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Newsletter

of the

LOWER HUTT

HISTORICAL SOCIETY INC. Preserve the past, Challenge the future

March 2019.

St Mark’s Church, Woburn

Road.

At the meeting committee member and

former librarian Hilda McDonnell will

speak about 'The Mediterranean shore'.

In the course of her overseas travels she

spent some months on the island of

Sicily.

All welcome.

Contents:

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Our thanks to last month's Guest Speaker, Bill Sheat, for his very

interesting presentation about New Zealand's first Theatre.

Next month, our meeting venue is required for another

activity. Therefore, we won't be having a meeting in April.

There will be an April newsletter in which there will be

information about future speakers and topics.

Hope YOU can come along on Friday evening to hear Hilda's

presentation.

Graeme Ross

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Round the rocks, Clyde Quay:

Timothy & Mary O’Loughlin.

By Hilda McDonnell

Long a resident in the Oriental Bay area

Mary O'Loughlin, the widow of Timothy,

died in Wellington at the end of 1897. An

obituary appeared in the NZ Times (reprinted

NZ Herald 15 December 1897):

‘This couple came from Sydney in 1840 and

entered the service of Lord Peters [Henry

William, son of Lord Petre], but after a short

while entered into dairying business at Depis

[Duppa's], Oriental Bay, and finding this

place too small they afterwards went to

Okiwi Bay [Brown's Bay, Eastbourne]. Mr

O'Loughlin was drowned while crossing the

harbour shortly afterwards. Mrs O'Loughlin

reared a family of five. One son went to

Australia. One daughter Mrs John Smith

was the wife of one of the City Councillors.

Another daughter was Mrs Cook of

Wanganui. Mrs O'Loughlin passed away on

Saturday and was buried at the Roman

Catholic Cemetery’.

Timothy and Mary had five children. All

were born in Wellington. Daughter

Elizabeth married David Bell and had eight

children; son Richard died in America;

daughter Mary, born in 1843, married John

Smith; daughter Ellen married George Cook

of Wanganui; son Timothy was born in

1848; a builder, he merited an entry in the

Cyclopedia of New Zealand, written in

March 1897, by which time he was living in

Boulcott Street.

A Jury List for February 1846 listed

‘Timothy O'Loughlin, Te Aro, dairyman’.

By mid-1846 he was listed as ‘Timothy

O'Loughlin, Oriental Bay, dairyman’.

Timothy O'Loughlin drowned in Wellington

harbour at the end of July 1848 while taking

his schooner to the eastern side of the

harbour. The NZ Spectator & Cook's Strait

Guardian (2 Aug 1848) reported that a

coroner's inquest had been held 'yesterday' at

the Cottage of Content [near Munn's Wharf

at Pipitea, south of the present Moore Street

steps] before Dr Fitzgerald, coroner. He

reported: ‘It appeared that the deceased left

Mr Rhodes's wharf for Okiwi, to which

place he had recently removed, in a

whaleboat in company with another man on

Sunday afternoon; he appeared sober at the

time. His body was found next day by a

policeman, about two miles beyond

Ngahuranga [Ngauranga] the boat was

turned bottom upwards, and the rope of one

of the sheets was found around his

neck...The body of the other man has not

been found. Verdict: Found drowned. The

deceased left a wife and four children’.

Mary gave birth on 6 August, a month after

her husband's death. Her youngest child was

named after his father. ‘Wm Mills Sergt of

Police’, the informant at the birth

registration, recorded that ‘he was the son of

'Timothy O'Loughlin, dairyman, and Mary

O'Loughlin, formerly Day'.

Timothy and Mary had come to Port

Nicholson from Sydney, according to the

Scholefield Papers at Wellington Public

Library. Their first child, Elizabeth, was

born in Wellington on 17 March 1840.

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Descendant H. C. O'Loughlin of the

National Broadcasting Service, Dunedin

wrote to Dr Scholefield about 1940: ‘On a

Sunday in 1848 Timothy (1) and several

members of his crew were crossing from

Brown's Bay [Eastbourne] on the other side

of the harbour, where the schooner was

apparently anchored, to Wellington in an

open boat – it is understood for provisions –

when a southerly gale swept over the

harbour, swamping the boat. All occupants

were drowned’. Again: ‘Elizabeth, child of

Timothy and Mary, married David Bell who

conducted the first Military Band in

Wellington...Timothy (2) was the first

drummer boy in Wellington. He married

Sophia Margaret Jackson, eldest daughter of

Thomas Jackson who came to New Zealand

with the 65th Regiment. Timothy died in

Auckland on 6 October 1925 aged 77 years’.

