THE GREAT VOLCANIC ERUPTION

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5643, 12 June 1886, Page 3

THE GREAT VOLCANIC ERUPTION

THE REPORT OF OUR SPECIAL | CORRESPONDENT. j ! i * | i The Journey to the Locality. Graphic Descriptions | of the Scenes. i i Thrilling Narratives, Maori Heroism. j EOTOBUA, June 11, 10.20 p.m. ! I left Tauran^a at half-pas*; six. The wind was sharp and bracing j the ground was covered with hoar frost, and the pools with ice. All over the surface of the land, as far as the eye could reach, lay a couting of volcanic dust, which was stirred up int | clouds by every puff of wind. As we ' ascended the hill towards Oropi bush, this eoatmg became thinner, diminishing from an even deposit of about a • quarter of an inch to a bare covering of the ground. The vegetation is everywhere ! coated with this beaßtly matter, although . not so deep as to prevent cattle from ob- ; taining feed. The atmosphere was per- I fectly clear, and the Bun unobecured. The j few Bettlers spoken to on the road all re- ! ferred to the alarm caused by the untoward event of the previous day, but it was generally taken for granted that the force of the eruption had expended itself. Its distance, and the cause of the dust-clouds being understood, there was no further un- j easiness, except for the fate of those near the centre of the eruption. The coating ' of dust steadily diminished as we neared ; I Ohinemutu, and there waa scarcely any on ] the road or the vegetation in Ohinemutu itself. On emerging from the bush at the top of the hill j OVEBLOOKING LAKE EOTORTTA, ! a magnilicent,and at the same. time sadden- \ ing, spectacle was disclosed. A dense bank J of steam, of snowy whiteness, extended for j miles above the range of hills on the shore ! of Botorua, opposite Ohinemutu. This bank of condensed vapour drifted slowly north- ' wards and merged into another dust- ! cloud, which was created by the play of the ; wind upon the thick deposit of dust which covered the bills and forests in that direc- j tion where Tarawera waa known to be. ■ The bank of steam was solid and unbroken ' for miles, and rose to a height of several thousand feet. Further to the right, over the road leading to Botomahana, was another vast ' column over that lake. The setting sun lighted up the clouds along the bank with a flush of pink, covering with glory the ram- , parts cf desolation below. Taking within : this view the whole line of hills from ; Taheke to Ohinemutu, that is to say, the whole of the northern shore of Botorua, everything wore the grey drab hue of the volcanic debris. At Ohinemutu itself, the steam jets appeared rather less active than otherwise, although numbers of new springs have broken out, and the waters of Lake Botorua have risen a foot. Parties from the Land Court, which was sitting at Taheke, under Judge Mair, when the eruption occurred, modify the statement made . regarding i THE DEPTH OF THE VOLCANIC DEBRIS along the line. At Taheke it aver- ! aged four inches, and fell softly, settling into mud by the rain. Precautions were taken to shovel it off buildings, in order that they might not be crushed by its •weight. At the Ngae the shower waa heavier, the dust falling to a depth of nine inches, and the Btories of mud and stones j being thrown to a depth of several feet at ( this place is thus disproved. The dust covered up all vegetation, leaving the cattle absolutely without food. Some have already died. At the Ngae they are being fed on hay. The block of land at Taheke, which was valued on Tuesday at eleven shillings an acre, is now declared almost worthless owing to this thick deposit of dust. Beyond Taheke, in the direction of ' Tauranga, the lightning felled several ' trees, which produced bush fires ; and the falling timber has obstructed the coach , road. There was, fortunately, no loss of life in. any of these directions. The in- ', habitants of Ohinemutu have now settled down quietly to their farming pursuits, almost as indifferent as ever to the ' treacherous character of the ground on ' which their buildings stand. They have not, however, yet got over the shock caused by the horrors of that dreadful night, when j the heavenß glowed with livid fireß, the earth shook and trembled, and the air was ' alive with missiles. The women fled, affrighted in the direction of Oxford, but most of them stopped at the residence of ' Mr Bobinson, Native schoolmaster at the ! Te Awhou settlement, nine miles from \ Ohinemutu. Here