The Wreck of the Cutter Oi on Panepane Beach, 1890

 

Panepane Point and Beach from Mount Maunganui, showing part of the narrow main shipping channel and the Tauranga harbour.

Populated for centuries by Māori iwi, and today mostly associated with Ngāi te Rangi hapū, Matakana Island is a long, flat barrier island 20km in length and about 3km wide. The island forms a sand barrier between Tauranga Harbour and the vast South Pacific Ocean. Since time immemorial Matakana’s dune-backed beach has been a landing and wrecking site for waka Māori, and before and following the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, a diverse range of Māori and Pākehā owned sailing vessels.

The name Panepane in 19^th century European sources referred to a specific southern section of Matakana Island close to Panepane Purakau or Panepane Point, not the entire ocean beach [1]. It was in fact a name for the southernmost three kilometres located across the channel from Mauao | Mount Maunganui.

Sailing craft, driven eastward during gales, were thrown bodily onto the beach where their crews attempted to leap clear into the surf, before their vessels began a deadly mast-shattering roll. Again, when sailing vessels of all sizes attempting to enter or leave the harbour during marginal conditions missed the channel by even a little, they, depending on conditions, either grounded temporarily or were rolled and wrecked among the breakers.

A Tauranga-owned and -based cutter, the Oi became a common sight on Tauranga Moana during its three-year working career - likely named, in part, after the common nautical haloo in use at the time, “Oi, ahoy!” Kauri-built cutters were much favoured by Tauranga’s small maritime entrepreneurs though they never outnumbered schooners. Interestingly, their single owner-operators also styled themselves master mariners though their crews might number only one or two.

On 16 January 1890, the Oi left the little Bay of Plenty port of Maketū. Crossing the Kaituna River outlet through heavy surf, it began the short 27km (14.6 nautical sea mile) voyage up the coast to Tauranga with a cargo of flax. Information on the cutter’s tonnage is not available, probably because it was unregistered. Regardless, the provisions and coastal timber trade on the Coromandel and Bay of Plenty coasts between the 1870s and 90’s was often handled by sailing cutters of 8-30 tons.

A gale had sprung up a day before the Oi’s departure from Maketū, but the captain and crew, later identified as ‘Messrs W. Turner and W. Cinnamon’ undertook the voyage regardless. The Oi cutter was last seen on the same day by people near Mount Maunganui around midday. It was then battling heavy seas just off Motuotau | Rabbit Island and Moturiki | Leisure Island and heading towards the Tauranga Harbour entrance [2].

 There were soon grave fears at Tauranga for the safety of the Oi and its crew, and two days later, despite the gale which was to last for a week, an intrepid search party comprising ‘Messrs Moss, C. Faulkner, C. Spencer, Allely, Maxwell, and Cotter’, was organised. First crossing by boat to Pilot Bay below the Mount, they were informed by the crew of another cutter that had just safely passed through the Mount Maunganui Channel, that they had seen wreckage of another vessel on Matakana Island’s Panepane beach.

The old Auckland-based, gaff-rigged cutter Jesse Logan. Note the long bowsprit which, without making their masts taller, increased the sail area of cutters while allowing the sail plan to be broken down into smaller, more manageable headsails.

Crossing the channel to Matakana Island and Panepane Beach, the search party found the remains of the Oi lying literally smashed to pieces above the high-water mark.

The mast was broken off to a stump, the bowsprit was completely wrenched out, and the timbers had all parted at the stern, leaving a great gap. Her hatches were off, and the hold was swept of everything. Her rudder was found broken in two places, and her sails were found on the beach double reefed. No trace of the crew was discovered, and there is little doubt that these unfortunate young men have found a watery grave. It is difficult to say what caused the catastrophe [3].

The following day, the same party began another search along the full length of Matakana Island’s ocean beach on horses hired from the Island’s Māori residents. Half way towards Tauranga Harbour’s northern Katikati entrance ‘they found broken oars, part of a hat belonging to Cinnamon, and parts of an accordion’[4].  Footprints on the beach initially gave some hope and the cutter Eleanor and several other local boats continued the search as the gale abated. The police also searched Mount Maunganui’s forested slopes but the Oi’s crew were never found [5].

