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The story of what has become
one of the most numerous and widely distributed families in New
Zealand begins with Phillip Vercoe Snr, a stonemason aged 37, and
his wife Catherine (nee Collins), 33, who decided to escape the
poverty of Cornwall in the 1840s and make a new life in New
Zealand. They already had a good-sized family - Mary Jane,
seamstress 16, Catherine, seamstress 15, Samuel 13, Phillip 11,
Elizabeth 9, Arthur 3, and William 5 months. The decision to
emigrate was truly a family affair as Phillip Snr's sister
Martha, 28, and his brother Bryant, a stonemason aged 31, with
his wife Elizabeth, also arranged to go on the same voyage.
Bryant and Elizabeth had a son, James aged 2, who died en route -
a sad event that was followed 3 weeks later by the birth of a
baby girl, who was named Catherine.
Why did the Vercoes and
Foremans leave what seems to have been a comparatively pleasant
environment to face, almost literally, the unknown - a long
tedious, perilous voyage to a remote, primitive, savage land? The
answer lies, no doubt, in the condition of the common people in
the 1840s, unimaginably bad by today's standards, plus the
persuasiveness of the recruiters who were seeking people to come
out to the new colony.
In what was known as the
Hungry Forties in Cornwall, the whole family had to
work just to make enough for the bare necessities of life. Farm
workers got eight to twelve shillings a week, a surface miner
2.5.0 a month to maintain what were usually large
families just at subsistence level. A Commission of Inquiry at
this time into conditions of work for women and children found
that even children commonly worked from 6.30 am to 8 - 9 pm for 4
pence a day for, say, a 7 year old, while women got about 8 pence
a day. Schools were so few (many were run by illiterates just for
the modest fees) that not half the children in the County could
have received any education at all. Mining tin and china clay and
fishing were the chief industries. At the crucial time mining was
in the doldrums, while fishing was a seasonal and fickle source
of income. The common people, prisoners of their isolation
(Cornwall was a faraway part of the Realm), their insular
outlook, Celtic background and language, were almost without
hope. They were probably 'easy marks' for the recruiters sent out
by the Plymouth and New Zealand Companies to engage tradesmen,
artisans, and labourers, without whom the land purchased in New
Zealand by their shareholders and subscribers would have been a
poor investment indeed. To go to the new colony they were
promised free passages, better paid jobs, housing, a small
allotment, medical care while they worked for the Company and,
above all, a measure of independence and esteem. They saw the
advantages outweighing the risks, and they signed up in hundreds.
By the time the Vercoes reached New Plymouth, early as it was,
there were already 500 new settlers there.
Captain Cook's rediscovery of,
and proclamation of sovereignty over, New Zealand was nearly
wasted through the reluctance of Whitehall to undertake to
undertake the colonisation of an elongated archipelago 12,000
miles away on the other side of the world. However, the
Wakefields forced the issue by forming the New Zealand Company to
acquire and settle land there. This initiative was followed by
the establishment of the Plymouth Company for a like purpose
early in 1840. Composed of Devon and Cornish gentlemen, with the
Earl of Devon as governor, the influential directors included Sir
William Molesworth MP. The aims of the company were "to
render available the resources of Devon and Cornwall, and to
present to the inhabitants the means of participating in the
favourable prospects offered by this new field of
colonisation".
By 1842 the Plymouth Company
was in financial trouble which forced its amalgamation with the
New Zealand Company; but before that occurred it had
independently chartered 6 barques to convey cabin passengers and
emigrants to its settlement in Taranaki, where Colonel Wakefield,
in the Tory accompanied by Dr
Dieffenbach and Dicky Barrett, the Cook Strait whaler, had
already chosen the site for the future city of New Plymouth.
