Early European Settlers to Karioitahi, Part 3:

 If any of the following are your ancestors, and you have images of them or other information you would like to share, please let me know. Also, please feel free to contact me if you believe any of my information is incorrect or needs changing.  Most information has been researched from Papers Past  (online copies of old New Zealand newspapers) and the search facilities of Ancestry.com.  

 I'm trying to find out who were the first European settlers to Karioitahi. Here's what I've discovered so far. For more background information,  click on Home   and scroll down to previous posts, or  read my first  post  on this topic. Names are taken from public notices in early NZ newspapers advising which settlers were qualified to vote in the upcoming election based on their land ownership details. Most  of these settlers arrived in New Zealand in January 1865 on the Matoaka.    Even though some of these first settlers had a fleeting relationship with the district, they shared a long and dangerous voyage with the  settlers who stayed here, and, one way or another, had a lasting impact on the  district because they stayed - or because they didn't, and somebody else bought the land they left.  They would have all been well known to each other by the end of the voyage out, and no doubt, they would have all remained interested in each other's lives, families and stories long after they left the district.  They would have been reading the same information about each other in the newspapers of the day as I am reading about them online all these years later.

Charles William Pain: Allotment 27 Kairoitahi [sic] (Note: the surname seems to have been also spelled as Payne and Paine indiscriminately. Hopefully, I have got the right people!)

William Charles Pain (recorded in the newspaper article as Charles William Pain, somewhat confusingly) is identified as the freehold owner of allotment 27 Karioitahi, and his eligibility to vote was attested by Archibald Campbell.  William and family came to New Zealand on the Matoaka and are listed as: William Charles, Charlotte, William Charles, and Hannah Pain.  

William Charles Pain senior was born about 1826 in Bamford, Middlesex (there's a Bamford Avenue in Middlesex) and his occupation was recorded as being a mariner at the time of his marriage (as was his father, also known as William). His mother's name was Hannah Stanton.  William married Charlotte Uncles, daughter of Joseph and Jane Uncles, on 1 July, 1850, in Lewisham St Paul, Deptford. Charlotte was born in 1829 in Manchester, Lancashire, and her father, Joseph, was recorded as being a labourer at the time of her marriage. 

William and Charlotte's children are recorded as William Charles, born 1851, Martha Maria, born 1853, and Hannah born 1856.  Martha Maria died in 1857 - aged 4 years.  

The Pain family stayed in Waiuku /Karioitahi at least until 1870, as William was enrolled in the Raglan electorate by virtue of his 10 acres of freehold land at allotment 27, Kariotahi, Waiuku West.

According to records in Helensville Museum, William and Charlotte Paine (note different spelling of surname) were residents in Kaukapakapa by 1874. 

There is a record of William Pain (Payne) marrying Mary Ann Hickey in 1872, and this is possibly William junior. 
 

NZ Herald 23 February, 1872

There is no evidence of a John Payne in Kaukapkapa so this must have been an error somewhere along the way.  Interesting that it says eldest son, as William junior was the only son. And the subsequent article (see below) clearly indicates that Wm. Payne [sic] is the father of the groom.

A snippet in the New Zealand Herald, 29 February, 1872  suggests a somewhat interesting background to this relationship.

Wm Payne and Mary Anne Hickey must have legitimately married as it is entry number 1872/4545 in the NZ Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages. According to Ancestry.com they married at Thames, Coromandel.   It seems they lived in Thames (Shortland) for some time.

With a nod to both fathers, their (first?) child is registered (1873/20936) as William Daniel Pain. Daughter Helena Mary Payne was born in Thames, Coromandel in 1874, and died the following year. Another daughter, Ada  Mary Payne was born in 1878, and another son, Albert Charles Payne was born in 1883 and died in 1884. 

Both Mary Ann and William Charles junior are recorded (Ancestry.com) as dying in Coromandel: Mary Ann in 1896 and William in 1919.  

In 1874  William (senior) and Charlotte's daughter Hannah married John Drinnan and went on to have ten children, (4 sons serving in World War 1 - and one dying in France in 1917). Hannah died in January 1917, aged 60, in Helensville, and is buried in Kaukapakapa cemetery.

