The Mōtiti Road Rail Ferry

 

Two maps of Mōtiti.  Neither is contemporaneous with Brain’s work on the island, but the coloured image shows the settlement pattern of the island’s residents in 1929; the black and white sketch map shows the route (dashed line) of the tramline that once led to Orangatea Bay.  Images: (left) Western Bay of Plenty District Libraries, SAK 34A, digital only; and (right) Te Ara, An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, ed. A. H. McLintock, 1966

I first began researching the people who lived in the Brain Watkins House back in the early 2000s  when I was working for NZ Historic Places Trust (now Heritage New Zealand).  Among the listed achievements of Joseph Brain was “a tramway on Mōtiti Island to transfer cattle to a ship waiting off shore”.

George Alexander Douglas, An Irishman, originally from Derry, moved down from Auckland to Tauranga and received a Crown Grant of a piece of land in 1867. He became a successful storekeeper when he arrived in Tauranga.

He had begun working in Auckland as a commissariat contractor supplying the military forces in the country and was elected a member of the Auckland Provincial Council from 1869 to 1873. G A Douglas leased a portion of Mōtiti Island from a local chief Tupaea, probably commencing in 1867 but he did not move there to live until 1870. He improved the breeding of cattle and Clydesdale horses on Mōtiti. He was also responsible for the introduction of the Bumble Bees that were essential for the fertilization of the Red Clover flowers. The clover had been introduced to boost the quality of the stock food but could not flourish without the bees. The soil on Mōtiti was fertile, water was abundant from numerous springs, but it lacked a natural harbour. 

S.S.Staffa   Image: Te Ao Māramā – Tauranga City Libraries Photo 04-593

To ensure transporting stock and goods, Douglas bought a small coastal steamer S.S. Tauranga in 1870. From 1876 to 1881 he had the S.S.Rowena and S.S.Staffa. The difficulty created by the lack of a harbour was loading the stock onto his ship before he could send the cargo to Tauranga.

In Orangatea Bay Douglas built a system of stock yards, and tramline. The late local historian Alister Matheson, in his book Motiti[1], tongue in cheek, named the project “The Motiti Road Rail Ferry”. The stock yards held the stock until they were loaded on a punt that could hold twenty cattle. The punt sat on a cradle or bogie that ran down the tramline, gaining speed, and was attached by a rope on a winch on land. When the punt reached the steamer it was secured and the rope wound back by the winch. The cattle were individually lifted by slings on to the steamer, which then sailed to Tauranga.  Douglas was helped in the construction of the tramline system by Joseph Brain, the experienced ship and bridge builder of Tauranga.

Hoisting fat cattle from the wharf to a steamer for shipping from Auckland to Sydney, Australia, 1902. 

Image: Supplement to the Auckland Weekly News, 14 August 1902, p. 10

In an interview with Mrs Elva Brain Watkins, the youngest daughter of Joseph, Matheson learned that Brain’s practice was to row across the harbour to Mount Maunganui then walk along the ocean beach until he was opposite Mōtiti Island where he would signal his arrival.  A boat from Mōtiti would then pick him up from the beach. In his boatyard on The Strand Brain employed Māori men from Mōtiti who would stay at the Mōtiti Hostel across the street.

J. D. Brain, Brain Watkins House Collection.  Image: Shirley Arabin

At the time that Matheson wrote the book the only remnants of the Mōtiti Road Rail Ferry were decaying puriri posts at the site, so it is unlikely that there will be any evidence left of this project today.

When George Douglas visited Napier in 1892 to purchase sheep he fell ill and died there.  He had not married and in his will the beneficiaries of his estate were his nieces and nephews.

 [1] Matheson A.H.,Motiti,pub. Whakatane & District Historical Society P O Box 203, Whakatane 1979.

