Family History 4.09

Robinson Story

Extract from "Robinsons of Rotherhithe" by Joanne Robinson

The Cornwallis Timber Company

Symonds

In 1839 Theophilus Hele, a Captain, and part owner of the East India ship Aurora, landed passengers at Port Nicholson, Wellington. He then proceeded to the Hokianga to load spars for the British Navy.

In sailing out of this harbour he lost his ship and subsequently travelled overland to the Bay of Islands.

Here he met four gentlemen: Dudley Sinclair, Larner, Captain William Cornwallis Symonds and a Mr McLaughlin.

These five men formed a company along the lines of the Port Nicholson Company (later the New Zealand Company) with the chief objective being to buy land from the natives to cut up and sell to intending emigrants.

Their objective was to establish a large firm including a mercantile house, a steam saw mill, and to run a vessel to the Australian southern ports.

Aurora
Ship: 550 tons
Captain: Theophilus Heale
Surgeon Superintendent: J. M. Stokes M. D.
Sailed London, Gravesend 22nd September 1839 - arrived Port Hardy, 8th January 1840                                                             

Port Nicholson 22nd January 1840

The  Aurora was wrecked in April 1840 on the northern head of the Kaipara Harbour.

The company was named The Manukau Land Company and the mill, The Cornwallis Timber Company.

The men crossed the isthmus into the Manukau Harbour and Captain Hele, being a good marine surveyor, selected Karangahape Bay lying inside Puponga Point about five miles inside the Manukau Heads on the north side.

Captain Hele, the leading spirit of the enterprise, proceeded to north America to obtain the latest idea of a steam sawing establishment. He then proceeded to England and on arriving in London appointed Captain Everside, a shipbroker, his agent.

He then had a steam saw mill constructed with frame and circular saws, shingle cutters, turning lathe, and a Cornish beam engine and boiler. A two story house was also made ready for shipment. The schooner Osprey was purchased to freight everything , with the remaining space to be used for merchandise for native trading. She was placed under the command of Captain Sedgwick and fourteen crew, the complement numbering thirty made up by paying passengers.

Captain Hele next chartered the barque Louisa Campbell, a 287-ton vessel built in Yarmouth. This ship that Joshua, Caleb and their families came to new Zealand on was commanded by Captain Darby and eighteen hands with Dr Morrison the ship's doctor.

The passenger list records two ministers, a Rev Kissling and a Rev Spenscer and their families. Other passengers of note were Mr Berry - the first sherriff of Auckland - and Mrs Berry, Mr Appelmard - the donor of the corner of Shortland Street and Queen Street to St Johns College - and Mr George who had charge of the first bond store in Auckland.

There was one wedding, two births and two baptisms during the journey, one of the baptisms being Caleb Joshua's, Caleb's third child. The Osprey is recorded as leaving London in November 1841 and the Louisa Campbell leaving Plymouth on the 6th of January 1842.