I now plan to scour your site for stories related to Linwood canal…

Best regards,

– Steve

Schoolboy walking under the trees along the Avon River, Christchurch. ca 1880s-1920s. Photograph taken by an unidentified photographer employed or contracted by 'The Press' newspaper of Christchurch. National Library of New Zealand. ID: 1/1-017601-G

The Avon is a lovely river. Of course I know that many people will say that it is no better than a ditch, &c. I pity their want of taste. Of course the stream is narrow and does not contain any great volume of water there is nothing in the least majestic or imposing about it, but lovely is an adjective which exactly describes it. The winding circuitous course, the clear, sparkling water beneath, where every stone and weed and bank of sand, every bit of broken crockery and preserved meat tin is distinctly visible, the latter being perhaps too much in evidence; but what would you? Kerosene tins are a distinctly colonial feature, and even on the slopes of Mount Cook one cannot escape them. The willows are perfect in their way, both in number and size, and it seems difficult to believe that the largest of them is not half a century old; but the soil and climate suit them to perfection, and so they attain a beauty and symmetry which I have never seen equalled elsewhere.

Mr and Mrs Vaughan rowing on Avon November 1906. Image: Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 236-7530

There are some people who only care for boating as a means of progression, and like a long, smooth reach of water with every facility for racing others again care for nothing of the sort unless it has a spice of danger and they can feel that life or limb are in peril. To such I fear the upper reaches of the Avon offer few attractions, for the narrow, winding course is not suitable for racing, and should our boat be upset by any evil chance it would not be very difficult to wade out. But there are others who love the clear, running water for its own sake – and to whom every flash and ripple, every clear, shining, luminous depth is a keen delight who watch with eager interest the arrowy movement of the trout as they glide swiftly over the sandy bottom, who love to rest in the shadow of the interlacing trees and look upward through’the clear, transparent green of the delicate leaves to the summer sky above, and feel in some strange, inexplicable way that they are nearer to all beautiful things, to the ideal life, than they can ever feel in any temple made with hands. To such – and there are more of such people than you or I fare at all aware of – l say go for a pull up the Avon on your next holiday, and if you don’t enjoy it “write me down an ass.” But  you will; you can’t help it. And then when you are tired tie your boat to the stump of a tree and lie in the bottom and dream the dreams which are so much sweeter than any reality or else step out upon the turf and take a stroll through the park or the gardens and admire the trees and the flowers, the manner in which the whole has been laid out, and the most trifling natural advantage made the most of.

Christchurch Hospital Doctors' Residence on left, and glimpse of the Antigua Boatsheds on the right behind the willows. Photograph taken by the Steffano Webb Photographic Studio, Christchurch. Image: National Library of New Zealand . ID: 1/1-005227-G

There are picturesque features on either bank without number from the hospital, with its red brick timbered gables, to the solid structure of Wood’s mill, which stops our upward journey. The grounds of the hospital come down to the water’s edge, and are covered with the greenest and softest of turf; and I always admired a seat so placed as to command one of the prettiest views on the river, but I never saw anyone occupy that seat, so perhaps the invalids did not admire it so much as I did.

Then we come to the gardens and the two pretty footbridges, and looking back we see the museum spire rising up behind the trees, and pause to admire this addition to the landscape. Have you ever noticed how much the gable end of a building, the summit of a spire or tower, or even a stack of chimneys (if not too new) improve a landscape, adding to it a suggestion of life, and the contrast of regular lines to the uncertain ever-changing outlines of trees and clouds and cloud-capped hills? In nature as in art, contrast is always effective.

Canoeing on the Avon. Image: Private postcard collection.

On again, and we find ourselves opposite the head master’s house, and admiring its umbrageous seclusion, and a really picturesque stack of chimneys discoloured with smoke and over-grown with ivy. Here the river is narrow and swift, and the boat grates ominously as we punt her along over the shingly bottom, using one of the sculls as a pole. Rather rough on the owners, as one of our party mildly suggests while another declares, “They are used to it,” but does not condescend to explain whether the “they “refers to boats or sculls or the owners of the same.

At this part of the river there are generally plenty of boys to be seen fishing, paddling, bathing, &c. but when I was in Christchurch the schools were all closed for the holidays, and the boys were conspicuous by their absence.” This will also account for the fact that although I saw the outside of many fine scholastic buildings, I did not enter any, an empty schoolroom being to me a very unattractive scene.

Armagh Street Bridge, Christchurch, 1914. Photograph taken by the Steffano Webb Photographic Studio, Christchurch. Image: National Library of New Zealand ID: 1/1-005315-G

Some of the bridges are very fine, that of Armagh street a mass of solid masonry, and others are built of stone, more or less ornamented. Nearly all of these bear the name of some civic magnate during whose rule it has been erected, and whose name, it is to be hoped, will thus be preserved from oblivion. Perhaps some of the bridges are a little too pretentious for the slender thread of water they span but they are certainly solid and handsome, and for the reasons already given a bridge is always a telling incident in a landscape.

A few more shallows, up which the boat is dragged and punted somehow – there is no towing path here, so that simple form of getting out of the difficulty is impossible – and then we reach a wide curve of still water, almost deep enough to drown one; while overhead the willows meet and interlace their branches, and their long drooping tresses dip into the water and make a mysterious suggestive shade into which we plunge recklessly, scattering the lights and breaking the shadows as we scull through them (one must scull on the Upper Avon, for it is not wide enough for oars) and so almost before we are aware of it – and certainly before we desire it we come to the mill-pond and the mill, and pushing the boat into a narrow backwater between the trunks of two fallen trees light our pipes and yarn.

It was on these occasions that I heard some wonderful yarns of the river -  its past glories and present decadence, of the dam which had been removed by the municipal or some other irresponsible power, and which had once kept the river bank full and wondered to find how curiously human nature is alike all the world over, for always “the former things were better than these”; for just such stories, alike in nature if differing in degree, have been told me on the Thames and the Severn, the Warwickshire Avon and the Yorkshire Ouse, and many another river of the Old World. It seemed strange to hear the same thing in this new country which has, as yet, no past.

At New Brighton showing bridge over the Avon River with barges moored next to the right bank. Photographer: Radcliffe, Frederick George. circa 1910-19. Image: Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 35-R341'

Then we began to talk of the delights of boating and other simple pleasures, and of how much those people loose who “see nothing in them,” and one of the party waxed enthusiastic and declared that if he were a rich man he “could purchase permission from the corporation to replace the dam, pay for all damages it might occasion on the low-lying ground, and finally give an annual sum to keep the channel clean and free from weeds.” This started a new kind of game, and each of us said what he would do if he were rich. One said he would “put up some concrete rocks at New Brighton,” a remark which elicited many ironical cheers. At that time I had not seen New Brighton. Later on, when I was privileged to view that uninteresting town I was able to appreciate the importance of this suggestion. Another – our kindly and genial stroke – declared that if he were rich he would yearly take a holiday party of men and women, who all had similar tastes the chief being a hearty love of nature – and similar disabilities – the chief a short purse – and transport them all to the lakes, or the Sounds, or some other charming spot; and this time the cheers were not ironical, but a strange silence fell upon us, and it seemed as if each one questioned his own soul concerning the lost opportunities which he had let slip. Happiness is a rare and beautiful thing. It is good to feel that you have been the means of giving it to another, though for ever so short a time.

Time’s up,” said the captain and we backed out into the stream and suffered the current to take us gently home. “This is what I call jolly,” said the hero of the concrete rocks, letting his scull fall into the rowlock and trail behind the boat. “That is the advantage of pulling up stream you get back so easily.” We agreed for if there was one thing in which C- – (sic) really excelled most men it was the art of doing nothing. He should have been a Turk of the Middle Ages; he was – an impecunious clerk of the the latter half of the nineteenth century.

Rowing on the Avon River 1906. Image: Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 236-7573.

It is not usual to boat on that part of the Avon which flows through the streets of Christchurch, but from Avonside downwards it is quite a considerable stream. Here there is plenty of room for racing, and two four oars can easily pass and repass each other — indeed, on a summer evening the number and variety of the craft render navigation quite exciting, especially when your coxswain is a little uncertain as to which side she should take, and you shout excitedly, “Pull to the right no, no, I mean the left — their right oh, bother! that won’t do; pull this line pull” And you come in contact with a large family boat, well ballasted, with broad beams, a full crew, and half a dozen passengers. They shout and try to shove you off, and then back themselves, and then in the general confusion you glide past, rowlocks touching, and breathe a deep breath of thankfulness that that danger is past, and give your coxswain a lecture on steering which, in her excitement, she invariably forgets.

But the stream is tolerably broad and of uncertain depth, for the water is no longer crystal clear as it was above the town, but thick and muddy and defiled with sewage, yet beautiful still. The trees are not so thick, and they cannot interlace overhead but they form lovely groups here and there, generally in the grounds of some fine mansion or closely embowering some rustic cottage. One such cottage, which seems fairly dropping into the river and is yet beautiful enough in its decoy to tempt any artist to limn (describe) its picture, has a romantic love story attached to it, which one of our party related; a love story with a very touching commencement and a sad common-place ending— disappointment on one side, folly and sin on the other one of those stories which shows us what a poor thing human nature is after all.