 The loss of well-captained, shallow-draught, local vessels like the Oi had disruptive as well as tragic outcomes for the Bay of Plenty’s coastal communities. From December 1887, for instance, the Oi had transported much needed cargoes of provisions and sundries twice per month from Tauranga to the settlements of Katikati and Te Puke on the Uretara and Kaituna Rivers respectively, ‘cash on delivery’. In one instance, the cutter had sailed the inner harbour route from Tauranga to deliver, to the Uretara River bridge at Katikati, sacks of potatoes, flour, sugar, oatmeal, seed, ‘maize by the bushel’, and boxes of tea, soap, candles, jam and golden syrup for the new settlers there [6]. 

A beach-wrecked ketch or sloop at the high-water mark.

The Oi was by no means the last Pākehā or Māori owned sailing craft to be wrecked or temporarily stranded in the wrecking zone on Panepane Beach. In May 1893, just three years after the Oi’s loss, the wreckage of an unidentified ketch was found on Panepane Beach following a gale. The violence of the wrecking had broken off the 25-foot mast at deck level. Again, the bodies of the crew were never found [7].

References

[1] Panepane Purakau, Western Bay of Plenty District Council,https://www.westernbay.govt.nz ›community› projects

[2] Te Aroha News, 23 April 1890: 4.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Bay of Plenty Times, 9 December 1887: 3.

[7] Grey River Argus, 9 May 1893: 2.

Image credits

Panepane Point, Matakana Island, photo/file. Kiri Gillespie, ‘Matakana Island proposal: Panepane Point plan prompts encouraging level of interest’. Bay of Plenty Times, 27 August 2020.

 ‘Jessie Logan, circa. 1880s. Restoration of NZ’s Oldest Surviving Yacht’. Image courtesy of Keith Pine, New Zealand Prosthetic Eye Service, info@prosthetic eye service.

 Abandoned maritime wreckage. Stocktake royalty free images https://www.freepik.com › free-photos-vectors  

Te Kaewa-The Wanderers, a new book by Trevor Bentley

           

This book by local author Trevor Bentley recounts, in vivid style, the ‘shipping out’ of Māori adventurers across the seas and oceans of the world on Euro-American whaleships It investigates the reputation of Māori as the most courageous and dependable of all the indigenous Pacific seamen engaged in whaling - a notoriously brutal and bloody exploitative industry. It discusses their diverse work roles aboard foreign windjammers, their exploitation by avaricious shipowners and captains, and the maritime customs, lingos, diet, dress and superstitions they adopted.

Te Kaewa describes how Māori seamen coped in the face of multiple dangers, privations and separation from their whanau for months or years at a time. It details how they responded to mistreatment by ship’s officers and crewmates, their lives ashore in rollicking port towns like Sydney, and the diverse challenges overcome by those who managed to return home.

                     

Te Anaru

                                Robley, H; Moko or Maori Tattooing, Chambers and Hall, London,1896: 37.

The book also references Anaru, (likely Te Anaru -The Brave), a Tauranga adventurer, who worked aboard whaling ships and was based in Sydney. There, he met and married a European wife (unidentified by name), before they sailed for New Zealand. The couple lived with Te Anaru’s hapū at a pā in Tauranga. The British Army officer and renowned artist Horatio Robley sketched Te Anaru at Tauranga circa. 1864 but, unfortunately for local posterity, not his Pākehā wife.

Bentley, Trevor, Te Kaewa - The Wanderers: Māori Sailors on Euro-American Whalers, 1790s-1890s. Kererū Press, Tauranga, 2025.

Jocelyn and the King of Siam

Jocelyn Dumbleton at Pilot Bay, c. 1930s-1940s
Tauranga Heritage Collection, Ref. 0211/21

Many of us remember the splendour of the great musical shows of the 1950s and 60s such as “My Fair Lady”, “Oklahoma” and “The King and I”. The latter was the story of the King of Siam’s desire to modernise and westernise his country, which he had protected from colonisation, and had an English governess teach his children. This world attracted Jocelyn Dumbleton, a young English civil engineer who specialized in designing and building railways, to apply for a position in the Siam (Thai) State Survey and Railways Departments.

