Gamman Brothers and The Tauranga Sawmilling Company

Steam hauler in the bush, c. 1912
Tauranga City Library Collection 01-106

Saw milling in the early 20th Century was a very important industry in the hinterland of Tauranga, particularly in Oropi, Omanawa and Whakamarama. There were huge native forests of rimu, totara, matai, tawa, tanekaha and hinau, to name some of the more commonly used timber.

One of the most active families involved in setting up and operating 2 mills were the Gamman Brothers the second generation of a saw-milling family from the lower North Island. In 1908 Arthur and Frank obtained 24 acres on what is now known as Gamman Mill Road opposite the Oropi School.

Steam log hauler on ‘skids’ at the Mill, c. 1912
Tauranga City Library Collection 01-107

They had cutting rights to thousands of acres of bush in 3 blocks south of their mill. Most of the first workers and the plant were brought here from Dannevirke and the mill could cut 9000 super feet of timber in a day.

Gamman Brothers' Oropi Mill, c. 1915
Tauranga City Library Collection 06-050

Sawn timber was transported 6 miles down to the landing on the Waimapu River, and from there by launch and barge to the Town wharf.

Jack Rodgers' Horse team, c. 1912
Tauranga City Library Collection 01-108

In eight years the bush had been well cut over and many of the mill and bush hands had been drafted overseas to fight in the First World War.  Unfortunately a large number of them perished in Europe. The Tauranga Sawmilling Company went into liquidation in 1915, but the community that had grown up around it survived.

In 1910, another brother George and his sons set up a much larger mill at Omanawa, near the waterfall. This mill could process 30,000 super feet in an 8 hour day and continued until 1917, at its peak employing 100 or so men. The sawn timber was taken down to the landing at the Wairoa River, where it was planed, taken by punt to the harbour, loaded onto scows and transported to Auckland and other main centres.

Omanawa Mill
Tauranga City Library Collection 99-1367

In 1923 George and Sons moved to the Mamaku and set up again, as the topography of the land made transport of the logs a little easier. That operation was finally sold to Fletchers in the 1960s.

Other family members were involved later with the H.H. Sharplin mill at Whakamarama and a smaller private mill on Plummers Point Road.

In 1971 Arthur Gamman, 89, and by then resident at Hodgson House, was interviewed. In his words ‘the Oropi Mill was the first decent sized mill able to supply Tauranga’s needs for dressed timber and mouldings.’

Sources
Tauranga Kete, Gamman Brothers Tauranga, Debbie MaCauley - 2017
Oropi, 100 Years Following the Confiscation of the Land, Robert Craig Scott - 2018
Oropi School Centenary and District Reunion, Edited by Annie Rae - 1999
The Ngawaro Regional Historical Review, Jim Pendergrast - 2005
Omanawa Settlers 1910 - 1960, Compiled by Trish Heke and Margaret Bennett
Mamaku 100 Years, Edited by Shona Jennings - 1994

The Voyage of the Venus Pirates, 1806-1807

Early Sailing Vessels and Visitors to Tauranga, Part VIII
The Voyage of the Venus Pirates, 1806-1807

Looking out to sea, most Tauranga residents can identify Taumaihi Island. Situated close to the southern end of Motiti or Flat Island, it is accessible at low tide with permission, via a narrow spit of packed stone and sand. During the first two decades of the 19th century, Motiti was intensely cultivated and supported a large Maori population. Taumaihi Island which had been scarped over the centuries into an impregnable refuge pa known as Matarehua, was in 1806 controlled by the Ngaiterangi rangatira Hukere. The arrival of the Venus, a small, innocuous brigantine (two masted vessel), off Motiti and Taumaihi in 1806 set in motion events that led to the destruction of Matarehua Pa, the death of Hukere and many of the Motiti people.