On again, under two or three bridges, with many arches, the shooting of which is a little exciting, as you may at any moment come into contact with another boat, unseen till then, in which the solitary sculler, with his back towards you, comes on in all confidence, in spite of shouts of, “Hi, there! look out; look alive, stupid,” from the boys on the bridge, who look forward to the excitement of a collision with breathless excitement, and are evidently much disappointed when the sculler suddenly awakening to the consciousness of danger, deftly backs with his right scull and allows you to pass him on the left, muttering sotte vose (intentionally lowering one’s voice for emphasis) , “Wrong side,” a remark which you pretend not to hear.

From these lower reaches of the river you catch occcasional glimpses of more extended scenes -  a stretch of river meadows with a farmhouse behind them, and in the distance the rugged outlines of the Port Hills, which so clearly mark out the crater of one of those huge extinct volcanoes with which the whole island of New Zealand is studded. These hills look wonderfully well in the sunset light, when they reflect a thousand tints of crimson, orange, and purple, and then fade slowly into a pearly grey.

Hark! what is that. A strange booming roar as of distant artillery. I looked questioningly at my companions. “The sea,” they said, and so it was. Strange that I should not have recognised a sound to which I am so accustomed. Oddly enough, though I knew that the sea must be very near, I had not thought of  it before. “Out of sight, out of mind,” and then all at once I felt a great longing to see it again, and. taking up my oar rowed with a will.

Homes along side Avon River, Christchurch, 1920s. Photograph taken by Samuel Heath Head, Christchurch. National Library of New Zealand. ID: 1/1-007132-G

Past houses great and small, handsome and ugly – the traditional tea-chest style of mansion which meets you all over New Zealand and stares at you with four straight walls past trees of many kinds, but chiefly willows, and so on to the mouth of the Avon and New Brighton. And so I made the acquaintance of that spot which is destined, so I hear, to become the bathing place, the summer resort, the future Margate, Brighton, Eastbourne of Christchurch. There may be more dreary places on the face of this earth, but I have never seen them. Picture to yourself 90 miles of sand, unbroken by a single rock, or hill, or other salient feature human habitations, when there are any, half covered with sand and dwarfed to the size of ant hills sand everywhere, on the beach, in the houses, in your clothes, between your teeth. The long swell of the melancholy sea I never thought it melancholy before — rising and falling on this huge sandbank. No merry tinkle of the shingle as the stones roll and tumble over each other. No rush of waves and spray over a resisting rock, no scrambling, no pools of salt water to explore, nothing but a wide, restless expanse of sea as dreary as the land, and a sandy, shifting, featureless shore as monotonous as the ocean. Plenty of fresh air, no doubt a little too much of it, when the wind blows over those 90 miles of sand. Some people might live there and not go mad, they must be strangely deficient in imagination. I knew now why one of our crew had wished to make some concrete rocks at New Brighton, and I respect him as a public benefactor.

NOTES ON A CHRISTCHURCH TRIP. DOWN THE AVON TO NEW BRIGHTON. PART 11.
By FABIAN BELL.
Author of  “The House in the Fells,”" Recollections of Belgium,” &c.

Printed in Otago Witness , Issue 1989, 10 April 1890, Page 35

Miss Rachel Ross of Riccarton, studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London. In 1890 she obtained her teaching certificate, with special marks for her knowledge of harmony and courterpoint. She returned to New Zealand in 1893 and became a teacher of piano, organ and harmony, and sub-organist at the Cathedral. Image: The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Canterbury Provincial District

The Christchurch Girl
According to the Press, feeble out of doors, useless in domestic duties, the Christchurch girl’s most deplorable feature is her absolute lack of brains and mental culture. She is not only weak, clumsy and ill-dressed, but absolutely ignorant and stupid. Poor girl! There are not half a dozen young women in the town (we read) who know that Lord Salisbury is Premier of England, or Mr Ballance of New Zealand.

The Christchurch maiden never reads a newspaper, English or Colonial. No, she reads nothing except novels bound in yellow (cheap trashy novels). “If we were to ask such a girl,” says our critic, “with admirable gravity, if Shakespeare had any new plays recently, she would take the question quite seriously, and answer that she was not quite sure. Why this painful mediocrity?”

The Press’ article has excited a good deal of controversy -  just what the writer wanted perhaps. The correspondence columns of the paper are now well supplied with letters of absorbing, if temporary, interest, and a sensation has been created in perhaps a few circles – for it must be remembered that the Press circulates most freely amongst people of means and position.

The (Lyttelton) Times, the organ of the working man, essays to defend the Christchurch maidens of degree. The average Christchurch lady, says the Times,

The Lady Principal of Christchurch Girls' High School, Helen Macmillan Brown, nee Connon, may well have taken exception at the Press' portrayal of Christchurch girls, many of whom were under her tutelage. She had been Canterbury College's first female student, and became the first woman in the British Empire to win a degree with honours. In 1890, two of her students were awarded NZ University Junior Scholarships. The same year, four women graduated with an M.A. from Canterbury College and CGHS old girl, Stella May Henderson, was just beginning to study law, even though the practice of law was barred to women. Image: Cantebury Museum.

“has her faults, but they are curiously unlike those attributed to her. So far from being feeble physically, her riding, walking, rowing, tennis-playing, and dancing are distinctly above the average attained to by the English girls in towns of the size of Christchurch.

Putting relative excellence on one side, they are positively good. Our Christchurch girls are not, indeed, as stylishly dressed as though they had passed through the hands of the best London and Paris dress-makers. But they are too poor to import dresses from Worth’s (English born Parisian designer during the late 1880s), and no sensible person, would sneer at them on that account.

They are not all as clever as Miss Fawcett (Philippa Fawcett, the first woman to obtain the top score in the Cambridge Mathematical Tripos exams), perhaps, or as learned as Miss Ramsay (Agnata Frances Ramsay who in 1887 attained the highest marks in the Classical Tripos at Cambridge), but those ladies are solitary stars even in the great firmament of English intellect. Many of our Christchurch girls show a bright intelligence, which often puts their male friends, to shame. They read fairly widely, and are really anxious to be decently well informed on the topics of the hour. If their education is not always first-rate that is rather the fault or misfortune of their parents. We have the pleasure of knowing many of them who are as good as they are agreeable, and who are as patient and helpful at home as they are lively and charming abroad.”

“As for the dancing, we can only suggest that our critic should find – if he can – some Christchurch maiden willing to be his partner in a running polka. Let him thereafter mop his perspiring brow and ask himself what he meant by talking about the mildness of her dancing’s excellence. Then he might venture to talk to her about something a little above ‘small gossip and mild slander.’ We venture to say that if he managed to talk intelligently he would find that he had a sensible and agreeable companion.”

^{Source: Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XVIII, Issue 6063, 9 May 1891, Page 3}

The Press Friday April 24, 1891

Members of a Christchurch ladies cycle group, the Atalanta Club, circa 1890, include pictured here, Miss Blanche Lough, Captain (standing centre); Mrs Alice Meredith Burn (Hon. Secretary), pictured on the right; Miss Bertha Lough, pictured seated in the centre. Image: Christchurch City Libraries, File Reference CCL PhotoCD 5, IMG0054

Why is it that young ladies who move in what they are pleased to call society in Christchurch do nothing well.

We venture to say that hardly any of them really excel at anything. They dance, they row, they play tennis, they walk, they read, they write (some of the rather imperfectly though showing some originality in the matter of spelling), but they never attain to anything but the mildest degree of excellence in any such or the like pursuits.

The average English girl would put the best of ours to shame.

In christchurch if a man cannot talk small gossip and mild slander he is at a loss what to say when in conversation with young ladies. They never read thenewspapers, wither English or colonial.

Even in matters of dress…, the Christchurch girl is behind the age. She is truth to tell, often a sad dowdy.

We think this mediocrity of which we complain is to be attributed to a lack of ambtion, which is, perhaps, brought about by our distance from the great world of Europe…

We are afraid we will incur a good deal of odium for the hard things we have said of Christchurch society, but if our young ladies do not look to it, they will find themselves beaten in the race for life by their sisters of a lower social stratum, who are making good use of the educational advantages which are open to all in this colony, and are thereby acquiring knowledge and refinement which those of better birth but with emptier heads sadly lack.

Extracted Letters to the Editor at the Press:

Rosetta Rhodes, niece of William Sefton Moorhouse, pictured here in 1901, married Arthur Edgar Gravenor Rhodes at a "very fashionably attended wedding" celebrated in Waimate on 10 February, 1892. Source: The Weekly Press, 8 May 1901. Image: Christchurch City Libraries, PhotoCD 5, IMG0073.

“When in England a short time since, after an absence of many years, I was much struck with the difference in style, dress, an intelligence of the ladies met with in an English drawing-room and the same class in New Zealand generally. It is indeed very hard to find among the young ladies here one who has any sense at all, the whole of their thoughts seem bent on frivolity generally. “

“Since reading your leader of Friday last I have come to the conclsion… that when you wrote your article on the Christchurch society girl you were suffering from one of two things, vix, a disappointment in love, or a bad attack of indigestion.”

“…roughly speaking, twenty years ago the average English girl was as empty headed, uneducated, and incomplete as you tax our girls with being.” May I ask, Mr Editor, what you are doing to make our girls more noble, you who have so much in your power! Do you claim that there is anything elevating in the reading which is devoted to “The Ladies” in your weekly issue?”

