Pre 1848 Settlers of Otago and Southland

The Following article is reproduced from the publication "The Advance Guard - series one" published by the Otago Daily Times in 1973 to mark the 125th anniversary of the Otago Settlement

David and Hannah Carey
By Daphne G. Elliot

David Carey was born on January 25. 1814, in a picturesque farmhouse at Hooe a village near the town of Battle in Sussex. and his wife. Hannah Hutchinson. a few years later at St, Leonards, on the Sussex coast. The early years of their lives spanned a time when industrial revolution and agricultural difficulties were causing much unemployment and hardship all over the country. Many of the yeomen farmers and small landholders were forced to sell their land to those who held larger areas and consequently they and their families had to look elsewhere for employment. At such a time. David Carey and Hannah Hutchinson met and fell in love. It is said that they met in London at the time of Queen Victoria's accession to the throne in 1837. and. when we remember how young people of all generations love to witness pomp and ceremony. the tradition may well be true.

It was at this time too. that posters were being widely displayed urging people to emigrate as free settlers to Australia. with the prospect of being given a grant of land in that new colony. Two of David Carey's friends, Benjamin and William Coleman, both young married men, decided to try the new life in Australia and persuaded the young couple to join them in the venture. Benjamin Coleman, it should be added. was married to Mary Carey. David's sister, so that the three couples and the small daughter of Ben and Mary Coleman made a family group. Against much opposition from both their families, David and Hannah decided to join the Coleman's. and. a week after their marriage at the village church at Hooe on May 24. 1838, they sailed on June I on the ship Coromandel (Captain Neil) for Sydney. arriving there the following October. Like the Carey's and the Coleman's. many of the passengers on board the Coromandel were English farmers and. although the spirit of the adventure no doubt spurred them on the monotonous five-month journey must have curbed some of their exuberance.

On their arrival at Sydney. they were housed in large barracks and the conditions under which they lived and worked were a big disappointment to them. By this time. the transportation of convicts to Australia had almost ceased. Many who had been sent there earlier. had now been released as their terms of imprisonment expired, or as a reward for good behaviour and were given small grants of land and the chance to build new lives for themselves. The early free settlers at this time were mainly agriculturalists who had been offered free passage to Australia. with the opportunity to purchase land for themselves later. after working on the farms owned by earlier settlers and ex-convicts. Becoming dissatisfied with the conditions under which they were working. and finding that the warm climate of New South Wales w as not agreeable. A small band of these farmers from the south of England decided to move to fresh pastures. They had heard of the new settlement which Mr John Jones proposed to establish in New Zealand in order to break in the land and grow crops to provide food for the various shore-based whaling stations he had set up in the South Island. Until then the only white settlers in the South Island were whalers escaped convicts and some deserting sailors and the likely attitude of the Maoris towards a white settlement was largely unknown. Yet in spite of these uncertain prospects they showed the courage and enterprise characteristic of true pioneers and decided to make another move into the unknown. An added inducement it must be acknowledged. was the offered payment of £'38 a year and free rations with a grant of 60 acres of land after two years of service for 'Johnny Jones. So, after spending almost two years in Australia. the little family group from Sussex decided to join the English agriculturists whom Jones had persuaded to go to New Zealand.

The party on board Jones's ship the Magnet. when it left Sydney late in February 1840, Was by the most likely accounts suggest-made up of 11 married couples, 13 children and one single man, a small band of 36 people who subsequently played an important part in the early history of Otago. Perhaps they were somewhat reassured on boarding the Magnet to find, in addition to the white passengers and the sheep, cattle and horses with which Jones was to stock his farm, three Maori chiefs. travelling back to New Zealand from Sydney. They had been invited by the master of the ship. Captain Bruce, to accompany him on the previous trip from New Zealand to Sydney in the hope that after observing the ways of the white man. they would help to make the arrival of settlers more acceptable to the native inhabitants. The voyage to New Zealand was comparatively short. but the seas round the southern coast are rarely calm and the passengers were no doubt glad enough, when on March 16. the Magnet reached Bluff. Some repairs were made to the vessel there, and it is said that one of the chiefs and a cow were also put ashore on nearby Ruapuke. White anchored at Bluff tradition has it, some of the men ventured ashore to climb the nearby hill, but when some Maoris appeared out of the bush. a small boy who had accompanied them was so afraid that they all made a hurried retreat hack to the safety of the ship. After leaving Bluff, the Magnet sailed up the east coast, arriving at Waikouaiti on March 18. 1840, three months before the proclamation of British sovereignty over New Zealand.

