GOVERNOR HOBSON

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLIII, Issue 20829, 10 September 1937, Page 13

GOVERNOR HOBSON

ANNIVERSARY OF DEATH INTERESTING DOCUMENT A Government Gazette Extraordinary issued within a black mourning frame, announcing the death of Governor Hobson on September 10, 1842, and notifying the order to be observed in the official procession on September 13, 1842, is an interesting document in view of the approaching Centennial of events in which Hobson played so important a part. The document is all the more interesting in that it is probably the only New Zealand Government publication depicting a coffin as the central feature of a State announcement. The titles of the high Colonial dignitaries of the time are grouped around the coffin, in the order they were to follow the remains of New Zealand’s first Governor to the place of interment, Grafton Cemetery, Auckland. The Gazette is as follows: (within a black frame) GOVERNMENT GAZETTE EXTRAORDINARY Vol. ll] Auckland, [No. 37 Saturday, Sept. 10, 1842. Colonial Secretary’s Office, Auckland, Sept. 10th, 1842. His Excellency GOVERNOR HOBSON departed this life at Government House at Auckland, this morning, at i past 12 o’clock A.M. In consequence of this lamented event, no business will be transacted this day at Public Offices and they will remain closed until the remains of His Excellency shall have been interred. The ceremony of the funeral will take place on Tuesday, the 13th instant, at 1 o’clock P.M., when the presence of all Public Functionaries is required, and the attendance of all other persons who may be desirous of testifying their respect is requested. The following Order is to be observed in the Procession to the place of interment:— FIRING PARTY Medical r—l Attendants. Attorney General. I I Chief Justice. Member of Councll.l I Treasurer. Sheriff. |_j Surveyor-General. The Horse. Chief Mourner. Acting A.D.C. Private Secretary. Military Officers Civilians. Members of Government Four Deep. Civilians. Not Members of Government Four Deep. (For the Colonial Secretary) JAMES STUART FREEMAN. The names of the dignitaries were William Swalnson (Attorney-General), James Coates (Sheriff), William Martin (Chief Justice), George Cooper (Treasurer), Felton Mathew (Sur-veyor-General), Willoughby Shortland (Colonial Secretary and Chief Mourner), A. D. Best (Acting A.D.C. and Captain of the 80th Regiment), and Edward Shortland (Private Secretary). In his "Captain William Hobson” Dr. Guy H. Scholefield presents an interesting description of the first Governor’s funeral, “The highest possible honours were paid to a man whose private and official rectitude even his enemies admired. Covered with a Union Jack, the coffin was borne by sailors of the Government brig ‘Victoria,’ preceded by a firing party of the 80th Regiment. The riderless horse was led behind the coffin. . . After the Government officials and the military walked ‘nearly all the respectable Inhabitants of Auckland.’ A feature of the obsequies was the genuinely sorrowful conduct of the Maori.”

The judgment of the Maori chief who wrote to Queen Victoria is wellknown: “Let not the new Governor be a boy or one puffed up; let not a troubler come amongst us; let him be a good man like this Governor who has just died.”