The Foremans were Kentish. They
came from St Nicholas-at-Wade, Birchington, on the Isle of
Thanet. Richard White Foreman, shoemaker, son of Richard White
Foreman, shoemaker, married about 1820 his first wife, Mary. They
apparently shifted to Wade from one of two or three neighbouring
villages. Between May 1822, and November 1837, she bore him 10
children, 3 of whom died young; she herself died in childbirth in
1837 aged 39. Richard the following year married Susannah Sole,
widow of Edward Sole with 6 children, and daughter of John Gore,
in the large medieval church of St Nicholas. The records of that
Anglican church suggest that he could have belonged to
Littlebourne, Canterbury, Kent, or to Minster-in-Thanet,
Ramsgate, Kent, as the register of St Nicholas' shows that in
October 1793 the banns were called for another Foreman, George,
of Littlebourne, and in October 1834, of Mercy Foreman, of
Minster.
The Foremans were the first to
go, in the Oriental of 506
tons, which had already made a voyage to New Zealand with
Wellington's first colonists. Their considerable family were:
Foreman children - Richard white Jnr 17, Stephen 15, James 12,
Harriett 10, Thomas 9, Anne 7, and Eliza 5. Sole children - David
18, Jane 17, Henry 15, Thomas 13, Edward 10, and William 8. The
combined Foreman family came out to New Zealand in the third of
six expedition ships chartered by the Plymouth Company, the Oriental,
which reached New Plymouth on 7 November 1841,
having left Plymouth 21 June 1841. For 143 days her passengers
had been cooped up on a small sailing ship, buffeted by winds,
held up by light winds. And cooped up they were. With little more
than 6 feet between decks, headroom was minimal and conditions
were cramped, especially for the emigrants.
Their accommodation was in
three divisions: the young men quartered in the bow; the young
women aft; the married people and children uncompromisingly in
between, for no contact between the sexes was tolerated. The
marrieds shared one big space near the young women's quarters.
Ranged round its sides were tiers of bunks, so the only privacy
they had for dressing was by drawing the curtains. In the center
were large tables which were hauled up out of the way between
meals.
The Timandra's voyage with the Vercoes is well recorded, thanks to a meticulous
daily journal kept by Josiah Flight, later Resident Magistrate at
New Plymouth, as well as the Master's full log. The Timandra,
Little Hampton-built, was a brand new ship rate A1 at Lloyds, 403
tons. She sailed from Plymouth 2 November 1841, arriving at New
Plymouth 24 February 1842. Chartered for the "conveyance of
cabin passengers and free emigrants", she had "a
top-gallant forecastle, unusual space between decks" (6 feet
5 inches) and a complement of 22 officers and men.
Sir Henry Brett, Kt, in
"White Wings", Vol II, refers to the Timandra
as the "stoutest and best-found of the vessels
sent out to New Plymouth". Her 212 passengers, he says,
formed the largest number sent out in any one of the six vessels
chartered by the company, and she had "a pleasant passage
out". In marked distinction from many of the emigrant ships,
"she was a happy craft and everyone had a good word for
her". Among the passengers, Brett records, was Mr W
Devenish, who brought with him a small flock of Southdown sheep,
the first in New Zealand.
Timandra he insists, "seems to have had luck all the way through for
she landed her passengers and cargo without a hitch in perfect
weather". This contrasted with the experiences of some of
the other vessels in the hazardous open roadstead, including the Oriental,
which almost went ashore after landing her people.
In his 1959 study,
"Plymouth to New Plymouth", R G Wood takes a different
view, claiming the Timandra was an
unhappy ship. She had high death and birth rates - six deaths
(five were children) and five births. Ill-feeling existed between
the cabin passengers and the emigrants over attempts by the
former to organise schooling for the "steerage"
children; also over a health rule requiring chloride of lime to
be sprinkled about the bunks (the emigrants complained that it
burnt their clothes); and over the refusal of the bereaved to
allow regulation post-mortem examinations of the body of a
deceased relative. A great deal of sickness prevailed - not an
easy situation for Captain Skinner, who was making his first long
voyage; but he did nothing for crew relations by refusing to
permit the traditional "Crossing the Line" celebrations
and the sailors' usual practical jokes.