Jocelyn Charles Dumbleton (1877 – 1964) was born in Southsea, Hampshire, educated in England, and died in Tauranga, New Zealand. He was the son of General Charles Dumbleton and brother to Arthur Dumbleton, who had arrived in New Zealand some years earlier and married one of the daughters of George Vesey Stewart in Katikati.

Dumbleton spent the years from 1902 to 1909 in the Siam State Survey Department, and from 1909 to 1917 in the Siam State Railways, during the reign of King Chulalongkorn of Siam. It was the King’s father, King Mongkut, who had avoided the power of the European colonialists and began instituting modernisation in Siam. He is the King on whom the film ‘The King and I’ was based, and had appeared in the book “Anna and the king of Siam”. The internal reforms continued during King Chulalongkorn’s reign included instituting a uniform and centralized system of administration over the outlying provinces, abolishing slavery, establishing law courts and reforming the judiciary. He also introduced a modern school system and constructed railways and telegraph systems. 

After several years of successful work developing the railways, Dumbleton contracted malaria and returned to England on sick leave. Jocelyn Dumbleton was awarded the Order of the Crown of Siam third class, by King Chulalongkorn. The law in England required the permission of the King of England for any subject to accept an award from a foreign monarch and George V permitted acceptance by Dumbleton.

Wyke Lodge, Wellington
Tauranga Heritage Collection

He did not return to Siam, and eventually resigned from his position, settled in Wellington in 1919, and set up a private civil engineering practice. Dumbleton married Winifred Alexander (1894 – 1961) in Auckland in 1918, and they had one child, Phyllis Joyce (1919 - 1986), who spent most of her life in Tauranga.

In Wellington, he designed and built a house “Wyke Lodge”, named after the family home in Hampshire. This is where Phyllis spent her first few years.

Dumbleton’s Rotorua house
Tauranga Heritage Collection

By 1923 he was practicing as an architect in Rotorua where he built his next house in Pukakai Street. Dumbleton appeared to be listed in the 1930s as a farmer in River Road, Hamilton while their daughter Phyllis attended the Waikato Diocesan School.

Dumbleton’s Mount Maunganui house
Tauranga Heritage Collection

In 1931 Jocelyn Dumbleton appeared on the Tauranga electoral roll and built the house at Mount Maunganui on a block in the Cedric Banks subdivision. The house was built in the dunes facing the sea but the address was then Te Ngaio Road.  The address of the current building is 54 Marine Parade, Mount Maunganui and consists of an apartment block.

Dumbleton’s Mount Maunganui house
Tauranga Heritage Collection, Ref. 0179/21

The house was built on a timber frame with weatherboard cladding and a corrugated iron roof. It was a two-story building with bedrooms and a living room upstairs, all with sea views. He repeated a feature of his Rotorua house, installing bi-fold windows in the Mount house. Possibly the use of these windows enhancing air flow may be a carry-over from his years living in the tropics.

 

Dumbleton’s Mount Maunganui house
Tauranga Heritage Collection, Ref. 0186/21

Dumbleton built another dwelling he described as a “cottage” on the plan so it is difficult to tell if he regarded that one as a bach as he had other Tauranga addresses over time in Ohauiti, and Turrett Road before their last address in Grange Road. This building has an unusual roof line and from the east elevation, the roof appears to be mainly a hip roof with a skillion at the rear.  The large voids for windows on the seaward (front) wall may indicate he planned to use the bi-fold window style visible in the image of his Rotorua house.

As well as being a keen photographer since boyhood, Jocelyn spent much of his retirement sailing. During World War Two an escaped prisoner stole Dumbleton’s yacht “Jeanette” and sailed for the East Cape, where he was apprehended within a few days. Jocelyn Dumbleton may not have been your average Mount Maunganui retiree but was representative of a class of Englishman who found returning to the British Isles after working for years overseas unsatisfactory and chose instead to live in one of the Dominions.

Plans of Dumbleton cottage
Tauranga Heritage Collection

Max Avery ably told Phyllis Dumbleton’s story in his article in the Historical Review, Volume 66, No.2 November 2018.

