Newspaper Article 2006 – Pioneer Days: One woman’s story

Pioneer days: One woman’s story

A book which traverses three continents and almost 100 years of history offers some interesting stories – with Hawke’s Bay connections – on the life of an English family, which over two generations was involved in events that changed the British Empire.

LAWRENCE GULLERY
[email protected]

She gave birth nine times, totalling six years and 48 weeks of pregnancy, endured foreign countries, civil war, travelled across mountains, deserts and oceans and was exiled from her own family.

Isabella Gascoyne (nee Campbell) had lived through a life-time of events all before she was 43 but nothing had prepared her for life as a colonial settler in New Zealand’s pioneering days.

Born in India in 1810, Isabella was raised in England. Her journey as the wife of British military officer, mother of nine children and Kiwi pioneer was documented in the book, Strangerland, A Family At War released earlier this year.

Her story has Hawke’s Bay connections: Two of her children settled in the region and relatives still live in the Bay.

Her great-grand children, Gascoyne and Constance Miller, 89 and 99 years old respectively, live in Meeanee and Havelock North.

Isabella’s other connection with Hawke’s Bay was through her cousin Donald McLean, who was appointed master-buyer of Maori land in 1853 and purchased Maraekakaho Station, west of Hastings.

McLean was a mediator between Maori and settler and figured prominently in New Zealand’s colonisation by the time Isabella arrived in the country.

Isabella’s journey from England, army life in India and then to New Zealand was discovered by English author Helena Drysdale when she was sifting through records of her great-great grand father, Sir George Bowen, a governor of various British colonies for 28 years, including New Zealand.

News clippings she found described the murder of Bamber Gascoyne, his wife and their three children near New Plymouth in 1869. They were beaten, tomahawked and clubbed to death by Hone Wetere, a minor chief from the King Country, and his men.

Drysdale recognised Bamber’s surname as possibly a relative and later discovered three family members had written memoirs of the murder, including Isabella in 1888.

Bamber was Isabella’s nephew. Her memoirs went on to describe her own life and Drysdale decided to abandon the idea of a book on Bowen in favour of researching Isabella’s story.

She found details of the Gascoynes’ incredible journey from India to New Zealand and of Isabella’s infant life as an orphan, but little was known about the 10 years she had spent in this country.

Her memoirs abruptly ended when she reached New Zealand, only to describe her new found home as a new world in a very painful sense and they were buried for 20 years.

Drysdale, while in New Zealand, found letters written by Isabella to her cousin, Donald McLean, at Wellington’s Turnbull Library, giving her clues to the missing pieces of the puzzle.

Isabella’s husband, Charles, a military officer in the Bengal Cavalry, decided to move the family to New Zealand to begin a new life as a farmer.

At the same time Isabella was forced to travel to England where she stayed until her health improved. A year and a half later she rejoined her husband and children only to find her standing in the family had been taken over by the governess, Amelia Sutherland.

She became isolated from her family and a series of letters ensued to her cousin, Donald McLean, asking for his intervention in the matter.

The author uses Isabella’s letters to McLean to track her exile from the family and then later, her possible reconciliation as the head of her family.

Closer to Hawkes Bay, Isabella’s son Fred followed in his father’s footsteps becoming a prominent military man, featuring in some of the first militia and colonial ranks formed in New Zealand.

Drysdale tracks Fred’s quest to hunt Maori leader, Te Kooti, a master of guerrilla warfare, through northern Hawke’s Bay and into the Ureweras.

His military career also brought him into contact with other significant Maori leaders, such as Kingi Tawhiao, the first Maori King.

Ironically, as war eased, Fred was sent to take charge of the outpost at Chatham Islands, the very place to which Te Kooti had been banished years before, but had later managed to escape to the mainland.

During the book, Drysdale also offers some interesting comments on army life in India, the Gascoyne’s tribulations as Kiwi pioneers and relationships between Maori and European settlers.

She also tells of the gold rush years and the influence religion had on settlers and Maori.

The author’s postscript summaries the family’s extraordinary tale well.

“So here were two generations of one family who traversed oceans and continents to reach three corners of the empire at a time when that empire was taking shape,” Drysdale wrote.

The Gascoynes were involved in the First Afghan War, the First Sikh War, the Indian Mutiny and the Maori Wars, all great events which transformed the way the empire developed, she said.

Drysdale concluded the family’s stories raised intriguing questions of race, Britishness, empire, religion and politics.

Readers could consider the book’s title, Strangerland, was simply a name given by settlers to describe their new home.

Welcoming notes between Isabella and McLean upon her arrival in the country give readers other clues.

She wrote to her cousin, stating how glad she was to have a relative and friend in New Zealand: “I shall indeed be glad to be as relations in this far off and strange land.”

Proud family heritage revealed

Gascoyne Miller’s mind is sharp: He can recall stories his parents told him about his family’s early pioneering days and those tales are likely to be retold when he celebrates his 90th birthday later this year.

Gascoyne, who lives in Meeanee and his sister Constance, aged 99, who lives in Havelock North, are both great-grand children of Charles and Isabella Gascoyne, the couple who were the subject of the book, Strangerland, A Family At War.

Their story has been published by English author, Helena Drysdale, also a relative, who visited the Millers about six years ago while researching her book.

“We are very privileged to have our family history printed. We knew of Isabella’s time in India but it was only through Helena’s investigations and research that we find out more, especially about her life in New Zealand,” Gascoyne said.

He was only young when he listened to his mother’s stories about her time in the Chatham Islands, where Gascoyne’s grand father, Major Fred Gascoyne, was stationed during his military service.

“There were many stories (about the Chathams). He (Fred) built the main wharf there and I believe it is still standing there today,” he said.

Portraits of his great-grandparents were handed down through the generations and now hang proudly on Gascoyne’s wall at home.

“It is incredible that these portraits have survived, as they were carried in the children’s knapsacks on elephant and palanquin (in India) and escaped the floods of Motueka,” he said.

Fred’s name is indelibly etched on Hastings and Taupo, where streets bear the Gascoyne name.

Photo captions –

RELATIVE:   Constance Miller, 99, the great-grand daughter of Charles and Isabella Gascoyne, now lives in Havelock North.

FAMILY HISTORY: Gascoyne Miller, 89, Meeanee, holds portraits of his great-grand parents, Charles and Isabella Gascoyne. The portraits survived war in India and travelled with the family to New Zealand where the images have been handed down through family generations.