Flo Chapman's Farm Diaries

Flo's diaries, 1935, 1940, 1957

Farm diaries hardly ever survive. Because – if used as the publishers of these practical tools of farming life intended – they were there at the docking race, the hayshed or the A&P show. They, like their owners, had a hard life. Used to record only the dullest and most quotidian details from year to year they, mostly, were discarded as soon as the farm accounts were beyond the reach of auditors and the taxman.

Notwithstanding their usefulness for farming life, in fifty years of publication the New Zealand Journal of Agriculture makes only four references to the farm diary. These references are, however, very telling. The diary is an essential aspect of prudent husbandry [1] and land management [2]. It supports the farm’s business records [3] and can be used to satisfy an inquiring accountant of just when and why that cheque stub recording “Cash  - Repairs and Maintenance” (often abbreviated to “Cash - R&M”) was written out [4].

Perston Collection plan showing Chapman's farm, n.d.

You can therefore imagine the excitement felt by the archivist of the Te Puna Community Archive when, among the items stashed in a cupboard of the soon-to-be-demolished Te Puna Community Library, were found three battered volumes, each, apparently, recording day-to-day activities on George Chapman’s farm along Wairoa Road in Te Puna. The earliest has the scrawled inscription “1935” on its cover. The next carries an advertisement for boot polish and is from 1940, the first full year of the Second World War. The third, in slightly better nick, is confidently labelled, “Whitcombe’s New Zealand Farmers’ Diary for 1957” and carries the exhortation, below an image of exemplary mixed-country industriousness and prosperity: “This Diary will help you to increase your profit very materially, if you will keep a record of the notable facts and incidents, relating to your farming operations from day to day.”

How wonderful, the community archivist (the present writer) thought, in a landscape so changed and fractured by horticulture and life-style blocks as Te Puna’s, to have even three separate years’ record of day-to-day farming on a single farm before, during and in the decade after, WW II.

Vicinity of Chapmans farm, 2024, riverline in distance

George and Florence (always known as ‘Flo’)  Chapman’s farm was close [5] to those of H J Perston [6] and Arthur Todman [7].  If a conscientious record of ‘notable facts and incidents’ on their  property had been kept, the mid-twentieth century rural economy of quite a large swathe of land above the Wairoa River [8] might, by inference, be available to future researchers.

It turns out, not. The diaries are, each of them, Flo’s brief and unemotive account of the doings on, off and around the farm and within her household. There’s hardly a day missed, except for some blank sequences when she is evidently away from the farm. The weather is invariably reported on, but as often in terms of getting the washing dry as getting the haymaking done – or even, being “too wet to work this afternoon”. There are many references to arable crops – mangolds, onions, lucerne - and very few to animals. Pigs are delivered or sent away and the bobby calves are put out for the truck, which sometimes fails to turn up. (George’s carriage-horse hobby, for which he won prizes in 1927 [9], seems to have faded by 1935.) And his activities in the Farmer’s Union, which had been prodigious through most of the 1930’s [10], were much curtailed for the year of the 1940 diary. On January 26, Flo notes, “Men went to a farmers meeting, I went to the pictures”. After that, although they are sometimes in town on the day of Union meetings, Flo does not record any specific purpose for the trip. Fuel was tight in wartime, costs were rising in the war economy, and labour was in short supply. Their farm worker, Richard (Dick) Flavell was called up in early October [11] – nowhere mentioned in the diary – and was still on-farm for Christmas and Boxing Day, because Flo notes he had both days off.

In the easier economy of 1957, or maybe after some hard-won experience, Flo’s farm diary becomes more like the record idealised in the Journal of Agriculture. She notes the cost of baling 333 bales of hay on January 8: “£25-13-0 paid”. One-and-six a bale would have seemed a lot compared to 1935, when George and helpers built a haystack, but, unlike stacked hay, bales maintain higher nutritional qualities and all of every bale is quick and easy to feed out. The herd tester is there for the afternoon and morning milkings over 24 and 25 March. The dairy season re-starts on 7 July, when the first calf is born on a morning of “very heavy frost”. The first can of cream is sent off on 19 July, presumably still in excellent condition after eight successive days of frost that ended only on the 17^th. As the cows “come in” for the new milking season, arrivals of bobby calves and the first lamb are interspersed with car repairs and Flo’s bowling scores. On the same day she got a £2/7/2d cheque for the bobbies, George got measured for a suit. Flo has hot water piped to her wash house and carpet in her kitchen. Things are looking up on the farm.