 

Editorial note: Readers may be interested in finding an extended photo-essay on Mōtiti Island life in the 1960’s by Tony Ahern, editor of Tauranga Photo News, Issue No. 34, April 3 1965:

https://paekoroki.tauranga.govt.nz/nodes/view/101354 

A Brief Three-Part History of Karewa Island

Part 1 - Early Human Visitors and its Inhabitants 

Karewa Island
Whites Aviation, Karewa Island, February 1954, with Mount Maunganui and the Tauranga Harbour entrance in the background
Alexander Turnbull Library, Ref. WA-35082-F

Karewa Island is located some 4 miles or 6.5 km north-east of the Tauranga harbour entrance. When viewed from the higher parts of Tauranga township, it appears as a solitary, conical rock, jutting abruptly from the waters of the Bay of the Plenty. When viewed during a north-easterly blow from atop Mt Maunganui, the island seems to be on the move. It appears as an orca or great white shark swimming on the surface and steadily battling its way out to sea. The island’s foreshore environment comprises bedrock slopes, rocky reefs, and rock pools with several small, sandy beaches. Parts of the island are forested in taupata, a resilient, low growing shrub or small tree bearing very shiny dark green leaves. Widely used as a hedge plant for seaside gardens, taupata forms the low, dense forests that we often see on coastal islands and along the exposed coasts of the North Island and upper South Island.¹

 

For Maori, Karewa island was a traditional harvest site for titi (mutton birds) and kai moana (sea food), with paua, crayfish and kina (sea urchins) abundant on almost all the rocky reefs. The island remains a very popular dive site and is well known among locals, for the variety of fish caught in the surrounding waters.²  Karewa is a home to kekeno or fur seals, but is best known for its high densities of tuatara (Sphenodon punctatus). These ancient reptiles are dependent on the continued productivity of the surrounding marine environment, especially the well-being of the mutton birds or sooty shearwaters which coexist with them and share their burrows.³

When Captain Cook sailed the Endeavour between Mount Maunganui and Mayor Island on 3^rd November 1769, he did not name Karewa, describing it instead as ‘a small high island’.⁴ The late 19^th century ethnologist Elsdon Best wrote that Karewa was the named by the first Polynesian deep-sea navigators who arrived in the Bay of Plenty on the Takitimu waka around 12^th century A.D. He states that they named Karewa after the star, upon which they relied, to make their voyage to New Zealand.⁵ Gilbert Mair, the colonial soldier and New Zealand Cross winner who, from the 1860s, lived out his life in the Bay of Plenty, said however that the first arrivals on the Te Arawa waka named the island Karewa because: ‘In fine weather, owing to mirage, it appears to be like Mahomet's coffin, floating in the air, the silver streak of sea showing plainly underneath; hence the name Ka-rewa, to float’.⁶ 

Gilbert Mair later sailed tuatara collectors from Taurangato to Karewa Island on board his 35-foot whaleboat
Gilbert Mair in military uniform, glass copy negative of half-tone print, unidentified photographer
Alexander Turnbull Collection, Ref. 1/1-017971-G

Mair added, that to his annoyance, the Maori name Karewa and other Tauranga place names were too often mispronounced by Pakeha. 

Some friends in Tauranga, where I am now resident, pronounce the simplest Maori names quite incorrectly… Here are a few illustrations of this ear-annoying mispronunciation:
Katikati is popularly Katty-kat.

Maungatapu is mutilated into Manggertap.
Waimapu is called Waimap.
Paapaa moa becomes Papper-moa.
And Karewa is Karewha.⁷

Sir Maui Pomare recorded that traditional uhi Mataora or the face carving chisels used by tohunga ta moko (tattooing experts) were often made from the wing-bone of the albatross, adding that: ‘The Bay of Plenty tribes made expeditions to Karewa Island, which was a breeding place for the albatross and many other sea-birds.⁸ Among the other sea-birds nesting on Karewa were gannets, whose feathers were highly prized by the rangatira class as adornments for their hair. One of the myths recorded from Rotorua’s Te Arawa people concerning Hatupatu, describes the appearance of this famous ancestral hero figure, when he stood to address and inspire his warriors before battle.