“The mental horizon of the average Christchurch girl does not extend beyond a radius of fifty or a hundred miles from her own immediate surroundings. Of all that goes on outside that little circle in the great worlds of art, politics, and literature, she remains for the most part in blissful ignorance; her mind, such as it is, being sufficiently exercised by the schemes and scandels of her own little social whirl. “

At Christchurch its effects were most alarming. The first shock occurred at three minutes past 1 o’clock, and was followed at intervals by four other shocks extending over half an hour. The whole of the city was aroused. People rushed from their houses into the streets, momentarily expecting the rocking buildings to collapse. The greatest commotion prevailed. Pictures on the walls were dashed to the ground, and there was an immense destruction of glass and crockery ware. The bells of the Cathedral were made to toll by the rocking of the spire, and immediately afterwards about 26ft of the spire came crashing to the ground. A large number of chimneys also fell, and a number of buildings cracked. The cathedral itself does not appear to have suffered much damage, but it has been decided not to hold a service there tomorrow.

A small portion of the stone work of the Durham street Wcsleyan Church has been displaced. The Normal School also suffered. Morton’s block of new buildings, opposite the Bank of New Zealand, sustained a considerable rent. The Sunnyside Asylum escaped without damage. The Museum escaped uninjured as far as the building was concerned, but the exhibits were knocked about a good deal. The Young Men’s Christian Association building shows evidence of having been considerably affected, the planks being cracked in several places. Generally, however, the damage is less than was expected. The inhabitants were at first greatly alarmed, but after the shocks ceased they returned to their homes. Just before the first shock came, it is said that great flashes of light were seen in the direction of the Hanmer Plains hot springs.
^{Source: The Argus, Melbourne. Monday 3 September, 1888.}

Professor Hutton Reports

The earthquake that took place on Saturday, the 1st September, 1888, was felt from Invercargill in the south to New Plymouth and Masterton in the north, a distance of about six hundred miles, but was most severe in the neighbourhood of the Hanmer Plains, which are nearer to the northern limit of the disturbed area than to its southern limit by about fifty miles. The shock commenced soon after 4 a.m., with a rumbling noise and slight shakes for a second or two, followed by the main shock, lasting from forty to sixty seconds, or even more in some places. Judging from my own feelings at Christchurch, I should say that the shock was a backward-and-forward oscillation that began gradually and as gradually died away after about forty-five seconds’ duration, and that it was not accompanied by any sharp jerks. It was followed within the next quarter of an hour by two much smaller shocks, with other slight ones occurred continually until 5 or 6 a.m., these slighter shocks being only felt in the Amuri, At Boatman’s, Reefton and Westport. All Saturday, Sunday, and Monday the ground at Hanmer Plains was quivering ; with smarter shocks, felt on the west coast and at Christchurch, at about 3.55 a.m. and 4.25 p.m. on Saturday, at 11.15 a.m. on Sunday, and at 8.15 a. m. on Monday.
^{Source: Extract from ART. XXXII – The Earthquake in the Amuri. By Professor Hutton. Read before the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury, 6th September, 1888.}

Professor Frederick Woollaston Hutton, professor of biology, and geology lecturer at Canterbury College at the time of the 1888 quake. Image: Alexander Turnbull Library, Making New Zealand Centennial Collection (PAColl-3060) Reference: MNZ-0474-1/4; F

The Supposed Lights of Hanmer Plains

Sulphurous fumes, which were combustible, says Professor Milne¹, were belched out of the earth at the time of the Jamaica earthquake in 1692. The Professor adds that “in addition to the flames, lights appear often to have been observed, the origin of which cannot be easily explained. The earthquake of November 22nd, 1751, at Genoa, is said to have been accompanied by a light like that of a prodigious fire, which seemed to arise out of the ground.” Volger (Georg Heinrich Otto Volger, January 30, 1822 – October 18, 1897, was a German geologist) has attributed the origin of lights or flames appearing above fissures to the friction which must take place between rocky materials at the time when the fissures are opened. As confirmatory of this, he refers to instances where similar phenomena have been observed at the time of landslips. At the time of these landslips the heat developed by friction as been sufficiently intense to convert water into stream, the tension of which threw mud and earth into the air like the explosion of a mine.
<sup>Source: The Press, Sept 8. 1888
1. Professor John Milne, British geologist and mining engineer who worked on a horizontal seismograph. His nickname was ‘Earthquake Milne’.</sup>

A Warning to Architects

For the fourth time in twenty years Christchurch has been visited by an earthquake sufficiently severe to cause appreciable damage to property and extreme discomfort to the nerves. Opinions may, and do, differ as to whether the shock of Saturday morning was worse than the famous “double knock” of 1869. It was quite bad enough, at any rate, to set as a warning to architects, and to fill the minds of those who hope that the Christchurch of the future may be numbered among the artistically built cities of the earth with gloomy apprehensions. The earthquake is not friendly to the picturesque in architecture.

Here is a description of a model earthquake-proof house, constructed on scientific principles ;- “A one-storied, strongly-framed timber house, with a light flattish roof, made of sheet iron, the whole resting on a quantity of small cast-iron balls, carried on flat plates bedded in foundations.” Fancy a city composed in the main of such things of beauty as this! It would be a moot point as to whether a certain amount of danger might not be preferable to safety gained a the cost of living in a town composed of family vaults above ground.

In Caraccas, the city of earthquakes, towers are things unknown, steeples are as strange as pagodas, and chimneys come to a premature end close to the house roof. The householder who should dare to indulge in light fantastic superstructures would speedily hear from his neighbours on the subject, and we are specially told that to top a chimney or turret with any iron ornament “would expose an architect to the anger of an excited mob.” What the good people of Caraccas would think of an iron cross surmounting a spire of porous Oamaru stone, we can only faintly imagine. But then every town is not like Caraccas – fortunately. The soil there is almost as unstable as the Government.

The Preliminary Shock

A sharp shock of earthquake was felt in Christchurch about three minutes past ten p.m. on August 30. The direction was from North-west to South-east, and the duration was estimated to be fully half a minute.

The Severe Shock

The violent earthquake shock, which so rudely roused everyone from sleep at a few minutes past 4 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 1, may possibly not be the severest on record in this part of New Zealand, but it has certainly been the most destructive since the “Canterbury Pilgrims” landed.

As a usual thing it is somewhat difficult to settle the exact time of an earthquake’s occurrence. On this occasion there can be no doubt about it. The Post Office clock recorded that little item most considerately by stopping short at twelve minutes past four. With regard to the direction, always another matter for dispute, rubbish, fallen objects, &c., point pretty plainly to a North-east – South-west disturbance.

The duration, too, is a matter not easily ascertainable. During an earthquake, many people’s fears cause seconds to prolong themselves into minutes, minutes to seem hours. The disturbance, however, appears to have lasted perhaps a couple of minutes. Persons who retained their presence of mind sufficiently to take mental note of the occurrence, speak of a wave-like motion, increasing in violence till it reached an alarming pitch, and then dying gradually away to stillness. Some observers say that the uproar caused by falling masonry and creaking buildings was succeeded, after the shock had passed, by a brief interval, not more than a second, of deep silence, awful in its intensity, after which arose the hum of many voices, and the outcry of affrighted animals.

Not the Severest Experienced

We have said that the shock of Saturday morning was possibly not the severest that has been experienced here in Christchurch. A comparison of notes with people who remember the very alarming shake which occurred about eight o’clock on the morning of June 5, 1869, leads us to the conclusion. One of the most vivid memories remaining in the minds of those who remember that phenomenon is the hideous fear that was exhibited by animals. The unearthly noise caused by the barking of dogs, the lowing of cattle, and expressions of fear on the part of other dumb creatures, can never be forgotten by one who heard it. Nor is it easy to forget the waving of the trees, the uncanny wave-like motion of the hedges, or the twisted and fractured chimneys that were to be seen in many quarters of the town. Still, the characteristic feature of the Cathedral City had not then been reared, and the damage done on this occasion, therefore, at once assumes a magnitude beyond that of former days.

Subsequent Shocks

The principal shock was followed on Saturday by over half-a-dozen others, all of them so slight that many people did not feel them. The first of these occurred about half-past 4 a.m., the second five minutes later, the third about a quarter to five, and the fourth about five o’clock. At five minutes to eleven a fifth shock occurred, and stopped several clocks, those at the City Council Office and Police Station among them. The sixth shock took place about half-past eleven. Another occurred shortly before twenty-five minutes past four.

On Sept. 2, there was a slight shock about five in the morning, and another at a quarter past eleven. Both were so slight that they were not noticed by several people, though others were somewhat alarmed. Several persons who were in Church went out, apparently fearing a panic if the shock continued.

Damage to the Cathedral

In the first place, what everyone feared would happen some day has actually happened, the spire of the Cathedral has come to grief. Its tapering, graceful outline, a landmark for every dweller on the plains within thirty miles, and a beacon for the mariner crossing Pegasus Bay, no longer cuts the sky. Twenty-six feet of the upper spire have given way, and the melancholy appearance of the wreck strikes every eye. Hanging by the iron bands built into the stonework, the cross and parts of the finial remained aloft till late in the afternoon, the cynosure of all eyes in the crowd which constantly gathered and melted away in the square below.

In Christchurch the emphasis of the whole thing is given by the fall of the top of the Cathedral spire, which very fortunately was unattended with loss of life. If it had happened on a Saturday evening, when the roadway is crowded with pedestrians and wheeled traffic, there would have been a different tale. But the damage to the spire must not mislead us into an exaggeration of the magnitude of the earthquake disturbance. The spire came down not because the shock was too great for a spire, but because the spire had an iron rod built into it to hold the cross on top. The rod spoilt the unity of the vibration by its superior rigidity. A jar was set up in consequence, and away went the stonework. Besides this the rod acted as a lever against the stonework, with all the weight of the ponderous oscillating cross.