Tension was relieved when the
boat called at Capetown on Christmas Day, 1841, staying five
days. Commented Mr Flight, pointedly: "Many of the emigrants
returned to the ship .....! (cheap wine at Capetown)".
At last the long haul from
England was over. On February 23, 1842, Mt Egmont's snow-dusted
cone was sighted. Next day all passengers were safely landed near
New Plymouth's present site in the Company's whaleboat. Everyone
immediately got work at 5 shillings a day, seven shillings and
sixpence for carpenters, and some sort of housing.
Information about the two
families from here on is patchy and consequently confusing,
because the unconnected stories nurtured by the various
descendants are often contradictory and often unreliable when
checked against known facts and dates. A simple of properties and occupants in New Plymouth was carried
out on 31 January 1846, and this gives a reasonable idea of the
families there at that time.
In 1845 Philip Snr's eldest child, Mary Jane, married Hannibal Marks who had come out in the Regina in 1841, and founded a very large family.
Philip Vercoe Jnr, bachelor,
and Anne Foreman, spinster, were married in St Mary's Anglican
Church, New Plymouth, on 6 September 1855. No other particulars
were kept prior to 1880, except that the marriage was only No 77
on the register at New Plymouth. Philip would have been 25, Anne
21. The ceremony was performed by the ven. Archdeacon Govett.
By this time the now not-so-new
colonists had carved out a place for themselves in the community.
Philip Snr apparently found his services as a stonemason in
demand and continued in his trade; but Philip Jnr turned to
farming, for an 1860 list of jurors shows: Vercoe, Philip,
Moturoa, mason; Vercoe, Philip, New Plymouth, farmer; Vercoe,
John, Moturoa, sawyer;Vercoe, Thomas, New Plymouth, settler.
The settler's way of life was
soon to be disrupted by the outbreak of the Maori Wars. From the
beginning of Pakeha settlement the local Maori people more or
less amicably accepted the settlers; in fact they actively
emulated them by adopting European farming methods, equipment,
and clothing, and industriously developed their remaining land.
But disaffection started from one cause and another, as tension
and distrust grew between Maori and Maori and Maori and Pakeha,
the need to organise defence was recognised. Not long after his
marriage Philip Jnr enrolled in New Plymouth in the Militia, from
which Nos 1 and 2 Companies of the Taranaki Rifle Volunteers were
drafted when in 1860 hostilities finally broke out. These
volunteers were all experienced bushmen, and for the
guerilla-style warfare that developed they were better able to
handle the rugged terrain and the elusiveness of the enemy than
were the redcoat regulars of the Imperial Forces. They accepted
the offer of an old Indian Army officer, Major Lloyd, to give
them lessons in drill, so that in case of an outbreak, they might
be able to work together, under their officers, for the
protection of their wives and children. The young men of the
district were as thoroughly used to bush life, and as much at
home in the forests of New Zealand as the natives themselves.
Forming themselves into a company of bushrangers, they chose Mr
Atkinson as their captain. It was this sort of fighting the
Imperial British soldier dreaded - guerilla warfare in every
sense of the word - which the newly-arrived regular was neither
fitted for in dress, nor in the way he was armed. It was
evidently this group that Philip joined.
Auckland and Nelson were chosen to receive the
"refugees", as they were called. Anne and three
children, Philip, Mary (Polly), and Susan went to Nelson, where a
fort had been constructed on Church Street (this was before it
became Church Hill) and, although it was never required for
defence against the Maoris, it accommodated 1,100 to 1,200
refugees during the troubles elsewhere.
With his family safe Philip Jnr went to war.
Not much has been recorded of his military service; however,
because of a perceived injustice, Philip Jnr petitioned
Parliament and this document contains his own account of his war
service. Legislation to recognise the veterans of the Maori Wars
seem to have been passed grudgingly well after the event, and
even then it was necessary for application to be made, with proof
of having been under fire.
