THE SOUTHERN RUNS

Southland Times, Issue 23380, 11 December 1937, Page 19

THE SOUTHERN RUNS

East Dome, Glenaray, Cattle Flat, Wakatipu And Fernhill

[SPECIALLY WRITTEN FOR THE SOUTHLAND TIMES]

(By

H. BEATTIE)

(No.

42.)

The next run in our list is No. 327 which is marked in the book by Mr W. H. S. Roberts as “East Dome” and by the collector as “Waikaia district.” It was applied for by J. Stoddart and Co. in 1859, the locality being defined as “Umbrella Ranges West.” It is a run about which the collector has singularly little information, and even that little may not all be accurate. The run, whatever its locality definition in Dunedin in the year 1859, lay just north of No. 326, or perhaps northwest, and who followed Stoddart and Co. in its ownership the collector cannot say. It was outside the Southland Provincial boundary, but was included in the new Southland Land District in 1871. At that time the owners were Grant and McDonald, their sheep numbered over 15,000, while the area of the run is stated as being 30,000 acres. The next owners seem to have been Driver, McLean and Co., and unless the collector is mistaken this was the Dome Run that was owned by Guthrie and Lamach. Two of the men under them were Robert Grant, manager, and James Watt, musterer, both of whom made their mark in later life, the former at Balfour, and the latter at Pyramid. Run 327 like Run 326 became an Otago School Commissioners’ endowment

GLENARY

This run is No. 328 on the, register but the collector does not know much about it. The applicant was David Hood, the year was 1859, locality was comprehensive, being between Clutha and Nokomai.” Before the applicant could pioneer his run there was a feverish rush of applications for all parts of Otago and he felt that one of these applications unduly infringed his rights, so we come across the following item: —“At the Waste Land Board on August 7, 1860, Mr Hood, per Mr Stewart, objected to Messrs Chalmers and McHaffie’s application, No. 401, being granted, as interfering with his application. No. 328. He was informed that his application. No. 328, would take precedence of application No. 401 to the extent of the acreage applied for.” A history of the district states: — “About the time gold was discovered at Switzers, Mr J. Gow took up the country known as Glenary and stocked it with cattle, which for many years used to be top of the Dunedin markets, when bullocks were worth from £lB to £25 each.” Mr Colin Robertson wrote:— “Glenary—This run was selected by the late John Gow, of the Taieri, and he sold to the late Francis Fielding, who sold to John McKellar, late of the Stock Department, Invercargill, and <t was probably the last named gentleman who called it Glenary. Previous to this it had gone under the name of Gow’s run.” As against this concise statement it is only fair to mention that another of the pioneers supplied the collector with different information saying that Low owned it in 1865 and Alan Macdonald and his brother were in it in 1868. Perhaps portions of it were let to other lessees or. again he may have confused it With some neighbouring run. In 1871 the run was included in the Southland Land District and in 1874 John McKellar gave William Boyer an order for 45,000 feet of good birch timber to build the Glenary woolshed. For many years Glenary has been under the wise sway of Mr George Pinckney, and the name “Pinckney of Glenary” is now a household one.

A FAMOUS RUN

RUN No. 329

This run was alongside the Mataura river in the vicinity of Cattle Flat. It was applied for in 1859 by Robert Wilscn, the situation being described as “Mataura West.” As this was on the Southland side of the old Provincial boundary (which happened to be the Mataura river from its mouth to its source), the collector can present the brief official record concerning it which runs thus:—“No. 329—Applicant, Robert Wilson of Wakaia Plains Run in the Mataura district. Boundaries—north, a line from the Mataura river; east, the Mataura river; south, Fellowes’application; west, Run No. 191. Robert Chapman, official administrator of the estate has paid the fee. The term is for fourteen years from February 26, 1860, the annual fee to be £5.”

The Robert Chapman mentioned was a solicitor in Dunedin and was the official Administrator of Intestate Estates within the province of Otago. The necessity for him to act in this case and to nay the first annual fee to protect the estate was that Wilson was drowned crossing stock at what was later known as Keown’s Ford on the Mataura river. He had come over from Australia in charge of sheep belonging to the Victoria Company and had successfully driven them up from the Bluff to stock the company’s run at Otama and Waikaia Plains. He was a very tall man and was familiarly known as “Long” Wilson. Feeling, no doubt, he would like to better himself he applied for the piece of country lying vacant up the Mataura. Being young and active and apparently not anticipating death he had made no will, hence the official administrator had to act. In 1860 Edward Orbell, who was the manager of the Victoria Company, was running sheep on Run 329 and a year or two later it was taken over by J and W. McNeil, the owners of Ardlussa, the adjoining run, and by them was incorporated in their various holdings.

RUN No. 330

The next run No. 330 brings before us again the question of the exploration of Lake Wakatipu. Quite a number of runs do that, but in this particular case the collector thinks he is correct in saying that this run is the first one where in advertising the application, and defining the locality,, the name Wakatipu is used. True it is mis-spelt, but that is nothing unusual for those times. The application was made by William Saunders in 1859 and the place stated was “Wakitip Lake East.”