Flo's handwriting, 31 Dec 1957

Such threads and patches are probably insufficient to support any firm historical conclusions about mid-twentieth century farming life in Te Puna. But, lodged safely as they are in the Te Puna Community Archive, the diaries are valuable as representative examples of rural work and local society, only occasionally resonant of the world a long way away [12] and often silent or only hinting at issues that must have had significant impact on the Chapman’s life on their farm [13].  These humble volumes would repay more considered study.

All images by Beth Bowden

References

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[1] Papers Past | Magazines and Journals | New Zealand Journal of Agriculture | 20 June 1914 | WORK FOR THE COMING MONTH.  Author, Primrose McConnell

[2] Papers Past | Magazines and Journals | New Zealand Journal of Agriculture | 16 June 1947 | STUDIES IN FARM MANAGEMENT  Author, J G Richards

[3] Papers Past | Magazines and Journals | New Zealand Journal of Agriculture | 15 August 1945 | SEASONAL NOTES  Farm Records, author E M Bates

[4] Author’s personal recollection, Ettrick Farms Limited records (private archive).

[5] Trespass warning, Papers Past | Newspapers | Bay of Plenty Times | 28 April 1921 | Page 1 Advertisements Column 7

[6] I am indebted to René Swan of Tauranga City Libraries for finding Perston’s survey drawing in their collection of local maps and plans

[7] https://taurangahistorical.blogspot.com/2021/11/after-demobilisation-arthur-weber.html  Author, Beth Bowden

[8] https://taurangahistorical.blogspot.com/2024/05/maihi-te-poria-and-wairoa-road.html  Author, Beth Bowden

[9] https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/BOPT19270224.2.20 

[10] Papers Past, multiple references; for background to farming politics at the time, see also https://taurangahistorical.blogspot.com/2019/12/putting-matters-right.html  Author, Beth Bowden

[11] https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/BOPT19401003.2.32

[12] Diary entry, 4 October 1935:  “War started between Italy & Abyssinia.”

[13] Farm labour, for instance.  Not only was Dick Flavell’s departure to be a soldier delayed for months after he was balloted in 1940;  Flo’s 1935 entries between the fortnight beginning 30 September – 13 October tersely describe the strains created by worker Reg’s decision to leave.

The Hard Life and Times of Tauranga’s First Harbour Master

By guest author Max Avery

Captain Thomas Sparrow Carmichael
Photo courtesy of Carmichael Family Collection

The separate appointments of Harbour Master and Pilot for the Port of Tauranga in 1864 may have sounded like soft berths, but they were no sinecure for Captain Thomas Sparrow Carmichael, London-born in 1826. A merchant navy sailor, in 1859 he became master of the coaster Petrel in the Auckland-Whangarei trade. After marrying in 1862 he bought a house in St George’s Bay Road, Parnell, and later applied to the Customs Department for a shore job.

Captain Carmichael was appointed to the two Tauranga positions by Robert Graham, Superintendent of the Auckland Province, on 7 December 1864, and arrived in Tauranga on 13 December. His accommodation was a tent on the slopes of Mauao, becoming the first European resident at Mount Maunganui, but more than a year elapsed before the Province provided him with a house.

Notice of Carmichael's Appointment
Auckland Provincial Government Gazette, 8 Dec 1864

Excerpts from Carmichael’s diary, extracted by great-granddaughter Jean Goodison, describe his trials and tribulations, both with officialdom and locals. He arrived in Tauranga with no pilot boat, but managed to borrow an old dinghy from a Mr Rice at Te Papa (as Tauranga was then known), and proceeded to the Mount towed by the schooner Rapid. He recorded: “landed on the western side and pitched my tent. Obliged to stand up to my waist in water for three hours until the tide left the boat. Boat very old and leaky.” He awoke on 25 December 1864, to find that the boatman he had employed only three days before had absconded with all his provisions. No Christmas pudding for the Harbour Master.

H.M.S. Esk (at left) guarding the prison hulk Marion in Auckland Harbour, 1864
Watercolour by Joseph Osbertus Hamley
Collection of Alexander Turnbull Library, Ref. E-047-q-031

H.M.S. Esk arrived on 8 January 1865, but with no Jack hoisted obviously did not require a pilot. The next day the man-o-war practiced with her guns. Apparently attracted by his light-coloured tent they used it as a target, for the shells burst close to it. The Harbour Master hastily took shelter behind a large rock. When a boat-load of officers later came ashore and were appraised of their indiscretion, they apologized, saying they did not know anyone lived on Mauao. Carmichael magnanimously piloted the Esk to sea after she had hoisted the appropriate signal requiring pilotage. He warned visiting mariners not to interfere with unexploded shells from the Esk, but only a short time later there was a great explosion and Captain Doughty was wounded.

