THE JOURNAL OF JOHN B. WILLIAMS

Turnbull Library Record, Volume XI, 1 November 1953, Page 3

THE JOURNAL OF JOHN B. WILLIAMS

Eric Ramsden.

Mr. Eric Rarnsden, who contributes the principal article to this issue of the Record, writes on his subject with some authority. His works in volume form include Marsden and the Missions (1956), that happy blend of scholarship and readability Busby of Waitangi (1942), Sir Apirana Ngata and Maori Culture (1948), and Rangiatea, the Story of the Otaki Church (1951). He is at present engaged in writing a memoir of the late Sir Peter Buck (Te Rangi Hiroa).

WHEN I VISITED the Peabody Museum at Salem, Massachusetts, towards the end of 1915, as a guest of the State Department of the United States of America, there was placed in my hands the manuscript journal of John B. Williams, once American Consul at the Bay of Islands, and later at Fiji. Strictly speaking, this volume is not a journal; rather is it a compilation covering the years 1842-44, written subsequently, and not a day-to-day record. Obviously it was prepared with an eye to publication, because there are occasions when the writer directs the attention of “the gentle reader” to this or that fact. Much of it is written in wild and extravagant vein; not a little is libellous. Though it has apparently escaped the attention of historians over the years, it is of considerable importance to New Zealand. As an account of social conditions at “The Bay,” and a resume of the economic resources of the colony, it is well worthy of study: Williams was a witness, if a biassed one, of the birth-pangs of our country. After I had published some extracts from the work in the Evening Post (Wellington) of 12th November 1951, microfilm copies were obtained from Salem for the Alexander Turnbull Library and the General Assembly Library.

Williams, a typical New Englander of the day, puritanical in outlook, and obviously deeply religious, was in

the Pacific, apparently for the first time, in 1832. He was then serving in the Tybee, a vessel of 298 tons, which is said to have been the first ship from Salem to open a direct trade with Australia. The Tybee was owned by the firm of Nathaniel L. Rogers and Bros., a well-known Salem firm of the period. George Granville Putnam in his Salem Vessels and their Voyages (1930) says the vessel left on 27th April 1832. Williams, a son of Captain Israel Williams of Salem, was then twenty years old. A tall, angular young man, who admitted that he “gloried in the name of Yankee,” he was six feet and one inch in height; and the probability is that, though entered as a member of the crew, he was employed as a clerk. Such a course was customary in those days with educated young men of Salem who wanted to go to sea. Putnam also states that it was through the influence of N. L. Rogers that John Tyler (President of the United States, 18411845) appointed Williams consul at the Bay presumably with jurisdiction also in Fiji.

The Joseph Moseley , of Salem, is said to have been wrecked on a reef “to the south at New Zealand” and plundered. Williams was on board. On a visit to Salem in 1854 he declared that he had “mingled with the natives without any sense of personal insecurity.” But whether that referred to his first shipwreck, or to a second (to be mentioned below) one cannot say for certain.

Williams was at the Bay of Islands when H.M.S. Beagle arrived there in 1832. As consul he arrived at “The Bay” on 25th December, 1842. In 1844 he was supercargo on the brig Falco of Boston. On 28th July 1845 the vessel was wrecked at “Table Bay,” and portion of the cargo looted by local Maoris and Europeans. There is a reference to his having been at “Wangawi” on Ist August of that year, when some goods were transferred to the schooner Uncle Sam. He states that the Maoris were then more peacefully inclined, and that “Archdeacon Williams” had arrived with a party to protect the wreck and cargo. He goes on to say: “we went ... to Hawke’s Bay, at Mr. Perry’s station. . . . August 3: Archdeacon Williams held divine service at Mr. Brown’s house.” The shipwrecked men were taken by the Uncle Sam to “Wai-

kokopo,” and subsequently to Auckland. There the salvaged goods were sold at public auction.* The title of the journal suggests that Williams must have left New Zealand shortly after this episode. He is believed to have died in Fiji about 1857.