As one who has lived most of my life in Otago. and learned to enjoy the beauty of its coast-line. I have often wondered what thoughts were uppermost in my grandmother's mind as they sailed nearer to their destination. Did the beauty of Waikouaiti's wonderful stretch of beach.
flanked by Matanaka's green slopes and the rocky headland of Karitane, help to reassure her about the life which lay ahead? Was it a day of sparkling beauty? Or were the skies grey, with a cold wind blowing in from the sea, as she was carried by her young husband from the ship's boat, through the breakers, to become one of the first white women to set foot in Otago? At least we know that, from that day, she faced the many hardships which came into her life with rare dignity and courage.

Accommodation had been provided for the settlers in roughly constructed communal barracks. but it was not long before each family had its own log hut with a stone chimney and thatched roof. Most huts consisted of two rooms. They were situated on slightly raised ground overlooking the northern end of the beach, at the foot of the slope leading up to Matanaka, where John Jones later built his home. At that time the hillsides were covered with bush, so an open site may have been preferred for the huts if only as an additional safeguard against Maori attack. The men found the land heavily covered with tussock, toe-toe, flax, matagouri and tutu-a poisonous plant which menaced not only their cattle, but also the lives of their young children. Breaking in the land was an arduous task with no implements available except grub-hoes. but with these crude tools the ground was prepared for the first cereal crops. Some cattle and sheep had been brought over from Australia, but these were for breeding purposes and it was some time before fresh meat was available. In the mean time, corned and dried meat had to be shipped in from Australia. Flour, sugar, tea and salt came from the same source and there were occasions when the settlers were out of these necessities for months at a time. We can imagine the anxiety of the women, who would climb the hill at Matanaka and gaze out to sea, looking for that speck on the horizon which meant the arrival of fresh provisions. Yet, although much hardship was endured in this way, food was available from other sources-fish from the river and sea, wild pigeons and ducks to be snared and. if a man had a gun, there were plenty of wild pigs in the bush. The Maoris already grew potatoes and when other foods were short, the settlers quickly adopted the native diet of sea foods, such as pipis and the stems of the cabbage trees, which grew in abundance.

Such were the conditions under which David and Hannah Carey, along with their fellow settlers, set to work to make homes for themselves and it is probably fair to say that they had a tougher time of it than did the New Zealand Company settlers eight years later. When the Magnet arrived there were about 100 Maoris living at Waikouaiti and in the vicinity of the whaling station. About 60 of them, working on Mr Jones's farm at Matanaka, once became involved in a dispute with the pakehas and threatened the lives of all the settlers. Fortunately, they were prevented. Tom Jones, who had come with the party on the Magnet, acted as overseer to the workers and had some influence with the Maoris. Although this incident gave rise to apprehensions of further trouble, nothing eventuated and relations between the two races gradually became friendly. John Jones himself had the confidence of two chiefs Jackey White (Kareta) and Bloody Jack' (Tuhawaiki) who exercised a good deal of control over the tribes and had as many as 700 Maoris at their command.