He had been sitting down, and as he gracefully arose, it was beautiful to see his plumes and ornaments of feathers fluttering in the breeze; the long hair of the young man was tied up in four knots, or clubs, in each of which was stuck a bunch of feathers; you would have thought he had just come from the gannet island of Karewa where birds' feathers abound^.9

Tuatara (Sphenodon punctatus)
Bernard Sladden. Close-up view of a tuatara on a branch. Date: Within Sladden's adult life (1900-1961) Tauranga City Libraries. Pae Koroki Ref. Photo bs-205

Karewa Island is often mentioned in the journals of Tauranga’s pre-Treaty missionaries. After arriving in the Bay of Islands in 1834, the missionary printer William Wade went on to the Bay of Plenty to help establish the new mission station at on Tauranga’s Te Papa Peninsula. When intertribal warfare broke out in the district in 1836, he was evacuated back to Paihia. After a dispute with the Anglican Church Missionary Society over his employment, in April 1840, Wade left Tauranga to serve as a baptist minister in Tasmania. One of his journal entries read:

In every part of New Zealand that I have visited lizards are numerous. There are several varieties of small green lizard; and, by native account, many of the insular rocks abound with guanas. The island Karewa, off Tauranga, is said to swarm with them. Although perfectly harmless, the lizard is held in great abhorrence by the New Zealanders, who say it is the form or resemblance of Wiro, the evil Spirit.¹⁰ 

A portrait of Taurikura, the mythical ancestress of Karewa Island’s tuatara can be seen today in the poupou (carved wall pillars) of  the meeting house Tamateapokaiwhenua in Tauranga’s Judea
Photographer unknown, Tamateapokaiwhenua Wharenui, 1962. Tauranga City Libraries, Pae Koroki Ref. Photo 16-139

In Maori mythology, Whiro, the god inhabiting the underworld was a personified form of evil, misfortune, darkness and death. The first tuatara to resemble Whiro on Karewa was, according to Ngati Ranginui legend, their female ancestress Taurikura. A spoilt young woman of noble birth, she one day refused to fetch water for her thirsty koro [grandfather], With great difficulty, the old man who was disabled, descended a steep track to the river, before returning with a gourd of water which Tauri-kura demanded.  The old man became angry and told her that she was selfish and a disappointment.

Embarrassed and ashamed of her behaviour, Taurikura left the village with a kit of charms and went down to the river. There she turned herself into a ngarara or reptile and swam down the Waikaraeo Estuary and out to Karewa where she became the ancestor of the tuatara that live on the island today. Taurikura is remembered at Judea today, where her carved portrait can be seen on the poupou (carved wall pillars) in the meeting house Tamateapokaiwhenua.¹¹

During the 1830s, the island became a regular provisioning port of call for the Bay of Islands’ missionaries during voyages on their small sailing vessels to and from Tauranga, Maketu, Whakatane and Opotiki in the Bay of Plenty. In February 1832, the Rev. Henry Williams and his Maori crew, sailed the mission schooner Karere (Messenger) to Maketu in the hope of making peace between warring tribes. After camping overnight at Mercury Bay on the 26^th he recorded:

 

Fine morning. I intended to move at break of day, but the boys were apprehensive of a Southerly wind; delayed till 9 o'clock when we pulled out in quest of a wind. A breeze sprung up at East, which shifted in the course of the day to North. Passed on at an agreeable rate to Karewa. Mr. Chapman out of sight. The boys landed and caught a number of young birds and found some potatoes, which afforded them a good supper. Entered Tauranga by 9 o'clock, landed under the Great Hill, "Maunga nui." Kindled fires and cooked our supper which we all stood much in need of having taken nothing. Rolled ourselves up in blankets, and laid down on the ground…Our distance run today about 40 miles.¹²

A stylised painting of Henry William’s Karere (Messenger) accompanying a Ngapuhi predatory expedition to Tauranga in 1832, in the hope of negotiating peace.
Joseph Josenhans, “War Canoes’ in Illustrations of Missionary Scenes, An Offering to Youth, Mainz, Joseph Scholz, 1855. XII

Departing Maketu on the Karere with a full complement of Maori passengers six weeks later, Williams again described landing on Karewa, and an additional Maori reason for fearing the tuatara:

