Shirreffs seemed to have little difficulty in persuading sufficient young women in Scotland, most likely from Glasgow or Aberdeen, to come out to the colony, but it must be remembered that conditions were bad at Home about that time. The brother in Scotland firstly urges his brother to advise the company to ship immediately as much meat as possible for, he writes (under date of February 12, 1871), there is a great demand for food supplies of all descriptions from Paris which last week capitulated to the Prussian Army under the King of Prussia, his son (now the ex-Kaiser), and his generals, Count Bismarck, Count Moltke, and von Roon. The Prussians themselves need supplies, for during the time they were holding the city they devastated the surrounding country from which in normal times the Parisians obtained much of their supplies.” The writer of the letter stated that he would forward newspapers containing news of the siege, for owing to the fact that the Prussians had cut all communications between the city and the outside world, the people in the Old Country received only meagre details which were carried to the outside by balloons. The writer further on bewailed the fact that he was not likely to see any of the New Zealand tinned meat sold in Aberdeen, for it would mostly go to the Continent. Government Bonus. Another paragraph of interest in this letter reads: “Doubtless your company has claimed the bonus of £lOOO offered by the Government of New Zealand for the first successful shipment of preserved mutton or beef to the Old Country.” In a recent article on the “Early days of the Frozen Meat Industry in New Zealand” in the columns of the Southland Times, it was correctly stated that the Land Company made the pioneer shipment of frozen mutton and was awarded the bonus of £5OO for it, but as yet it is uncertain whether it was also awarded this bonus of £lOOO for the first successful shipment of preserved meat. If so, then it is more than likely that this pioneer shipment went from the Woodlands works, which in those days employed hundreds of men and did a huge business. As a matter of fact the works were the terminus of the first railway from Bluff, and. it was due to the Land Company’s interests that the railway was brought here and later continued through Edendale, another possession of the company, on to Gore and Dunedin.

In many ways the company did magnificent work in opening up the country for closer settlement, and its schemes, such as building of works at Woodlands (which last season remained shut for the first time since their establishment 72 years ago) _ and a similar institution at Kakanui (North Otago) did much to stimulate the progress of the colony, for in the sixties and the seventies the rapid growth of the settlement of the young country was checked. At this time also the gold production boom had passed its peak and was on the decline with unsuccessful miners and others out of employment. The Maori wars also were just drawing to a close and had taxed the slender resources of the Government to such an extent that in 1871 Sir Julius Vogel had to float the first big loan abroad to carry on the country and pay for the war. The Late Charles Wyeth.

It is worthy of note here also that while this letter was being written there was a young colonist who was afterwards, to marry the daughter of Joseph Shirreffs engaged in the Maori War. He was in 1870 and 1871 in one of those columns out in search of Te Kooti, the last of those great fighting chiefs who refused to submit to British rule. This colonist was the late Charles Wyeth, who died at Woodlands only a year or so ago, and many a stirring tale he related in after years of the notorious Te Kooti, who from his fastnesses in the Urewera country made repeated raids on the white settlers and soldiers’ camps until he was forgiven and peace was at last made. As a matter of fact the late Mr Wyeth was nick-named “Te Kooti” after the fighter of whom he made a hero to his many listeners of a younger generation.

When he settled in Woodlands the late Mr Wyeth became a popular figure as one of the outstanding allround athletes of Southland who competed with great success all over the country. In later years Charles Wyeth became famous as a handicapper of most of the important professional sports meetings in Southland and a treasured possession of one of his grandsons is an inscribed gold watch given him by the Southland Caledonian Society on the completion of many years’ service as the official handicapper of that body. When the late Joseph Shirreffs left Woodlands on the expiration. of his contract with the Land Company, he established a business of tinsmith in Invercargill, which is still carried on by his son and grandsons. To show the passage of time since the letter was written it is interesting to note that there was married recently one of the late Mr Shirreff’s great grandsons whose descendants will be the fourth generation following this colonist. Towards the end of the letter is a footnote: “Thanks for the spray of fem you sent. I have enclosed it in the family photographic album.” This, no doubt, was an action whicn instigated]

a custom kept up through the succeeding years of the relatives in Scotland sending out bunches of heather as a reminder of the folk out here of the land their forefathers left so many years ago.