Chapter 1 - How it all began

The Wrights came from Leicester, England and my grandfather was born at Earl Shilton.

Photo at left:

Home of W.R. Wright

Castle Farm, Earl Shilton, Leicestershire

I have never visited there but my brother did after WWII in the 1960's and tried to look up the family history. He did verify that Granfy, Richard William Wright, was born there but he did not come up with a family tree. When Granfy came to New Zealand in 1880, or thereabouts, he stayed with Wright relations on their farm, Elmsthorpe of 675 acres at Hunter which was about 10 miles north of Waimate on the foot hills of the Hunter Hills. He stayed with them for a number of years and farmed near Whangarei and Lake Omapere.

The Wright family during their stay in Earl Shilton 1850 -1950

A closer look at the Wrights reveal that their sojourn in Earl Shilton endured for approximately one hundred years, from about the middle of the ninteenth century to the middle middle of the twentieth. A period during which three generations were born and bred there, ensuring the continuity of the male line, and a time during which William Wright in particular, or more precisely his immediate descendants, left their respective families to branch out laterally

To clarify, these three generations were headed by Wiliam (1814-1897). Charles (1862-1952) and Charles William (1887-1970), Thomas coming before them, and being the originator in the district, and John Trevor (Jack), being the last of the line born there and departing later to end the five generations' time in and around Earl Shilton.

Many of these other lateral descendants, from William's daughters, extend now to third and fourth cousins still residing locally, and yet largely unrecognised by each other under their many different names. However, the male line is now extinct in Earl Shilton. One of these branches, although still using the Wright name, actually emanates from an illegitimate birth to one of William's daughters, therefore, as they are using her maiden name that family cannot be classed as a continuation of the male line. Perhaps this might seem chauvinistic by today's standards, but it is still considered a correct assessment by genealogical conventions.

Although William Wright was baptised in the parish church in 1814, he only took up residence about 1850; the male line then lived in various locations in Earl Shilton until 1946. It was John Trevor Wright who then left the area to resume his married life, after interruption by the war, and later nurture the next generation in Boston, Lincolnshire.

(From: http://www.bcope.co.uk/wrights in earl shilton.htm)

Note: The Cyclopaedia of New Zealand 1903 has the following entry for Richard Wright:

When the Wright cousins decided to move on from the farm at Hunter, Ken married May Middleton. Len and Frank moved to Dansey's Pass Station in North Otago, and Jack remained in the Waimate District and became a stock (sheep and cattle) trader. Granfy Wright (William Richard) set up on the farm at Claverton near Burnham and he had another property on the Weedon-Lincoln Road that abutted the Phillips' farm. My father's oldest sister married a Phillips from that area. She lived all her life on a small farm on the Main Road just south of Weedon but didn't have a lot to do with her husband. He was supposed to work for his parents on the home farm on the corner of the Main Highway and the Weedon-Lincoln Road. But I believe he was not very energetic and he certainly, in my time, never spent any time with Auntie Laura and did not live with her when I met him about 1930.

Ken Wright set up as a farmer near in Whangarei , and he and May had three children. The oldest Ken was accepted into the Rural Farm Cadets Scheme about 1946. He was an open air, high-country type of bloke, enjoying his stint on the sheep station in his first year. He was bonded to the Lands and Survey Department for five years for a bond of $1,000, which he tested but, in the end he honoured. Ken managed the Ngaio Station at Kekeranga on the coast north of Kaikoura. He then moved to Clayton Downs.

I met Ken in 1950 when the RFCs [Rural Field Cadets] were on a trip to Opiro, which was my mother's childhood home. The property was being farmed by my cousin Patrick, who unfortunately has recently died. Patrick was the son of Tom, who was the Member of Parliament for Waitaki from 1949 to 1962 and died in office.

At the end of the business part of the visit, Ken and I took leave of the group as I wanted to introduce him to my parents who lived about 20 miles away. This journey took us via and into the Waihao Forks Hotel. After tea with my parents I delivered Ken to the Waitangi Station further on the north bank of Lake Waitaki above the power station of that name. Monty Cooke was in charge of the Lincoln group and Ken later told me that he was subsequently given all the menial chores for the remainder of the trip which went as far as Invercargill. Ken and his family retired to the Te Anau area but unfortunately he died in his sleep in 2008.

Ken's cousin, Don Middleton, who defected from the RFC early in 1942, now lives at Wanaka where he has close business and family ties with Sir Tom Wallis and Warbirds over Wanaka.

After he went to Burnham, Granfy married Joyce Barnett whose family farmed at Leeston. They had a property called Deep Springs and that had a big two-storied homestead on it. They sold that property to the Rich family. In later years I worked in the Lands and Survey Office in Christchurch with a girl Rich, but I never thought much about it or asked her anything about the history after the Barnett's left there. All my uncles and aunts were born while Granfy (or pater as my father called him) and Joyce lived at Claverton. There is nobody among the relations who can fill in any more detail until Granfy and Grandma (who I never met) moved to Willowbridge.

In 1911 Granfy moved to Willowbridge which was on the north bank of the Waihao River. He had a 400 acre farm bounding State Highway 1. Willowbridge was the district and the district immediately to the north of it was Studholme and that is where my mother's people lived. The Hayman's lived and farmed on the banks of the Waihao River right near where the river discharges into the sea. The Willowbridge farm was flat and square. It had 400 acres with no waste ground and in my time there were no big plantation trees on it. It was very good soil and it was my father's hope that it would be kept in the family, But there were four boys in the family and it appeared inevitable that it would be sold and various members set up on their farms elsewhere. Lionel had drawn a ballot farm at Roxburgh. Dad was sent to Coventry (my assumption) at Waihao Downs. I have never seen any photographs of my parents' wedding. I assume the shot gun did not have a camera attachment. Clarence was struggling on a farm north of Waimate.