Sources

Dumbleton Collection at Tauranga Museum. (photographs and documents)
Various NZ newspapers Papers Past
Online British newspapers
Wises NZ Post Office Directories
NZ Electoral Rolls
Bob Scott

The Voyages of the Kukupa and the Missionary John Wilson, 1834-1837

Early Sailing Vessels and Visitors to Tauranga, Part XIII.

The Kukupa (another name for the kereru or native wood pigeon), was a large missionary sailing boat of some two and a-half tons. Constructed at the Bay of Islands in 1832 by a ‘Mr Gardiner,’ a boat builder from Deal, it was built for both speed and capacity, being able to accommodate up to seventeen Maori passengers. As with the whaling chase boats of the period, it had sharp bows fore and aft for easy access to and from sandy beaches, and in calm conditions it was powered by four oarsmen. There is no information available on the Kukupa’s mast and sail configuration, but it was likely ketch or schooner rigged with two or three masts and a bowsprit, features common to missionary vessels constructed at the Bay during the 1820s and 1830s.

Like its companion craft, the missionary sailing vessels Karere and Kahawai, the Kukupa was designed to carry Anglican missionaries, Maori passengers and their possessions safely to and from the newly established Anglican mission stations at Te Papa, Tauranga and at Puriri and Matamata which were accessed by the Thames (Waihou) River during the 1830s. The Kukupa was skippered by the missionary catechist John Alexander Wilson, an accomplished sailor who had spent ten years on Royal Navy vessels as a gentleman volunteer.

Unidentified two masted, open missionary vessel, Kerikeri mission station, circa. 1824.
Ambroise Tardieu, ‘Church of England Mission Station’, circa. 1824, Kerikeri New Zealand
Auckland Art Gallery, Toi o Tāmaki, 1990/40

Crewed by several Ngapuhi (Wilson refers to them as ‘our men’ or ‘the boys’), the Kukupa proved a swift craft. Wilson recorded their progress after rounding Cape Brett, when he and William Fairburn made their first voyage in December 1833.

24th. -Running before the breeze we passed rapidly along the coast. The country is beautifully wooded, but near the sea often broken and sometimes very irregular. It appears quite different to any European seaboard, and its very diversity of formation gives it interest. We passed many pretty little bays and boat harbours in a run of forty-five miles. After midnight we drew our boat up at Whangarei, and pitched our tents at two o'clock in the morning.

25th. --The weather perfect. Standing before a fresh sea breeze, we passed at times through shoals of kahawai, in places covering the whole surface of the water. In these immense gatherings the fish appear in millions. They are finely formed, a model of symmetry, and are something like the mackerel. In going through these shoals the natives row quickly, and throwing a cleverly made artificial bait overboard, generally catch some.

When not overloaded with passengers, Kukupa also proved a seaworthy craft, Wilson adding that the little craft later negotiated a period of high seas and winds with an ease which would have pleased its builder.

On January 5th 1836, Wilson and William Wade took the Kukupa through the Tauranga Harbour entrance without drama, to find the local tribes in turmoil. The leading Ngati Haua rangatira Te Waharoa was rumoured to be preparing to cross the Kaimai Range from Matamata with a 1000 strong intertribal musket taua for their campaign against the Te Arawa people at Maketu.

In March, Wilson and Wade sailed the Kotuku past Maungatapu Pa in the inner harbour and landed at Rangitaua Bay below the great fortress of Maungamana (Mangatawa) now occupied by Te Waharoa’s army. Located at the northern end of the Papamoa Hills this great fortress complex has almost been completely destroyed by Ministry of Works quarrying for local roads from the 1950s. There, they met with Te Waharoa, who was carrying his favourite weapon, a long-handled battle-axe, but their attempts to dissuade him were unsuccessful.

Historic Drawing of Mangatawa Pa showing the area in green that was taken by Ministry of Works quarrying. Bryce Brown, ‘Mangatawa Pa, Paintings of Historic Places and Events in Tauranga’, www.brycebrownart.com/arts/news/from-the-archive

Later that month Maketu Pa fell to the invaders with great slaughter. When Wilson sailed Kukupa around Mount Maunganui and down the coast to Ngai Te Rangi’s Te Tumu Pa, he met with Phillip Tapsell, the resident flax trader from nearby Maketu Pa which was still in flames.