Philip Jnr applied for his
Maori War medal in August 1892 from Blenheim, but did not
receive it until March 1893. In February 1898, from
Springlands, Blenheim, he requested a land grant under
the Act for his service with the Taranaki Volunteers.
This being rejected by a Stipendiary Magistrate because,
it was held, he had been awarded under the Volunteer Land Act 1865, he petitioned
Parliament in 1911 for an annuity or pension for the rest
of his life, or a land grant. In the petition he pointed
out that the so-called grant of �5 was in fact payment in lieu of rations the Army
had been unable to supply during the campaign. Describing
himself as a retired flaxdresser, he made the petition
through John Duncan, MP for Wairau (now Marlborough),
giving his age then as 83, having lived in New Zealand
for 70 years, 21 in Taranaki.
Philip Vercoe Junior
Being drafted from the Militia into No 1
Company, Taranaki Volunteers, he came under the command of
Lieutenant (later Major) Harry Atkinson, subsequently Sir Harry
Atkinson KCMG, Premier of New Zealand. He said he fought in the
second engagement in Taranaki under Major Nelson, who commanded
the 40th Regiment. He then took part under Major Gold in an
operation to protect the steamer Tasman Maid,
which had stranded when crossing the Waitara Bar. Shortly after,
he fought with No 1 Company in the battle of Waireka, about 6
miles outside New Plymouth - "a very fierce and severe
battle" - under the command of Major Stapp. He was in a
skirmish at Oakura, 8 miles from New Plymouth, and in engagements
at Elliott's Road, Hawera, and Mawatihi under General Pratt, who
commanded the 40th and 65th Regiments. By this time the
Volunteers had joined the regulars of the 65th and a "very
fierce" battle was fought at Mawatihi (or Mawatia), 8 miles
from New Plymouth. The 40ths and 65ths, with Volunteers and
friendly natives, inflicted a heavy defeat, "97 of the enemy
being interred afterwards in the side of the hill where the
battle was fought". According to the petitioner, "the
battle was so severe and so disastrous to the enemy that it ended
the war, and the natives never appeared in the field again"
- a somewhat optimistic assessment as subsequent history shows.
However, for Philip the war was over. Having
word that his wife and one of the children was ill, he applied to
Major Stapp to be relieved of duty and to be allowed and to be
allowed to join them in Nelson. This was granted. And that is how
the Vercoes came to the South Island.
To continue the now rather sorry story unfolded
in petition: he stressed that he had "not received any grant
of land or any remuneration whatsoever for his service in the
field against his Sovereign's enemies except seventeen shillings
and sixpence a week and rations whilst on active service".
However, it had not been possible to supply the rations to the
troops as per regulation standard, and he, in common with many of
his fellow colonist-soldiers, on many occasions had to be content
with short rations. Having regard to his age, and the service he
had rendered to his country, therefore, he sought an annuity or
grant of land.
Parliaments Public Petitions Committee produced
a favourable recommendation, and this was backed up by the Hon
Richard McCallum, by then Member for the District. He told the
Defence Minister, Mr Myers, that he had known Mr Vercoe since his
(Mr McCallum's) boyhood and could testify to his high character
for honesty, sobriety and straightforwardness. He asked that
compensation be granted.
The Minister, however, declined a special
payment, pointing out that "Mr Vercoe would, it is presumed,
be entitled to a pension under the Military Pensions Act 1911,
payable through the Old Age Pension Department". The old age
pension at the time was ten shillings a week, with a pauper's
funeral if wanted. So much for a nation's gratitude as
interpreted by Government.
What followed the reuniting of
the family in Nelson is largely a matter of conjecture or at best
unreliable memory. Esther, the ill child, born in 1860 in New
Plymouth, died in 1862. The next child, Richard, was born in
October 1862. Other children were born there too, so the sojourn
in that district was quite lengthy. Philip's occupation then is
not known. One indication is that he was a sawyer, but he was
probably a flaxmiller because on coming to Blenheim that is how
he described himself.