Fortunately, the rest of the building has suffered no serious damage. Even the lower part of the spire, as has since been ascertained, is perfectly sound. The blocks of stone fell mostly towards Cathedral square, and spared the building, though bright white spots on the grey masonry of the tower and ornaments show plainly where they stuck in their descent, in some cases breaking off large splinters in their course. One hole has been made in the high roof of the nave, but it is not large; the more noticeable damage occurring in the aisle roof, which is broken through in several places. The falling debris, it is curious to note, struck clear of the memorial font to Captain Stanley, coming to the ground on either side of it, and spoiling nothing but a single arm of one of the tall gas-standards.

The Steeplekeeper – First on the Scene

Mr Anderson, the steeplekeeper, went to the cathedral with the utmost promptness, and was inside it – about six minutes after the shock.

“I was awakened by the shock and the ringing of the bells” he said. “Without stopping to fully dress I ran to the Cathedral and arrived there about five or six minutes after the first shock.”

Crowds gather in Cathedral Square to survey the damage to the Cathedral spire after the September 1888 earthquake.

He lighted the gas and found that there was only one place of leakage – from one of the standards near the font. One of the branches of this had been broken off by a large splinter of wood, he believed, detached from a roof beam by the concussion of a blow on the roof by some of the falling masonry. Having stopped the leak, he proceeded to make an examination of the building. He has had some experience of South America, par excellence the land of earthquakes, and knew what to look for. That was dust at the bottom of the walls inside. It seems that when a wall is injured by an earthquake, the shock dislodges certain particles of mortar, &c., which form tiny heaps and ridges on the ground. Mr Anderson’s examination was satisfactory. Dust there was none. The walls were uninjured. Together with Mr A. Merton, and another gentleman, Mr Watkins, who joined him, he pursued his investigations. He ascended the spire, to find that nothing was injured below the break. While he was in the tower a second shock, much slighter than the first, came. Mr Anderson felt it plainly, and described the sensation as similar to that experienced when one is in a cab jolting over a loose stone. He went up to the break, and removed some loose stones, for fear they might fall and injure either the building or the people who were by this time clustering beneath. The cross, which was hanging against the side of the steeple by the iron braces, which had not been detached, he secured as well as he could with a rope, so as to prevent it from falling to the ground. The four largest bells of the peal, which had been “rung up.” were “rung down” by the earthquake and it was these which caused the clamorous peal which added so much to the startling effect of the shock. The smaller bells, which had been also “rung up,” had not been moved, and none of the bells had been in any way injured.

“I had the greatest difficulty, early though it was, in getting the people who had collected on the footpath to go away out of any possible falling stones. The police were also early on the spot, but despite all we could do they took away stones, and could not be got away out of what might have been a dangerous position.” said Anderson in an interview to the Weekly Press Sept 7, 1888 page 1229.

During the morning the debris was cleared away from around the base of the tower, and arrangements were made for lowering the cross from its insecure position. This was successfully accomplished, under the direction of Mr Anderson, in the afternoon. The cross was lowered down to the gallery on the tower, in order that it might be taken to pieces and brought down to terra firma.

It may be interesting to know that the sound of the falling stones from the cathedral spire was heard at long distances from the spot. At Richmond it was noticed by several who predicted the truth, though unable to verify it at the time, that the cathedral spire had been damaged. The morning was exceedingly calm, and at the lower end of Sydenham the sound was also heard.

From daylight a considerable number of persons gathered in Cathedral square, and at all times of the day there were to be seen knots of loiterers about the square, gazing up at the ruined spire. Several views of the spire were taken by enterprising photographers.

Spire damage, 1888. Source: Canterbury Times, September 1888

History of the Spire

That structure (the spire) was crowned with finial stone and cross on May 19, 1881, and was formally reported as a completed work later on. It was a gift of the sons and daughters of he late Mr Robert Heaton Rhodes (R. H. Rhodes presented the tower, and the family of George Rhodes the spire), whose personal bequest was the tower itself. In the original plans for the erection of the Cathedral, which were drawn by Sir Gilbert Scott, drawings were made for a stone tower with a wooden spire. This idea, however, was afterwards abandoned, and a stone spire was designed by Mr B. W. Mountfort, and duly erected from his drawings.

The stone measures 5ft 3in high when finished, and was cut from a single block measuring 5ft 5in long, and 2ft 6in square, or close upon 34 cubic feet. It is of the hard, fine-grained limestone found at Castle Hill, … and was selected, quarried, and brought to Christchurch for this special purpose.

The total height of the spire and tower was 202ft. The break is about 20ft from the summit, not including the height of the cross, and the spire is about 6ft in diameter at the point of fracture. Mr Mountford could not say how much it would cost to restore the spire, but , so far, no consideration had been given to the question whether it would be desirable to restore it to its original design. Speaking from memory, he said that the spire cost about £2000. (The tower cost £5150.)

Professor Hutton considers that the stone used for the steeple is totally unfit for the purpose, being too porous to support the weight of the iron cross. When the vibration began, the weight of the iron cross cracked the stone. In any case the stone could not have stood many years within an earthquake region such as Christchurch is, as, in addition to the continued vibration to which it is liable, the porous nature of the stone is calculated to gradually cause it to fracture with its own weight. He alluded to the fact that in Oamaru some years ago chimneys built of the local stone had been shaken down, while the brick ones stood in nearly every case.

An Interview with Professor Hutton

With the desire of obtaining as full information as possible respecting the earthquake on Saturday, a representative of this paper waited on Professor Hutton, at Canterbury College, and obtained the following valuable information :-

Want of Date.

“There has been no systematic investigation of any kind, made by the Government, of earthquakes in this Colony, and no facts have been placed on record except the dates of their occurrence. If there are instruments in Wellington, there has been no notice taken of them nor is there any published record of the results obtained by them. To investigate earthquakes it is necessary to have instruments in not less than three different places, then some ideal of the position of the centre of disturbance could be made out; it would not be left to guesswork,; and we should then be able to gain the necessary information s to the size of the earthquake wave as well its direction.

A Practical View

The practical advantage of this information is that builders and architects can, by knowing the direction the earthquake takes , adopt precautionary measures in adapting their buildings so as to turn the strong side in that direction. Beautiful instruments are now being made in the Cambridge University which record all necessary data connected with an earthquake – time observations, and earth movements of all descriptions. These work automatically. In the interest of science and the Colonists generally, these should be supplied, and Wellington, Nelson and Christchurch are suitable places to procure the data, as there are plenty of people at each of these centres who could be found willing to attend to them.

Professor Hutton writes as follows:-

To the Editor

Sir, Telegrams show that the earthquake of Saturday morning did not originate in Banks Peninsula, as I at first thought probable, but somewhere to the West, probably in Inangahua County. I infer this from the times at which the earthquake occurred at different places – first at Greymouth and Westport, then at Timaru, Christchurch, Wellington and Nelson, and last at Invercargill, Dunedin and New Plymouth.

The shock was felt over a radius of three hundred miles from the centre of disturbance, and it is remarkable that a shock so widely extended should have done so little damage. This was probably due to the centre of disturbance lying deep down in the earth, so that the earth-wave at the surface was more vertical than usual.

Another remarkable circumstance is the extraordinary rapidity with which the earthquake spread over the surface of the earth, travelling at a rate of about a mile in a second, which is from four to five times faster than the observed velocity of transit of earth waves through the ground. This again can only be accounted for by supposing that the centre of disturbance was very deeply seated. But if we take the actual velocity of transit of the wave through the earth to have been 1200ft per second, which is the average of recorded observations, calculation shows that in order to get an apparent surface velocity of fourteen or fifteen miles per second, for from 100 to 300 miles, the centre of disturbance would have to be several hundreds of miles below the surface, which is quite incredible.

Of course time observations alone, even if made with the greatest accuracy, are only capable of giving the roughest approximation to the position of the centre of disturbance; but it is evident there is something wrong, either in recorded observations, or else in our ideas of the interior of the earth, and it is very desirable that accurate instrumental observations of our earthquake phenomena should be recorded in at least five or six places in New Zealand.

The seismograph in the Wellington Museum seems to be the only one in the Colony, and this appears to register the horizontal direction of the wave only, which is not sufficient to determine the locus of an earthquake. Excellent automatic, self-registering seismographs, capable of recording all necessary earthquake phenomena, can be obtained in England for about £60 each, and any intelligent person could be taught how to use them. But I have written so often in vain about the importance of studying our earthquakes, that I despair of the Government taking any effectual steps in the matter.

I am,, &c.,
F. W. Hutton
Christchurch, Sept. 2.

Personal Experiences

A gentleman not long from England, being awakened by the shock, aroused his brother, telling him that there was a severe shock of earthquake. “Oh,” replied the brother calmly, “You must be mistaken. It is only one of the very high winds we have in Christchurch occasionally.”

The “Lyttelton Times” Office

The Lyttelton Times Buildings 1885. Source:The Canterbury Times, 3 Feb. 1904, p. 35. Image: Christchurch City Libraries File Reference CCL PhotoCD 2, IMG0063.

The machinists and stereotypers in the Lyttelton Times Office had a most uncomfortable experience. The Victory web printing machining was going at its usual rate of speed when the first shock occurred, but worked so hard on its bearings with the rocking that work had to cease for a time. Meanwhile the steam indication in the engine gauge went down from 60lb to 40lb, and the huge webs of paper from which the Times is printed went rolling about in a most unpleasant way. In the top story of the building several of the stereotypers were at work, and they state that the rocking and creaking of the building was quite as bad as a ship in a calm in the tropics.