By the time the 1880-81 electoral roll was published, William Charles senior and junior were recorded as being freehold settlers on 35 acres at Kaukapkapa, in the Waitemata District,  and William Charles  - of the same address - for the Rodney district. Not sure how that worked! Obviously, the electoral registers did not include any females until the 1893 election, but we can assume that  William senior's wife, Charlotte were at the same address, and maybe William junior's land ownership in Rodney qualified his electoral eligibility - even if he was living elsewhere? 

William Senior died suddenly and tragically in a Melancholy Drowning Case" (is their any other kind?)  in 1884, as reported by the New Zealand Herald 21 November 1884. 

Our Kaukapakapa correspondent writes : — I regret to have to record the death by drowning of a man named William Pain, a settler of this place. It appears that Mr. Dye's cutter, under the charge of Mr. John Simcock, and Messrs. Drinnan's cutter, under the charge of deceased, returned together from Helensville on Tuesday evening. Part of the way coming up tho Kaukapakapa River with the tide all hands were on board Mr. Dye's cutter, with the other in tow. In rounding one of the bends the mast of Mr. Dye's cutter came in contact with a branch of a tree overhanging the river, a part of , which was carried away, and fell on the deck, striking deceased over the right eye, and making a slight wound. When about a mile from Mr. Drinnan's wharf, deceased went on board his own cutter, and was apparently all right. The cutters were then freed from each other, and Mr. Simcock came on higher up the river to Dye's wharf, leaving the other cutter a little bebind. On Wednesday morning Mr. Drinnan yoked up his horses to cart his goods from the wharf to the store but was surprised to find the cutter at anchor a chain or so below the wharf. He got on board and found no one there, but saw deceased's boots and blanket. Mr. Drinnan then rode off to deceased's home and other places where he imagined deceased might have gone to, and not finding him came to the conclusion that deceased must have fallen overboard. Mr. Drinnan then gave the alarm, and as the tide receded a watch was kept up and down the river for some distance. About four o'clock in the afternoon the body of the deceased was found about ten chains below where the cutter was at anchor. The body had the appearance of having been in the water for several hours. The theory is that in throwing out the anchor deceased must have overbalanced himself and fallen overboard

The Herald on the 21st November also reported it in a News in Brief column.It identifies  Paine as a bushman - which William could well have been as a supplement to anything he was able to make off his land.

William Senior was buried in Kaukapakapa cemetery, and Charlotte followed him there four years later in 1888, when she died aged 60 . 

There is a record of William Pain Senior and Junior in the 1890 electoral roll. It has them both living on Part 33 and 35 (40 acres) at Kaukapakapa and they are both classified as carpenters.  William and Mary Ann's son William Daniel was born in 1872  which makes him 18 years old and not old enough to vote and William' Charles junior's father had drowned in 1874, so that's a bit of a mystery - unless he hadn't been removed from the roll?

I can find no further definitive references to William Charles or Mary Ann Pain/Payne. 

So that explains what happened to William Charles senior, Charlotte, William Charles junior, and Hannah (Annie) Pain of Karioitahi - who, in the end, were considered to be settlers of Kaukapakapa, not  the Waiuku area.

Karioitahi's Early European Settlers Part 2

 If any of the following are your ancestors, and you have images of them or other information you would like to share, please let me know. Also, please feel free to contact me if you believe any of my information is incorrect or needs changing.  Most information is from Papers Past - online copies of old New Zealand newspapers - and the search facilities of Ancestry.com.  Please note the spelling of Karioitahi is random and varies widely in publications over the years.

 I'm trying to find out who were the first European settlers to Karioitahi. Here's what I've discovered so far. For more background information read my previous post.  Names are taken from public notices in early NZ newspapers advising which settlers were qualified to vote in the upcoming election based on their land ownership details.  