The O’Loughlins’ eldest daughter Elizabeth

married David Bell, a veteran of the New

Zealand wars (see Cyclopedia of New

Zealand, 1897) and later band-sergeant. We

find from Hugh Hughes that ‘3182 Corporal

David Bell’, born in Tralee, County Kerry,

labourer, enlisted on 16 May 1853; he was

discharged at Otahuhu on 09 Sept 1865.

Like his father, David was in the 65th

Regiment. His wife Elizabeth Bell died on

24 April 1888 and was buried at Mount

Street cemetery, aged 48 years.

The O’Loughlins remained in the area. The

Wellington Almanack 1874 listed ‘Mrs

O'Loughlin, Clyde Quay, laundress’, and ‘T.

O'Loughlin, Clyde Quay, carpenter’. In

1879 her son Timothy was running a bakery

on land he owned fronting Clyde Quay, part

of Town Acre 366 (the Town Acre on the

northern corner of Clyde Quay and

Majoribanks Street). The property consisted

of a shop and dwelling of four rooms. The

shop was used for a bakery and grocery

business, was fitted with a counter and

shelving; there was a bakehouse, oven,

store, and stable. By now Timothy was in

financial difficulties. He was declared

bankrupt and the land and business were

sold (EP 8 April 1879). A support at this

time was John Henry Smith, who had

married into the family.

The Cyclopedia of New Zealand (1897) showed that

John Smith, who married the O'Loughlins' second

girl Mary, was born in Newcastle-on-Tyne. He

arrived with his parents in Nelson per Phoebe in 1843

and came to Wellington in 1847 via Wanganui on

HMS Calliope. He lived the rest of his life in

Wellington and had the Vulcan Foundry in Manners

Street. John Smith was a City Councillor for many

years, having been first elected in 1885. John and

Mary Smith had nine children.

On Thomas Ward's Survey of 1891, a police station

is shown on Town Acre 366. This was on the south

side of Clyde Quay School. According to Stone's

Directory 1895-6 Mary O'Loughlin lived just south

of the police station. Further north was the Clyde

Quay Hotel. In June 1889 Timothy had been granted the license for the ‘Clyde-quay Hotel containing 15

rooms, exclusive of those required for the use of the

family, owned by Martin Kennedy’. By the early

1890s Timothy had moved to the Manawatu; he kept

the Wellington & Manawatu Club at Shannon.

Among its notable acquisitions the Turnbull Library

Record 2018 listed a painting by C.D. Barraud

entitled ‘Round the Rocks, Clyde Quay.

McLaughlin’s Farm, 1858’. [B-168-022][Copied

below]. In the foreground are people digging for pipi. The watercolour was purchased at Dunbar Sloane’s

auction on 10 August 2016. The Turnbull Library

noted on the title record: ‘McLoughlin (name from

auction catalogue) might refer to a relative of Tim

O’Loughlin, who lived at Clyde Quay in about

1883’. The Jury List for February 1848 listed

Timothy O’Loughlan, Oriental Bay, dairyman and

Dugald McLaclan, Thorndon quay, labourer. In

February 1853 Dugald was still at the same Thorndon

address.

Footnote: This article was first published in Heritage Link December 2018 and is reprinted here with permission of the author.

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A scene showing Clyde Quay with Mount Victoria in the background. In the left foreground is

a group of Maori, two of whom are sitting, three who are digging for pipis on the beach, with

large kete for gathering them.

Other Maori are visible in the scene.

On the right is a kainga with palisades, with several European buildings beyond that.

Original caption. [Round the Rocks, Clyde Quay, McLoughlin's Farm (sic)]. Water colour by

Charles Decimus Barraud, 1822-1897. Ref: B-168-022, Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington.

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An excerpt from Thomas Ward’s Survey (1891) of Wellington, overlaid on a recent aerial map of the City, showing Town Acre 366 as mentioned in the text.

Town Acre 367 is the original site of the Clyde Quay School and now the Wellington Fire Station. The Clyde Quay Hotel was located on Town Acre 369. Clyde Quay, itself, is now

incorporated into Oriental Parade. City Council records show the address of the Hotel as 58-60 Oriental Parade, where the GSL Promotus building is today.

Overlay and map credit: Wellington City Council.

Prepared by G.D., 5.3.19.