Unbeknown to Carmichael, his appointment had aroused some local animosity, including that of Captain D. Sellars, master of the schooner Tauranga. While at Te Papa on 24 May 1865, Carmichael received a message to pilot the Tauranga out of the harbour, which puzzled him, as that schooner regularly arrived and left the port without assistance. Sellars was asked the draught of the vessel, but the Tauranga grounded on the middle bank, the master having deliberately given incorrect draught measurements. Sellars then came from behind and struck Carmichael on the back and head, knocking him across the heel of the bowsprit and his hat overboard. He countermanded the pilot’s orders, and when asked if he intended to continue to interfere, replied, “Yes, damn you. You have the berth I ought to have. I only sent for you to annoy you.” Saying he would leave the vessel, Carmichael was then struck on the head by Sellars, who attempted to throw him overboard, but was restrained by his crew. Soon after the pilot left the schooner the Tauranga ran aground twice, and after returning to Te Papa ran aground again, due to Sellars, as he explained in the Tauranga courthouse two days later, having been drunk at the time. Sellars apologized for his behaviour, Carmichael withdrew his charge of assault against him and received the sum of thirty shillings as pilotage fee – rather hard won.

Lack of a sound boat and proper navigation gear made life difficult for the Pilot, who recorded that he, “made a buoy from a spar picked up on the beach, to be put on the spit running out from the eastern shore. The lower buoy was drifting to seaward, but no boat available to collect it.” Later, “For three pounds able to borrow Swallow to capture and replace the drifting buoy.”

25 December 1865 was recorded as the worst Christmas Carmichael had ever had: “The boatman was drunk, insolent and using bad language. There was fog, drizzle and gloomy weather, meat rotten – even a dog would not look at it. For dinner two wormy potatoes and two thin slices of bread.”

Mauao, Mount Maunganui, c. 1910s
Carmichael’s tent was probably located roughly where the shelter at centre left was later built
Real photo postcard by Henry Winkelman, Auckland (Tourist Series 997)
Tauranga Heritage Collection, Ref. 0757/10

Carmichael’s hard life continued. He had to respond every time a ship fired a gun, and at night show a blue light before going out and piloting it in. Sometimes he rowed four miles back to Mauao after piloting a ship to sea, and once when it was too rough to get off a ship, he had to go to Auckland in it and return in the same vessel several days later. His boatmen were dismisses frequently for drunkenness and, in addition to piloting ships and maintaining harbour navigation marks, he had to organize the removal of unlawfully dumped ballast and mend his leaking tent after gales.

View of Mount Maunganui from the slopes of Mauao, c. early 1920s
Later incarnation of the Pilot House visible at lower left
Collection of Tauranga City Library, Pae Korokī Ref. 99-160

At the end of March 1866 Carmichael had an opportunity to talk again to Superintendent Graham at Te Papa about a house for the pilot station, and to ask for and be granted some leave. Governor Grey was visiting Te Papa at the same time and, when he departed on the steamer Eclipse on 8 April, Carmichael was also aboard. When the Governor went ashore at Kawau Island, it seemed that the Eclipse would stay there for a few days. Not wishing to waste precious days of his leave, Carmichael borrowed the ship’s dinghy and set out to row to Auckland at 9.30am on the 10^th. Throughout the day there were south-west squalls with rain, but he arrived at Wynyard Pier at 10pm and was home in St George’s Bay Road at 11pm. Such was the seamanship and determination of Carmichael, who finally occupied the Pilot House on Mauao on 4 October 1866.

Thomas Sparrow Carmichael, one of the first Europeans to navigate the fabled North-West Passage, and holder of the Polar Medal, was probably glad to resign from his positions as Tauranga’s first Harbour Master and Pilot in late 1868 and return to a life as a ship’s master on the New Zealand coast. He died in Whangarei on 10 November 1900.

Foraging and Hunting on Pae Korokī

According to Tauranga City Libraries Heritage Specialist Harley Couper, whether you're "foraging or hunting" there is something for everyone on Pae Korokī, the library’s recently launched online gateway to historical information. Indeed, after learning more about Pae Korokī at February’s Historical Society meeting, I thought it would be interesting to go foraging and share a few highlights.

Image courtesy of Tauranga City Libraries Pae Korokī

One of the first things to note is that most of the stories on the soon to be retired Tauranga Memories website have been transferred to Pae Korokī and can be found curated under the ‘Stories’ navigation menu on the home page. Information collated by librarians, community members and local historians such as Ellen McCormack and Christine Clement continue to be accessible.