John  and Sarah Holmes, Allotment 29:
Now here's a family that did stick around and stayed to make their mark on Karioitahi, Waiuku and beyond! There's been comprehensive research published in a book called  "The Holmes Story"  by Greg Holmes (1982).    John and Sarah Holmes, and their children Alfred, George, Susannah, Samuel, Emily, Charles, Arthur, Eliza, and Ida arrived in New Zealand on the Matoaka in January 1865. The oldest son, Walter, had gone to Australia separately. The Holmes family settled  on their land (allotment 29) in Karioitahi and stayed there until 1876 when several of them moved to Australia, returning to Waiuku in about 1882. One son (Alfred) and his wife (Sarah) remained farming at Karioitahi and raised a family of seven daughters and six sons. There have been descendants of John and Sarah Holmes living in Karioitahi since 1865 - truly a Karioitahi name! 
John Holmes died in Waiuku in January, 1884, and Sarah died in 1900.

New Zealand Herald, 24 January, 1884

New Zealand Herald, August 2, 1900.

George Marshall, Allotment 18:
George Marshall, his wife Mary, and children James, John and George arrived in New Zealand on the Matoaka in January, 1865.  

 In 1868, a public meeting was called to discuss the need for local defense in the event of an attack from Maori. A prior meeting had resolved to ask the Government to extend the Militia Act.  It can be presumed that the G. Marshall mentioned is George Marshall from Karioitahi.

By February 1869, George (G.Marshall - must be the same person) was in the Royal Cavalry Volunteers - Waiuku Troop - and practising target shooting on Mr Constable's farm. 

But by July, it was becoming evident that, while men were from their homes on militia duties, their wives and families were left unprotected and their farms were neglected.  G. Marshall seconded a motion proposed by A. Campbell (Archie Campbell from the Kentish?) calling the attention of the Government to the unprotected state of the district.

 In November 1869, he was one of many Waiuku men who published in the newspaper a request for Ebenezer Hamlin Esq to accept their nomination of him to be the candidate for the Raglan electorate in the forthcoming election.  

George Marshall junior's first brush with the law was possibly in 1872 when he was charged with shooting a pheasant.   This must have been an interesting - if not somewhat embarrassing -  situation for George senior, as he appears to be an upstanding member of the community who attended the same public meetings as the Justices of the Peace and Resident Magistrate. 

In 1872, G Marshall (likely to be the same) resigned from the Waiuku Agricultural Society, and his position as vice.  No reason given, but a list of new members is included in the article.  

In February 1873, G Marshall featured in the places in the 4th Waiuku Agricultural Society show for his winter wheat, horse beans, potatoes, peas and rhubarb.  So for whatever reasons he resigned from the  committee, he still supported their show.  

In the 1874 (5th Waiuku Agricultural Society) show G Marshall / George Marshall was placed in the prizes for winter wheat, English barley, horse beans, field peas, prairie grass, potatoes, mangold wutzels, and grapes.  Interestingly, this show was deemed not as successful as previous years, with fewer entries attributed to  the dry season, but improvements in the quality of sheep was noted. 

It is probably George Marshall (Mr Marshall) who recommends, at the Waiuku Institute's Annual Meeting in March, 1874, that the subscription be lowered to encourage more people to use their book collection. This is probably the earliest evidence of a Waiuku library - and even then, there was concern about the way people treated and handled books! (Scroll right down link to find relevant article.)

George and Mary's sons, James and John, had joined the Volunteer Waiuku Corps, as their name or initial was in a list of scores and placings in a local shooting competition in April, 1874.

George must have rejoined the Agricultural Society by April 1874,  as he proposed an amendment that there be no ploughing competition match that year. 

It seems George junior was a fairly confident - if not successfully athletic -  lad, as seen in the results of a sports day held in Waiuku (Mariarohia) on New Year's Eve day, 1874, when between 500 - 600 people attended from far and wide. You'd think there would have been more entrants in each category but,  nevertheless,  we can assume it was one of George senior's lads who was the jockey for Mr Dromgool's "Piebald" (Marshall) which was unplaced in the pony race.  G. Marshall  (George junior) came third in the under seventeen year old 300 yard race - but there were only three entrants.  The article is still an interesting read, though.

George was still at Karioitahi in 1875 when his name was published in the Provincial Governmnet Gazette as one of 140 men issues with licences to kill game (pheasants were mentioned) Note spelling of Kariootahi! 