Nevertheless, we can well imagine how at first the women feared for their safety and their children while their men were away. Grandmother Carey used to recall how afraid she was that a Maori who sat all day at the door of her hut gazing in at her baby in its cradle intended to steal her child. In desperation she gave him her husband's best shirt and this pleased him so much that he immediately put it on and proudly continued to wear it thereafter. As friendship grew between the settlers and the natives the Maoris liked to show their appreciation for any kindness towards them, by making the women gifts of potatoes. They would sit in the huts, watching the way the white women prepared their meals and when they left, they always left behind them a flax-kit full of potatoes. Another time, Grandmother Carey made a sunbonnet for one of The Maori women and when she later left her hut for a short time, found on her return that she could not open her door, so many potatoes had been left inside. As time went on, all the women gave testimony to the gratitude, honesty and other virtues of the Maoris.
For seven years after the arrival of the Magnet there was virtually no currency available and business was almost totally transacted by means of barter between the settlers and whalers, and between the settlers and the Maoris. Once, when David Carey purchased some potatoes, or monea from an aged Maori, he gave in exchange an old white belltopper which the recipient was afterwards in the habit of wearing as his sole article of raiment.
Three months after their arrival in New Zealand, the Carey's suffered their first great loss when their little daughter, Harriet, a child of 18 months, was drowned in a water-hole near their hut. She was buried in the sand-hills beside the grave of another small child, at the end of Matanaka beach. Tragedy struck again when fire swept through the little settlement. A whaler, boiling blubber in his hut on a windy day, started a fire, which raced along the line of huts and only those fortunate enough to be living at the far end of the row were able to save any of their possessions. The huts were soon re-built, but gone were the few prized articles which had accompanied the settlers on their journeying, the reminders of the orderly life left behind in England.
The loss of their household possessions must have been a great blow to the women and it was some time before further supplies arrived from Sydney. Even then they remained without many necessities for a long time. as we are reminded by the fact that Captain Bruce of the Magnet was specially commissioned to bring them a supply of combs. Footwear was a necessity and Hannah Carey turned her hand to making sandals, or paraparas. The soles from pig or bullock hide. and the uppers from plaited strands of flax or pieces of old cloth. The men, of course, were able to get clothing more easily from the stores of the whalers, with whom the settlers always had good relations. Indeed, the same can be said for all members of the tiny settlement. Hannah Carey herself was described by one of her fellow settlers as being a "real. nice woman", and she was much respected at Waikouaiti and later in life during her residence at Port Chalmers and Evansdale. Grandmother in her turn, never forgot the many, kindness shown her by the Maoris, whalers, and her fellow settlers in those early days at Waikouaiti. One incident in particular stood out in her memory and is worthy of recording. In those days, when rations were short, tea was a luxury and on many occasions an infusion of bidi-bidi and wild mint took its place. The kind action of an old whaler, who gave her his precious store of tea, so that she might have a good cup to revive her after the birth of her daughter, Julia Ann, said much for the kindness and integrity of her fellow men, rough as they might have appeared to be.

The arrival of the Rev. James Watkin at Waikouaiti in May. 1840, did much to promote the growth of religious principles among white men and Maoris alike. Although some thought it a crazy idea for Jones to encourage the establishment of a mission station among the whalers. the presence of the Wesleyan missionary and his wife did much to introduce an ameliorating influence among Jones's rather motley collection of employees. The agriculturists. some of whom had been followers of John Wesley in their homeland, welcomed the visits and services of the minister and had their children baptised by him. The Maoris were greatly influenced by his teaching, many were converted to Christianity and were led away from their old life of war and cannibalism.
The headquarters of the Wesleyan Mission ,at Christchurch holds the first Register of Baptisms in Otago (1840- 1859) and among the earliest entries, is that of Julia Ann infant daughter of David and Hannah Carey who was born at Matanaka on April 21 1841 and baptised by the Rev. Mr Watkin on June 20 of that year--the first child horn of European parents in the Province of Otago. Their eldest son James. was also born at Matanaka on November 29 1842 . For some reason the baptism of this child does not appear in the register, although later members of the family who were horn at Otakou and Port Chalmers and baptised there by the Revs. Creed, Kirk and Stannard. are recorded. Perhaps the services of Mr Watkin were not available it the time for his circuit was an extremely wide one which caused him to he away from his station much of the time. The Carey family attended the Wesleyan Mission while they lived at Waikouaiti and later when they moved to Otakou were present at the services conducted there by the Rev. Watkin and his successors. After the settlement of Otago in 1848 when they moved once again to Port Chalmers they became members of the Wesleyan congregation there. In fact David Carey cut and prepared the timber which he gave for the building of the first Wesleyan church at Port Chalmers.

When the Waikouaiti settlers originally agreed to work for John Jones as we have seen, the chief inducement hid been the prospective grant of 60 acres of land after two years service. But, as it turned out, only one or two of them stayed long enough to receive their grants. Although relations among the settlers themselves remained good, dissatisfaction developed in other respects particularly in relationship with the farm manager. Tom Jones, who despite his satisfactory handling of the Maoris, turned out to be tactless and unfitted for leadership. When John Jones realised what was happening, he tried to put matters right by appointing a new manager, but the situation did not improve, and one by one, the workers left the farm, some to work as sawyers, others to go whaling, while a number moved to Otakou, on the Otago Peninsula, where the Weller Bros. had their whaling station and there was a small European settlement. David Carey and his wife, along with their relatives Benjamin and William Coleman and their families, left Waikouaiti at the end of 1842, or early in 1843, to make their homes at Otakou. In an interview with the historian, Dr. Hocken, in later years, David Carey stated that when Tom Jones was evidently not prepared to carry out the terms of the original agreement. they decided to leave the settlement and fend for themselves.

