MCHARDIE | Jewelian Family

MCHARDIE FAMILY

Elizabeth Cunningham, later to marry David McHardie, was born in Ruthven, and baptised on 15 January 1800. She is the only known child of David Cunningham and Jean Crabb, who were married in Ruthven on 16 July 1799.

The McHardie family was the earliest of my pioneering families to arrive in New Zealand. The family embarked at Blackwall on 16 October 1840 and left Gravesend, London on the “Lady Nugent” on 17 October, arriving in Wellington on 17 March, 1841. Mr George Hilliard, Surgeon- Superintendent on the ship, wrote a diary of the voyage, which is held by the Turnbull Library, and which I have transcribed. It is a fascinating account of life at sea, and obviously Mr Hilliard and David McHardie did not see eye-to-eye. Reading between the lines, there was a three way pull among Captain Santry, representing the ship’s owners, Mr Hilliard, representing the New Zealand Company, and the steerage passengers, of whom David McHardie appeared to have been the spokesman. This came to a head when provisions were running short when the ship was not far out from Capetown, partly as a result of adverse weather in the Bay of Biscay. The passengers demanded that the ship pull in to Capetown to buy extra provisions, but Captain Santry would agree to that only if Mr Hilliard signed the order, so that the New Zealand Company would be liable for any costs. Before the dispute could be resolved, the ship was well past the port, and there was no question of Captain Santry sailing back against the prevailing winds to Capetown. The McHardie family lost a child later in the voyage, as did the Alexander McHardie family in a later date on a different ship, so David McHardies’s attitude is understandable.

The family consisted of David, aged 39, his wife Elizabeth, aged 40, sons David jnr and Alexander, and daughter Janet (Jessie) aged 3. In Mr Hilliard’s diary the death of McHardie’s son is recorded on 1st February 1841, but no name is given. In the diary kept by Mr Joseph Greenwood, an Intermediate passenger, the death of James McCarthy is recorded on the same date. As there was no family of this name on the ship, this has to be David McHardie’s son. Greenwood gives his age at about 4 years. However, in the website record of passengers of the Lady Nugent, there is a reference to a daughter aged 18 months who died of marasmus at sea on 2/2/1841.

David McHardie

Aleaxander McHardie arrived on the “Lord William Bentinck” in May 1841. He is listed as an agricultural labourer.

On 16 October, 1841 the ship “Arab” arrived in Wellington, and among the passengers were David’s sister Isabel (married to David Smith) and their family from Zoar by Forfar, and David’s youngest brother John (who spelled his name McHardy) aged 18. John later became to the first licensee of the “Highland Home” Hotel in Upper Hutt, which was later to be named the “Quinn’s Post.”

In 1841 David wrote a letter (dated 16 October, 1841) to his former employer in Kirriemuir, Mr Angus, giving his impressions of life in the River Hutt district, and this letter was published in “The New Zealand Journal” in 1842. It gives a rosy picture of life in the colony, and no doubt the New Zealand Company was keen to publish the letter. Whether or not there is an element of propaganda in the letter, it is an interesting report of conditions at the time.

David was allocated 13 acres (approximately 1/7 of a hundred acre block), partly on the flat and partly on the hill, approximately where Wairere Road on the western hills of the Hutt Valley now is. David jnr. had 13 acres alongside. The Hutt River now flows through the properties, but at that time it flowed in a loop further east - it has since been straightened out to lessen the danger of flooding.

Things did not stay as idyllic as they were at first, and in 1846 fighting with the local Maoris broke out over land ownership. My great-grandmother Jessie McHardie was a girl of 9 at the time, and as an old woman told her grand-children of the events. One of them, Gordon Saunders, recorded some of these stories. Apparently her mother once refused to move from her house when there was threat of fighting, and the Maoris, apart from roughing her up a bit, merely stole a pig, and left her alone.

Alexander McHardie arrived in New Zealand on the Lord William Bentinck in 1841. He is recorded as being 33 and single.

The following is an extract from the “Australian and New Zealand Gazette” for 1853.

Page 13. Fatal Accident - As Mr Alexander M’Hardie, an industrious and worthy settler of the Hutt, was felling a white-pine tree for the purpose of cutting into timber, the tree in falling struck the top of another, and bouncing off the stump crushed him to death against the one which stood behind him. The deceased has left a wife and four small children to mourn his untimely end - Wellington Independent.

The death certificate reads as follows.

McHardie, Alexander -52/28 Date 17/7/1852

Occupation - sawyer

Age - 46

Cause - killed by the falling of a tree.

Family tradition has it that his widow and family eventually returned to Scotland. This is borne out by the following items in the Lower Hutt Methodist Church Admission Register.

Nov. 9 1851 Alex. McHardie, 10 son Alex. McHardie, Tatia (sic) Road. Class 5 Left the school. Gone to Scotland.

Oct. 1852 Anne McHardie, 8 daughter Mary McHardie, Bridge St, Class 3. Left the country.