In 1875, Waiuku held its sixth annual agricultural show where G.Marshall was placed first, second, or third in such categories as bull, sows, cape-barley, horse beans, field peas, mangold wurtzels, cabbage, potatoe onions [sic], geese and plums.  He was singled out for specific praise in the after-match-function dinner (attended by 50 men) at the Kentish Hotel that night, where Mr May commented on the number of exhibits he entered and prizes he won.  The article is worth reading just for the numerous toasts and responses. Another report of the same event can be found in the Southern Cross newspaper.

The New Zealand Herald, 26 February, 1875

About a week after the dizzy heights of agricultural and pastoral success, George Marshall was brought down to earth - very literally - when he was thrown out of his horse and cart on the way into Waiuku. George was just passing the residence of notable Waiuku local and Kentish hotel owner, Mr Edward Constable, when his horse took fright.  With the potential of being a fatal accident, he had a lucky escape  but  still sustained serious injuries. Note the spelling of Karaotahi in this report. 


 In 1877, George Marshall was a character witness for a man who was accused of breaking into a woman's house in Maioro. In the same newspaper column, a G Marshall was charged with a breach of the Vagrant Act by using abusive and threatening language towards P. Tivanon (another Karioitahi settler) on a public road.   G Marshall is most likely to be George's son, George Marshall junior, as he appeared in front of the Magistrate two years later, having taken no lesser person than notable  and benevolent Waiuku resident Edward Constable (of the Kentish Hotel) to court for using threatening  and abusive language.  The case was dismissed with the Bench's unanimous decision that had George junior not been in such an excitable state, the need for such threatening language from Constable would not have arisen. 

In 1879 George Marshall of Waipipi advertised that he was selling  his farm at Waipipi 
(allotments 10 and 10A). This seems most likely to be the same George Marshall, although it  it not his Karioitahi property of allotment 18.  Maybe he had 2 separate properties or had previously sold his Karioitahi  allotment. 

The "invisible "  wife and mother of the George, James, John, and George junior, Mary Marshall   died in November, 1890, at her son George junior's residence, Union Street, Auckland. George junior had married and had at least one child by this stage.  It is possible George Senior was living there too, although Mary was returned to Waiuku for burial. 

In 1892, George Marshall, Union Street,  (does not specify  senior or junior) was removed from the electoral roll through not being able to prove ownership of the building attributed to them. 

There are numerous other references in newspapers to George Marshall, but none that can be specifically attributed to the Waiuku - Karioitahi George.  Likewise other references to James and John Marshall - of which there are numerous, but none an obvious connection to these ones. There are references to a James Marshall at Grahamstown, and it could be that he went goldmining, but hard to prove that it's the Karioitahi James.  Also, there is no record of any Marshalls on any of the available Kariaotahi School rolls.  Wherever they ended up, George Marshall senior was certainly a founding member of Waiuku society.  As usual for the times, there is no published mention of his wife's contributions to the community . . .

James Munro, Section 4, 23 allotment, 10 acres
James and Isabella / Isabel were also passengers on the Matoaka and arrived in New Zealand in January, 1865, but apart from  James's attestation for Raglan district 1n 1865 and again in 1870 - 71, there is nothing more to be found on either of them or nothing to indicate what happened to them - or if they had children. 
 

James Munroe (now with an e) in the electoral list for 1870 - 71.

It seems that they lived socially uneventful lives and participated in no civic activities (where names were duly listed when events were reported in the newspapers of the day).

I have found, however, what could be the banns and an entry in the marriage register for James and Isabella. The dates and ages fit the likelihood of them being the same passengers on the Matoaka - in the absence of any other more likely contenders,  James was from the parish of Saint Botolph, Bishopgate, and Isabella was from the parish of St Marylebone, London. 

And here's the entry from the marriage register, 23rd October, 1863.  James Munro, aged 24,  was a stonemason, and son of George Munro, also a stonemason.  Isabella Herd was aged 23 and lived at Bentink Terrace. Her father, Andrew Herd, was a labourer.  Note that both James and Isabella could write their own names, and James's father (the witness). The other witness was Sarah (what looks to be) McDonough. 

I wonder what happened to James and Isabella?

