DEED DISCOVERED

Waikato Times, Volume 126, Issue 21043, 20 February 1940, Page 6

DEED DISCOVERED

NEW ZEALAND INTEREST

BUYING OF SOUTH ISLAND PURCHASED FOR £IOO (United Pres? Assn.—Elec. Tel. Copyright) SYDNEY, Feb. 19 According to the Daily Telegraph, a deed of indenture, recording the purchase of the South Island of New Zealand for £IOO, has been discovered in the strong room of the Wentworth family in a Sydney solicitor’s office. The deed discloses that the island was purchased by W. C. Wentworth, explorer and statesman, and John Jones, of Sydney, from Maori chieftains in 1840. Stewart Island was also included in the purchase. In addition, the purchasers had to pay an annuity of £SO to the Maori King, Towack, also smaller annuities to several chieftains. Mr W. C. Wentworth, of Point Piper, a grandson of the original buyer, expressed his intention of presenting the document to the Mitchell Library, Sydney, where it is regarded as of great value. The document bears Maoris’ tattoos in place of their signatures. AN EARLIER DEED SALE OF AREA AT BLUFF vßy Telegraph.—rress Association) DUNEDIN, Monday An announcement from Sydney that a deed of indenture recording the sale of the South Island in 1840 for £IOO had been discovered there reminded a Dunedin resident that she had in her possession a copy of a deed drawn up two years earlier recording the sale of an area of about 2000 acres at Bluff. The parties were Edwin Palmer and John Towack, chief of the tribe of Kito. Edwin Palmer made his first visit to New Zealand as early as 1826 and for some years following 1835 was a partner in a whaling venture with John Jones, who was mentioned in the message from Sydney as one of the parties to the 1840 transaction. The deed recording Palmer’s transaction is in the Hocken Library. It was drawn up in Sydney and was signed by the Maori chief with his tattoo mark. “One sealing boat, the sum of £2O sterling, one dozen of axes and adzes, and a quantity of slops in hand, well and truly delivered,” constituted the purchase price of the land, which remained in the hands of the Palmer family for 60 years, although Edwin Palmer in 1851 settled on another property at Otokia.