One of the most interesting accounts of personal experience of the earthquake is that given by Mr Smith, a member of the publishing staff at this journal, who was on his way to work at the office when the shock occurred. He was, he says, walking passed the house in Latimer square formerly occupied by the last Mr W. J. W. Hamilton (William John Warburton Hamilton, Collector of Customs, Magistrat and shareholder in the Lyttelton Times, died on 6 December 1883, aged 58), when he heard, apparently behind him, a rumbling like that produced by a heavy vehicle. The noise appeared to travel onwards towards the town, and he looked around for the cause. Seeing no vehicle, he became somewhat alarmed, and set off at a smart pace towards town. As he neared Cathedral square, he heard a sound like the rushing of wind among trees, noticed the ground begin to quiver under his feet, and was startled by the crash of a falling chimney. He looked up at the Cathedral spire, and saw that it was shaking violently. It quivered for a few seconds, then the top seemed to melt away, and came down with a roar of the ground below. Almost simultaneously, so it seemed to Mr Smith, a wild, discordant clangour of bells burst from the tower.

Mr Ross, a scavenger

At the time of the shock a man named Ross (described as a ‘scavenger’ by the United Press Association), employed by Mr Brightling (John Brightling, a contractor in Cathedral square), was walking along the middle of the road through Cathedral square in front of the Cathedral. He states that the spire began to shake almost with the commencement of the earthquake, and when the shock reached its climax, the upper part of the structure seemed to collapse, and came crashing to the ground. One of the pieces of stone fell very near to Ross. Most of the stone struck the footpath, South-west of the tower, between the fence and the drinking fountain, about eight feet from the fence, and about on the spot where the small piece of stone which was detached from the spire by the earthquake a few years ago fell. The mass of stone which came down on Saturday seems to have exploded like a bombshell, for fragments, some half as large as a man’s body were strewn all over the footpath, and even on the road. The asphalt was smashed to pieces, for an irregularly shaped patch of nearly a yard in extent. A considerable portion of the debris fell into the Cathedral yard on the northern side of the tower.

Christchurch Cathedral after the 1st September 1888 earthquake.

A young man, whose name could not be ascertained, was also an eye-witness of the disaster to the steeple. He was on the footpath near the Godley Statue, and bolted, under the impression that the entire tower was coming down. Finding it did not fall, he returned, and was soon joined by others, anxious, like himself, to see the extent of the damage. In a few minutes a crowd of considerable size was collected around the building. Many persons picked up the smaller pieces of the stone which were scattered about, to preserve as mementos of the event. All devoted themselves to examining the tower as well as they could in the dim light, and many expressed the opinion that it was considerably out of the perpendicular. When, however, the morning began to dawn, it was seen that the graceful shaft which has long been the architectural pride of Christchurch was, although truncated, erect.

Mr Young’s Narrow Escape

A rather narrow escape happened at the cottage of Mr John Young, at Moa place, off Madras street north. His cottage adjoins a parapet wall attached to the house next door. At the time this wall was built Mr Young protested against it on the ground that was not safe. However, the work was allowed by the Works Committee of the City Council. About 2ft of brickwork were knocked off the top of the wall last night by the earthquake, and stove in the roof of and completely wrecked a little room in Mr Young’s cottage. Some of the occupants of the house were sleeping just on the other side of the wall of the injured room at the time, so that if the debris had fallen but two feet, or perhaps even one foot further, a serious accident, it not loss of life, would most likely have ensured.

Clarkson and Sons, Drapery Warehouse

In the fancy department of the drapery warehouse of Messrs Clarkson and Sons, the shock played strange vagaries. Hats which were stacked in neat orderly heaps were found in the centre of the floor in miscellaneous heaps. The various lay figures, on which were displayed the latest triumphs of dressmaking, were in a recumbent position. The most remarkable portion of the upset of the department was in the ribbons. Some thousands of rolls of ribbons were dislodged from the shelves and sent rolling in inextricable confusion all over the floor.

Mr Buckley of Sumner

Mr Buckley, who lives in one of the small bays off the Sumner road, reports that he was awakened by the noise of a large boulder coming down the hill. It passed over the road leading to Sumner, and continued its career to the sea. Of course the stone was not seen, but from the noise it made, and also from the marks left on the road where it crossed it must have been of very large dimensions. Luckily there were no houses in its course, or the result would most certainly have been serious. The noise it made tearing down the hill was heard on the Lyttelton side of Sumner road, a distance of many hundreds of yards from where it descended.

“Becky Sharp”, The Ladies Page

“Of course the great subjects of conversation just now are earthquakes and spires. I am quite tired of the invariable question whenever anyone fresh comes to see me : “Did you feel the earthquake?” I don’t suppose there is a person in the whole town who didn’t feel the earthquake, and, what is more, wishes he had not. I shall not describe my feelings, because they were not creditable to me at all, and the only excuse I have is that, as I am almost utterly helpless, the experience was a very terrible one to me. I believe some people – lucky things – rushed out of doors in the most peculiar costumes. One lady took great care to put on her hat, though with other garments she was scantily provided, while quite a number of provident persons appeared attired in the Native dress of a blanket. Dinah says that those people who rushed off to the Cathedral to look at the spire noticed that the town was mildly illuminated. In every house lights were moving to and fro, and one man was seen walking along the footpath with a lighted candle. I wonder how most people past the next night. I quite expected another earthquake myself, and Dinah had the greatest difficulty in getting me to bed at all… They say the poor spire looks most melancholy, and everybody seems quite sad about it. I am glad I have not seen it. I would not have been Mr Anderson for untold gold. Fancy rushing up the tower while it was still rocking from the shock which had thrown down twenty feet of masonry from the top. I prefer to leave those kind of actions to other people. Lying in bed and trembling is about as much as I can manage.”

Sources: This article comes from extracts taken from The Canterbury Times and The Weekly Press, September 7, 1888, unless attributed elsewhere.

Professor Frederick Wollaston Hutton was a professor of Natural Science and Biology. After serving in the military as a Captain, he retired in 1865 and emigrated to New Zealand the following year. In 1877, Hutton was appointed professor of natural science at the University of Otago, transferring three years later to Canterbury College where he became professor of biology and lecturer in geology. He later became the curator of the Canterbury Museum (1893-1905).

The second store at 16-20 Goose Gate ,Nottingham, belonging to the Boot's Chemist chain, founded by Jesse Boot (who later was made the 1st Baron of Trent) and his parents, c1885. This store is a short distance from the business James Boot left behind in Alfreton Street. Source: BBC Nottingham website.

James Boot arrived as an assisted emigrant, bringing with him his wife and five young children: James Alfred, age nine; Millicent, age seven; Frederick, five; Eleanor, three; and Walter age one out to Lyttelton on the immigrant ship, the Tiptree. Like many new settlers, he left behind his parents, siblings, and an occupation as a medical botanist situated on Alfreton Road, Nottingham – just two miles from another Boot family herbalist business which later become one of the most famous chemist shops in England.

Why James had left England is not known – most likely to improve his situation in life. According to his immigration application, he had been employed for two years as a joiner with prominent local tradesman William Woodsend, in his building business – which was continued by his decendents until liquidation in February 2011. William provided James with a character reference, as did local lacemaker, William Smith.

James’ words may suggest his removal from Nottingham may not have been under ideal circumstances,

“If ever I get to Old England again, I would work night and day to redeem myself; but that can never be.”

His letter – a sad and desperate appeal for help – reveals the sorrow, despair and duplicity James and his family felt towards those people whom he believed had induced him to emigrate under false representations. James wrote,

“I have heard women say myself they could stand and see those men pulled limb from limb who advertise false representations in the English papers to induce people to go. It is a pity the public should be gulled.”

For many immigrants to Christchurch, life was much harder compared to what they had left behind in England. Living conditions were quite primitive. After a few days acclimisation at the immigration barracks, settlers were turned out to fend for themselves. They were expected to find their own accomodation or build their own homes, and until such time they often lived under canvas or in V-huts.

“I have seen some queer places. One house in a place called  ’The Valley’  I called at, you could not stand up in, and I do not think it was five feet from the top to the bottom, the roof slanting to the ground, and there being no walls nor any floor save the ground you walked upon. But I need not say anything about that, for I have no floor in my house, neither can I get any at present, wood being so awfully dear. It is all imported into Canterbury.”

Panorama of houses in Christchurch looking towards the hills at the time the Boot family arrived, 1860s. In the middle is Gloucester Street with Liverpool and Manchester House displaying a array of drapery goods outside. To the left of this is Joseph Papprill's tailoring and habitmaking store and home. Photographer: Alfred Charles Barker. Source: National Library of New Zealand, ID: 1/2-075411-F.

An occupation most repugnant to my feelings!

Obtaining work was also a major problem. James’ occupation on his emigration records stated that he was a joiner. Most likely he was under the impression that a trade profession would be more sought after in the colony  compared to his medical botany background.

However, he had only managed to acquire ‘half work’  at seven shillings a day, since landing in Lyttelton on January 20th, 1864.

Afterwhich, he had no work for two months, though he had searched all over town for it, like so many others.