In the meantime, however, there
was a period of residence in Havelock, lasting until the late
1870s. Havelock was then a bustling timber and goldmining centre,
and he could have been involved in brickmaking, but the evidence
is slim. A descendant recalls that they ran a freight service in
Pelorus Sound with a cutter named Flirt.
She must have been a small craft because he recalled that when
becalmed they just took to the oars and rowed it. They must also
have punted timber from the Blackball Mill.
The first marriage in the
family took place in Havelock, when the eldest daughter Mary
"Polly" 19, married Patrick Campbell "Peter"
Patterson, sawyer, aged 26, on 21 June 1877, at the bride's home.
The bridegroom's father was Thomas Patterson, blacksmith, of
Mahakipawa.
About 3 years later, around
1880, the family came to "the Wairau", as the
Blenheim district was called. Philip Jnr by then was 50
and the family were growing up. The eldest, Philip III,
was 26; later he was the only one of the six sons to
leave Marlborough permanently. Between 1893 and 1896 he
went on the land in the North Island, first at Kaihu,
North of Dargaville, where he turned his hand to
forestry, felling the mighty kauri trees which were
plentiful at that time.
However, of the daughters, only one, Susan or
Susannah, remained in the Wairau. It was a remarkably
close-knit family which, as far as the five sons were
concerned, stayed together for many years - in fact,
practically for life, - the brothers, Richard, John,
Ernest, Fred, and Aeneas, invariably working with their
father or with each other on various projects. The first
venture appears to have been a brick-kiln in Springlands,
on the river bank near the Western end of Nelson Street.
A true Cornishman, Philip was something of an amateur
geologist and, surprisingly, he located beside the Omaka
River (now the Taylor, the Omaka having been diverted
away from the town) about a quarter mile below the High
Street Bridge, Springlands, a deposit of clay suitable
for brickmaking.
He decided to set up a kiln at
the site, which has a good water supply in Murphy's Creek right
alongside. He therefore, in May 1888, leased 6 acres of land from
John Hewitt, gentleman, he himself being described already as a
flaxdresser. The conditions of the lease were tough by any test.
The term was 10 years without the right of renewal, but he was
required to erect a house of a value of at least �100 keep it in good order and insured in
the lessee's name, and then, at the expiration of the lease, to
surrender it, along with all other improvements without
compensation.
Besides all that and a rent of �52 a year, plus all rates and taxes, the
lease was subject to certain prior rights, as it appears other
operations were already going on in the area. Philip had the
"full and free right and liberty to take clay or soil for
brick-making from the piece of land lying between the pugmill and
the water-race." But it was all subject to the "sole
and exclusive right of Charles Benjamin Taylor to the water in
the stream (Murphy's Creek) for milling purposes," and
"with liberty to cross or dam the stream or for other
purposes connected with the mills...".
Philip built a substantial
brick house nearby, probably with some of the first bricks made
on the site, and occupied it for many years. The Mill House, as
it was known was surrounded by paddocks where flax fibre was
later laid out in hanks to dry and bleach. Adjacent was Fulton's
'Bohally' farm, now occupied by the Girl's college, Innes House
Hostel and the Bohally Intermediate School. The Mill House is
still standing; it is now 47a Nelson Street, Blenheim, and the
more recent owner has modernised it, added to it, and given it
shutters and paint, but even to its interior brick walls it is
substantially the original fabric. However, it is now hard to
distinguish from the attractive modern homes surrounding it.
Brickmaking continued on the
leasehold until the clay gave out. The pugmill was horse-powered,
the clay being worked to the right consistency in a huge cask or
tub with the horse walking round stirring the mix. Murphy's Creek
was later diverted into a race to power a water-wheel of the
Pelton wheel type.
Incidentally, the lease had a
final harsh clause requiring that the claypit be filled in by the
lessee when finished with; but Philip evidently rebelled at the
owner's excessive demands and the clause was struck out. The hole
remained until recent years, when a housing subdivision was
developed.