Tuesday, 26. A quiet night. At daylight calm but cloudy, afraid to move out. No stir amongst the natives, all quiet. At 5 p.m. light airs from the N. E.; left the harbour on our way home, in all seventeen including Hamu our old lady who accompanied us from the BOI, besides a dog and two kittens, our boat was very full. We pulled to Karewa, a small island 8 miles from Tauranga. Some of the boys landed here to look for birds and potatoes. Upon the island are Ruatara, a species of the lizard about a foot in length, which are regarded by the natives as Atua. Strict orders given [by Hamu or an accompanying rangatira] not to disturb them in their holes lest we should be upset. About 8 o'clock a light air from Southd; got underweigh and stood on our course.¹³

Dr Ernest Dieffenbach
Dieffenbach, Ernest, Travels in New Zealand, Vol. II, John Murray, London, 1843: Frontispiece
Alexander Turnbull Library, Ref. A-259-010

Karewa’s tuatara drew several famous men of science to Tauranga during the 1840s and 50s. The touring German naturalist and geologist Dr. Ernest Dieffenbach visited Tauranga’s Te Papa mission station for several days during June 1841. Wishing to obtain a tuatara specimen, he attempted to visit Karewa as a passenger on one of the mission station’s whaleboats, but was forced back to port by bad weather. He was not however, entirely disappointed in his quest:

I had been apprized of the existence of a large lizard, which the natives called Tuatera, or Narara, with a general name, and of which they were much afraid. But although looking for it at the places where it was said to be found, and offering great rewards for a specimen, it was only a few days before my departure from New Zealand that I obtained one, which had been caught at a small rocky islet called Karewa, which is about two miles from the coast, in the Bay of Plenty, and which had been given by the Rev. W. Stack, in Tauranga, to Dr. Johnson, the colonial surgeon.

 

From all that I could gather about this Tuatera, it appears that it was formerly common in the islands; lived in holes, often in sandhills near the sea-shore; and the natives killed it for food. Owing to this latter cause, and no doubt also to the introduction of pigs, it is now very scarce; and many even of the older residents of the islands have never seen it. The specimen from which the description is taken I had alive, and kept for some time in captivity: it was extremely sluggish, and could be handled without any attempt at resistance or biting.¹⁴   

HMS Pandora
Thomas Hornbrook, HMS Pandora (1833), Wikipedia

During his survey of Tauranga Harbour in November 1852, Captain Byron Drury of HMS Pandora described Karewa as: ‘a rugged island about half a mile in circumference) 6 miles N. E. by N. of Monganui, is two miles off this sandy beach, having a channel on either side, of 12 to 15 fathoms’.¹⁵ According to Lieutenant Theodore Jones of the Pandora who toured the Tauranga district with some of the ship’s officers:

          During our absence Capt. Drury accompanied by the doctor [surgeon John Joliffe, R.N.], had visited the little Island of Karewa, about three miles from the entrance of the harbour, where they succeeded in capturing some very large lizards, the longest measuring 20 inches. It had been supposed that this was the only Island on which they were to be found, having been quite exterminated on the mainland. On a subsequent visit to Mongonui one had just been found in that neighbourhood, and I believe on Moto horo [Moutohora-Whale Island], they have also been seen. They have a rather repulsive appearance – of a darkish brown colour with serrated back – and of them either living or dead the Natives have a most lively horror.¹⁶

Not all Maori appear to have held the tuatara ‘in great abhorrence’. On Motiti Island where they were once common, Gilbert Mair saw one that Maori had kept safely from predators in an old kumara pit ‘for over three generations’. ¹⁷  

Endnotes

¹ Karewa Island – Dive Zone Tauranga, https://www.divezonetauranga.co.nz › karewa-island

² Site 68 Karewa Island Risk Ranking, https://www.boprc.govt.nz › media › karewa

3 https://www.divezonetauranga.co.nz › karewa-island

⁴  Reed, A.H. and A.W; (eds.), Captain Cook in New Zealand: Extracts From the Journals of Captain James Cook, A.H. and A.W. Reed, Wellington, 1969: 55.

⁵ Elsdon Best, The Astronomical Knowledge of the Maori, Genuine and Empirical, W.A.G. Skinner, Government Printer, Wellington, 1922: 40.