An early 19th century brigantine

Built in Calcutta, the 45 ton Venus arrived in Sydney on 8th May 1805 with a cargo of tea, rice and jute sacks. Purchased by the Sydney merchants Campbell and Co., the vessel made two sealing voyages to the islands of the Antipodes and Bass Strait. On the 16th June 1806, after transporting a cargo of provisions and rum for the military at Port Dalrymple, Tasmania, the convict crew of 14, seized the Venus and sailed away with the cargo. Despite having little knowledge of navigation, the Venus’s pilot successfully crossed the Tasman, before making landfall among the Te Aupouri people at North Cape. There, the convicts seized and carried off two high born Aupouri women as sex slaves.

The Venus next called at the Bay of Islands where two of the crew and two convict female passengers were marooned ashore, and two Ngapuhi wahine rangatira (chieftainesses) were kidnapped. One of these women was the sister of Te Morenga, who was one of the most powerful chiefs at the Bay. The other was related to Hongi Hika who later achieved fame as the greatest Musket Wars general and conqueror of tribes. Calling at Whangarei, two further high born women were kidnapped, one of them being Tawaputa, the niece of Te Morenga. Entering the Hauraki Gulf, the Venus visited Thames where it was boarded by the leading Ngati Paoa rangatira Te Haupa and his daughter. Noticing that the sails were billowing and that the Venus was underway Te Haupa leapt overboard, but his daughter was carried off by the pirates.

After rounding Cape Brett, the Venus was sailed into the Bay of Plenty. It is not known if the vessel entered Tauranga Harbour, but at Motiti Island, some 10 miles to the north-east, the convicts sold Te Morenga’s niece Tawaputa. Purchased by Hukere in exchange for parawai (superior cloaks), she was kept as his slave wife at Matarehua Pa. In due course, Te Waru, Ngaiterangi’s leading chief came into dispute with Hukere over Tawaputa. Taken across to Tauranga, she was killed either by Te Waru or at his direction at his pa on Mount Maunganui and her body was cooked and eaten.

Motiti Spit at low tide with Taumaihi Island (Matarehua Pa) in the distance

Responding to rumours about the fate of his abducted niece and sister, Te Morenga sent spies disguised as traders to the Bay of Plenty and East Coast. They reported that some of the women abducted by the Venus convicts had been sold, and later killed and eaten at Tauranga, and at Maraenui Pa, the Te Whanau-a-Apanui fortress located at the mouth of the Motu River in the Eastern Bay of Plenty. Others, including Te Morenga’s sister, they stated, had suffered the same fate at Kawakawa Bay (Hicks Bay) near East Cape in the rohe of the Ngati Porou iwi. It was to be 12 years however, before Te Morenga and Hongi Hika accumulated sufficient muskets to ensure victory over the offending iwi and to exact the utu that custom demanded.
In January 1818, Te Morenga led a fleet of waka taua (war canoes) south to Motiti, where Taumaihi Island and the Pa of Matarehua was besieged by land and sea. Armed only with rakau-Maori weapons of stone, bone and wood, the Ngaiterangi defenders eventually succumbed to the firepower of the northern musketeers. The pa was stormed with great slaughter, but Te Waru escaped to Tauranga. Hukere was killed and several hundred survivors including his wife were taken back to the Bay of Islands as slaves. Matarehua Pa was never reoccupied by Ngaiterangi.

In January 1820, Te Morenga led an expedition against Te Waru at Tauranga and during two battles, many Ngaiterangi were killed by gunfire. With honour satisfied and peace arranged, Te Morenga returned to the Bay of Islands, taking with him with all Te Waru's canoes, 200 prisoners of war, and the toi moko (cured tattooed heads) of several chiefs.

Te Morenga’s moko kanohi (face tattoo)

Eight years after the kidnapping of niece and sister by the Venus pirates, Te Morenga sketched this image of his own ta moko for John Nicholas who was assistant to the leading missionary Samuel Marsden.

What became of the Venus is uncertain. A brig which may well have been the Venus was reported to have been in distress off the Northland coast in May 1808. Te Pahi, a Ngapuhi rangatira was reported to have hanged the pirates when the vessel returned to the Bay of Islands. Maori elsewhere in New Zealand claimed to have captured a vessel about this time. The crew were killed, eaten and the ship burned on the beach to obtain the metal nails.