An ardent republican, he was very much prejudiced against the British administration, and he spoke of “English robbers” as having deprived the Maoris of so much land at the Bay that they no longer had even a; foothold. Between 1818 and 1839, he declared, more than half of the Maori population had died from disease. While he was vitriolic concerning social conditions at the Bay in the early forties, he asserted that they were equally horrifying at the Thames. Half-caste girls were following in the footsteps of their mothers, and there was no apparent effort to check this European-created trade. He wrote of the “chicanery” employed by the British Government to “treaty with these poor, ignorant natives.” “It is positively a disgrace to England,” he added, “not unlike the gross imposition at the founding of the American colonies.” Hobson’s taking of the country by fraud had led to “a succession of unjust measures.” Williams was unfair to Hobson whom, apparently, he had not known. Hobson, he declared, was appointed Consul at the Bay with the proviso that, “if he could obtain a treaty with the chiefs, the whole or part of the country” was to come under his authority as Lieutenant-Governor, subject to the laws of New South Wales. But he was to have jurisdiction over only such parts as should have been conceded by treaty. He went on to say that Hobson, on arrival at Sydney, had concocted a plan with the Governor (Sir George Gipps) contrary to the Home Government’s instructions. Williams called it a “disgraceful, a deeplaid plan,” whereby Maori rights were completely

* A full account of the “Shipwreck and Plunder of the American Brig Falco” appeared in the New Zealander newspaper (Auckland) on 13th September 1845. The wreck took place to the north of Table Cape, and the crew and passengers took refuge in Perry’s store at Waikokopu. The “pirates” who plundered the cargo and mails were mainly Europeans from the shore whalingstations. The archdeacon who arrived from Poverty Bay was no doubt Archdeacon William Williams.

ignored. The manner in which Hobson set about his task of obtaining signatures for the Treaty of Waitangi was, he said, highly improper, and should never have been countenanced by the laws of nations. The Maoris, in their simplicity and innocence, had scrambled for tobacco like children for apples.

The American observer was particularly caustic concerning certain of the officers in Government employment —both as public servants and in their private capacities. Far too much time was occupied, he alleged, with “lewd Mauri women.” Queen Victoria’s officials at the Bay observed from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. for office hours! However, through Bishop Selwyn’s influence all military officers had been ordered to dispense with their Maori mistresses. But while he dwelt at great length on drunkenness and debauchery generally, he found that there was little abuse of alcohol by the Maoris, indeed it was rare to see a drunken Maori in those days.

Six-eighths of the houses at the Bay, he said, were “groggeries.” Because one public house was called after the Queen (whom he held personally responsible, presumably, for all the abuses), he wrote: “Her Majesty must surely feel proud to have her name embellishing such a house, where all kinds of satanical devices are practised with impunity.” An escaped convict from New South Wales was host at the Duke of Marlborough Inn, where, said Williams, he had never witnessed such moral depravity. Furthermore, the American flag had been prostituted by foreigners, as well as by his own countrymen, to “cover a wicked and immoral trade.”

The demeanour of the people at Wahapu was the reason for the abandonment of Clendon’s point, which had been selected by Hobson for a Government township. “Grossly abusive and vile” was Williams’s description of them. “No honourable or respectable man could live among them,” he declared, “the Governor leaving them in disgust, abandoning the settlement, choosing the next site. Auckland, the present site of Government.”

A hill in that vicinity it was an indication, incidentally, of American influence in those days—was called Mount Washington. “Beneath it is this sad picture.

this sorry tale,” added Williams. “A more appropriate appellation would be Mount Hell!” Not the least interesting portion of the manuscript is that relating to James Busby, the ex-British Resident, and his wife. In uniform, the American Consul went across to Waitangi to partake of the Busbys’ hospitality: “Mr. Busby has displayed great taste about those parts of the ground he has improved. Doubtless, Mrs. Busby must share in this credit . . . this most excellent lady is secluded from all society I might almost say from the world, and oh! what deprivations this graceful lady must have undergone in bygone days! ...”

The former he called “a worthy and urbane gentleman,” and Mrs. Busby “this most excellent lady.” With the latter he ranked Mrs. James Clendon and one or two other women, and he thanked God for their presence at the Bay. But Queen Victoria, he declared, gave little thought to the plight of her sex in such a quarter of the world, nor to their sufferings, particularly when childbearing.

Though Williams is certainly discursive, and obviously biassed, there is much in his account that is valuable. He was an intelligent observer, particularly in his approach to the Maoris, even discerning a difference in dialects among the tribes; however, he believed the American Indians to be the superior people. While one cannot agree with all that he has written, it is certainly interesting to see our forbears through American spectacles.