Thus ended the second attempt of the Carey's to make a permanent home for themselves and, with their two small children. they left by open whale boat for Otakou, taking all their possessions with them. Situated just inside Taiaroa Head, at the entrance to the harbour, Otakou had become a calling place for ships from America, as well as from European countries. The Maoris, troublesome at first, had eventually become friendly with the members of the mixed community, and were willing to lease to the settlers small block of land where they could build homes and grow food. After acquiring some land in exchange for old clothing, trinkets and blankets, David Carey set to work growing potatoes and other vegetables, exchanging them with the whalers for flour, sugar and other necessities. Subsequently he and his mates secured some dogs and began to hunt for wild pigs, not only on the Otago Peninsula and the area where Dunedin now stands, but also as far afield as Saddle Hill and the Taieri Plains. They built a hut at the end of the harbour, at a spot where the main Dunedin Post Office now stands, as a base for these expeditions, and the pigs were "swagged" back to the hut then taken by boat to Otakou, where they were sold to the whalers and visiting sailors. At times, therefore. Grandfather Carey was away from home for long periods, hunting and exploring the countryside round the harbour, looking for suitable timber. For one season, he went whaling at Moeraki, some distance north of Waikouaiti, where John Jones had another station. A serious rupture with the Maoris was narrowly averted during his absence, when the whalers, short of meat, stole and killed pigs belonging to the natives. Discovering this, the Maoris turned out with the intention of killing all the whalers. Tragedy was just prevented by the ingenuity of one of the crew who suggested to the Maoris that they should not kill all the men, but watch out for the thief and kill him. Needless to say, no more pigs were stolen after that, and the Europeans branded their pigs to distinguish them from those of the Maoris. At another time, he travelled back to Waikouaiti to help harvest a crop of grain, grown by his brother in-law, Ben Coleman, who had leased some ground and sown the crop when he was working at the settlement. This is believed to have been the first crop harvested in Otago. These first crops cut with a sickle, were not very successful, perhaps owing to the difficulty in tilling the soil to a suitable depth with the crude tools available at the time; but the settlers persevered and the crops seen by visitors on Jones's farm a year or so later, were described as being of good quality. By the time the Scottish settlers arrived in 1848, methods of cultivation had improved and the growing of wheat had developed into a sound undertaking. It is also said that David Carey was the first man in Otago to shear a sheep, the shears having been brought from Sydney on the Magnet and when we realise the magnitude and importance of both the agricultural and pastoral industries in Otago today, it is fitting to recall occasionally the humble beginnings from which those industries developed.

One cannot help wondering how the few women fared, in such a mixed community while their men were away working? Their homes were still rough huts, and most of the furniture was home-made. As their families grew larger, they must have been very fully occupied in caring for their children, as well as working in the potato and vegetable patches which were so essential to their existence. By this time, the Maoris at Otakou were mostly on friendly terms with the white people, although the chief', Taiaroa. was somewhat of a tyrant. American, French and occasional German and Danish whalers visited the harbour, during the early 1840's and these contacts influenced the lives of the Maoris tremendously.
The visits of the Wesleyan missionaries, the Rev. Mr Watkin and his successor, the Rev. Mr Creed, were much appreciated, and services were held and children baptised, at first in the homes, and later in the first small church which was built amongst the sand-hills. This building was lost when it was gradually buried in the sand, which encroached on the area. Benjamin Coleman built and kept an accommodation house, and there was already a store and accommodation house run by Octavius Harwood, manager of the whaling station. Although whales had become scarcer and the day of the whaler was coming to a close, ships still made Otakou a port of call.