Karioitahi's First Settler Land Owners Part 1:

 
 If any of the following are your ancestors, and you have photos of them you would like to share, please let me know. Also, please feel free to contact me if you believe any of my information is incorrect or needs changing.  Most information is from Papers Past - online copies of old New Zealand newspapers - and the search facilities of Ancestry.com. Please note there will be random spelling of the place name, depending on the context of its use at the time.

 I'm trying to find out who were the first European settlers to Karioitahi. Here's what I've discovered so far. 

From early 1865, those eligible to vote in the 1866 election were exhorted to register  at the earliest opportunity.  See this article, from The New Zealander, 25 February, 1865, for example. 

In the 1866 election, Kariaotahi was part of the Raglan electorate - with the  eastern part of the area being in the neighbouring Franklin electorate.  With the area south of Auckland sparsely populated,  electorates were huge,  and it must have been nigh on impossible for any candidates to travel to the smaller and more remote settlements.  The southern boundary of the Raglan electorate was the Mokau River, and  Raglan town had the only polling station between the southern boundary and  Waiuku, with the rest being in the Auckland suburbs. The northern boundary of the Raglan electorate was close to the centre of Auckland and bordered the Newton district.

To be eligible to vote in the 1866 election, a person had to:
- be a male, 21 years or older and
- own a property of at least £50,or
- own a leasehold  with a yearly value of at least £10, or 
- occupy a tenement  of a yearly value of at least  £10 in town or £5 in the country, or
- hold a miner's right 
(There were time period qualifications for the property / miner's rights eligibility.)

To be registered to vote, a person had to send an application to the registration officer of the electoral district, and this had to be attested by another householder or freehold land holder.  In the previous election of 1860, a Justice of the Peace was the only person allowed to attest the application, and many men could not register as they lived too far away to travel to the nearest JP. 

  From  New Zealand and Auckland papers published on April 19th, 1865, the following Kariaotahi residents or landholders had registered to vote in the 1866 election. Note the differences in spelling,  taken directly from the application forms. Whoever deciphered the handwriting could have, understandably, misread some of the writing also (in the absence of an established form of spelling the location).

Snapshots taken from newspapers published 18/19th April 1865:

Buckley, James, Waiuku, freehold allotment 39, Kariotahi, Waiuku West, attested by Archibald Campbell.

Casely, William James, Waiuku, freehold, allotment No. 22, section 4, Kariotahi, 10 acres, freehold, attested by Archibald Campbell.

Costar, Charles, Pura Pura, freehold allotment 15, Kariotuia, Waiuku West, attested by Archibald Campbell. 

Fuller, Stephen, Waiuku, freehold, allotment 24, Kariotuhi, Waiuku West, attested by Archibald Campbell.

Passmore

Marshall, George, Pura Pura, freehold, allotment 18, Kariotahi, Waiuku West, attested by Archibald Campbell.

Munro, James, Waiuku West, freehold, section 4, 23 allotment, 10 acres, Kareoatahi, Waiuku West, attested by John T Mellsop

Pain, Charles William, Waiuku, freehold, allotment 27, Karoitahi, attested by Archibald Campbell.

Stebbings William, Waiuku, freehold, allotment 3, Kariotahi, Waiuku West, attested by A. Camppbell. 

Waldrom Thomas, Waiuku, freehold, allotment 9, Kariotahe, Waiuku West, attested by Archd. Campbell. (Note: written Waldron elsewhere)

People mentioned above: 

Archibald Campbell emigrated from Scotland in the early 1850s and leased the Kentish Hotel from Edward Constable from 1857 until at least the mid-1870s. He also started his own hotel on the corner of Kaiwaka Road and George Street in 1876.  He was a well-known and well-respected identity and an obvious choice to attest the applications of intending electors. He  ran a bookshop in Auckland for a while also, and died in Waiuku in 1891, aged 68. 

I wonder if the Alexander Campbell attestation of William James Casely (above) is actually an error and should be Archibald Campbell? I can find no Alexander Campbell in Waiuku at the same time. 

