THINGS NOT GENERALLY KNOWN

Observer, Volume II, Issue 47, 6 August 1881, Page 532

THINGS NOT GENERALLY KNOWN

[It is very much to be regretted that most of the earliest public records of the Colony have been either lost or destroyed. Many of the official documents went down in the Lord Ashley, when the seat of Government was removed from Auckland to Wellington. So far as our researches have extended we have been unable to find any newspapers, gazettes, or Parliamentary records in the Supreme Court or Public Library extending further back than to 1840, but from these we have extracted a few facts, not generally known, which may interest our readers].

It is not Generally Known That :— — Mr J. Newman was an auctioneer in 1840. ■ — C. J. Stone was a house agent, and Thomas Russell was advertising ships' stores and chandlery. —Auckland had even then an. Agricultural and Horticultural Society. —At the first Auckland Races the biggest money was £20. —At the first Auckland Regatta the highest prize was £20 for cargo boats, under 6 tons. — An " Institution for Aboriginal Females" was established in Auckland. — The first survey of the town of Wellington had just been commenced. — The Colonial Bank of Issue at Wellington had about £500 in notes, and £200 in coin. — The first Primitive Methodist Chapel was opened in Auckland in 1851. — George Hunter sold oranges and pears at " The Red House," Queen-street in 1850. —Mr P. A. Phillips was selling fish, soap, candles, etc., in a little shop in Victoria Lane. — Soup was first provided at the Exchange Hotel in that year. — The present Attorney- General was practising as a solicitor in a small house on the Kororareka Beach. — The N,Z. Advertiser, published at Kororareka, was the first newspaper published in the Colony. —The Daniel Webster, 296 tons, was 22 days on the passage from Sydney to Auckland, and lost 200 sheep. — A company was formed in 1851 with a capital of £500 to work a coal mine just discovered at Matakana. —The system of prepaid postage, by means of stamps, . was first introduced into New Zealand in 1851. — At the first Auckland fair, in 1850, there were "sports in accordance with old English customs." — John Chadwick, now a wealthy owner of Tauranga property, was once a butcher in Queen-street. — J. T. Boylan was an active member of the committee of the Auckland Mechanics' Institute. He sold pottery and earthenware as now. — The Thames natives had threatened to sack Auckland, and great alarm prevailed ; but peace was restored. — The 21b loaf was 9d, and a company was proposed for the purpose of providing cheap bread in 1850. — James Williamson kept a two - roomed hotel, about 12ft. by 10, much frequented by whalers in 1845. The chief beverage was rum. — On Queen's Birthday 1851, the Governor presided at a banquet held in Robertson's rope walk, Mechanics' Bay, attended by 400 persons. In 1840 Mr Eyre, afterwards Governor of the West Indies, first planted the Union Jack in the centre of the Australian Continent. — Amongst the curious advertisements of that time is one inviting offers to plough land in exchange for cattle. Coin of the realm must have been scarce. — The Auckland Press were jubilant on January 15th 1851, on the receipt of news from Wellington to December 18th, by the John Whiteby. — Asiatic cholera was raging in San Francisco, upon which the editor piously remarks that " God seems to have sent the cholera into San Francisco." — A public meeting was held in Auckland in 1851 for the purpose of establishing a Lunatic Asylum, to be supported by voluntary contributions. —The people of Auckland were getting up monster petitions to the Imperial Parliament and agitating against the transportation of British convicts to New Zealand. — In consequence of the large number of insolvencies amongst the officials, it was notified in a gazette that bankrupt officers would forfeit their appointments. — The Runeiman and Barribal family, even .at that early period, were the leading prizetakers for butter and cheese at the Agricultural Show. — The chief item of export from Auckland in 1850 was potatoes, of which 12,875 tons were sent to San Francisco in two months. Tom Russell made no end of money in this business, and put together his own boxes. — The Census returns of Auckland showed that among the population there was only one editor, and but three "gentlemen." There were also 7 farm servants, 1 chemist, 1 dairyman, 1 hairdresser, and 6 school masters. — The rates of interest on deposits were : 4 per cent, on daily balances, current account.; deposits payable in ten days, 5 per cent. Discount rates: 60 days bills, 10 per cent.; 100 days, 12£ per cent. — The ship Victoria, with the English mails for New Zealand, left London on October 17th 1850, and reached Auckland on the sth February 1851. Unfortunately, however, the Auckland portion of the mail had been sent by another ship to Dunedin, and it did not reach Auckland until two months afterwards later, via Botany Bay.

— On June 6th 1851 the editor of the Next) Zealander announces that a copy of a Wellington paper had reached Auckland on the previous day, and regrets that "it has not yet come into his hands." — The Waikato natives had sent to the Queen a ton of flour, from wheat grown and milled by themselves, in exchange for Her Majesty's portrait ; and the arrival of the portrait caused a great sensation. —About 1846 the people of Auckland fitted out an exploring party to search for coal. The editor of the Auckland Times, in a leading article, expressed a fervant hope that gold might some day be discovered in New Zealand. • — There is an advertisement for a female servant, " Wages no object." These were the golden days of Abigails. It is surmised that perhaps the advertiser wanted a wife. There were no accommodating Hannafords in those days. — At the Executive Council one of the members suggested that an order should be issued, prohibiting any person from leaving the Colony unless he had given 48 hours' prior notice to the Commissioner of Customs. Cases of levanting were very numerous. — There was a project, supported by the Governor, to connect the Waikato River and the Manukau by a canal. The highest point in the proposed line was 58 feet 4 inches above the Manukau, and 50 feet 5 inches above the Awaroa River. — The editor of the New Zealander joyously welcomes the arrival of the barque Novelty (29 days from San Francisco), which had placed him in possession of the latest news "from every part of the world." He thinks the extraordinary rapidity of the Novelty's passage " abundantly attests the superiority of that route, above all others, for intercourse between this Colony and the Mother Country." — On the 2nd September, 1840, Gilbert Mair, father of Major Mair, of the Waikato, with Daniel Pollen, and four others, established the first New Zealand Bank at Kororareka, J. P. Clendon, now a Resident Magistrate, being President, and Mr Kennedy manager. Kennedy went afterwards to the Bank of New Zealand, came to grief over a model farm, went to England, ana wrote a book on the Colony.