Bricks made at the time had the
initials 'PV' impressed in the frog. The symbol at other periods
was '+PV' and also 'PV+S', representing 'Philip Vercoe &
Sons'. Bricks with these marks still occasionally turn up when
old Blenheim houses are demolished. Part bricks can still be seen
in the old water-race. The brickmaking plant was largely
transferred, it seems, to Redwoodtown where John Vercoe, one of
the sons, operated a brick-yard.
At this date it is not possible
to say when the Vercoe's flaxmill started beside the river. It
could have been when the brick-kiln was transferred to
Redwoodtown, or perhaps the two undertakings overlapped, running
simultaneously for a time, using the same head of water from
Murphy's Creek as it was probably adequate. Flaxmilling was a
logical venture; there was no lack of raw materials in the
district's extensive swamps, labour and know-how were available
in the family, and there was a world demand for fibre.
Unfortunately, however, it was a fickle business as the market,
like that for wool, fluctuated widely. In the late 19th century
and early 20th there were literally dozens of mills scattered
about the district, advertising their presence by the pulsing
whine of their strippers as the flax blades were fed in one by
one. Most mills were out in the country near the source of flax
supply but the town site had advantages initially of handy water
power. For some years Vercoe's mill was one of the few secondary
industries in the slow-growing borough. Vercoe's flaxmill and the
nearby Vercoe's Footbridge, an interesting high-level structure
over at the river at the Northern end of Beaver Road, were
well-known landmarks.
After John Hewitt died the term
of the leasehold by the river was apparently extended, for it was
not until 17 years later that it was transferred, in March 1905,
to Frank Milton Paine, painter. He transferred it after a year to
Edward Stone Parker, cycle dealer. He later freeholded the area
and extended the mill, which was updated and operated until about
the Depression years, when the flax fibre trade faded almost
completely away.
It is not known precisely when
ownership in the mill changed hands but it appears that Philip
and his sons were victims of falling prices. When Mr Parker took
over he retained the expertise and experience of the family at
different periods.
Fibre prices about the turn of
the century were attractive and the brothers in various
partnership combinations embarked on their own undertakings in
the Awatere Valley. Although the Awatere was mainly open sheep
country, Phormium tenax grew strongly wherever
conditions were favourable, and the good prices created by world
demand for fibre led the settlers to turn their flax patches into
cash. In 1898 John and Richard Vercoe set up a mill near the
South end of the present Awatere road and rail bridge known as
the Starborough Mill. It was a large enterprise, a 12 horsepower
Ruston and Proctor steam engine driving two strippers and two
scutchers, while the washing was done with water from a race 200
yards long. At least 20 men were employed, and production was 4
tons of fibre a week, worth up to a ton.
Vercoe brothers also had a mill
at Blind River on what is now I W McConway's property. It ran for
3 years, its bad luck including, in February 1900, being engulfed
by a grass fire which burnt 20 tons of fibre. Millhands and local
farmers battling the blaze were heartened by the dramatic arrival
at the gallop of a "posse" of 17 mounted men from
Flaxbourne, headed by E A Weld, owner of that sheep station. Two
other Awatere mills working between 1903 and 1908 were at
Blairich at a point about 4 miles upstream from the homestead
that is still called Hill Flat. One of these was a Vercoe mill,
and it appears from an advertisement of a forced sale of flaxmill
equipment that it failed in 1908.
That was in no way an unusual
fate for flaxmilling ventures at that time as the bottom fell out
of the market and mills closed all over the country. An ironic
situation precipitated the general collapse, flaxmillers and
"flaxies" (employees) sharing in a dilemma brought
about initially by high prices. In the "good" years the
"flaxies" had gone to the Arbitration Court, with the
support of their employers, and obtained an award based on the
current high prices. When the market crumpled the millers were
totally unable to sustain those wages, the men, realising the
position, were willing to accept less; but the award was
immutable so mills closed all over the country, throwing hundreds
of men out of work. Prices that had reached as high as �36 a ton skidded to �22
, and, relatively never quite recovered
so what had been a major industry and a remunerative field for
experienced millers like the Vercoes slowly but surely withered
away.