⁶ Mair, Gilbert, Reminiscences and Maori Stories, Brett Publishers, Auckland 1923: 52-53. 1923:

⁷ Ibid.

 

⁸ Pomare, Maui, Legends of the Maori, Vol. II, James Cowan (ed.), Southern Reprints, Papakura, 1987: 315

 

⁹ Grey, Sir George, Polynesian Mythology and Ancient Traditional History of the New Zealand Race, H. Brett, Auckland, 1885: 122.

¹⁰ Wade, William, A Journey in the Northern Island of New Zealand, George Rolwegan, Hobart, 1842: 178.

¹¹ Bay of Plenty Times, 23 December, 1948: 4. Rotorua Daily Post, 22 June, 2013: 7. Taurikura – Te Rununga O Ngati Ranginu, http://www.ranginui.co.nz › taurikura

¹² Williams, Henry, The Early Journal of Henry Williams, L.M. Rogers (ed.), Pegasus Press, Christchurch, 1961: 286-287.

¹³ Ibid: 301.

 

¹⁴ Dieffenbach, Ernest, Travels in New Zealand, Vol. 1, John Murray, London, 1843: 206.

 

¹⁵ Byron Drury, Sailing Directions… For the Northern Part of the Colony of New Zealand, Williamson and Wilson, 1854: 28.

 

¹⁶ Jones, T. M; ‘HMS Pandora in the Bay of Plenty, 1852’, Extracts from the Journal of Lieutenant T.M. Jones, RN, Part II: 72, in Historical Review: Journal of the Whakatane and District Historical Society Inc. Vol. XVIII, No.2: 72.

 

¹⁷ Waipa Post, 1 March 1923: 3.

Going Downhill

The Taioma passing the Tauranga Domain, 8 April 1979
Image: Tauranga City Libraries, Pae Korokī Ref. 07-368

When talking about the tug Taioma, formerly Empire Jane, I always recall hearing of its journey to the Tauranga Historic Village in 17th Avenue. The perils of transporting a 232 tonne tug down the busiest road in Tauranga makes the basis of a good story.  I’m told that on Sunday 8 April 1979 I stood with my family, and many other Tauranga residents, to watch its progress down Cameron Road. I wish I could remember it. Fortunately the man behind the project, Sir Robert Owens, spoke of the day’s events in an oral history recording conducted by James Harstonge in May 1992.

“I’d been chasing this tug around the place for a considerable time and talked to BP who supplied us with fuel. I talked to the boss in Wellington and he said, oh well, you can have it but keep the BP logo on the funnel. So we had to tow it up from Wellington, and it weighed about 340 tonnes so we had a job of getting it on the slip, as it wouldn’t take a 340 tonne ship, so we had to take quite a bit of weight off her. From there the transfer onto the trailer was a tremendous job, and Freightways – they had the heavy haul gear in those days – and John Dale, they gave me a very good rate, very kind, and we got on with the business.”

A tense time as the Taioma is transported down 17th Avenue, 9 April 1979
Image: Tauranga Heritage Collection

“Well from an advertising point of view we all came out of it very well because that day we shifted her up the hill and into Cameron Road, we had to shift power poles and all sorts of things and she came along, and then we got her to the museum and it was getting a bit dark and so we decided we wouldn’t try taking her down the hill. We parked her across the road for the night and then we had an anchor truck behind her with forty tonnes of sand in, that was one of our trucks, and we put it on behind and this driver, a Maori guy, a hell of a nice guy, I was walking with him and there was obviously a bit of tension there and so we started on the dip and she started to go and of course the anchor truck was at an absolute dead stop and smoke started from the tires and she gathered momentum, lost me, I was running at that stage but I couldn’t keep up with her and the anchor truck passed me and the smoke from the tires was terrible. Anyway we got to the bottom and I ran up to the driver and he was the whitest Maori I’ve ever seen in my life. It was a big laugh after that because the rest of the journey was easy, but we ruined the tires.”