they remained until yesterday. But it is when we set out from Ohinemutu, j IN THE DIRECTION OP TARAWBBA AND I EOTOMAHAHA, I the favourite resort of tourists, that the stupendous calamity which has befallen the place is revealed in all its awfulness. j A melancholy procession passed along this , road to-day, to dig out the Haszard family ! and the remains of missing natives. The ' pretty little Titokihu bush, such a favourite with tourists, is completely destroyed. The whole forest is covered with three feet of volcanic dust. Trees 150 ft high are lying flat, torn by the convulsions and the high wind. Their roots, a3 they were torn from the earth, are lying in many cases ten feet high. All the undergrowth is swept away, or borne down by the weight of cUbris. Not a leaf is to be seen, and the foliago of big trees is destroyed. Beaching Tikitapu, we find it is the blue lake no longer. The water is changed to a dirty brown. Fol- i lowing the road, the sidings are filled up j with drift deposit to half the width of the road. Bifling tlio hill we come IN VIEW OP TOTOKAHI. What was once a green lake is now dirty water, and the heaviness of the shower may be gauged by a ditch of two feet and a bank of four feet, the top of which is only visible. The river conveying the overflow of the hike is stopped, and the bed filled up. In a gully beyond this point was Been the dead body of a horse, which had been tethered, and evidently had a fierce struggle for life. THE ENTRANCE OF WAIBOA presents a scene of complete desolation, the wharo tops piercing out of the accumulated debris. On the roof of one was lying the dead body of ite former owner, who had been dug out. Three rooms of the Terrace Hotel are standing, but the back part is knocked away, and the balcony stove in. The Botomahana Hotel is a shattered wrack. The roof of the store next door has tumbled in with the weight of stuff. THE SEARCH PARTY had dug out the remains of Haszard, who was lying face downward, evidently crushed to death with the weight of beams which foil acroas his back. Ilaszard's death was probably instantaneous, as also that of his little baby, who is in a fearfully crushed state; but his little seven-year-old daughter appeared to have suffered a great deal of agony. She waa lying on her back, i with wood on her face. The house had taken fixe and was still smouldering, but

the bodies were not burnt. The three bodies taken out to-dtiy, with two children exhumed yesterday, arere conveyed into Ohineumtu. The old Mission station near Haszard's has collapsed ; only a little of the roof is visible. THE NATIVES ARE WORRIES HAIID ; in the village, digging out their belongings. One old fellow had dug a way out for himself, after remaining buried in his whare thirty hours, One old woman was found doubled up in her wharo", dead. Search was made in the boatshed for the boats, but they were beyond recovery. The track was nearly obliterated. Lake Tarawera itself is completely overhung with vapour, and the mountain has not yet been seen in consequence of obscuring clouds. No single native has come in from Rotomahana, a too significant indication of THE FATE Off THE ARIKI SETTLEMENT, near the entrance to the lake, which has, it is feared, been engulphed with all its inhabitants, computed at about fifty. The stream and waterfall at Wairoa, formerly running at the back of the hotel, haa suddenly dried up. One poor horse was Been wandering about the township, frightfully cut and battered. This was the only sign of animal life in the disturbed village ; everything else had succumbed to that terrible storm. BLYTH, THE BTTRVEYOR, who was in Haszard's house at the time of the catastrophe, says that at first he thought it was an electric storm with hailstones, but aoon found out its true character. "When they found that the roof was collapsing with the weight upon it, they tried to open the door, but it was blocked up. Mr Lundin, a young surveyor, who was also staying there, tore a window out, and, getting through himself, aesisted Miss Haszard through. Blyth followed. The wind was co tremendous that they made for an old verandah, under which they took shelter. From here they saw the fire-bolt fall on the roof and set the place on fire. MiBB Haazard then led them through the gloom to her house, which was partly sheltered. There they remained until found by M'Eae. Mrs Haszard and her two daughters are staying in Ohinemutu ; the girls are bearing up wonderfully well. Mrs Haszard'a leg ia