Helen and Martin Bowler have settled in New Zealand since 2000. That was about 94 years after my great-uncle Bob (Penfold), brother of my mother (Gwen Penfold.Archer 1909-2009)’s father, went out in 1906. But whereas Uncle Bob went out single, married a Maori (though I don’t think that was known to my mother or anyone else in the family), and ended up at the north end of the South Island, at Motueka, Helen and Martin met back in England, married in Katikati and live in Auckland ie towards the northern end of the North Island. We (Ruth and I) may be able to explore the diifferences between the two locations on our 2016 trip to NZ. The family link to NZ seems a very positive thing. We saw the film “Suffragette” in early December 2015 and were reminded that women got the vote in NZ in 1893, long before the 1919 (partial) and (about) 1929 in UK. These things matter. Women treated as equal citizens. In 1909, there was much emigration going on. New Zealand was the land of opportunity. And no doubt Uncle Bob was ‘doing his own thing’ by seizing the opportunity. And certainly (to be cont’d)…….
(Continuing 22.12.15): So, it’s now 109 or so years since my Great Uncle Bob settled in NZ and 56 years since he died in 1959. He was brother of my ‘Grandad Penfold’, Frank Penfold, the estate agent and auctioneer with Knight Frank and Rutley, and ultimately with his own business, ‘Camerons’, at Walm Lane, Willesden Green, London. What Robert Penfold did in NZ seems to be lost in the mists of time. There ought to be censuses showing what he was employed as. Probably something connected with agriculture, though I don’t think he had any such skill when he went out.
New Zealand 2016
A two-month venture
Day 1: Friday 1st January 2016:
Saturday 2.1.16 en route from Dubai to Melbourne in an Emirates Airbus 380 (and then on to Auckland) at 09.50hrs (UK time). This venture is all about freedom. And it all started at least 6 months ago when my second cousin, Jonnet, suggested a version of a ‘house swap’. We would go to NZ for two months to see our daughter Helen and family, and they (she and her husband Andrew) would come to England (from Vancouver) to look after ‘Mum’. And so it is. Six months of preparation came to fruition yesterday, Friday. By taxi to Birmingham International and then Boeing 777 to Dunbai at 20.40hrs, and here we are, crossing the Pacific. The whole journey takes, of the order of 28 hours, including the stops at Dubai and Melbourne - a bit different from Great Uncle Bob Penfold’s day, when no doubt he went out by steamship, and it must have taken about a month to get there instead of just over a day.
Day 1 events included the taxi-man breaking the handle of one of our suitcases at Birmingham airport, and me almost simultaneously starting with an attack of BPPV (at the airport). But we will buy a new suitcase in NZ and as for my BPPV, I had my medication handy and was able to avert the worst dizziness and nausea that I used to suffer. But all is generally well, and here we are, free for two whole months, to do our own thing with the NZ branch of the family. Wonderful!
(Continued at 06.16 hrs UK time, about one hour from Melbourne): So, from a family history point-of-view, what do we have here on this trip? A couple in their early-seventies, born in the early nineteen-forties, going to NZ for two months, just as a trip, to keep better-in-touch with their close family, travelling there in some comfort in just over a day. And they are going to meet the NZ branch of the family - now well-established for over ten years in a very pleasant suburb of Auckland, and comprising a typical nuclear family of mother/father/two children below ten. And there is every sign that family life will continue in this general way.
(Inserted Monday 11.01.16): Week 1 in NZ: The five years since we were here have melted away. And NZ calls, as it must have done to Helen and Martin, back in 2000, when they came. Agapanthus in bloom everywhere. A weed here, something that is an exotic delight in UK. So it is. And was. The natural world a delight. And the climate. But life, of course, isn’t as simple as that. The week has been filed with ‘family stuff’ and visits and updates on all and sundry. Bird calls heard in the night while awake with my chest-congestion, convey the exotic feel of NZ’s fauna for us. And we revel in the freedom from the pressures of our care-life responsibilities in Lyddington. Health issues still concern us. My virus chest-infection is waning. Plans afoot for a programme of activities for getting back to where we were three or so years ago, before we became carers. Can it be done? Great possibilities exist if we will only believe in them and ourselves. The NZ family has settled wonderfully. They really are a fixture just as much as we are in Lyddington. The family has spread its wings and widened its horizons. The change is permanent, just as it was for Ernest Archer when he married Johanna van Dongen and settled in Netherlands in (from memory) about 1898.