The old man, as he really was
by this time, usually had something coming up. This time it was a
lime-kiln in the Branch Valley, off the Taylor Pass Road. In
1903, at the age of 76, he entered into a lease to develop
minerals he was convinced were on "Meadowbank" Station.
This was his Geology interest coming out again; but a long-winded
legal document, preserved in the Lands Department suggests he may
have just been indulging in a grandiose dream.
Lease No 17263 from G B
Richardson, "Meadowbank"s owner, as lessor, and G T
Seymour, as lessee of the station as sublessor, gave Philip
Vercoe, brickmaker, rights over 19,200 acres, excepting 1,464
acres in the North East adjoining the Taylor River. The term was
for 42 years from July 1903, with right of renewal for another 21
years, and it gave the lessee the right to "all seams of
coal, minerals, rocks and clays, except gold, silver and
copper". Rent was by way of royalty of 3 pence a ton of
coal, coke, lime, cement, clay and bricks to both Richardson and
Seymour up to 1913 and then 6 pence a ton. It gave the right to
construct colliery buildings, kilns, etc, and workers' dwellings.
Within the first year the lessee was supposed to spend �5,000 "on the working and obtaining of minerals,
etc", the erection of buildings and the installation of
machinery and weighing-machines. There was to be no compensation
for buildings on termination, but plant and machinery could be
removed.
What developed from all this
was simply a modest lime-kiln, pretty well intact, is today an
interesting ruin on the side of a hill about a mile up the Branch
Stream from the Taylor Pass Road, with a few signs of a small
tramway and a drive into the hillside to mine what was apparently
high grade limestone. This was burnt to produce quicklime for
mortar, etc.
The lease, however, was
surrendered in November 1904, the document saying that the
Wellington and Marlborough Cement, Lime and Coal Co Ltd had taken
over the interest of Philip Vercoe. However, the Company found it
more profitable to work other sources of raw materials to supply
the cement works it built and operated, unsuccessfully, at the
elevation (near Picton) for a few years from 1904. However, the
Vercoes continued to work the Branch lime-kiln as a small
undertaking until about 1912.
It was the end of an era for
the Vercoe family enterprises. From then on the brothers either
worked in pairs or small groups or went their several ways. The
eldest son, Philip, had already taken up land in the North
Island. John concentrated pretty successfully on brickmaking at
the Redwoodtown Brickyards, selling bricks in 1913, for instance,
at �3 a thousand! The kiln was located at the
corner of Weld Street and Wither Road, but the clay had to be
hauled by horse and dray about a mile from a pit at the foot of
the Wither Hills at the top of Redwood Street. After World War II
the business changed hands, production being centred by the new
owners at the Tua Marina Kiln, now also closed. The Redwoodtown
Kiln site is now covered with housing, and the old clay pit,
completely leveled, is occupied by an attractive modern home - of
concrete block construction! John also developed a bush farm in
the Tinline Valley, a branch of the Pelorus. Aeneas went
dairyfarming at Havelock Suburban, on the banks of the Kaituna
River where John Price later had his celebrated garden of
flowering shrubs and trees. Aeneas later shifted to a property on
the Benmorven Road, where his homestead was burned down, with the
loss of much family history in photographs and so on.
Grandfather Philip always
appeared to have some new scheme in mind. One of his last,
launched when he was a very old man, was alluded to in the family
as "Grandfather's Polish". Somewhere he appears to have
located a deposit of kaolin or fuller's earth - the source was a
secret that died with him - and this he refined and sold or gave
away as a white powder or set in blocks. According to him it was
a universal cleanser and polish for teeth, metals and so on and
even had medicinal virtues.