James took to going around the district, visiting settlers’ homes to ‘hawke’ medicinal pills he made for a penny a piece – an occupation he said was, “most repugnant to my feelings”.  This was the only way he could make any money using the skills he had as a medical botanist – a profession he had taken up after moving away from the family trade as lace workers in Leicester.

“I did middling at first. The second day I went out, I earned 12s with small wares and 12s, with pills, which made £1. 4s., a good day…. but the last few weeks I have done nothing scarcely earning a living.”

Advertising by the Canterbury Association for tradesmen, labourers and domestics. Source: The Bristol Mercury, Saturday, May 1, 1858. Issue 3554

After being in Christchurch for a short time, James saw advertisements in the Nottingham home papers, claiming that carpenters and smiths were much needed in Christchurch. He wrote to his family back in England, complaining of the reality,

“Smiths cannot get work,  for I know several who are driving carts, or doing anything they can get, not being able to obtain a job since they came.”

In desperation of his joblessness, James went to the ‘Government’ to ask them what they suggest he should do. They were sorry but had no suggestions apart from offering him a day’s work cleaning the windows of ‘Parliament House’.  James hoped that they would keep him on, and find him something better.

How a man with a family is to live here I leave you to guess

Food and supplies were expensive in Christchurch – some merchants and suppliers could charge whatever they liked due to lack of competition or supply.

“Things are most awfully dear. Bread is 1s. 4d. the 4lb. loaf, or what ought to be 4lb.; but loaves here I think are made by guess. We cannot get any of them weighed; they run about 3lb. 10oz,. and we have weighed them 3lb. 2oz., being 14oz. too light. We eat two of these things a day, so you may soon reckon what our bread bill is a week – only 16s. 8d. potatoes are 11/2d. per lb, and rising; flour 5d. per lb. ; butter 2s. per lb, ; eggs 4d. each…”

It was very difficult for James to support his wife and five children under the age of ten.

“How a man with a family is to live here, I leave you to guess.  My poor wife often cries bitterly at the misery we have come to. Little Nelly and Freddy often ask why I have brought them to such a miserable place, and say “It’s a nasty New Zealand ; when shall you go back to ‘Nockinam?

It’s a nasty man as took all the ‘cheers’ and tables. We have no furniture at all but the boxes we brought, and I think half the houses in New Zealand are the same.”

James wishes he was a pauper in Nottingham Workhouse, instead of trapped in unemployment and misery half way across the world.

“I do not think there is one in fifty but who regrets the day they came. Some tell me they dare not write the truth home for it would break their poor mothers’ hearts, so they are obliged to wrap things up as well as they can.”

Letters for Home

Newspapers and letters from home were one of the few ways new immigrants could stay connected with the life and people they had left behind in England. They took months to reach New Zealand and so the news was well out of date by the time it arrived, never the less the ships, and the news they carried, were eagerly anticipated.

Letters written home by settlers were often passed amongst friends and family, and some were submitted to newspapers for publication – much to the embarrassment of the writers. In one of Charlotte Godley’s letters written to her mother in England, she requested that her letters not be published as her husband and friend, Mrs FitzGerald had been greatly annoyed when it became known to them that some of their private letters had been shown around and published in the home papers, which had subsequently made their way out to New Zealand for all to read.
^{Source: Letters from Early New Zealand, Lyttelton. September 30th. By Charlotte Godley.}

The same fate befell James – 5,000 miles of ocean was not enough to keep his private thoughts sent in letters to his family, from reaching New Zealand. After being published in England, his letter was apparently copied into the Daily Southern Cross in Auckland, who expressed pity for his circumstances, suggesting that an Aucklander should rescue him from his plight. This article came to the scathing attention of the Editor of the Christchurch Pres, who accused James of being “a man of singularly refined palate, to whom all the luxuries of the season are necessary to render life tolerable” ,  a “helpless mortal”  who should get back to the Nottingham Workhouse as fast as he can and a whinging, “chicken-hearted lazy fellow” who apparently gives in at the first difficulty.

“The writer seems to have thought that in coming to a colony they were on the way to a kind of El Dorado, where they could make money as fast as they wished – how they did not stop to enquire, have abundance of everything provided for them, and trouble of every kind be forever unknown. When they are fairly landed, the contrast between their romantic expectations and the hard reality is a shock which they seem never able to overcome. Of course everyone who comes to a colony has something to undergo at first ; the very change in the ways and customs of the place, and the absence of many things which in England one has been accustomed to all one’s life, are trying ; but these are the very things that show what stuff there is in a man. A plucky resolute man goes to work at his business with a will, or failing that, turns his hand to anything he can pick up, soon obtains regular employment, and is on the way to securing a competence, if nothing more. A chicken-hearted lazy fellow gives in at the first difficulty, goes about groaning and sighing, can do nothing to help himself, writes whining letters home to his friends and finally throws himself upon Government and begs to be supported at the public expense.

..we have already said that we know nothing of Mr. Boot, but if his is one of the former sort, we have no doubt that next year he will be writing home in a very different strain, and will probably assist his relatives to join him in New Zealand, without any reason for ‘weeping tears of blood’ on their arrival. But if he is really the helpless mortal his letter indicates, our best advice to him is to get back as fast as he possibly can to the Nottingham Workhouse. He will be much happier there than in Canterbury, and he is quite right in supposing it is the best place for him.”

^{Sourced from the British Library Gale Document Number:R3209365798. Extract from: NEW ZEALAND AND ITS SETTLERS. Nottinghamshire Guardian (London, England), Friday, February 24, 1865; pg. 3; Issue 996. Original article: Press, December 9, 1864.}

Although James did not know at the time, there was some truth in what had been written in the Press. After a few years, he managed to acquire work and the Boot family fortunes changed for the better, whilst his Nottingham based family’s suffered. But this was still a few years off, and James’s experience of emigration left him feeling alone, isolated, unemployed and desperate – an issue that would not be fixed any time soon.

Unemployment in the Colony

Even before James’ arrival in 1863, reports had circulated about the employment situation in the new Colony. The Secretary of the Working Men’s Committee in Canterbury, W. H. Barnes, had written to publications in Australia in October 1859, claiming that 600 men were out of work at the time, with several more ship loads enroute to Lyttelton,

“The place is swamped with labour of all sorts, and many that are working cannot get sufficient to keep themselves and families.”

Barnes listed the wages given and what could be bought with them so readers in Australia could judge for themselves whether it was worth their while to go to Canterbury or not.

Agricultural and other labourers were paid 5s per day; carpenters, smiths, masons and other trades from 8s to 10s; rent per week was from 10s to 15s. Flour per 100 lbs was £1/6s; bread per 4 lbs was 1s 2d; Tea per lb, 3s 3d; Sugar 8d; milk per quart 6d; butter 2s; bacon and cheese 1s 3d.
^{Source; The Hobart Town Daily Mercury, 19 October 1859, page 2.}

Meetings of unemployed were constantly being called throughout the colony. James had written in his letter home:

“Auckland is the same as Christchurch. I have met with many who have come from Auckland here to do better, and they say Auckland is just the same.”

On the 23rd January, 1871, five hundred unemployed men met in Auckland to adopt a petition, “stating that they were in a condition of destitution, and approaching starvation, and requesting employment.”
^{Source: Wellington Independent, Volume XXVI, Issue 3105, 24 January 1871, Page 2}

Ten months later, in October 1871, a petition was presented to the Canterbury Provincial Council, signed by 168 persons, complaining of want of employment. The Government had provided employment for men in the Domain at 3s and 4s per day, and on stone breaking at the new Addington gaol at 4s per day, but they had been discharged when the work had ceased.

One of the signatories to this petition was James Boot, who was also called to give evidence to the Committee set up to examine the issue. By this time James had begun a business as a fruiterer, with just 4/6 in his pocket. His change of circumstances and personal views bore the Committee’s findings – there was work for those who wanted it, but  “the immigrants from England are taught to expect too much”.

Amongst the Committee’s findings were:

• That while some of those out of employment are deserving of assistance, a great number are men who will not work if they can help it, or who will not take work under a certain rate of wages or who through extravagance of various kinds, have failed to make provision for a period of slackness.
• That while there is a demand in the country for single men and women and married couples without encumbance, there is sometimes a difficulty for a married man with children to obtain a situation especially if his wife be unable to work.
• That it would be advisable for the Provincial Government, should complaints of want of employment again occur, to offer piece work to married men so as to enable them to earn something less than the then current rate of wages
• That those persons who have arrived here as assisted immirgrants form a very considerable section of the population and as a body are in a highly prosperous condition.
  ^{Source: Archives New Zealand, Christchurch}

Boot's celebrated muffins and crumpets Ad 1869. Source: Star, Issue 246, 25 February 1869, Page 1. Image: Past Paers.

Pines, Oranges and Refreshment Rooms

By 1866, James had established a good business as a fruiterer in High Street. Before emigrating, James had worked in a confectionery store in Nottingham, so it was inevitable that confectionery would also be added to his produce.

James had also recognised a gap in the market in the city for a good refreshment tea room and coffee house, so he pioneered the idea and established a respectable and highly successful shop which offered hot tea, coffee,’pines and oranges’ and his ‘celebrated muffins and crumpets’ served at all hours as well as a convenient cloakroom staffed by a female attendant for ladies to relieve and refresh themselves whilst in the city. The Boot Tea Rooms became synonmous with good service and food and was highly patronised by Cantabrians of that time.