Oct. 1852 Mary McHardie, 6 daughter Mary McHardie, Bridge St. Class 5. Left the country.

Alexander McHardie, son of David and Elizabeth, married Celia Cazley in January 1852. There appears to be one son of the of the marriage, Thomas, born March 1854. On a website on “Ancestry” there is a reference to Alexander McHardie arriving in Melbourne on 25 August 1854, and that he died in Victoria in 1854.

There is no reference to the death of Alexander in local newspapers or in the Births, Deaths and Marriages records, so the above is a most likely explanation.

In the Archives New Zealand Reference BDM 20/1/1 Microfilm R6906 there is the following Intention to Marry Notice

No 44 Married 23 May 1856 at the private residence of Joseph Cayley Waiwetu Road by Rev. James Buller and others John Lewis, bachelor, farmer , aged 28 years, resident at Waiwetu about 6 months.

Celia McHardie, widow, 24 years, resident Waiwetu Road for about thirteen months

In the 1858 list of communicants of the Hutt Presbyterian Chapel a Mrs McHardie is listed, whom I think to be David’s wife Elizabeth. Possibly she remained with the Presbyterians, while the rest of the family attended the Methodist church. I have also been told that the family attended the Methodist service in the morning and the Presbyterian service in the evening. There is also the grave of Isabella Smith in the Knox Church cemetery (the name is engraved on the memorial stone), who was David’s sister.

Eventually David, together with other former Kirriemuir families, took advantage of the “Manchester Settlement”, and took up land just north of Bulls in 1865. McHardies Road is still there, and street-names in Sanson record the names of other families who moved there - Farmer, Milne and Speedy.

McHardie's at Bulls

In 1996 a relative visited McHardies Road, and spoke to some of the local people. An elderly man who turned out to her relative told a story about his father having helped David McHardie snr with some fencing when he was a boy. David had made him turn out his pockets at the end of the day to check that he wasn’t ferreting away any staples.

It appears that the folk who came to New Zealand on the “Lady Nugent” stayed together pretty closely, and when land was purchased for the sum of L18 15S for the erection of a “Presbyterian Chapel” (now Knox Church) in 1851, four of the seven trustees were from the area, David McHardie, William and James Milne, and Peter Bruce.

David McHardie died at Moutoa, where he was living with his daughter Janet, on 25 July 1886, aged 85. His wife Elizabeth had predeceased him, having died at Bulls on 7 January 1876. Both were buried at Bulls below) along with their son David.

About the time that the family moved to Bulls, Janet received an offer of marriage from James Saunders of Featherston, who was eleven years her senior. She turned him down, also by letter, but must have reflected on her decision, and changed her mind. Apparently her re-action was “I’m 28 and not very pretty, and I mightn’t get another offer.” In order to get to Featherston before the letter, she walked over the Rimutaka Ranges, at a time when there was no proper road, to accept the proposal in person. They were married in Wellington on 4 January 1866 at the home of the Rev. Isaac Harding. Janet’s ability to walk long distances was legendary, and when she was in her seventies she walked from Collingwood to the flax mill at Patarau on West Whanganui Inlet to “see how her boys were getting on.”

NZ Free Lance 27/1/1912 Janet McHardie

“We have not many old colonists in this district whose memories carry back as far as did that of the late Mrs James Saunders of Moutoa, up in the Mana-watu. She could recollect things that happened in the very early forties in Wellington, and she had had her share of peril and alarms in the Rauparaha troubles - an epoch whose story seems very ancient now to the young colonial. The other day a candidate for parliament described himself as an “old hand” when he was asked how far back his colonial memories went, he said with pride that he arrived in N.Z. in 1878. How Mrs Saunders would have laughed at that! It was in 1841 that she arrived here, a tiny girl, with her parents. The ship that brought her out from England was the Lady Nugent. In those days, as she remembers, the shores of Wellington Harbour were bush clad and the Maori was the King of the land. The white settler of 1841 was “small potatoes, and few in the hill.”

In the forties of the last century, Mrs Saunders’ family lived in the Hutt district, and many an alarm there was in the Rangihaeta War of 1846 and there abouts. On one occasion, when a Maori war party had passed on, the family, who had been taking refuge in one of the military stockades, returned to find the house and garden ransacked, the wheat stack burned, and the pig killed. On another occasion, her mother, Mrs McHardie, could not be persuaded to leave the dwelling, preferring to remain and trust to Providence. The wild Maoris shook the old lady by the shoulders and again ransacked the house, and passed on. Yet another occasion of peril was when 200 soldiers, to whom the women and children looked for protection, were all more or less intoxicated. Why they were not all massacred on that occasion by the Maoris was a wonder. John Maori lost a good chance of using his tomahawk.

