The Streets of My City - Wellington, New Zealand By F. L. Irvine-Smith.

The Streets of My City - Wellington, New Zealand By F. L. Irvine-Smith.

Publisher: A. H. & A. W. Reed 1949. Good hardback with no jacket. Boards are bumped at edges with some marks. Inscription to ffep. Some tanning/foxing to pages. 325 pages, illustrated.

CHAPTER ONE IF IT WERE possible to condense all New Zealand's early history into one word, it would certainly be the word "SHIPS," for there is assuredly no country whose beginnings have been so closely associated with ships as our own. Each province of New Zealand has, so to speak, its "Mayflowers," and in respect of numbers, Wellington easily takes the lead. As everyone knows, or ought to know, the great Ship Date of Wellington - the annus mirabilis of its colonisation - is 1840, though long before this year, systematic attempts had been made to colonise New Zealand. De Thierry had tried; Captain William Stewart, whose name is given to Stewart Island, had tried; as early as 1825, in order to alleviate the distress following upon the Napoleonic Wars by founding for the purpose a New Zealand Colonising Company, a group of Englishmen had tried. This Company had sent two vessels, the "Rosanna" and the "Lambton," under Captain Herd and Captain Barnett, to establish workmen in New Zealand in order to prepare flax and spars for export to England. Reaching the south coast of New Zealand early in 1826, the vessels coasted north, looking for a likely spot to commence operations, followed up the east coast of the South Island, and entered Wellington Harbour, at no time visited by Cook. To this inlet Captain Herd, in honour of his friend, the Harbour Master of Port Jackson, gave the name of Port Nicholson, henceforth to be known to the early sailor man as "Port Nick" and to the Maori as "Poneke."