Mr D. A. Cameron supplied the collector with many notes and among them is one as follows:—“William Saunders, formerly a runholder in the Mackenzie Country, reached the south end of the lake a day before us in February 1859. He, immediately before us, went to the land office and applied for land that was soon after bought for Grant, Gammie and Rees, the latter gentleman being W. G. Rees, afterwards of Queenstown. W. Saunders went to the lake with Nathaniel Bates, who had assisted J. T. Thomson in his survey. Bates had a Maori woman as his wife, and supplied Saunders with his information. He (Saun ders), Angus Macdonald (later of Reaby) and I travelled together on our way to Invercargill from Dunedin, bul with Bates as his guide he reached the south end of the Jake, as I have said, before us. He did not stay long, however, as his object was to reach Dunedin’ before us, and he succeeded therein. We, on the contrary, went to explore the country, and did so to

some purpose, as you are already aware.” Exactly what happened the collector cannot say but the locality of Saunder’s application was shifted from Lake Wakatipu to near Mount Difficulty, halfway between Queenstown and Cromwell on the south bank of the Kawarau river, where 80,000 acres were apportioned to Run 330. It was later in the possession of Douglas, Alderson and Company for several years, and about 1866 it merged into the New Zealand and Australian Land Company which held it until ic was required for closer settlement. James Cowan managed it for them for some years. RUN NO. 331 This also is a noteworthy application for it marked the completion of an important bit of exploration, the name of the applicants being advertised as “Donald and A. Cameron,” the date being March 1859, and the district “Wakitip Lake East.” Having arrived over from Australia, D. A. Cameron and A. A. Macdonald went to the Dunedin Land Office on February 7, 1859 and asked for a plan of the Wakatipu Lake country as drawn by J. T. Thompson from Maori information. The two explorers then proceeded south to Invercargill and Riverton, where they engaged a Maori known as “Sandfly" to guide them to Wakatipu, and accompanied by William Cameron, set out for the unknown. They spent the first night at Waicola, the next at Hamilton Burn, the next at Hogue’s station at Five Rivers, the next at Cameron’s station at Glenquoich and then on to the lakeside. Mr W. Cameron stayed in camp while the other three pushed on up the east side of the lake, naming the Devil’s Staircase, the Roy River, and a river they could see across the lake the Locky, until they were stayed by a stream flowing through such a bouldery chaos that they determined to return. ' They named this the Lumberbox but Mr Rees later re-named it Wye Creek. Here they camped a night under a big rock and then returned to civilization to apply for this country. Many years later Mr Macdonald said to the collector:—“We thought the lake terminated a little past where Queenstown is now, for we did not get far enough up towards the Kawarau outlet to see the continuation of the lake round the bend. Our application for a run asked for the country along the east side from ‘end to end’ of the lake, and this was written under the impression that the lake ended at what we now call Queenstown.” As far as the collector knows, the Camerons did not develop this Staircase run, concentrating on other runs which shall be mentioned later, and in this instance transferring their rights to W. G. Rees. In 1871 its area was 50,000 acres and it was under the jurisdiction of Boyes Bros, of Kawarau Falls. It may be linked up with the latter run to this day.

We now come to a run that is famous for various reasons, viz., its situation, for Queenstown is built on the station site; the romance of the explorations connected with it; the personality of its owner, and the gold discoveries on and around it It is numbered 336 and the original applicant for country covered by this number was Fred Walker early in 1859 and the description of the territory he applied for was “Wakitip Lake West.” By what species of wizardry the area he made application for was transferred from the west to the east side of the lake the collector cannot say, nor does he know anything of F. Walker and his connection with No. 336, but certain it is that it was allocated to, or absorbed by, W. G. Rees in 1860. The collector would hazard a guess that Walker did not follow up his application and when Rees applied a year later, the official in the Waste Land Board office knowing about the unused number, allotted it to Rees. The collector has given four reasons why this run occupies a famous niche in southern archives and to these a fifth could be added in that a book was written about its start and first two years. This book was “The Wakatipians” by A. H. Duncan, and many years later the author (since deceased) graciously sent the collector an autographed copy, the book having then