Official opening of the Taioma, 23 June 1979. Sir Robert Owens can be seen addressing the crowd
Photograph by Bob Tulloch, Bay Sun
Tauranga City Libraries, Pae Korokī Ref. 09-063

Officially opened by Sir Keith Holyoake on 23 June 1979, the Taioma became a star attraction at The Village. So much so that an additional charge for going onboard helped to pay for the tug’s maintenance. The trip down Cameron Road had been described as the boat’s last journey. However, with the closure of The Village in 1998, the Taioma eventually travelled to its final resting place on the sea floor off Motiti Island. While this journey was made at night along the Takitimu Expressway, it was still witnessed by many whose nostalgia compelled them to catch a final glimpse of the old tug.

The Taioma travelling down Takitimu Expressway, March 2000
Image: Tauranga City Libraries, Pae Korokī Ref. 14-0147

References

(i) Several websites including these two record the weight of the vessel as 232 tonnes. http://www.tynetugs.co.uk/empirejane1944.html & https://www.shipspotting.com/photos/1718613
(ii) To listen to the entire recording, which covers many aspects of the city’s development under Sir Bob’s leadership, visit https://paekoroki.tauranga.govt.nz/nodes/view/20911
(iii) http://taurangahistorical.blogspot.com/2014/09/memorabilia-from-tug-taioma.html

HMS Pandora and Captain Byron Drury, November 1852

Early Sailing Vessels and Visitors to Tauranga, Part XX

Built and launched at Woolwich Dockyard on the River Thames in 1833, the 318 ton HMS Pandora was a medium sized naval vessel with a length of 90 feet.  A 3-gun packet brig, it initially served in British waters as a coast guard vessel and naval personnel and freight transport until converted to a survey ship in 1845.

In 1850, the Admiralty dispatched Captain Byron Drury and the Pandora to the South Pacific to complete the marine survey of New Zealand, begun by Captain J. Lort Stokes and HMS Acheron between 1848 and 1851. Noted for their detail and accuracy, British naval charts were the consequence of long, tedious surveys and Drury and HMS Pandora remained in New Zealand waters until June 1856. During 1852 the Pandora surveyed the Bay of Plenty Coast, during which the ship’s boats were used to survey its small harbours and bar-protected rivers. In early November of that year, Drury took HMS Pandora through the Mount Maunganui channel entrance to anchor in Pilot Bay. The vessel remained for 23 days while the hydrographic survey of Tauranga Harbour was completed. 

‘HMS Pandora’ by Thomas Hornbrook, 17 February 1851
Auckland Art Gallery, Toi O Tamaki Collection, Ref. 1916/12

Tauranga’s harbour charts were collated under the direction of one of the Royal Navy’s most experienced and discerning hydrographers. Entering the Royal Naval College in 1828, Byron Drury served on a variety of battle ships and saw action in Brazil and China. During the 1830s, he was involved in surveys as far apart as Northern Brazil’s Para River and South Australia’s Port Essington. In 1841, he received his officer’s commission and for the remainder of that decade, was involved in surveys including China’s Yangtse River and the West Coast of Scotland.

Captain Byron Drury, Photograph by Greetham Brothers, Woolwich, 1861
Auckland War Memorial Museum, Ref. PH-2014-171

In 1856, the reports on the New Zealand surveys conducted by HMS Acheron and HMS Pandora were published in London as The New Zealand Pilot. Drury’s November 1852 Tauranga survey report, was also published in New Zealand newspapers at the time. It included some of the following observations:

“The Bay of Plenty is the long extent of coast comprised between Mercury bay and cape Runaway, near the East cape: a line drawn between these two points measures 120 miles, and the greatest depth of the bay from such a line is about 40 miles. There are a number of islands and detached rocks in this extensive bay; the only anchorage in it of importance, and which offers shelter for any vessel larger than a coaster, is Tauranga harbour.

“The difficulty of entering this harbour through the deepest channel, is its somewhat tortuous course, and the liability to eddy winds on rounding Mount Monganui; the channel in one place being only half a cable's length wide; but with those winds which would make the Bay of Plenty a lee shore, Tauranga harbour is the most accessible, and when once inside there is anchorage for a fleet.