Regardless, one convict pirate proved a great survivor. John Redmonds, a black veteran whaling sailor who piloted the Venus down the North Island’s east coast, was found living as a Pakeha-Maori at Mercer on the Waikato River during the 1860s and has left descendants. His ‘Wanted’ description posted by the Sydney authorities in 1806 read: ‘broad nosed, thick lips, stout made, wears hair tied, and with holes in his ears, being accustomed to wear large ear-rings’, suggesting a pirate out of a story of the Spanish Main. The actions of Redmonds and his fellow pirates however, cannot be romanticized. Their abduction, enslavement and sale of seven northern wahine rangatira, set in train a cycle of utu that escalated into New Zealand’s longest, and bloodiest conflict – the intertribal Musket Wars (1818-1839).

Sources

Bentley, Trevor, Pakeha Maori: The Exraordinary Story of the Europeans Who Lived as Maori in Early New Zealand, Penguin, Auckland, 1999.
Crosby, R. D; The Musket Wars: A History of Inter-Iwi conflict, 1806-45, Reed, Auckland, 1999.
Foster, Bernard, ‘Te Morenga’, An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand. A. H. Mclintock (ed.), 1966, Te Ara – the Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/1966/te-morenga
Marsden, Samuel, The Letters and Journals of Samuel Marsden, 1765-1838, J. Elder (ed.), Coulls, Somerville Wilkie and A. H./ Reed, Dunedin, 1932.
Nicholas, J. L; Narrative of a Voyage to New Zealand, Vol. I, James Black, London, 1817.
Smith, S, P; Maori Wars of the Nineteenth Century, Whitcombe and Tombs, Christchurch, 1910.
Vennell, C. W; The Brown Frontier: New Zealand, 1806-1877, A. H. and A. W. Reed, Wellington, 1967.

Illustrations

Robinson, John and George Francis Dow, The Sailing Ships of New England, 1607-1907, Marine Research Society, Salem Mass, 1922, plate no. 89.
Motiti Spit at low tide with Taumaihi Island (Matarehua Pa) in the distance. Author’s collection.                   
Te Morenga, self portrait in Nicholas, John, Narrative of a Voyage to New Zealand, Performed in the Years 1814 and 1815, James Black, London, 1817: 216. enzb.auckland.ac.nz

The Begonia House

Begonia House, Tauranga, N.Z., Postcard publ. by Rendell's Photo Service
Collection of Justine Neal

One of Tauranga’s hidden treasures is the Begonia House found at Robbins Park. It might be small but it is a peaceful and relaxing place with an ever changing vista of tropical flowers and plants.

It began life as the borough glasshouse and was converted into a begonia house by Park Superintendent E. J. Holland and his wife. It opened in 1954 and was rebuilt in 2007 at a cost of $55,000 and there it sat quietly providing pleasure to Tauranga locals and visitors alike Unfortunately most locals who visited didn’t sign the visitors book not realizing the Council would use this as a guide as to whether the Begonia House was viable or not.

In 2015 the Council decided they could save money by closing the display house. This provoked a strong reaction from the Tauranga public and a petition was organised by the Tauranga South Garden Club which resulted in the Begonia House remaining open to the public.

Fats forward to the present day and the Begonia House is once again on the Council’s cost cutting list. The Friday 29th edition of the Bay of Plenty Times reported that, for the time being anyhow, the Begonia House is safe, as the Council had voted to keep the $61,000 to fund the tropical display house in Robbins Park.

Tauranga Postcards by F.G.R.

Tauranga. Postcard by F.G. Radcliffe (3545)
Image courtesy of Tauranga Heritage Collection

This image taken by professional photographer Frederick George Radcliffe (F.G.R.) looks towards Devonport Road and the "Triangle Building," located on the corner of The Strand and Devonport Road. Radcliffe is credited with taking more than 8,000 images of rural and urban New Zealand, many of which were sold as postcards. There are at least fifty-eight Tauranga postcards by Radcliffe that, among other things, show scenes of Mauao, the Tauranga harbour and buildings such as the Star Hotel and the Old Post Office.

To see more of Radcliffe's postcards visit the Tauranga Heritage Collection at https://view.taurangaheritagecollection.co.nz/objects?query=radcliffe