WILLIAM GILBERT REES

been long out of print. It is not proposed here to quote it, but merely to give items noted in the collector s many notebooks and scrapbooks. It has been said—Give a lie or a half-truth 12 hours start and the truth will never overtake it. The false yarn that W. G. Rees and N. B. von Tunzelmann were the first white men to discover the lake has been repeated again and again until it has assumed the form of genuine history and has been quoted frequently in the Press and even in Government publications. The real fact is that over a dozen pioneers were at the lake before them. WAKATIPU EXPLORATIONS Honour is due to Rees and his companion for their strenuous exploration in February 1860. Leaving Moeraki they pushed past run after run until they came to Wilkin’s station at Lake Wanaka. Here they left the beaten track and following up the Cardrona and over the Crown Range reached Wakatipu from the east, being the first to reach the lake from that direction as far as is known. They spent three days making a mogi, or Maori raft, and five or six more in travelling 10 miles on the lake with it. Then they 'returned to civilization and applied for two runs, one on each side of the lake Rees had a great contract getting his sheep on to the run. After swimming them over the Molyneux about Clyde, they followed up the south bank of the Kawarau, but were stopped by Mount Difficulty. They retraced the route to the Molyneux and then went up. to within two miles of Wilkin’s station, thence up the Cardrona and so onward to the site of Queenstown. It is sometimes assumed that if W. G. Rees did not discover the lake, he was the first to place sheep along its shores, but even this priority cannot be claimed for him. for D. A. Cameron and A. A. Macdonald had sheep on the south and east of the lake before this. The latter pioneer said to the collector: — The winter of 1860 was a very severe one only surpassed by the famous winter of 1878, and we shifted our sheep from the Staircase run down country. f was at Mr Rees’s station the night his first sheep arrived and I told him he was occupying part of my country be cause my prior application included where we were then standing. Eventually I sold out the Kawarau Falls country to him and relinquished my connection with that district.” Mr Robert Cameron was the first white man to see the Shotover river, which he named the Tummel. He applied for the surrounding country at the end of 1859 and as W. G. Rees applied foi the same region some months later, the second applicant bought out the first. He asked the discoverer if he had any objection to the Tummel being re - named Shotover, and Mr Cameron replied that as Mr Rees now owned the country he could bestow what names he pleased.

W. G. Rees was a cousin of W. G. Grace, the world’s most famous cricketer, and was bom in North Wales. He came from Home in the ship Equator and found his way to Otago in December 1859 or January 1860. After the exploring trip which determined the locality of his run, he fixed the situation of his station to be at the mouth of the little creek which runs into Queenstown Bay and here he erected a wattle-and-daub homestead. In 1862 when the diggings broke out it was surrounded with tents, the one solid structure in a world of canvas. One of the diggers relates that there were only two craft on the lake at thb end of 1862, these being a small boat owned by Jewiss and Evans and a small fore-and-aft schooner belonging to Rees. In driving up stock to Rees’s run to feed the diggers a mob of 30 bullocks in charge of a stock man named Clements went over the cliff at the Devil’s Staircase and were all lost. In later years tourist exaggeration magnified the number lost to 300. Rees’s son Cecil Walter, was bom at Waipahi as Mrs Rees was journeying to her new home at Queenstown. He was named after two friends of Rees at Home, and the memory of the same two gentlemen is preserved in the nomenclature of the vicinity, although one account of the district is so far astray as to say the two peaks are “named after Cecil Walter Rees who discovered the lake in 1859”! 1 1 Some time about 1864-65 the small Cecil Walter fell into the lake and but for his sister grabbing him by the seat of his pants and screaming for help he would have been drowned. Some time after his father built the Kawarau Falls station and removed there. In 1872 he went as manager to Station Peak in South Canterbury and his death occurred in October 1898. Of the men who assisted him to start the run, Flint was shepherd at Lake Hayes out-station, Walter Mclver died at Waikaia in September 1909, aged 80, and George Washington McGaw died at Waimatuku in October 1910, aged 80. Of the subsequent history of the old Lake Wakatipu Run after Rees left it in 1872 the collector has no information except that D. Manson managed it between 1884 and 1894 for the New Zealand Loan and Mercantile Agency Company. THE FERNHILL RUN To complete this article it is proposed to incorporate here the little the collector knows about the run taken up by Rees’s companion in the exploring trip of February 1860. The number of N. von Tunzelmann’s run was 350 and here we find the same difficulty in defining its early ownership as existed in the case of Rees. No. 350 was originally an application for a pastoral licence by one John Thompson in the year 1859, the locality which he had in view being called “Hekerarika Lake north.” This would demarcate it as being north of Run 324 (Mt. Nicholas) but what happened to John Thompson or how his number came to be allocated to von Tunzelmann the collector cannot say. The sheep for run 350 had to be brought up the Oreti and through White’s run to reach their destination which was the run at the mouth of the Von river and which its owner named Fernhill. In the Sheep Return for 1863 N. B. von Tunzelmann had 1500 sheep; in 1868 the number was 5340 and in 1870 in conjunction with Picket and Green he ran 9330 sheep on Fernhill. In 1871 the run was included in the new Southland Land District, its area is given as 50,000 acres, and in September 1872 Thomas C. Low, Fernhill, Wakatip, is listed as running 10,000 sheep on Run 350, and 4000 on Run 324 (Mount Nicholas). In one of the sheep returns the printer comes a cropper over the foreign name and produces it as “von Turzlemaun.” What year he left Fernhill the collector cannot say, but one pioneer names him as being there in 1874. Mr A. A. Macdonald wrote:—“He was familiarly known to his intimates as ‘Old Von’ and he occupied Fernhill until, like so many of the pioneers, evil times overtook him in the late ’sixties He then removed and ended an honourable career under the shadow of Walter Peak on tire shores of the lake- he loved so well and had sailed over so often. ‘Mr Von’ was a good fellow, as we say. He had studied veterinary science in Paris and at Edinburgh University, but dropped the profession on coming to New Zealand.” In the obituary of Mrs von Tunzelmann who died at Queenstown in April 1918, aged 71, it states that her husband had been a member of a titled family in Russia. She was survived by two sons and three daughters.