In 1844 Frederick Tuckett, the surveyor who had been sent to New Zealand in advance of the Scottish settlers, arrived in Moeraki. After visiting Waikouaiti, he first engaged some Maoris as guides, and then travelled overland to the Otago Harbour, in order to select a suitable site for the location of the new settlement. He visited the Maoris on either side of the harbour and engaged three of them to accompany him further on a southern tour. At Otakou he visited Octavius Harwood, the agent of the Welder's, and noticed his good house and garden and mentioned about twenty other Europeans who resided there, most of whom had good vegetable gardens and grew the "finest potatoes he had seen in all New Zealand".
It must have been at about this time that the first cattle were brought there from Waikouaiti. Some more of the Magnet settlers left Waikouaiti in 1844, followed a track south around the coast, and took with them some cattle. These were driven along the beach known now as the "Spit", and were made to swim across the narrow harbour entrance to the beach on the other side. Some of the cattle, unfortunately, were lost, one of them being the mother of a calf which had been taken across in a row-boat along with Mrs Barry, one of the members of the party. Mrs Monson, an early resident of Port Chalmers who had been a young girl at Otakou at
this time, recalled that she ''first met Mrs Barry when she was her crying bitterly over the fate of her cow as she sat beside the fire in Mrs Carey 's house.'' in those early days, a cow was a prized possession but at the time of the arrival of the Scottish settlers in 1848, milk and butter were in better supply . Life then it Otakou became a little easier for the Carey's, the Coleman's, the Beal's and others who had endured so much hardship together after landing New' Zealand, and the knowledge that they were to be joined by more settlers from Scotland. Must have been great comfort to them.

What excitement there must have been, when the first ship, the John Wickcliffe was seen sailing in through the entrance to the harbour Everyone watched as the vessel was piloted on the way to an anchorage at Kotupai or, as it was to he re- named. Port Chalmers. Mrs Wolsey , who as Mary Coleman had arrived on the Magnet, remembered climbing the hill at Otakou to get a good look it the ship. The day was fine lie with light easterly wind blowing. and a handsome picture the ship made. The smaller Carey children were held in the arms of their Maori friends and waved, perhaps a little comprehending at the children they could see on board. Then came the Philip Laing and after this it steady stream of ships, each with its cargo of people and the many items to which settlers in a sparsely settled country had been denied. The wheel of change was beginning to turn, but very slowly, and it was to be still some considerable time before life in Otago could be really be said to compare with that of the established communities of Europe.
At the time of the arrival of' the first immigrant ships, David Carey and his mates were sawing timber on, or beside the land which was later the property of Mr Macandrew and which we know as Macandrew Bay. He had spent much of his time at Otakou felling and sawing timber the Peninsula. Some of it destined for his own small ship. The timber was rafted down the harbour to Otakou, where he and another settler, Charles Roebuck a coach -builder by trade, laboriously built ,a ketch of about 20 tons. The timber was hand-sawn, nails were obtained by barter from the whalers, while the ironwork required was worked up out of old harpoons and other iron scrap found about the station. When it was as ready to be launched. the builders could not agree about the naming of the craft, and-so legend has it-were even prepared to destroy it out of' pique when an other settler, coming along in the heat of the argument resolved it by naming it the Mercury'. Perhaps the mercurial temperaments of the two builders inspired him to give the little vessel it's name. So she was is launched, one of the first ships to be built in Otago and, when rigged with blue dungaree sails, begun her career by trading round the coast. On her first trip to the whaling station at Moeraki for a load of pigs. She proved to be such a lively craft in a sea that one member of the crew fell down the hold and broke two ribs, and the ketch had to put back to Otakou to repair damage. After that she was known by the name of the Jumping Jackass. Nevertheless, this vessel became a useful trader round the Coast between the whaling stations.

The arrival of the John Wickcliffe and Phillip Laign persuaded David Carey to move from Otakou to Port Chalmers, with his wife, daughter and four sons to work as a lighterman and stevedore. The passengers on those first vessels hid to live on board for some time, anchored in The deep channel off Port Chalmers, until suitable accommodation was available ashore. The Mercury' was often used it this time to ferry passengers and goods between ship and shore. and Carey can claim to be the port's first lighterman. In subsequent years he owned and operated a small fleet of lighters, including the Banshee, Father Thames . The old Dutch galliot Reninau Engelkens and the water tanker Bloomer, and it was ultimately through this work that he raised enough money to go farming.
But those years were still ahead. In the meantime, in modest circumstances, he lived on the edge of the lovely little bay, just north of Koputai, which now bears his name. Family tradition says that his home was a hut, built of pungas or wattle-and-daub. which is perhaps more likely that the description given in the letter written to the Otago Daily Times by "Pioneer" in the issue of June 19. 1947:

"Among those who arrived here in 1862 by the cutter Emma were Messrs W. Goldie and Rennie. They brought with them their lighter, which had been used to supply fresh water to sailing ships there. After the Emma had anchored off Port Chalmers, these two men rowed round the bays, fringed by thickly -wooded Shores. searching for a suitable stream of water. On rounding the point where the Sea Scouts' shed now stands, they saw a boat anchored to a great forest giant, and rowed in to exchange greetings with the owner of the boat. Mr D. Carey . . . In these beautiful surroundings was a tent, the temporary home of the Carey family. Both men, Goldie and Rennie, decided to settle there and started clearing the foreshore to build a jetty. A few days later, Mr Mansford was rowed in and surveyed 11 acres round the mouth of the stream, which he named Carey's Bay."

It was from this stream that Carey had drawn fresh water to supply visiting vessels, but his activities extended beyond lightering, and he spent much time in the then universal task of clearing scrub and bush for settlement.

It was while he was away in charge of one scrub-cutting expedition, that his wife had an experience which frightened her very much. When she saw a Maori chief, with a boat full of Maoris who were under the influence of drink, put into shore near her home, she sensed trouble. and decided to go to her husband for help. After sending her son, George, and her youngest child to hide at Leans Rock, some distance away, and telling the other children to hide under the bed. she ran along the rough track to Port Chalmers with the Maori chief in pursuit. As she ran, she called her husband's name "David! David! " On hearing the name, tradition goes, the Maori turned, ran back to the boat and hurriedly left. Another incident of a happier nature occurred when Sir George and Lady Grey were making a visit to Port Chalmers in 1850. Having missed seeing the Governor when it he was on a previous visit, my grandmother made sure of going into the port. It is not clear whether she saw the Governor or not, but on her return home, she was greatly surprised to find Lady Grey, sitting in her modest hut and nursing her son William, then the youngest member of the family.

As well as being the first lighterman and stevedore on the harbour, David Carey can also claim to have been the first man to pilot a ship from Port Chalmers along the narrow and difficult channel to Dunedin. With his knowledge of the channel gained from taking his row boat up to the head of the harbour many times in search of pigs, lie piloted the ship successfully and was paid £3 for doing so. This did not please the port authorities, as he was not a registered pilot, when he was taken to court he was ordered to pay a fine of £6 -quite a large sum of money in those days. The captain of the ship very willingly agreed to pay the flue but he was never asked to do so. as the fact that a ship had actually been taken right up the harbour to Dunedin itself, was looked on as an important event.

Shortly after the Carey and Coleman families moved from Otakau to Port Chalmers. David Carey's sister' Mary, had the misfortune to lose her husband as The result of a boating accident in the harbour. A Dunedin man who had been detained later than expected, was anxious to return that night and decided to make the trip, against the advice of his friends. There was a very strong northerly wind blowing and the boat. manned by Ben Coleman. Thomas Harman and a man named Hunter, capsized it Black Jacks Point, and all the occupants except Hunter were drowned. The loss of such a close companion must have been a great tragedy for the Carey's. Ben Coleman left a family of eight children, The oldest a girl of 12. It is easy to imagine the problems and anxieties which faced a woman left in such circumstances, and we can only appreciate the fact that she had someone on whom she could rely for some help. Mrs Coleman was still only 33 when, on October 12. 1850, she married a second time---this time to Captain Peter Williams (55), who had already had an adventurous career in transtasman shipping and the whaling activities it Preservation Inlet. Although they had three children, Mary and Peter Williams did not enjoy a happy life together and separated a few years later. Williams lived with his housekeeper until his death in 1868, while Mary lived in Port Chalmers until 1905, when she died it the age of 89