(Continued Thursday 07.01.16 at 0720hrs NZ time): In 1906, when Robert Penfold, my maternal grandfather’s brother, emigrated to NZ, the British Empire was at its apogee. Edward VII had been on the throne for 5 years, and was at the height of his powers in terms of diplomacy and international infulence. Kaiser Bill of Germany was in awe of Edward’s natural abilities in that area, which had led to treaties with France and elsewhere which made the German leader feel ‘surrounded’. The British Navy remained second to none, at least in perception, and worldwide, British influence was financially and militarily and politically, from many points of view, paramount. Queen Victoria might have been dead for 5 years, but she had had the world’s most magnificent funeral, to which ‘the whole world’ in terms of royalty and power and infuence, including her many German royal-family-connections, had come to pay respects to all that was British, in 1901. So Robert Penfold, who must have felt that he belonged to a nation of power and influence, left England in 1906, and never returned, as his intended return in 1959, close to the end of the life of his brother Frank, was interrupted by his own death.
And yet, 1906 wasn’t a bad time, in retrospect, to have been leaving England. It was just eight short years from the commencement of ’The 31Years War (1914-1945)’, which saw the end of all the power that Victoria and Edward had wielded, and saw, as a mirror of all that, Uncle Bob, sending food parcels from NZ to his family in England, including (during World War II) to his niece Gwen Archer and her family: husband Fred Archer, and two boys, Michael (born 1938) and Philip (born 1941) Archer, living in Oxford. Those food parcels were very welcome, and I still remember some of the tins of ‘meat pudding’ being finished-off at least some few years after the war finished in 1945. They had been stored in the larder at our home at 17 Sandfield Road, Oxford. I wonder what the brand was? It would be so interesting to know. No doubt some ‘utility’ war-time brand.
But the point of this reminiscence is the parallels between 1906 and 2016, one hundred and ten years later. Times of change and extreme foolishness. So say I. The changes impending in 1906 are unarguable and universally acknowledged, particularly for the British. The end of the Empire. A war so bad that it was universally called ‘The war to end war’. And it was that bad. No justification is needed for the comment. And yet, at the time, it was welcomed. Including by thinking people. By poets and writers. It was thought to be likely to produce a purging and a forging of better things to come. And in a sense, it did. Out of it came a coming-together of nations, a working together of peoples, in a way that had never happened before in the whole history of the world. And war in continental Europe, that had been endemic for so many centuries, since the written history of Britain began, and has been celebrated by writers of the stature of Shakespeare, has effectively come to an end in the European Union.
And the parallels to 1906 in 2016? Certainly foolishness. Short-sightedness. An inability to take a longer view, to see how to guide our peoples towards a spirit of generosity and brotherly-and-sisterly self-help. And instead ‘the spirit of the 1930s’ can be seen raising its ugly head in right-wing parties and slogans all across Europe, from UKIP in the UK to the Front Nationale, in France, seeking the end of the EU, and exit of those countries from the European brotherhood which has made Europe a force to be reckoned with, that Google and Putin and the USA and China have to respect and take seriously.
Week 2 in NZ:
And so to Queenstown (click here) at the south end of the south island of NZ. Named no doubt after Queen Victoria. These are the family summer-holidays. Eight whole days amid scenery and names very reminiscent of Scotland. Weather issues here are just the same as elsewhere. It can rain all day - as it has on day two of our Queenstown week. Likewise life issues - no easier here than in other countries, apart, of course, from those affected by New Zealand’s plenty in terms of space for people. Which is a major issue just now, in Europe. Queenstown is about 600 miles and about an-hour-and-a-half by Airbus A320 in which we flew, from Auckland. So it is much further towards ‘coolness’ and ‘the midnight sun’ than is Kenmore (about 400 miles north) from our home in Rutland.
(16.1.16 at 2057hrs): Enjoying Shapiro on Shakespeare in 1599. Much about the clash of two cultures: Anglicanism and Roman Catholicisim. Much relevance these days: the clash between climate-change denial and climate-change action, And more. And within families. Cultural and related differences. Leading to widely differing views on the importance of aspects of ways of life. Differing visions. But though these affect attitudes to so much causing comfort or the reverse in every-day aspects of life’s daily round, I can see that they should be kept under a very close rein since they have the potential to cause tribal-type divisions which are the root of so many of this world’s problems.