A visit to 'Archives’ was next and this category contains some real treasures including the Tauranga Borough Council rate books and the outward letter book of the District Surveyors Office in Tauranga between 1866 and 1868. However, it was the diaries that caught my eye; those of Te Puna farmer Thomas Lochhead in particular. Twelve of his diaries, dating from 1883-1905, have been digitised and more will follow.

Image courtesy of Tauranga City Libraries Pae Korokī

One of the most popular features of Pae Korokī will undoubtedly be ‘Images’ where visitors can access an ever-increasing number of photographs that reveal the people, places and events of this region. Stand outs include the Gifford-Cross and Photo News collections. However, a real surprise was the selection of stills taken during the 1935 filming of ‘Hei Tiki’. Described as an important piece of New Zealand film history these stills must be unique.

Image courtesy of Tauranga City Libraries Pae Korokī

Onto ‘Maps’ and this section contains some intriguing hand drawn and annotated maps, including a sketch map of Katikati district and a map that shows the Maori occupation of Mauao. If this wasn’t enough, with ‘More’ visitors can search publications including the Journal of the Tauranga Historical Society 1955 to 1982 and listen to oral history recordings.

Image courtesy of Tauranga City Libraries Pae Korokī

Not only will Pae Korokī be a first stop when I’m researching, it will also be a place to visit when I have time on my hands and the urge to learn more about where I live.

The Brigantine Victoria and Ensign Abel Best, 1842

Early Sailing Vessels and Visitors to Tauranga

Part XII. The Brigantine Victoria and Ensign Abel Best, 1842

In 1842, the colonial vessel Victoria entered Tauranga Harbour after sailing from New Zealand’s new fledgling capital of Auckland. On board were colonial officials and British Imperial troops, intent on ending an intertribal war between Tauranga’s Ngai Te Rangi and the Te Arawa people at Maketu. The acting governor Thomas Shortland’s pretext for intervening was a report that each tribe had seized a vessel belonging to one of their enemy’s resident traders, for use as warrior transports.

Built at Deptford, N.S.W. in 1840 for Governor Hobson’s new colonial administration, the 200 ton square-rigged Victoria was well prepared for any conflict with Maori. Armed with two 18 pound carronades and a four pound cannon, there were 226 round shot and 175 rounds of grape shot and canister on board. The vessel also carried 40 soldiers of the 40th Regiment led by Major Thomas Bunbury (who had taken a copy of the Treaty of Waitangi around New Zealand for Maori to sign in 1840), and some seamen and marines from HMS Tortoise, for whom 7,100 musket ball cartridges had been loaded.

The colonial brig Victoria
Image courtesy of Keith Snow, New Zealand marine artist

Shortland established his headquarters at Maketu and began peace negotiations, but the leading rangatira at Tauranga and Maketu objected to the right of the British to interfere in their wars. Shortland managed to effect a temporary peace and the return of the cutter Nimble, seized by Te Arawa from the traders Charles Joy and Peter Lowrie. Conscious of the escalating cost of the expedition, the limited size of his military force and the intransigence of the opposing rangatira, Shortland withdrew his troops and returned to Auckland. This was the first of several occasions where British army and naval troops were called out to settle an intertribal dispute and to recover European property during the 1840s.

On board the Victoria during the initial voyage to Tauranga was Ensign Abel Dottin Best. A talented officer of the 80th regiment, Best had served on a convict ship in New South Wales and Norfolk Island. In New Zealand he was given special instructions by Bunbury to take detailed notes on the defences of all Maori pa he visited. Posted to India in 1843, Captain Best was killed in battle in 1845, not yet 30 years old. He kept a journal however, which casts further light on some of the residents, locations and vistas at Tauranga during July-August, 1842.

"July 13th Running down the coast passed close to the Islands Hausey Mercury Aldermans Mayor &c - and at Night shortened sail at times laying to.

14th The harbour of Tauronga is so remarkable that it cannot by any possibillity be mistaken. At its immediate entrance the S. E. head rises into a conical hill with a flat top of a very considerable elevation all the coast to the N. W. being low for at least 15 miles and about 12 miles off lies the island of Kawera.