“The entrance to the harbour lies north and south; the eastern head is the remarkable flat-topped hill Monganui, rising abruptly from the sandy shore to a height of 860 feet: the western entrance is formed by low undulating sand-hills, which extend 13 miles northward to Kati-Kati river; one mile north-westward of Monganui, a spit with 9 feet extends eastward from the western sandy shore for a mile; this spit generally breaks.

“The approach to Tauranga harbour is remarkably distinct. Vessels bound to it from the northward should bring the south end of Mayor island to bear north, steering a south course; the high flat-topped hill of Monganui will first appear like an island: on this course, Karewha, a small rugged island, bearing from the entrance of the harbour N.N. W. 1/2 W. 6 miles, will be passed on the outside about 3 miles, in 23 fathoms.

“Above Te-Papa there is only a boat channel amid extensive flats, and 3 miles above, it narrows again into a small but deep river, running to the southward, which is navigable for boats for 15 miles, and by it a journey can be accomplished to the Rotorua lakes in less than two days. Te-Papa is the Protestant mission station;  the site is well chosen on elevated ground, on the south side of the harbour, three miles from Monganui; two miles westward of it is Otumoiti village, where there is a Roman Catholic mission establishment. and a very neat church, the interior gorgeously decorated by Native wicker-work. ' Four or five Englishmen reside here, chiefly engaged in building small craft, and I am informed, three Frenchmen live at the mouth of the Wairoa.

“The total native population of the Tauranga district is estimated at 1,000, and large tracts of land are under cultivation; fresh water can be obtained just within Stony point in small quantities, and pigs and poultry may be had from the natives at reasonable prices.

“During the twenty-three days H.M.S. Pandora was at anchor in Tauranga harbour in the month of November it blew very fresh, and almost continually from the S.W., but such strong winds were considered unusual.

“Tides: It is high water at full and change 7h 10m, range of tide 6 feet: the strength of the tides at springs is 3 knots; in the narrow channel at Stony point it may attain 4 knots.

“From Tauranga harbour, the coast, which is a uniform sandy beach, runs E. b. S. for 15 miles to Kaituna river. The land between is covered with fern, and low, with the exception of two hill ranges of 600 and 800 feet, which rise one mile inland and extend to the S.W.;--a remarkable flat-topped range of hills about 1,000 feet high rises 10 or 12 miles inland of Tauranga, and extends in a north-westerly direction.

“Moititi Island lies 4 1/2 miles off this sandy coast, there are 12 fathoms water midway between it and the shore.”

Published by the British Admiralty in 1857, this hydrographic shows locations including Otumoetai and the Te Papa mission station where Drury and his officers were regularly hosted by Alfred and Charlotte Brown.
Admiralty Chart no 2521, Tauranga Harbour, New Zealand Archives. Ref. ADOE 16621 MW676 Box 1/3A 2521

At the end of the Pandora’s New Zealand survey in 1856, Byron Drury was thanked and recommended to the British Admiralty by Governor, Sir George Grey. On his departure from Auckland, Drury received a testimonial and a service of silver plate from the Chamber of Commerce and local citizens. The South Auckland settlement of Drury was named after him and on his return to Britain, he became a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, with promotions to rear admiral in 1875 and to vice admiral in 1879.  Tauranga residents commemorated his visit and survey by renaming the hill Hopukiore on Maunganui Spit, Mount Drury.

On her return to Britain, HMS Pandora resumed her original role as coastguard watch vessel around England. Sold by the Admiralty in 1862, her name passed to a succession of larger Royal Navy vessels.

Sources

New Zealand Spectator and Cook’s Strait Guardian, 18 June, 1853: 4.

Morgan, William, The Journal of William Morgan: Pioneer Settler and Maori War Correspondent, Nona Morris (ed.), Auckland City Council, Auckland 1963: 110.

Richards, Captain G.H. and Mr. F.J. Evans, R.N. (comp.), The New Zealand Pilot: From Surveys made in H.M. Ships Acheron and Pandora, Captain J. Lort Stokes and Commander Byron Drury, Potter, J.D. London 1856: 75-79.