injured very severely below the knee : she is prostrate, but is not considered in a dangerous condition. : k'rae'b remarkable narrativt. ' Eelative to the manner of his escape from the Rotomahana Hotel window, M'Eae, after graphically describing the scene, says : — " After the first eruption had* started, and I found the torrents of lava were breaking down the house, I said: ' Boys, we shall have to go ; put what you can over your heads.' We all placed rags and planks over ub to protect us from the danger. Humphrey and his wife went first; Bambridge, the English tourist next; I took the two girls, jumped over the broken balustrade which lay in our way, and lifted the girls over. - 1 called out : ' ' Are you all right, boys ?' and all seemed to call out ' Yes.' So we went on, shouting to each other, only haying to go 700 yards to reach Sophie'B house. ■ We continued Bhouting to prevent our losing one another. Suddenly I missed the young touriot, and putting the • shawl again around my head went at once , back after him. The Bhower of debris waB ; so great that I was knocked down, but ! getting right again, called a3 loud as poßsi- ; ble. Though unable to find him, I was ; rewarded by coming in contact with George ; Baker, my cook, who was standing against | a tree, and I got him to the whariS Then , I went to look for Humphries, whom I had . missed. While looking for them met j Messrs Minnett and Stubbs, and helped I them to reach Sophie's. After some • time further searching, I was assisted j by a brilliant fire-ball coming from , the crater. Lighting on a wharo it ; burst into flames, and I could see better. | Presently I found them, and we went on ', towards Sophie's. A native, accompanied i us with a lantern, but suddenly left us in j a torrent of blinding mud, which caused us , to miss the track. After much trouble we succeeded. I took a bottle-lantern and covered it with my shawl, and going to the schoolhouse caught sight of Miss Haszard, clinging to the broken roof of their house. Blyth and Lundin, and the elder Miss Haazard joined us. The girls in reply to questions, said their sisters and parents were dead in the house. I then got my brother-in-law, John Bird, to return with me, and see if we could render any assistance to the Natives. We got into my house and obtained a couple of bottles of brandy and some bread, and gave these to the Natives. John and I then returned to the schoolhouse to try and aid out the buried Haszard family, but could not find out the spot, so we were obliged to abandon the attempt, particularly as the darkness and obscurity caused by the falling ddbris was so grea^as almost to prevent us again finding our way. After going two miles we were ready to give it up and try and return, not knowing where we might be going to. Mud, stones, &c, were falling fast about us. We were much pleased at this juncture to learn of THE APrROACa OF BLTTH, in company with Cox, Moroney, Douglas, and Willie Bird. We went in a body to Wairoa, and got into the store, obtaining two spades and two shovels ; and coming back by the aclvool we were rewarded by saving the life of a woman. Quite a thrill was caused by seeing her fingers moving, showing she was alive. We called out that we would soon have her out, and on digging away the accumulation -we found her with a shawl wrapped round her head, which we unfastened. She was sitting on a chair, with her back to a chiffonier, her right arm round the neck of Mona, her dead little daughter. Her dead little son was across her lap. She eaid: "Yes, I know they are both dead : you can take my children away." Ted Robinson now came to Wairoa, and helped us to carry Mrs Haszard on a stretcher. Chesson, manager, for Mr Carter, had be?n half-way to Oxford, but kindly brought his coach and somo refreehments over to our relief. NEXT HORNING (fKIDAt) the Government sent men to help clear the road, which had got packed up five feet deep with enormous trunks of trees, nine feet in diameter, across the track. Consequently the work of digging out bodies was attended with the utmost difficulty. Altogether sixty to seventy men mustered on the ground. The first thing done was to search for the bodies of the Haszard family. After clearing the drift, &c, from the demolished structure, the sand was carefully taken from among the sheets of iron and timber, and after a little time the foot of a little boy was seen. When taken out he wasfound to bequite d3ad,hishoadfearfully mangled. The next body