Although, he had come from a farming background, David Carey, as we have seen, turned his hand to many different Occupations during its earliest days. In the electoral roll of 1855, for instance, he gave his Occupation as that of a sawyer. Before the days of the settlement, good standing timber was located on the slopes around what was known later as Sawyers Bay and several of the earliest settlers became engaged in pitsawing. The timber was carried to the beach and rafted to Dunedin from Port Chalmers, not always a simple matter in stormy weather. It is not clear whether David Carey cut timber in this area or nearer Port Chalmers. but later his lighters were engaged in supplying firewood for different works being established at the port. At one time lie was employed by Captain Cargill and Dr Burns. burning lime for agricultural use. and has some claim to being the first lime-burner in the province. Before the settlement, he and Charles Roebuck, are even believed to have distilled whisky from cabbage-tree stems. They had seen the Maori chewing it, and on trying it themselves and finding it contained sugar, experimented by boiling it in an old try-pot. It was afterwards distilled through a musket barrel, coloured, and used as a means of barter with the whalers and sailors. Perhaps this fledgling industry might have developed into an export trade had it not been suppressed by the authorities. In an article in the Evening Star in September 1933, a journalist from Port Chalmers writes of what he called the neglected, natural industry of The district: "The finest whisky in New Zealand was distilled in the Inner Harbour in the early days: every creek had its still, one might say-its factory: at the mouth of the creek was anchored the whaleboat for carrying the output to the retail trade. The modern milk cans were probably invented to carry the product up the harbour where every hotel received its weekly can, sometimes one, sometimes more." No duties were paid on this product it needed no advertising, and the greatest difficulty was the demand. In a busy harbour, as it was at that time whisky distilling was a very profitable business. We know that David Carey was involved with the distilling of whisky in one of the stills situated on the harbourside and on the hills overlooking the lower Harbour. For a time all went well, until the authorities took action, and it was then necessary try for those involved to take precautions. Kegs were used instead in milk cans, and in due course delivery had to he made under cover of darkness. Eventually the continued efforts of the Customs men prevailed, and the work of these pioneer manufacturers ceased altogether.

It is known, too, that David Carey and David Millar, who arrived in the Philip Laign had settled it Sawyers Bay, were The first brewers in Otago. They were succeeded by Mr W. Strachan, who carried on in a small way at the bay for a year or two, then moved to Dunedin to establish the well known Strachan's Brewery.

David Carey's land holdings in the early years are impossible to ascertain. Although his sojourn at Carey's Bay is beyond question, he is also connected at times with other harbour areas such as St Leonards named it is said, after his wife's home town. As more land bordering the Lower Harbour was surveyed for settlement, more and more immigrants took up small farming lots and the Carey's settled at Pulling Point, two miles closer to the harbour entrance. Nor do we know much about the life (if the family. which in time came to number nine, two daughters and seven sons. There are references to the small private schools, which preceded the first public school in Port Chalmers in 1856, to the engagement of a tutor for the older children, and to the attendance of the younger children at a "dame school". For the most part the interests of the Carey sons lay in farming and boat-building, following in their fathers footsteps. James, the eldest, worked his lighter between the Port and Dunedin, before farming with Edwin at Fvansdale.. George lightered firewood for fish works then established at Deborah Bay then settled on the Pulling Point farm:
Stephen, in 1873, built a 70-ton ketch called the Mabel Jane. David junior, who lived his life at Careys Bay, was engaged in fishing and in building fishing craft: while William went into The printing trade in Dunedin; and the youngest, Henry, after a brief encounter with higher education, became a coachbuilder.

All this, however, was still in the future. What we do know is that when the rush took place to Gabriels Gully, David Carey left his family at Pulling Point and set off with a companion to I.awrence. Although he did not remain at The diggings long, he must have done quite well fur himself for, on his return, be was able to buy 100 acres at the northern end of Blueskin Bay, the area now known as Evansdale. Subdivision of this area had followed reconnaissance and survey in 1859-60, the land was considered to be good farmland, and David Carey managed to buy two blocks one in his own name, the other in the name of his eldest son, James. The property, as we have seen, was situated at the northern end of the bay and on the direct route to North Otago. During the time of the gold rush, a good road was made from Dunedin, through Waitati and over the winding hill country, known as the Kilmog, as far as Palmerston. It then continued inland through the Pigroot into the Dunstan, providing access to the goldfields. At a point where the road commences it's climb over the long winding Kilmog hill. Grandfather Carey decided to build in accommodation house, a stopping place for travellers, and a resting and changing place for the coach-horses, which travelled over the roads to Naseby, Clyde and Cromwell. Timber for building the hotel was carried to Blueskin Bay by boat from Port Chalmers and floated in over the bar, and it is said that a large Rimu tree was felled in Evansdale Glen and sawed into lengths for building the dining room. When the building was completed early in 1864, David Carey and his wife Hannah once more moved their home, this time accompanied by the younger members of their family and two of their older sons, James and Edwin, who farmed the property at Evansdale. George, as was mentioned above, remained at The farm at Pulling Point, and David junior at Careys Bay.