^{Source: Star, Issue 246, 25 February 1869, Page 1.}

The Boot family lived in a house on a quarter acre section on Cambridge Terrace east, which in 1881 was valued at £1,600. While his fruitery and confectionery rooms continued to flourish, that same year in Nottingham, James’ eighty five year old, widowed father Joseph, was living in an almshouse with his daughter, Sarah who worked as a dressmaker and his grandson William who was employed as an iron turner.

Twenty Four Lashes with a Cat-o’-nine Tails

The Boot family home on Cambridge Terrace east, had a large glass house in the back garden. Within this temperate hot-house, grew an illustrious vine which produced a crop of much anticipated grapes in late summer. This delicious crop was tended carefully until the ripened sweet fruits were harvested and transported carefully to the fruit shop to be sold at a good price. However, on the night of Tuesday 25th February, 1879, James’ son, Walter discovered five boys in the back garden caught ‘red handed’ with their arms loaded with the precious bunches of grapes as well as mouths quickly swallowing the juicy evidence. The young lads – George Hyde, William McDonald, John Borland and G. S. Rose, who were aged between ten and twelve years were held by the furious Boot men while a police came to the house to arrest them.

They boys were charged with breaking in and stealing thirty six bunches of grapes valued at the grand total of £7 10s. In court, despite the boys’ parents’ tears and distress over the charges laid against them, the bench intended to make an example of them.  They were found guilty and taken to the Addington Gaol where they were detained for four hours to await their punishment. The three oldest lads – George Hyde, William McDonald and another called Henry Chiverson – had been charged with other similar offences committed around the same time, so were given twenty four lashes with a cat-o’-nine tails, whilst the other two, John Borland and G. S. Rose, received the lesser amount of one dozen lashes.

^{Source: Star, Issue 3399, 3 March 1879, Page 3.}

Licensed to Sell Wine and Beer

James had built up a reputation for running a respectable establishment. Many patrons who enjoyed partaking in his refreshments and meals at his High Street shop were in favour of him gaining a liquor license so they might be able to enjoy a glass of wine or beer with their food. However obtaining a license was not an easy exercise, even for respectable businessmen such as James Boot.
^{Source: Star, Issue 1311, 8 May 1872, Page 2.}

Alfred Gee, another confectioner operating in High Street, already had a wine and beer license, so the bench was “shy of multiplying licenses”

Others objected to the petition as they were concerned that might Mr Boot no longer be involved in the business, the license could be transferred, and “the place might become a nuisance.” The shop was next to Spensley’s Hall which was leased by Mr Spensley and used for music rehearsals. There was concern that alcohol could make its way into dance parties at the hall, through a connecting door from the shop to the hall.

The bench was assured that it was not Boot’s intent to open a bar, but to merely supply wine and beer with meals to patrons who did not like going into public-houses. James was also willing to make it a condition of the license that it be surrendered should he leave the business, and the door between his shop and Spensley’s Hall be permanently closed. Never the less the Bench wanted to view the premises, and another adjournment was made in a fortnight. The application was then turned down on the grounds that they had refused similar applications before, and if anyone wanted ‘refreshment of that nature‘ they could send for it.

James tried again for a license in December, 1874 to serve wine and beer to this lunch time customers, including ladies dining in a special private room. His application was supported by a petition signed by a ‘large number of respectable citizens‘. Eventually the license was granted to Boot, afterwhich patrons were able to enjoy a wine or beer with their meals.
^{Source: Star, Issue , 22 May 1872. Press, 29 May, 1872. Press, 2 December 1874.}

The Boot Brothers

In June 1887, sons James Alfred and Frederick, trading as “The Boot Bros. Pastrycooks and Confectioners”, were celebrating their take-over of the business established by their father twenty years earlier at 232 High Street.  Cocoa, soup and hot Scotch Pies were offered on their menu of refreshments while muffins and crumpets, made famous by their father, were still available, along with pastry and confectionery of all kinds. They boasted of their wedding, christening and birthday cakes which could be ordered “on the shortest notice”, and that they were now able to serve wine and beer with their meals as they had obtained a license.
^{Source: Star, Issue 6054, 10 October 1887, Page 4.}

The brothers expanded their business by opening a second shop and refreshment room at 177 Colombo Street, opposite Cab Stand Corner. They  offered light refreshments, luncheons and teas from 9 a.m. until 10 p.m. It was the perfect place to sit and enjoy a quiet cup of tea with a delicious sweet treat, while browsing through the latest copy of the ‘Graphic’.

Theatre Royal Christchurch: London Gaiety Burlesque Company. "Carmen up to date". May 1893. Source: Alexander Turnbull Library ID Eph-B-OPERA-1893-01-cover.

The London Gaiety Burlesque Company, visiting Christchurch as part of their New Zealand tour and performing at the Theatre Royal in May 1893, fortified themselves at the Boot Bros. Refreshment Rooms before going to the theatre according to the brothers’ advertising. Evidently they had a sense of humour, as they also claimed they were “By Special Appointment to the Begum of Beezhgarnooroooopooly”
^{Source: Star, Issue 4649, 20 May 1893, Page 4.}

After renewing their lease on the Colombo Street premises in August 1896, the brothers redecorated and refurnished throughout – painting the exterior an eye-catching white and gold colour scheme so their patrons would have no trouble finding them – they were the only ones with that colour scheme in town at the time. Patrons could enjoy soups and grils (sic) at lunchtime, with beverages and hot pies available all hours.

By mutual consent, the Boot Brothers dissolved their partnership on the 3rd April, 1899. Frederick took over the High Street shop where he manufactured goods on the premises, and James Alfred took over Colombo Street.

Frederick eventually moved the High Street business in April 1908, to the former premises of Roche and Co., Hatters and Mercers at 220 High Street, next to Petersen’s Jewellers – six doors south of his old shop.
^{Source: Star, Issue 9203, 4 April 1908, Page 5.}

James Alfred, continued in business in Colombo Street and by 1922 was listed in Christchurch’s telephone directory as having telephone lines at his shop at 701 Colombo Street and a factory at 57 Hereford Street.

Having left the pastry and confectionery business in the capable hands of their two eldest sons, James and his wife, Jane, retired around the turn of the century to 195 Fitzgerald Street.  James died on Saturday, 17th August, 1912, of a cerebral embolism, at the age of eighty two years – having spent over half his life in New Zealand. Jane passed away in October 1918.

After their arrival in New Zealand, the couple appear to have had three more children: Alice born in 1867, William Arthur in 1869, who also became a pastry cook, and Roland who was born 1873.  Roland was the only one who seems to have worked outside the family pastry or confectionery business. He first worked as a furniture designer, then as a talented musician and singing teacher.

 ^{James Boot’s letter dated Christchurch New Zealand, June 12th, 1864, published in the Nottingham Express. Source: Birmingham Daily Post (Birmingham, England), Monday, August 29, 1864.}

Back of D McTaggart's butcher shop after earthquake, Cheviot. Image: Alexander Turnbull Library ID: 1/2-022298-F

Earthquakes in Christchurch are not unusual events, we’ve been beset with them since European settlement began – and no doubt long before.

What is most disturbing of all is that our European pioneers knew of the danger that stone and brick buildings posed in earthquakes. Charlotte Godley, who preferred the permanency of stone to timber buildings, wrote that in planning the Christ Church Cathedral, “some of the Committee, however, incline to a wooden frame for the Church, filled in with bricks, which would be much safer in case of earthquakes”.

However, as the city grew and buildings were put up in close proximity, fires became more common events. When alight, the old timber buildings could take out whole city blocks, so replacing them with brick became a priority.

The sad sight of the Johnston house, destroyed by the quake which took the life of baby Margaret. Source: Canterbury Times, Nov 20, 1901

Cheviot, 1901 – a Town Devastated

On November 16th, 1901 a large earthquake, centred in the small town of Cheviot, caused widespread alarm and damage throughout Canterbury. The town of Cheviot was in a state of collapse; brick buildings fell, every chimney was said to have collapsed, windows were shattered. So fierce was the shaking that the body of one Doctor Williamson, who had died a few days earlier, was reported to have been thrown out of his coffin! But sadist of all was the death of little Margaret Johnson, a baby of some 2-4 months old who was inside the family’s small sod house, with an iron roof, which collapsed on the first shock.

In Christchurch, the spire of the Christ Church Cathedral was damaged for a second time, having already sustained earthquake damage in 1888. The model  Normal School, built on peaty ground on a corner of Cranmer Square, sustained several cracks on the outside walls. It was reported that if it wasn’t for the buttresses, the whole northern wall would have fallen down.
^{Colonist, Volume XLV, Issue 10260, 18 November 1901, Page 2}

Earthquake Experiences – a Grocer, a Portly Lady and a Couple of Cats

A greengrocer just happened to be calling when the shock occurred at the house of a rather portly lady, who herself answered the vegetableman’s knock. At the first rumble the lady promptly fainted, and the vegetableman, unequal to the task of holding her up, was borne down by her superior weight, and before he knew what had really happened he was sent sprawling with the contents of his basket liberally and dispassionately distributed over the lady and himself.

At Lyttelton, the Post Office clock bell started ringing, and articles hanging in shop windows were set swinging. In brick buildings the shock was most felt, but beyond the shaking down of a little plaster from ceilings, no mischief happened. Vessels in the harbour were, as one mariner expressed it, “bounced up and down like a ball.”

The shock caused a wave of six to nine inches in the Kaiapoi River from the north bank to the south.