True to their Cornish blood and
their way of life in early Taranaki, Nelson and Marlborough, the
Vercoes had a love of the sea and seafood, and of the bush and
hunting. Much of their spare time was spent in keeping their
kitchens well supplied with fish, shellfish and the abundance of
meats yielded by their skill in hunting wild pig, deer, duck,
black swan and lesser game. Conservation of natural resources was
the last thing anybody thought about in those days, and they
talked without shame in later years of taking, for instance,
sacks of native pigeons (the largest pigeon in the world, which
were in the bush in their hundreds and were shot with ridiculous
ease), and whitebait by the tubfull, the surplus being fed to
pigs and fowls. Seine netting at the Wairau Bar produced sacks,
not bundles, of fish, and bags of fat cockles were gathered on
the formerly popular pipibeds there. Wild pork, venison and
rabbits were also a regular and abundant part of most families'
diet in those times and were, in fact, a necessary factor in
balancing lean household budgets.
Described in the Express as
unique in that it was an all-day and night affair, it began with
a luncheon and went on with a dinner and dance at night. Their
daughter Susan and her husband William Jones were generous hosts
and the big homestead, now demolished, and the fertile farm were
established by general assent as the family headquarters for
special occasions. William was an able and courageous farmer who
had finally achieved prosperity in the face of years of adversity
and disappointment caused by repeated Wairau floods - as many as
three in one season, when he sowed afresh each time to finally
get a bountiful harvest. The newspaper report said "a large
number of presents and congratulations and a purse of sovereigns
were presented to the aged couple as a token of regard and
esteem." In the evening they led off the first set of
lancers, when everyone commented on their hale and hearty
appearance. At that time of their 14 children, 11 were still
alive and there were 71 grandchildren and nearly 30
great-grandchildren.
Philip died at his home on 27
September 1916, in his 86th year, Anne following him on 28
January 1917, aged 83. She was referred to by The Marlborough
Express in a fine flight of eloquence as "the relict of a
well-known colonist and veteran of the Maori Wars. The courage
with which the vicissitudes and perils of the early days in
Taranaki were faced by the pioneer settlers illuminates one of
the most stirring and creditable chapters in the history of New
Zealand, and the fine old lady who has just joined the great
majority contributed a full share to this splendid record...a
woman of unfailing spirit and industry and exercising a kindly
and neighbourly disposition, she was held in the highest esteem
and affection by her family and friends." She had gained
high regard as a midwife as a younger woman, travelling long
distances under rough conditions to help when doctors were few
and far between.
Philip's obituary in the same
newspaper described him as "a fine-spirited man of active
mind and habits" who "interested himself in minor
developments (in the district) and discovered the extent of the
limestone deposits at Meadowbank." He loved music and played
a small harmonium until near the last. But his 'trademark' was a
lifelong habit of humming tunes quietly to himself so that the
older cousins usually referred to him, a trifle irreverently, as
'old hummer'. Just after his death, the Express recalled an
occasion many years before when he had a chance meeting with his
old Maori War commander through this habit. He was
contemplatively humming while admiring a lovely display of
flowers when visiting Wellington when he was approached by an
apparent stranger, who recognised him after a lapse of 40 years
by his humming.The 'stranger' was Sir Henry Atkinson, his
one-time company commander and later Premier. He was recognised
in a similar way after many years by Mr Justice Richmond, who
thereafter never failed to visit the couple when he came to
Blenheim on Supreme Court circuit.
Having lived close to the
native people in Taranaki from his early teens, Philip had had no
difficulty in acquiring a facility in colloquial Maori. This
accomplishment was useful in the role of interpreter on many
occasions, official and otherwise. Despite the fact that he had
fought against them in several desperate engagements during the
war - or because of the respect he then gained for a valiant and
chivalrous enemy - he always had the warmest regard for the Maori
people and they in turn reciprocated the sentiment, to the extent
that they used the native equivalent of his pakeha name, usually
addressing him as Piripi Waaka.
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