Feilding’s royal story
In 1871 Colonel William Feilding rode through Manchester Block – and what was to become Feilding. Sam Kilmister takes a look at the Manawatu¯ town’s settlers and what they did.
Few know the story behind the Manawatu¯ town of Feilding, or that it was named after a prestigious British family, considered part of the aristocracy.
Residents celebrated the town’s 144th birthday during Settler’s Day on January 20, not knowing how similar it was to the day of its inception.
Colonel William Henry Feilding, born in 1836 to the seventh Earl of Denbigh, came from a long line of British leaders dating back to 1622.
He spearheaded one of few successful private immigration schemes in New Zealand when in 1871 he rode through what was to become Manchester Block – and ultimately the town of Feilding. He purchased 43,000 hectares of land for £75,000.
But how did the British soldier leave such a legacy?
In 1871, Colonel Feilding was tasked with leaving England to find a block of land for the Emigrants and Colonists Aid Corporation to proceed with their proposed emigration scheme for the labouring class.
His social standing gave him an entree to the people who mattered in Government circles. Feilding was a soldier of the Coldstream Guards, the oldest regiment in the British army, where he served in the Crimean War and Francoprussian War.
He was decorated with the Legion d’honneur, the highest honour in France, for saving wounded patients in a burning hospital after it was attacked.
Feilding arrived in Wellington on December 12, 1871, where he stayed at Government House and met with ministers about possible blocks of land that might suit the corporation.
He was sent north where he journeyed up the coast to Foxton and met by Arthur Halcombe, who escorted him to an area of inland Manawatu¯ that the Government had for sale.
A couple of days later he bought Manchester Block, the thin strip of real estate running between the Rangitıkei River and the ranges, and covered in bush.
Recruiting of emigrants from South England could now begin.
Feilding’s job was complete. He left New Zealand less than two weeks after arriving.
The first shipment of immigrants arrived on January 22, 1874, on a boat named the Duke of Edinburgh. Within five weeks, ships named Salisbury and Ocean Mail followed.
It was in 1874 that Hector Booth took the first families of settlers by jolting and lurching a bullock wagon through the mud between Palmerston North and Feilding.
They were taking up land on Manchester Block.
Settlers had to be aged 45 or younger, since the task of breaking in the block was strenuous.
They were paid no money, but provided labour. In return, each received an acre of land. They lived in a town of tents, fending off mosquitoes, before cottages were built.
It was not at all the picture painted for them before they left.
Five years later, the whole 43,000-hectare block was settled, and farms established.
Some of the settlers were leasing land from Ma¯ ori groups, but they were mainly workingclass immigrants from England looking for a better life.
By 1879 there were 1800 people. They cleared dense bush and built roads and railways. Totara was used for railway sleepers.
The first immigrants’ barracks was built on the corner of Beattie St and Kimbolton Rd, also where the first Presbyterian church services were held in 1874.
The first immigrants to Manchester Block contained fewer skilled men than anticipated, with some calling themselves a carpenter, sawyer or blacksmith when, on arrival, they proved not to be.
Colonel Feilding returned to visit his new settlement in 1875. He learned life had been hard for immigrants – a wet winter meant miserable conditions for those who had been expecting green fields and landscapes similar to what they left behind in England.
Feilding spoke to a group of settlers, giving practical advice and sympathy for those who had found the going tough.
Among them were Frederick and Maria Towler, who were given false information before leaving England. The family believed they could lease 100 acres at £3 an acre, with five years to pay.
However, Manchester Block agent Follet Halcombe told the family on their arrival that land was £10 an acre, to be paid within three years.
This placed considerable stress on Maria Towler, who was pregnant. Her son Walter would become the first European child born in Feilding.
He was christened by the first preaching Anglican minister and given a quarter acre of land by the town’s founder. Walter Towler died in 1949, aged 75, but is still remembered by some Feilding residents today.
As other immigrants flooded in by the shipload, in the 1880s, businesses were established. While some thrived, others were not so lucky – going bankrupt in less than a couple of years.
Among them was William Westcombe Corpe, the town’s first international exporter. It was big news for a community that
considered trading across international borders before the 1900s a pipe dream.
Corpe, a dairy farmer, established the Makino Butter Factory in 1883. The factory was the first in the lower North Island and was supplied with milk by settlers from around the region.
After taking samples of his butter to England in 1887, he began exports to England and Sydney. Its success was an immense relief for small farmers in Manawatu¯ , according to the Feilding Star.
Trade wasn’t so favourable for Charles Dahl, who came to Feilding from Denmark in 1878. His general store – The Campbelltown Store – opened in 1881, but he declared bankruptcy, closing in 1884.
Records show an unnamed Irish shoemaker was also given a wake-up call after falling in love with a Ma¯ ori woman. The shoemaker mended boots for farmers and tradesmen clearing bush.
He described the Ma¯ ori woman as a ‘‘swate craythur’’, Irish for ‘‘pretty creature’’. He vowed to marry her and ‘‘go live with the savages’’.
The intention changed when his fellows questioned him. Since ‘‘the natives’’ didn’t wear boots, he came to realise this wouldn’t benefit his trade.
With the extensive clearing of trees to create Feilding, it is perhaps no surprise the town’s first industry was sawmilling.
Settlers felled totara, used as sleepers for railway and timber for building. The first mill was in O¯ roua, built in 1873, just across the O¯ roua River from the Manchester Block boundary. It employed 21 men.
At its peak there where 28 sawmills operating in the district.
Soon after, the first rail link from Feilding to Bunnythorpe opened and provided transport between sawmills.
And so the town began to grow. Great progress had been made by the time Colonel Feilding returned for his third and final visit in 1895.
As he looked out from the second storey of Martha Hastie’s Feilding Hotel he observed a thriving settlement.
The substantial two-storey wooden building with 50 rooms still stands in Manchester Square today.
It must have been satisfying for Feilding to see the swampy clearing he rode though 24 years before becoming an established little town.