Sighting Mounganui, the hill mentioned at daylight we beat in with close reefed Topsails against a strong Gale having the flood tide in our favour at half tide carrying in four fathoms. As the harbour was little known when inside Capt Richards let go his anchor in 10 fathoms. We had not long been anchored when a Canoe boarded us containing some of the people who had escaped from Taraia two of whom had been wounded one of them severely in the hand and thigh. The Canoe one of the best constructed I ever saw came down in capital style against a powerful tide her crew twenty in number keeping time to the waving of a battle axe dressed with feathers."

Captain Abel Best 1816-1845
Photo courtesy of Don Armitage, Voyages of the Colonial Brig "Victoria" 1842-3

"Shortly after Mr Browns (the resident Missionary) six oared boat arrived & we all went on shore  & were speedily introduced to Mr Brown & Miss Baker. Mr Brown having told us off to our respective Quarters Sd & Mr Clarke being allotted rooms in his house & Ed & I having the old dwelling of Mr Stack assigned to us we went to dinner and then amused ourselves untill tea wandering about. I observed that the Maories had adopted a system of imperfect Intrenchment as their system of Fortification probably owing to the nature of the ground & the deficiency of timber fit for Stockades.

In the afternoon the Brig worked in and let go her anchor opposite Otu Maitai. The Country round Tauronga for a distance of at least Ten miles is devoid of wood the first forest occurring on the road to Rotorua in which valuable timber abounds. I am of opinion that the whole of the Plains around Tauronga were once wooded but that the trees gave way to agriculture in the days when Tribes inhabiting the Bay of Plenty were in their glory. The whole appearance of the country the size of its remaining Pa's the ruins of Native forts all bespeak a time when Tauronga swarmed with thousands of Warriors and when its people were among the great of the land."

The Victoria’s master, Jeremiah William Nagle
Photo courtesy of Geoff Lloyd and Findagrave.com

"17th Sunday. Breakfast over Ed Sd Mr Clarke & I visited Otu Maitai, the main stronghold of the People of Tauronga it is situated on the Katikati about 1 1/2 miles from the Mission house. Part of the Pa is on the sea beach and part on the top of a cliff or steep bank 40 feet high. By its position naturally strong it is rendered more secure by a strong palisade and on the land side & flanks it is further protected by a deep and wide Ditch having a Stockade on its exterior side. Moreover the level of the exterior plain is somewhat lower than that of the Pa. Where it well defended its intricacy alone would render it formidable but at present there are not men in it to defend one fifth of its great extent. Nowhere have I seen so great a number of fine Canoes the care with which they preserve their fishing nets was also worthy of remark every net being placed on a little elevated platform and then securely thatched over.

18th Up at 1/2 past six and at nine shoved off in the Brigs boat for Mounga Nui which we ascended in about 20 minutes. The day was remarkably clear and the view we obtained from the summit highly interesting & extensive. To the S. W. the sacred mountain of Tarawera was distinctly visible though at a distance of at least fifty miles. Looking along the coast we distinctly saw Cape Runaway on one side and the high land near Cape Colvil on the other. Extensive plains extended some 20 miles up and down the coast running back to the hills towards Rotorua but the most striking object was White Island, enveloped in a cloud of smoke or vapour.

August 18th Taking leave of Mr Brown & his family we walked to our boat & shoved off amidst loud cries of Go to your friend the Governor at Auckland to which we replied we will go to our friend the Governor of all of us which repartee (for so it was when expressed in Maori) occasioned a hearty laugh & gave much satisfaction to this singular people who three days before would not have heard it without visible displeasure.

About 4 P.M. weighed with a light breeze and the ebb tide carrying four fathoms over the outside flat the water gradually deepening to 15 fathoms at three miles from shore.

19th Little or no wind crept up as far as the Mercury Islands inside which we passed without seeing the sunken rock reported to lie in that Passage. The water was perfectly alive with shoals of Porpoises darting about in every direction no doubt rejoicing in the fineness of the weather.

20th Found ourselves inside Cape Colvil little wind all day at night anchored off Wai Heke.

21st Weighed at dawn. Wind foul tried to make Taraias but the weather became so thick and threatening that with much reluctance Mr Shd ordered the vessel to be put about and at 3 P.M. in a heavy Gale we reached Auckland."

Sources

Armitage, Don, Voyages of the Colonial brig 'Victoria' 1842-3, sites.google.com › Home › great-barrier-island-history
Best, Ensign Abel, The Journal of Ensign Best, 1837- 1843. Nancy M. Taylor (ed.), Wellington: Government Printer, 1966.
Bunbury, Thomas, Reminiscences of a Veteran, Vol III, Charles Skeet, London, 1861.
Collinson, T. B., Remarks on the Military Operations in New Zealand, Vol III, John Weale, London, 1853: 48.