recovered was the little girl. Her face showed she had been crying bitterly, and had Buffered much. This corroborates her poor mother's statement that she was sure the child was doad, aa she had heard her crying with, pain. Next was found the body of Mr Haszard, much injured in the head ; but his face looked placid, as if death had been instantaneous, and there had been no suffering. OPERATIONS WEBB MEANWHILE BEING CARRIED OUT BY THE NATIVES, to dig ont members of their own tribe, ten men and a woman being found dead in the various buried whar£s. The road to the hut at Wairoa had to bo cleared, and great trees removed. An old Maori, over 100 years of ago, was dug out. He had waited patiently, with his elbows on his kneeß, until his deliverance came, and when the ashes were properly scraped off him, he rose, shook the duet from his person, and without giving a look of recognition to anyone, went straight away off and had a good feed. THB REV MR KAIRBROTHER, who lived at Wairoa for so long as missionary, rodo over from Cambridge to visit his former flock as soon as he heard of the misfortune that befallen them. IIE SAYS : " Those who know what a big snow-storm is, if they can imagine lava heaped up, ! instead of drifted snow, can understand ; what Wairoa looked like. To get to the ecene of the Hasiards' catastrophe wo had to go through nine miles of it. The difference between the lava and the snow is the greater weight of the former, which has borne down whatever it rested on. What was

once the beautiful village of Wairoa is now a desolate plain of mud, with here and there the skeleton of a tree, coated with lava. Many of the great trees of the forest are lovelled to the ground, while every vestige of foliage has entirely drooped from plain and mountain, the forest looking a perfect wreck. When I arrived there was one old Maori lady there who threw her arms round my neck, crying, ' I must die here, I must die here.' I afterwards persuaded her to leave and come to Ohinemutu. She then told me that Mary and her little boy were lying dead in Sophie's whare. I went inside, and when able to command my feelings, Mohi, the husband of the dead j girl, told me j HER FAD HISTORY. | He said, they were in the chief's house j when the eruption first commenced, but Mary was afraid to stay there because of j the noise of the falling boards of the house, i and they went down to their own whare, taking two little boys with them. Mohi ] said, ' well, Fairbrother has taught us to pray; let us pray to God;' and they prayed. The roof now was smashed in by lava and stones. To save the life of the elder boy, he wrapped him in a shawl, and i knelt over the little one so that the body should not receive any hurt from the falling lava and stones ; bnt theso drifted so quickly round his body that the little one was soon covered, and he had to keep throwing it aside with one arm to keep it away. The Maori had his hand on the ground, and was also on his knees, so as to provide effectual shelter for the little one, his back thus forming a resting place for an increasing fall of lava. All this time his wife was trying to protect the other little boy, named after Fairbrother ; but her efforts were in vain. The silent struggle with the elements and the lava overpowered mother and child, killing both. Mohi, finding it getting dark, and the lava very heavy on his back, made a desperate effort and flung it off, and taking up his little one called to his wife to be quick and follow, when to his horror he found both his dear ones had died silently by his side. They were afterwards dug out : she was in a sitting posture, with her arms extended over the babe to protect it from the sand-drift. This is but one of many s&d narratives which could be told of Maori devotion to their loved ones in 1 danger. j EOTOEUA, June 12. The term lava, commonly applied here for want of a better word to dSbris thrown out by the volcano, is misleading. Tarawera Mount has not yet been reached, and the character of the eruption there remains to be determined ; but the stuff which fell over Has-ard's house and covered the country for a HUNDRED SQUABB MILES, consists almost exclusively of fine dust, apparently pumice. At Wairoa, hard lumps were mixed with this, and showers of redhot stones were seen, some of which fell at ' Wairoa ; but so far as can be ascertained, at no greater distance. At Tehakaand Ngae there has been nothing but dust, but the great weight of .this, together with the : violence of the wind, was enough to bear down the buildings. The residents at Botorua described the noises heard •as similar to those experienced at , Tauranga, rumblings and tremors, but ; notbing resembling the cannon heard in ! Auckland. The noise probably arose from ■ the discharges in the upper atmosphere, 5 which were deadened to those nearer the • scene, through the rumblings and vibra- ! tions in the lower atmosphere. At Ohine--1 mutu the first signs of disturbance were '■ felt at two o'clock, when rumbling noises, j which were taken for earthquakes, coni tinued without intermission. On looking i out a dense black cloud was seen in the ! direction of Tarawera, but it appeared as , close as if it were hanging over Ohinemutu : itself. In thia occurred a wonderful j electric phenomenon like a most brilliant i lightning, but terrible beyond description. i Nearly the whole population rushed from j their houses terror-stricken, and ran down 'the street to get away from the black canopy, which swelled as if abont to seal up the historic village, and involve all the inhabitants in one common grave. Some declared that the Day of Judgment had come, and the feeling experienced was such as we all suppose would be felt by inhabitants of the earth on that awful day. None of those I have spoken to wish to repeat the experience of that fearful night. A party of Natives in search of their relatives supposed to be in three buried pahs returned from Botoiti, after an unsuccessful day's operatians, and are rapidly repairing a boat, intending to take it over land ten miles, and crosß the Botomahana Lake, so as to get across at the back of the locality. The returned Maoris see no bush or living things in the vicinity of where the pahs are situated. An important expedition has just started to determine the fate of the BEAUTIFUL PINK AND WHITE TERRACES. The party will consist of twenty. Mr James Stewart, Engineer of the Botorua Bailway, Messrs Firth, Fairbrother, Hopkins, the Star special, and Dr Hector, are expected to follow the party, equipped with tenta, bags, and provisions for several days. The party will take the Kaitiria track, which leaves the Wairoa road a mile from Wairoa, winding round Kaitiria Lake to Botokakahi, ten miles distant from Botomahana, Mr Fairbrothor determined to make the ascent to-day of a high range overlooking the.teriaceß. A Native named Mehaka and his wife arrived from Monrea the night of the eruption, and so escaped. They brought their daughter to have a burned arm treated by the Botorua doctor. He says the settlement must be completely destroyed, with the Maoris and the chief Hakarai. He thinks the adjacent settlement of Teauki, wiih forty men and their chief Eangihena, will also have been destroyed, together with an Englishman named Brown, a baker by trade, formerly in Waikato. These Natives were the remnant of a once powerful tribe, and only one of their number has escaped, happening to be near Botorua. He laments the destruction of his people, and bewails his loss. " The last of the Mohicans." Now the shocks have subsided, and ashee ceased blowing about, desperate exertions are being made to penetrate the country in the direction of each settlement. Ab yet, I cannot form an opinion as to the extent of the country injured, or actual settlements destroyed, tracks being obliterated for miles. The Nativea oonsider Government is showing disgraceful apathy in not sending help. Great anxiety ia felt for the Native tribeß in and about Eotomahana and Te Ariki and Moura settlements, where a whole tribe is supposed to be buried, together with a European named Brown and family. It is conjectured that the Nativea may bo still sur-iving in cases. All the boats being destroyed, and the conntry buried in ashes, connection should be effected. Several residents are willing to go out if Government authorised the expenditure. The cost would be only some £50. THE GLEN LAKE IB BTILL B_tOKIN«R AND ROTOBUA LAKB HJ8&INO. Thia morning the contractor . and men were engaged in driving piles in the latter for a retaining wall on the road, bnt both had to cease operations. Dr Cinder reports the springs remain uninjured. Madame Eachel a and Priest's bath still show an increasing volume and temperature, the smoke and steam rolling along the range in greater quantities, and the indications are not so favourable as yesterday. Men are hard at work. No sign of Bainbridge. No moro Maoris dug out. Four cats and a dog dug out alive and two