The experience of Mr C. H. Smith, a Christchurch storekeeper, was somewhat startling. He was behind the counter working when the shock came. On the top shelf behind him were about ten dozen pint bottles filled with machine oil, and these began to fall around his head in quick succession. All he could do was to  stand with his hands over his head whilst the bottles rattled down, spilling their contents over the goods on the shelves beneath and the goods on the counter. Mr Smith’ luckily escaped any hurt, but the floor was practically flooded with oil, and the same obtrusive liquid made its presence seen everywhere he looked. He estimates the damage done in these few minutes at between  £25 and £30.

A servant girl at one of the boarding-houses in the city would have done better to remain inside than to have rushed outside, because when she got out of the door a shower of bricks from above fell about her head. She had a narrow escape.

^{(Christchurch Press)}

A gentleman who takes a scientific interest in seismology states that the earth tremor in Christchurch lasted for about an hour, commencing at fourteen minutes to eight. The motion commenced with a steady east to west motion, and then after a few seconds’ cessation recommenced from north to south.

The large concrete tank at the Christchurch railway station was violently agitated, and for ten minutes after the main shock the water splashed over the sides in a two-inch stream.

A little child was standing in front of a fireplace on which there was a large pot of hot water, and its father just arrived in time to save the child from being scalded by the hot water which was splashing out of the pot.

A young lady at Linwood had a somewhat singular experience. She went out before breakfast for a bicycle ride, and when the shock came was gathering buttercups on the bank of the river. All at once she felt very giddy, as if the earth was rocking under her feet as indeed it was and came to the conclusion that she must be feeling faint for the want of breakfast. In some alarm she mounted her bicycle and rode home as quickly as possible, and, of course, the alarming symptoms had passed off before she reached home, and there learned the true cause of her discomfort.

A cyclist who was riding to work when the earthquake occurred got off under the impression that something had happened to his machine and was then thrown to the ground,, bicycle and all.

In moving some timber from a stack the earthquake jammed an up-country workman so that he was temporarily disabled.

Under a large bluegum tree near Leithfield a farmer on Saturday morning picked up from sixty to eighty young birds which had been thrown out of the nests by the shaking of the earthquake. A couple of cats which came on the scene were enjoying the windfall.

^{Source: “Damage to Christchurch Cathedral. Incidents in and around the City”. Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXV, Issue 10500, 22 November 1901, Page 2}

Johann Franz Julius von Haast, New Zealand Government Geologist, ca. 1867 / photographer unknown. Call Number P1 / 691. Digital Order No. a4216091. State Library of NSW.

German born colonist, Sir Julius von Haast, was an explorer, specialising in geology. Amongst his many achievements was the founding of the Canterbury Museum.

Born Johann Franz von Haast in 1822, in Bonn, he studied geology and mineralogy before travelling throughout Europe and Russia, studying art and music. Sent out to New Zealand to scope out the colony for settlement by German immigrants, he arrived in Auckland on board the Evening Star in 1858, on the same voyage as Lincolnshire immigrant,  Henry Hawkes Wright, who would also later settle in Christchurch.

It was in his capacity as Surveyor General of Canterbury, that Haast reported on the 1869 earthquake. His one time assistant, Alexander McKay, who became the Government Geologist, later reported on the 1888 earthquake.

The following particulars have been kindly furnished by Dr Haast:

An earthquake, however violent it may be, is of such a transient nature, that it is very important, for the furtherance of physical science, to collect the information of all the phenomena observed before, during, and after its occurrence at the earliest date possible. May I therefore be allowed to send you the following notes, in the hope that other observers will favour us with their experience.

The morning of the 8th of June was remarkably clear and beautiful, with a rising barometer, when, at 8.30 minutes a.m., a considerable earthquake shock, the most severe I ever felt in Canterbury, visited Christchurch and its neighbourhood.

This shock, coming from the south, lasted about 3 to 4 seconds it was succeeded, after a short interval of 2 to 3 seconds’ repose, by a slight tremor of very short duration. Another slight vibration, of a similar nature, was experienced at 7.16 minutes p.m.

I have been told that towards 12.30 p.m., a similar feeble shock was experienced, which, however, I did not observe, although at that time I was sitting in my office and writing.

From the observations I was able to make, the principal and first shock had, as near as possible, a magnetic south and north direction, or from south 15 west to north 15 east.

This first portion of the vibration in question was immediately followed by another, which came from the east, or at right angles to the first. As this second portion of the vibratory jar has also done some harm in a few stone buildings and chimneys, many persons in Christchurch therefore believe that this was the principal direction, but I think I shall be able to shew (sic) that the earthquake came from the south, and that the other direction was a secondary one.

Johann Franz Julius von Haast and Mary von Haast alongside a house, believed to be in Christchurch, circa 1860s. Photographer unidentified. Source: Alexander Turnbull Library. ID: PAColl-5381-02.

I shall confine myself in this communication to my experience in my own house and its neighbourhood only.

As far as I could observe, no hollow subterranean rumbling sound preceded or accompanied the earthquake, although in the latter case it may easily have been drowned by the creaking of the timber, the ringing of the house bells, and the falling and breaking of numerous objects.

Mr George Dunnage told me, however, that he heard distinctly the low subterranean sound in his house at the river Styx, near the Christchurch and Kaiapoi road.

As before observed, the first movement was from the south to the north. The ground seemed to rise obliquely, and then to return immediately with a wave-like motion.

During the first part of the shock, which seemed to me by far the most severe of the whole earthquake vibrations, the greatest damage was done, as most of the objects were then thrown down.

I stated before that the direction of the earthquake had been as near as possible S 15 W. to N. 15 E., and your readers would doubtless like to know how I obtained that result.

As bodies from their inertia fall usually backwards or in the direction from which the shock comes, it is evident that the position of such bodies after their fall will give us that direction. It is on this rule that the seismometer has been constructed, a very useful instrument to measure the direction and intensity of earthquake vibrations. Although I had no such instrument in my house, a milkcan, filled nearly to the brim, acted as such in aa excellent manner. The milk had distinctly run from N. 15 E. to S. 15 W. over the table in an unbroken stream, and only a few scattered drops were found in the opposite direction. Again, on the opposite side of the same wall, and in different rooms, are two mantelpieces on which some vases were standing.

In one room, where the wall in question is to the west, none of the vases were broken, having had some support from that wall when the great shock reached them whilst on the other, or opposite one, having the wall to the east, a vase of nearly the same size, and of the same material, was thrown down, the pieces also lying in the same direction as the milk had flowed.

Behind my house, in a street leading from Stanmore road to Armagh street, three brick chimneys were thrown down, the principal portion of which I found also on the same line, a few bricks only having fallen on a line opposite to it.

Several objects which, during the first shock, had remained standing, fell afterwards, when the vibration from the east took place. As before observed, it is this last shock which must have caused the principal damage to the stone buildings. Those component parts of stone buildings most liable to be displaced, not having settled down from the first movement, were now thrown in a different direction, from which they were sometimes unable to regain their former position. It is also this vibration which turned many objects partially round on our tables and shelves, and gave a twist to stones in buildings and chimneys, so that, at first sight, it might suggest a rotatory vibration.

Mr Richard Fereday, who was, during the earthquake, in his garden, and who saw and heard distinctly its effects before it reached him, will, I hope, publish his experience, as confirmatory of my own observations. (Richard Fereday lived opposite St. Barnabas Church, in Fendalton. He emigrated to Canterbury in 1862, became a barrister and solicitor, and noted amateur entomologist.)

It is almost needless for me to observe that, according to the nature of the ground, great changes in the duration and intensity of an earthquake usually take place, and that, in this instance, amongst other secondary causes, the direction of the bed of or vicinity to the river Avon may have had a material influence in different parts in Christchurch.

It was with considerable anxiety that I started this morning to town, fearing that considerable damage might have been done to property in Christchurch, and also that the telegraph might bring us accounts of far greater destruction done in other parts of New Zealand.

It was with a feeling of great satisfaction that I observed how comparatively little damage had been occasioned in Christchurch, and that, with the exception of Lyttelton, this shock had not been felt anywhere else in New Zealand.

That the earthquake was not felt so severely in Lyttelton as on the Plains may be accounted for by the fact that the former is built upon volcanic rocks, which have a far greater elasticity than sand and gravel, on which Christchurch stands.

It thus appears that this earthquake is simply the dynamic effect of some local abyssological disturbance in or near our neighbourhood, such as happens all over the globe by changes in the crust of the earth, and generally at a very great depth below us.

I think there is, therefore, no cause for the anxiety expressed to me by several of my fellow-citizens, that this earthquake might be the beginning of a series of still more vehement disturbances by which we are to be visited, although it is possible that a few minor ones may still follow in the course of the next few days.

Others believe that the origin of this earthquake is connected in some way with Banks Peninsula, an extinct volcanic system of considerable extent, which opinion in this instance I consider equally erroneous. I may, however, state that the primary direction of that disturbance closely corresponds to that longitudinal volcanic region which from the antarctic volcanoes Erebus and Terror stretches across the intermediate islands, also of volcanic origin.to New Zealand, and on which line Banks Peninsula is situated.

These notes are necessarily imperfect, but I trust that the inhabitants of the province who take an interest in physical science will favour us with their own observations. And I should consider it a great favour if gentlemen living in the country would send you or me an account of what they experienced, so as to be able to prepare a connected report of the whole phenomenon, comprising its extent, direction, and intensity.

Your obedient servant,

JULIUS HAAST.

^{Source: THE EARTHQUAKES. Star , Issue 332, 7 June 1869, Page 2}