He is a strong, powerful-built Dane, not much cowed by all that he had witnessed and lost. He had on a straw hat, shirt and trousers, the only things the marauders had left him out of £2,000 or £3,000 worth of property. He was attended by a handsome young Maori woman, his wife, whom Te Waharoa had permitted to leave the pa with him, although a native of Rotorua.

As the intertribal fighting in the Tauranga region escalated, Wilson and the missionaries Alfred Brown and James Stack at Te Papa, sent their families aboard the missionary brig Columbine for safety on 31st March 1836. They remained at the Bay of Islands and did not return until the following year. After visiting the Rotorua mission station which was subsequently looted and burned by Ngati Haua, Wilson departed Tauranga for the Bay of Islands. Returning to the abandoned Te Papa mission station with Mr. Ashwell in March, 1937, he found Tauranga still wracked by intertribal musket warfare, and fearing for his own safety, recalled:

At night I used to place two young men in my boat, and anchor it off the end of an old fortification which formed part of the settlement. In the boat I also placed a change of clothing, and my dog. The clothing was necessary in the event of my house being attacked during the night, not knowing but that I might be treated with as little ceremony as the missionaries at Rotorua had been some months previously, who were stripped to their shirts and trousers. Mr Ashwell and myself having arranged for our return to the Bay of Islands, I gave over the station in charge to Tahu. He was formerly a priest or Ariki [paramount or high chief, or first born in a leading aristocratic family].

Haka outside Maketu Pa circa 1865
This fortress fell to an invading Waikato taua during Wilson’s 1836 visit
Robley, Horatio Gordon, ‘Maketu 1865? A-080-051, Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington

On March 30th 1837, Wilson and Ashwell sailed away from Te Papa at first light, first visiting Otumoetai Pa on their way to the Katikati harbour entrance. At Otumoetai they were boarded by Te Waharoa and his armed personal retinue, the overloaded Kotuku narrowly avoiding disaster.

The wind was strong from the westward, and being met by the flood tide, occasioned a short breaking sea. The natives, though wet through by every spray, pulled well. At last a heavy sea struck the boat in the waist, more than half filling her with water; we were not far from an island [Matakana] at the time, but it was with difficulty we escaped and got on shore.

Wilson left a very brief description of his return voyage to the Bay of Islands in March-April 1837, so I have included part of his journal description of his January 1833 return voyage in the Kotuku. Forced to seek shelter in the Hauraki Gulf, Wilson’s account provides some idea of the challenges encountered by missionaries returning from their stations in open sailboats.

John Alexander Wilson
Wilson, John Alexander, Missionary Life and Work in New Zealand, 1833-1862, C. J. Wilson (ed.), Star Office, Auckland, 1889, Title Page

4th. --Reached an island called Waiheke where we had breakfast. After rowing ten or twelve miles came to a second island - Tiritiri Matangi [off the Whangaparoa Peninsula]. Here our men caught some penguins among the rocks, which hunger made palatable.

Sunday, 5th. --A day of rest! How great is the mercy of God, who in His goodness has set apart this day for man's spiritual and temporal use; for indeed, both body and mind are refreshed. The day was very hot. We held Maori service under some fine trees; afterwards we read the English service.

6th. --Before day dawned we stowed the boat. After sunrise the wind freshened to a gale; in a few hours the sky darkened, and we, with difficulty, stood along the coast. By 11 a. m. it became nearly impossible to keep the boat's head to the sea. We had seventeen natives on board, besides luggage and provisions; our little vessel being sharp both fore and aft, laboured greatly. The wind became so heavy in the squalls that to lighten her we threw part of the potatoes and fresh water overboard. At 4 p. m. we reached a small haven, many miles from Tiritiri Matangi; here we landed for the night. The natives, after the fatigue of the day, wandered about seeking shell-fish and birds.

8th. --Yesterday we were weather-bound. To-day we stood across the next bay, the wind still strong and sea high. After a run of about fifty-five miles, we reached the headland of the Bay of Islands; all very weary. We had fasted nearly the whole day and were glad to rest at this place for the night.