John T. Mellsop (John Thomas)  also attested those claiming qualification for voting registration.  He was born in Ireland and came to New Zealand at age 22 with his family.  He was a secretary for Major Speedy at Mauku so obviously had the administrative qualification s to  attest those claiming eligibility. He eventually settled at Glenbrook and raised a family of ten. Interestingly, his grand daughter married into the Costar family, mentioned below.

John Thomas Mellsop

James Buckley, his wife Annie, and family of Mary, Anne, Cornelius and James (junior) were passengers on the Matoaka, arriving in Auckland January, 1865. I can find no further information on James Buckley in Waiuku,  although James Buckley registered as a shareholder at Thames (Shortland) gold mine in the late 1860s (interestingly, at  the same time as William James Casely, below, was in the area). James Buckley  (and his wife Anne - must be the same couple!) had  a very interesting experience in Shortland (Thames) in 1869, as reported in Papers Past. An army volunteer, armed with rifle and bayonet,woke James and Anne at 2 a.m.  demanding to arrest James in the name of the Queen for threatening to shoot (the Queen's son) Prince Alfred who was visiting NZ at the time.  

In 1869, he took out a lease  of Crown land on behalf of the "Peruvian Gold Mining Company" for gold mining. The lease was cancelled in 1870 on account of  non-execution. 

James Buckley had sold his property at Karioitahi sometime before April, 1874, as his name was objected to being kept on the electoral roll on account of his freehold property being sold.  He had probably not lived there for some time.

By 1874 it appears as he was farming near Kauaeranga  as he complains about logs being floated down the Kauaeranga River as they would stop the crossing and prevent him driving his cattle to Puriri. 
  William James Casely, wife Mary and daughter Annie arrived on the Matoaka.   He also had interests in gold mining leases in Thames in the late 1860s and early 1870s.   He was a lieutenant in the Hauraki Rifle Volunteers in 1870 and saw active service.  Described as a carpenter, he was declared bankrupt in 1870 when he was living at Shortland (Thames). His Waiuku property had been sold by 1873, when Casely's eligibility to remain on the (by then) Franklin electoral roll was acknowledged.  In 1900, William James Casely was awarded a pension of £18.  A William James Casely died in 1910 and is buried in Purewa cemetery. It looks like his connection to Kariaotahi was fairly fleeting. 

Charles Costar   was born in 1805. His wife, Eliza,  nee Hardes, was born in 1825. They were married at St. Alphege Church in the parish of Greenwich, Kent, in 1857.  Charles was a widower,  and a coach painter - as was his father William. Eliza's father, Richard, was a bricklayer.  They arrived in NZ on the Matoaka in 1865, along with their children Martha, Christopher, Alice and Emily. Matoaka Atlantic Costar was born on the sea voyage. 

It seems the family lived at Pura Pura (bewtween Waiuku and Aka Aka /Otaua) and did not settle  for long at Karioitahi. 

Charles is still  registered in the Raglan District  for the 1870-71 electoral year, and is living at Pura Pura, with allotment 16 at Karioitahi his land ownership qualification for eligibility. Note his 1865-6 electoral year qualification was lot 15. Not sure if this is an error, of if he increased his land.

The National Archives (Auckland branch) hold records in the Land Information NZ Department  for Charles Costar of Papatoitoi [sic] of allotment 20 in the settlement of Karioitahi (1876). There is also a record in the National Archives Auckland Land Titles Office of Mortgagor Sarah Mason Speedy - Mortgagee: Charles Costar. Allots 52 & 20 of the settlement of Kariaotahi parish of Waipipi, also from (1876 -1879).


Charles died in 1879, at Paptoetoe, aged 74.  Eliza died at her daughter's house in Manurewa in 1895.

From Waiuku Post, 17 March 2015.

Stephen Fuller: There was already a Stephen Fuller in New Zealand by 1863, believed to be in Gabriel's Gully, as his sisters in Dunedin advertised searching for his whereabouts . Another Stephen Fuller arrived on the Matoaka in 1865, and this is likely to be the same person of allotment 24 in Karioitahi. Interestingly, other Fullers on the Matoaka (but listed separately) were Sophia and Louisa Fuller and Ada Maria Fuller.  They may or may not be related to Stephen Fuller, but I can find no more information about them apart from shipping information that accounts for Sophia Fuller leaving Auckland in 1866 for New South Wales.  There is, however, quite a bit of interesting information about Stephen - assuming it is the same Stephen.