Uncle Lionel who was the second oldest, was a returned soldier. He had a stiff leg as a result of his war service, which was caused through damaging his knee, probably through slipping on muddy duckboards in the trenches. Uncle Lionel was one of the last troops to leave Gallipoli. They devised a system using tins of water to keep pressure on the triggers of the guns to keep them firing. Uncle Ken and Auntie Mae were twins. They were born in 1909 and when Granfy wanted to retire in 1920 they were only 11 years old so they did not fit into the farming scene at all at that time. In 1923 Ken was 14 when Granfy bought the farm at Roxburgh bounded by the Teviot River.

Uncle Lionel was selected and allocated a ballot farm consisting of 1,000 acres of hill country out on the Teviot Estate at Roxburgh. It was healthy land over-run with rabbits and was purely sheep country. Uncle Lionel had a stiff leg, but he had to ride a horse to get around the farm, I do not think that Lionel and his wife Cora had been married very long before they went to that farm and there were no children. It was late in 1923 when the dogs came home without Uncle Lionel and a search was made for him. When he was found it was discovered he had fallen from his horse. Because of his stiff leg his foot had caught up in the stirrup and as the horse carried on forward Uncle Lionel's head was hit against rocks. He suffered much head damage and died. Auntie Cora, stayed on the farm for many years, and as Uncle Ken grew up he took over the management of the farm. It was next door to Granfy's and is now farmed by Uncle Ken's two sons

In 1923 Granfy had bought the farm next door to Uncle Lionel which nobody would take on because although it was sunny, north facing and overlooking Roxburgh town, it, too, was over-run with rabbits. His first exercise was to put a rabbit-proof fence around it and the locals said "Silly old Bill Wright is going to farm rabbits. He has put a rabbit -proof fence around his farm". But he knew what he was doing He claimed that he took 30,000 rabbits off the farm before he got them under control and he did say that the last rabbits cost him $5.00 a head to catch and kill and that would have been big money in the 1930's

Granny died in 1917 and Granfy died about 1935. After Granfy died Uncle Ken took over the farm and his sister Doris was the housekeeper. Doris stayed in the house until she married Harry Tough, who had a garage in Roxburgh, so they built a house for themselves in the town.

Uncle Ken went to WWII and he got as far as Canada for Air Force training, but he was grounded. He was sent back to NZ and took up the Air Training Corps position in Invercargill where he met his wife Mary Nicholl - she was the daughter of a businessman but her mother had died

Uncle Clarence was put on a farm north of Waimate on the Main Road but I think circumstances, or the economic situation were against him, and he had to walk off that and he worked at various jobs - truck driving and what have you. He may have worked labouring in Timaru .because he married a Timaru girl. Then, later, that would be in 1928 when Dad was contracting and was under pressure to serve more farmers Uncle Clarence bought a tractor - a Caterpillar 20 - but it was not as versatile as the 2 ton that Dad had. In the end he disposed of it because it was not safe and Dad made the agent AS Patterson take it back. It was badly balanced and perhaps that explains why there are few Caterpillar 20's, in museums, but there are numerous 2 tons. Uncle Clarence could no longer work as a contractor and in the 1930's he used to drive the cream truck, a Dennis, picking up milk and cream for the Waimate Dairy Company in the district that was mainly Studholme and Willowbridge. It was a very big area with most of the farms milking a few cows, but some had herds of thirty to forty. The cream was taken to the Waimate factory and processed into butter. The skim milk was fed on the farm to pigs which were generally killed to produce bacon for home consumption. That area is now serviced by a major dairy factory based at Studholme Junction (opened 2007) financed by Russian interests

The hot wash water from the Waimate factory was discharged into the Municipal Baths and we had tepid baths ahead of anybody else. I have a certificate for swimming 50 yards dog paddle in these baths which were superseded by the Norman Kirk Memorial Baths of 33 1/3 metres.

Each year my father would go to his father's farm at Roxburgh. Dad always said that a change was as good as a holiday. He took two local shearers from Waimate with him. As a further example of Dad's strength on one occasion they were loading bales of wool out of the shed, tipping them off a stack two high, then rolling them across the floor and lifting them on to the top of bales already on the truck. Dad bet £5.0.0d that he could carry the bales on his back, which he did for five bales. The average weight was 350lbs. I cannot remember if the bet was ever paid.

Uncle Ken had a SS100 Jaguar car and when he went overseas he left it with my father. One day I was sent home from the harvest field to get the Denis truck (ex Dairy Co). I had to back the Jaguar out first and then back the truck out. I had not backed the Jaguar out far enough and I backed the truck into it. The car had massive chrome fittings (head lights, radiator grill etc). My father did not give me a dressing down, he probably realized that he had sent a boy on a man's errand. I presume insurance paid for the repairs. It was wartime and spare parts would have been hard to come by as there were not many SS100's about. The car came on the market in 1938-39 in no great numbers.

William Richard Wright and his wife Joyce are buried in the Waimate Cemetery as are Ernest Cecil and his wife Rose. Of the latter's children Euan Cecil is buried in Rome; Norma is buried in Waimate and Patricia's ashes are in the grounds of the Timaru crematorium near those of her husband Ronald Goodson.

Photo at left: Silver Wedding Anniversary of Mr and Mrs WR Wright