Wadestown was one of Wellington’s first suburbs.

Wellington is the capital of New Zealand. It’s located on the Western side of the city up a steep hill – about one to two km from the business district and Parliament.

         It takes its name from John Wade. He arrived in Wellington on the vessel ‘Integrity’ in 1841. He and James Watt acquired the land in the area and sold it off in one and two-acre blocks.

         Five generations of my family have lived in the area and from time to time have walked down Wadestown hill to work in the city.

         It is a memorable sight walking down the hill in the early morning just as the sun rises over the harbour  – a magnificent view, never to be forgotten.

         Before I tell you about some of the people I met on my walks into the city let me tell you one of my father’s stories about Wadestown.

         “When I was 16, Nick Winter and I established a summer camp on a flat just below the Pitt Street railway tunnel.  We bought a tent fly, some billies and a frying pan. We both worked in the GPO (General Post Office as message boys. We changed in my Pitt Street home after work, and each morning to go back to work.  We slept in the tent at night.

We dammed the Kaiwharawhara stream with large boulders and made a good swimming pool. We lived well and supplemented our rations with trout and eels from the stream. Our site became an open-air club for Wadestown boys.

         One of our favourite pastimes was catching eels. We caught so many eels we would give them to a local poultry farmer for his hens, He, in turn, would give us some fresh eggs. But after a while, they developed a fishy taste so we went off eggs for breakfast.

         Downstream the army had land near its magazines. They had some good fishing pools with reasonable-sized trout. Up-stream was far more interesting with some good swimming holes. One was about 18 feet deep and made an ideal diving spot.

         On one upstream ramble, we came across a queer-looking shelter made from, tree branches and sacks. Inside were a couple of old blankets. But there was no sign of the occupant. Sometime later we found a boy called Sharkey occupied it. We called him Sharkey at school because of his big head and mouth and skinny body and legs.

         Sharkey told us he had run away from home because his stepfather knocked him about and made life unbearable. He was out of food and had no money. I took him home and Mum feed him and cleaned him up. She said, “What are we going to do with you?”

         We had a ‘council of war’ and Sharkey said he could get a job on a farm.

         It was wartime and labour was short on farms. Mum looked through the Evening Post newspaper and marked off several likely-looking employment agencies.

         We cleaned him up, gave him some money and some old,  but respectable clothes, and sent him off to town.

         He didn’t return that night and it was two weeks before we heard what had happened to him. We received a letter, written in pencil saying the first agent gave him his fare and sent him off to a farm in Featherston. He was working for an elderly couple and he was happy in his job.

         From time to time we would get a note from Sharkey and he said he was enjoying life. One day he wrote and invited us to visit him on the farm.

         A date was arranged and Mum and I traveled over the Rimutukas by train pulled by the old Fell engine,  and there was Sharkey at the station to meet us. He had filled out. His head was no longer too large for his body. He looked healthy and happy.

         We met the old folk who greatly praised ‘their boy’. They seemed to treat him like a son.

         Later we heard the farmer had died and Sharkey was managing the farm for the old lady and when she died she left him the farm.

         The half-starved Wadestown waif had become a farm hand, a manager, and ended up  a landowner.”

         At this time my grandfather was fighting in France with the 1st Battalion 3rd New Zealand (Rifle) Brigade. He was into his forties and had left three children in Wadestown. My Grandmother, Ellen Mary was very worried in case she was to become a widow and was left with children to bring up. In desperation, a friend introduced her to a ‘gypsy women’ fortune teller in Wadestown. After the due process, she was told not to worry as her husband would return home and would bring her some gold.

         He did return home having been badly wounded in  Messines and returned home with some gold,  a German ring. 

         After he returned from the Rotorua Military hospital he built a new home in Oban Street and walked to and from work from Wadestown to the Botanical Gardens. Having been trained in the Kew Gardens in the U.K. he became foreman of the City Council gardens.

         Next door there was a family called Smith. They had a boy my age and when visiting I played with him. One day he took his scooter down the Wadestown hill, came a cropper (crashed), and died. I was very upset!

         When I walked to work in the 80s. Each morning I would pass an old man and his dog. I usually met him down the Wade Street zigzag.  He was dressed in an old fashion shirt without a collar. I suspected he had seen better days and I usually stopped and said a few kindly words to him. “I must get a dog when I retire. It will give me an incentive to go walking.”

         Some times later I attended a Christmas function hosted by Dan Watkins, the General Manager of Ivon Watkins Dow. Dan was an old friend from my Taranaki days.

         During the proceedings, Dan came over to me and said, “Geoff there’s a gentleman over here who has asked to be introduced to you.”

         And to my horror, it was the old man that walked the dog. But this time he was immaculately dressed in a smart business suit. Dan said, “Geoff I would like you to meet our bank manager.”

         “I just want to tell you I haven’t retired”, he said. I get up early and take my dog for a walk. I don’t start work until 9 o’clock.” We both had a laugh but I was embarrassed.

         Walking to work down Wadestown Hill I met some interesting people and we would chat away. I met dentists, accountants, and several people that had a great impression on me.

         One was Sid Granger. After coming out of the Navy he built himself a house on Cecil Road before returning to his work in the Post Office.  I discovered we had both served on the same ships at the same time and we had never met.

         Another man I enjoyed walking with was a messenger in a Government Department. I believe he was Maori. He told me he had served in the army and was in the battle of Crete. He failed to be evacuated and ended up living in a cave until a local family found him and gave him food and refuge. The Germans failed to round him up. He worked on a farm for the rest of the war as he had a similar complexion to a Cretan.

         When he died I went to his funeral. To my amazement the Wellington Cathedral was packed. He may have had a modest job but he was a high-ranking Mason.

Geoffrey Moss (mossassociates.co.nz)