In those days, McHardie’s farm at the Hutt adjoined Boulcott farm which has been made memorable by the death of the heroic young bugler, Allan, who took his bugle in his left hand when the Maoris cut off his right, and sounded the alarm. The war party of Ngati-toa and Whanganui Maoris had crept up stealthily to surprise the British out post, who would have all been slaughtered, had it not been for the brave boy’s promptitude and determination. Mrs Saunders, though a very young girl at the time, remembered the incident, and often used to tell how she heard the two historic bugle blasts that night, the last the faithful youngster blew. “

Boulcott’s farm is said to have been situated on what is now the Hutt Golf Course. There is a memorial stone to the battle on the corner of High Street and Military Road in Lower Hutt, several hundred metres from the battle site.

Kirriemuir: When David McHardie applied for assisted emigration with the New Zealand Company in 1840, he gave his occupation as sawyer, although he had been a weaver in his home town. Presumably there was more call for sawyers in the new colony.

From the records of the New Zealand Company held at the Turnbull Library we can obtain an idea of who applied when to come to New Zealand. The local agents, in this case McEwen and Miller from Dundee, were active in the counties of Fife, Angus and Perth. The first to apply in Kirriemuir was David Smith on 24/8/1840, followed by David McHardie on 14/9/1840, and Alexander McHardie on 25/9/1840. The latter describes himself as an agricultural labourer, single aged 33. No doubt there were some family discussions once the first member of the family signed up.

David married Elizabeth Cunningham at Airlie on 9/11/1823. Their children that we definitely know about were:

David baptised Airlie 27/1/1825 Elizabeth “ Kirriemuir 24/6/1826

Jean “ “ 5/10/1828 Alexander “ “ 18/7/1830

Janet “ “ 18/6/1837

The entry in the parish records for Airlie reads, “22 January 1825. David McHardy and his wife Elisabeth Cunningham at Bakie had a son born – baptised on 27th named David.” Baikie is just off the main road between Airlie and Ruthven.

David was baptised on in Kirriemuir on 24 October, 1801, the eldest child of Robert McHardie and Elizabeth Crabb. . Other children of the marriage, all baptised in Kirriemuir, were:

Isabel 19/9/1803 married David Smith. Alexander 12/4/1807

William 16/5/1810 Charlotte Euphan 10/10/1815 married Michael Matthew

James 31/10/1817 married Ann Gordon George 1/7/1821 married Janet Mathers.

John 21/5/1823

Robert McHardy married Elisabeth Crabb in Airlie on 14 July 1799.

For most of this time the family was living at Wester Logie farm, on the main road about a mile south of the Southmuir. There is possibility that David and Elizabeth were related through the Crabb family, as Elizabeth’s mother was Jean Crabb.

Elizabeth Cunningham was born 15 January 1800 at Ruthven, Angus daughter of David Cunningham and Jean Crabb but we cannot find any other children.

When Alexander was born in 1807, Robert McHardie’s address is listed as “in camp”, so presumably he had been called up by the Army during the Napoleonic Wars.

Robert McHardie was born in the parish of Lintrathen, just west of Kirriemuir, in 1780, the second son of Alexander McHardie and Elizabeth Peter. In the parish records the name is spelt McHardy. The older brother was David. The entry in the parish register reads “1778, April 27th Alexander McHardie and Elizabeth Peter in Auld Allan had a child begot in ante-nuptial fornication baptized named David. David McLaughlin there was sponsor.” Alexander and Elizabeth were married the same day. Auld Allan is a remote farm north of Lintrathen, and it was probably quite difficult to get to church very often. Elizabeth Peter was born 18/10/1747 at Lintrathen, daughter of John Peter.

difficult to get to church very often.

Auld Allan farm town

Elizabeth Peter was born 18/10/1747 at Lintrathen, daughter of John Peter.In the 1841 census of Kirriemuir there is the following entry: Southmuir, Kirriemuir.

Robert McHardie 55 Wright

Catherine McHardie 30

Jean McHardie 4 months

Robert McHardie married Katherine Anderson in Kirriemuir on 4 August, 1838, this being his second marriage.

Also in the same area is: George McHardie 15 Linen Handloom weaver

When we visited Kirriemuir in May, 2002, we saw the cottage in Brechin Road where playwright J.M. Barrie was born in 1861. On the side of the house is a sign saying:”3-12 Lilybank”, Lilybank being the alley which runs alongside the Barrie house. As Lilybank was the name David McHardie gave to his farm at Bulls, N.Z., there may be a link between the two places. However, there is a Lilybank in Crathie and Braemar parish in Aberdeenshire, near to the Linn of Dee, and is highly likely that this is the homeland of the McHardys.

It is difficult to trace the family back any further. McHardy is an Aberdeenshire name, with most people of the name originating from either Strathdon, or Crathie and Braemar. The name is said to originate from an earl of Mar named Gartnaigh who lived about 1300. There is another theory linking to the name to the MacLeods of Skye, dating back to the time of Malcolm Canmore.

I It is thought that the Alexander McHardie living in Auld Allan was the son of Alexander McHardie (1715-1746, who was born in Braemar and married Isbelle Stewart. His father was John McHardie who was born in 1668 in Strathdon, and he in turn is thought to be James McHardie who was born in 1645.