During the gold rushes, the movement of prospectors backwards and forwards to the Dunstan made life at the Evansdale Hotel busy and exciting enough. The horses pulling Cobb and Co.'s coaches were changed there and fresh ones harnessed ready for the long tortuous climb over the Kilmog, sometimes passengers and drivers stayed overnight and many were the tales told of wonderful strikes or desperately bad luck at the diggings. The renowned gold coach passed through here Oh its way to Dunedin, taking its precious cargo to the banks.
My father, the youngest of the Carey family, spent his boyhood days at the hotel at Evansdale, enjoying to the full the excitement which contact with so many travellers inevitably brought, and especially interested in the doings of the drivers of the coaches among whom was the well-known driver, Ned Devine.
His desire to travel by coach to the Dunstan was so intense that it caused him to take a step which may have been the means of altering the whole course of his life. After finishing his early education at the little Evansdale school, he and a friend were sent to Dunedin. where my father was to live at the home of his married sister and attend Otago Boys High School, a rare privilege in those early times. Imagine the dismay of his parents when, after a stay of only one week in Dunedin, he arrived back home on the coach, having made up his mind that higher education did not fit in with his future plan of life. On arriving home his one desire was to accompany one of the coach drivers on a trip to the Dunstan. This he was allowed to do, after much deliberation and persuasion, on the condition that when he returned, he should go to town and become proficient at a trade. On returning from his adventurous trip, he became apprenticed to the firm of Cobb and Co. in Dunedin and learnt his trade as a coachbuilder, which calling he followed from then on. Whenever they told this story to us, as children, the moral it contained was always the same. that it had he followed the path set by his parents, his career in life might not have been that of a builder of coaches. but one of a lawyer, as was that of his learned friend. Still perhaps the choice to make use of a clever pair of hands was a wise one' and who can tell in what direction fate and ambition will lead?

From then on, the life of the Careys changed in many ways from that lived when they first arrived in the colony. Their gabled wooden building would perhaps still appear to be somewhat primitive by present-day Standards, with no lighting except candle and lamplight, and no hot water except tank water heated over an open fire. Still it was roomy and cheerful, and big enough to house the family in comfort as well as provide accommodation for the travelling public. Furnishings for this home, brought by ship from England or made by craftsmen who had set up business in Dunedin, made it a home more in keeping with the standards of civilisation. To Grandmother Carey it must have appeared a veritable palace in comparison with some of the dwellings in which she had dived for over 20 years. However, the truth of the old saying "Home is where the heart is", was well proven in the case of the Careys, rearing their family of nine children as they lived through the hardships of time early days. Plain wholesome food and an energetic outdoor life built strong sturdy bodies Only one son. Stephen, died at an early age-36 years, the rest of the family reaching old age.

The hotel at Blueskin was carried on by David Carey and his son Stephen, for about 25 years and only changed ownership on the death of the latter in 1889. By this time the Careys had retired to live at Port Chalmers, while the farm at Evansdale was left in the hands of their son. Edwin. They celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of their wedding at Port Chalmers, where they were greatly respected, on May 24. 1888 an occasion attended by many descendants and friends A few months later, my grandmother, who had been in failing health for some time, became paralysed and died at the age of 71. David Carey continued to live at Careys Bay with his son. David, until his death on March 26. 1896, at the age of 82. Until that time. as he often proudly stated. he had lived over 50 years in Otago, and had never needed a doctor. He and his wife were both laid to rest in what is now known as the "old cemetery" at Port Chalmers on the hillside behind the town. The sparkling waters of the Lower Harbour, stretching from the Port right out to the open sea, Make an unforgettable picture and it was here, in the midst of such beauty, that they had lived and toiled for the greater part of their lives.