It seems he retained his land  - if perhaps not his residency - in Karioitahi  -  when he was confirmed as remaining on the electoral roll in 1869, and again in 1871 when his qualification to vote was his freehold ownership of lot 24, Kariaotahi, Waiuku West. 

In June 1869, if this was the Matoaka Stephen Fuller, he was located at Thames (Shortland) and was a shareholder in the Sea Lion Gold Mining Company. In August 1869, his address was given as Auckland  (although this could be  the Auckland Province)when he was advertised as being a shareholder in the General Saint Ruth Goldmining Company,  By February 1870, he was recorded as living in Shortland (Thames) again, when he bought shares in the Erromanga Goldmining Company, and in Grahamstown (also Thames) in 1871 when he bought shares in the Cock-a- Doodle Goldmining Company. 

In the 1870 - 71 electoral year,  Stephen Fuller was  registered to vote in the now Franklin electorate, and he gives his address as Waiotahi Creek (Thames). In the 1875-76 electoral year, he was registered at the same address. This means a double up of Stephen Fullers in 1871 as he would have been registered in two electorates. (Could mean the Thames one is not the Karioitahi one, but the following story is too interesting not to tell.)


(Again, if this is the Matoaka Stephen Fuller) his private activities while at Grahamstown unwittingly became public knowledge following the newspaper publication  in 1873 of the details of a court case involving the theft of his US $20 coin. The details reveal that the coin was stolen by an acquaintance, one Robert Hagan, while Stephen was in a drunken state. Further details involve a scuffle with a Mrs Winepress, and that he had been on "terms of close intimacy" with both her and a Christina Wilson - who were also known to  Robert Hagan.
Hagan is described as a "man of fair education and abilities, and [occupying] a respectable position in society . . ."

Auckland Star, 9 April, 1873

Further and more in depth details of the trial can be found here. Interestingly, the judge pronounced that the offence  did not call for an extreme sentence, so imposed a lighter sentence of six months imprisonment on Hagan.

 It is difficult to find anything more about what happened to Stephen Fuller after this event - but it is clear his association with Karioitahi was brief and far less eventful than Stephen Fuller's associations with the Thames gold fields. 

By the time the 1873 electoral roll was being updated, Stephen Fuller had sold his property at Waiuku, and his ineligibility to remain on the local electoral roll was published in a list of others who had also been removed. 

 There are several references and records of  Stephen (and Steven) Fuller in Papers Past and Ancestry.com; however, they are either clearly the South Island Stephen Fuller (the one sought by his sisters in 1863) or without enough supporting evidence to be the Karioitahi Stephen. 

I wonder what ever happened to him after he sold his property?

Kariaotahi Reunion - The Movie

Kariaotahi in the News - a long time ago...

Auckland Star, Volume XX, Issue 162, 10 July 1889, Page 4

 

The Reunion

Thanks everyone for coming along  to the  Kariaotahi School reunion on Saturday. It was a wonderful day with so many memories shared and, of course, the world premiere of "Kariaotahi School - the DVD".
Copies of this are available from Viv Lee at 092358418. In keeping with true Kariaotahi tradition, a bountiful shared lunch was enjoyed , musical items were provided by the Bulte family and a jolly good time was had by all.  

Group photos will be sent  after Easter to those who ordered them. Meanwhile, other photos and information will be added bit by bit from here on.

It was encouraging to have so many people support this project and offer their photos and other information.

Meanwhile, keep checking out this site for the latest updates.

Kay and Viv  kariaotahireunion@gmail.com

Movie stars

We have a movie of Kariaotahi School in 1960, filmed by Noel Bulte, and recently transferred to DVD format. The movie stars Tony Turner (Principal), students and parents of Kariaotahi School, including a calfclub, a visit to Norman Douglas, a trip to the Museum in Auckland and a school picnic at the coast. There are also a number of photos taken from this blog, at the end of the movie.
We will be showing the DVD at the reunion, and it will be available for purchase at $10 a copy.