9th. --Crossed the broad entrance of the Bay, landed at Te Puna 10 a. m. Thankful to find my dear wife and the boys quite well. We had sailed some two hundred and fifty miles in an open boat on a coast nearly unknown, without an accident.

Wilson’s wife Anne, died on 23 November 1838 and was the first Pakeha buried at the mission cemetery  at Otamataha Pa, Tauranga. John raised their four young sons at Te Papa and the mission station he established at Opotiki in 1840. In 1852 he was appointed by the Central Committee of the CMS to the charge of the Auckland missionary district which extended from Whangarei to Taupo. In 1860, he was a missionary-chaplain to Maori war parties at Waitara, Taranaki. John Alexander Wilson left New Zealand in 1866, and his connection with the Church Missionary Society ended on 21 January 1868.  He died on 5 June 1887 on Jersey, Channel Islands. Like its companion missionary vessels Karere and Kahawai, the fate of Wilson’s Kotuku is unknown.

Sources

Basset, Heather, “Mangatawa”, Research Report Commissioned by the Waitangi Tribunal foe Wai, December 1996, forms.justice.govt.nz
Marshall, W. B.  Personal Narrative of Two visits to New Zealand in His Majesty’s ship Alligator A.D. 1834. London: James Nesbett and Co. 1836.
Wade, William. A Journal of Travel in the North Island of New Zealand. Hobart: George Rolwegan, 1842.
Williams, Henry. The Early Journals of Henry Williams 1826-1840. L. M. Rogers, (comp.), Christchurch; Pegasus Press, 1961.
Wilson, John Alexander, Missionary Life and Work in New Zealand, 1833-1862. C. J. Wilson (ed.), Star Office: Auckland, 1889.

Sailing in Tauranga Harbour

Tauranga Harbour, New Zealand
Postcard published by National Publicity Studios, Wellington, Ref. 5657
Collection of Justine Neal

During November 1878 a meeting was held at Ellis’s Commercial Hotel for the formation of a Boating Club. Nineteen members joined the club, the membership was 2/6. The club purchased two four oar boats, two pairs and one sculling boat, all to be outriggers, at the cost of 130 pounds.

In October 1924 the club applied to the Harbour Board to build a clubhouse near to the new railway bridge which crossed to Matapihi. The clubhouse was built in 1933 and remained there until 1982 when a new clubhouse was opened at the new marina at Sulphur Point.

Coastal Scene, Mount Maunganui, New Zealand
Postcard published by N.S. Seaward's Studio, Broad Bay, Dunedin
Collection of Justine Neal

The P-class was designed by New Zealand civil engineer Harry Highet. The first example appeared at Onerahi near Whangarei on New Years Day 1920. It was not until Highet and his family moved to Tauranga in 1923 that the full potential of the design became apparent. Soon a fleet of a dozen or so were racing each weekend on Tauranga Harbour. The P-class was originally known as the Tauranga Class. Boats carried the letter P on their sails to indicate they were primary trainers. By 1940 boys from all round New Zealand were writing asking for the plans.

Fourteen Footers, Tauranga
Postcard published by Mirrielees, Tauranga, Ref. No. 61
Collection of Justine Neal

Between the First and Second World Wars yachting progressed at a remarkable rate, helped along by the arrival of an unballasted fourteen foot open boat, a centreboard dinghy with a restricted design. Promoted by the New Zealand Yachtsman magazine in 1916, it was taken up by wealthy patrons.

By 1922 races for the three local fourteen footers were being held in the harbour. In 1934 the Ward Memorial Cup was available for fourteen footers sailed by youths under twenty one.

Tauranga Adventure by Patrick Wilson, Illustrated by Ron Stenberg
Published in 1963 by A.H. & A.W. Reed, Wellington
Image courtesy of Justine Neal

In 1963 a hardcover children’s adventure story called Tauranga Adventure was published by Patrick Wilson. It tells the story of the four young Bromleys who sail their one man P-class yachts on Tauranga Harbour and who race them every weekend. Of course things are never straightforward in an adventure story and it’s a pretty exciting summer leading up to the presentation of the Challenge Cup at the end of the season!

Wikipedia
Papers Past
Te Ara Sailing and Windsurfing
Tauranga Yacht and Power Boat Club History