The Queenstown week included visits to Arrowtown, the scene of the NZ Gold Rush, beginning in 1862, five years after James Archer started Archer & Co’s transport business in Oxford. And there is a splendid museum in Arrowtown (admission NZ$8 for seniors), recording the lives and times of the people of the Central Otago region of New Zealand, including a great many totally authentic exhibits of equipment and implements and articles from the times in question. An upright piano had the music of “Vienna City of My Dreams” on its music stand, and a lady visitor stood and played the music slowly but accurately, and the melody produced by that, probably about 100 year-old or more instrument, was perfectly recognisable. I would have quite liked to have tried it myself with one of my ‘Lee Simms’ style melodies, but would have needed a piano stool. [On looking up the date of composition of that melody, it appears to be 1914, which does indeed make it about 100 years old, although, actually, our own Brinsmead upright, dating from the 1920s, isn’t much younger.] Question: how did NZ export ‘frozen lamb’ in the 19th century, before mechanical refrigeration was invented? Perhaps using the ‘ice and salt’ technique? Must investigate.
Weeks 3 and 4:
Queenstown’s attractions included, for us, visits to Walter Peak Farm on the 1912 (built) steamer SS Earrnslaw, which has a totally authentic 6-cylinder compound steam engine (2 sets of 3 cylinders of differing diameters), and has at least two full-time ‘engineers’ working below decks, oiling and maintaining and controlling the steam engine (and perhaps they also stoke the furnace), and plies across Queenstown’s lake. The steamer takes about 30 or 40 minutes each way, and you then have a tour of the farm at Walter Peak, including feeding the animals and sheep-management by sheep-dogs, and sheep-shearing (by Peter the farm guide), followed by tea and cakes. Very pleasant. And the account by Peter of the varied ownership of the farm over the years, and the effects of that variety of ownership on the activities at the farm, which are now undertaken, provided an illuminating insight into NZ’s history over the last 200 or so years. Now, SS Earnslaw is totally tourist-centred. In previous times it transported cattle and sheep. Mere reflection of changing times.
And on to ‘Skyline’ and ‘The Luge’ (a downhill toboggan and cycle track), with their associated restaurant at the top, which give views over the town from (was it?) about 1000 metres. All part of the spectacular topography provided by the ‘Remarkables’ and their associated mountains around Lake Wakatipu. The Queenstown Gardens, adjoining the lake, and the nearby Bath House restaurant on the lakeshore.
And so back to Auckland. And the warmth of the north. Glorious sunshine everyday. Without fail. Making photography simple in some respects. Clarity easy. Atmospherics, less-so in bright sunshine. And a move to our own (rented) apartment. Walking distance from the family. And from the beach and the St Heliers shops. Not to mention the dentist, whose skill has been much needed to deal with the consequences of a tooth-breakage. All’s well now.
A flashback:
Oxford 1948. A summer’s day. The Cherwell at the northern end of ‘Mesopotamia’ (in which the river is divided by a Willow-tree-lined gravelled walk across which occasional overflow channels, each with a weir and a bridge for the walkway, extend). A bathing place has been built here, where the lower branch of ‘Mesopotamia’ ends, and a slipway of rollers for the punts allows these craft, less their occupants, to be manhandled in either direction. The bathing place is named ‘Dames Delight’ (click here for photo), in contradistinction to ‘Parson’s Pleasure’, which is its male-only nudist counterpart immediately upstream on the Cherwell. Ladies amongst the river traffic are invited by a finger-post to preserve their modestyby walking around (rather than boating-through) Parson’s Pleasure. But Dames Delight, though fenced-in to a height of six feet or more by green-painted corrugated iron enclosures, is a mixed-gender establishment entirely suitable for families, providing simple wooden changing cubicles, diving boards, and a boarded-walkway over the river. The boarded walkway is needed because the main river bank where the changing cubicles are, where we picnicked, and from which you enter the river, is on the west (Marston/Headington) side of the river, whereas the entrance to the bathing place from Mesopotamia is on the other (Oxford) side. There are wooden barriers in the river and suitable warning signs about the weir etc. And all is supervised by a friendly sun-beaten attendant who also takes the pennies at his little office at the entrance gate for the entrance fee.
Open-air. The Cherwell flowing peacefully through. Untouched river bank, apart from the diving boards.
And a 39-year-old mother sits on a wool rug in the August sunshine reading a biography. She has a picnic in a basket. Tea in a “Thermos” flask (with a cork stopper), and diluted orange cordial for her two boys, home-made rock-cakes, and sandwiches - perhaps of jam and others of “Marmite” and tomato. Michael, just 10, and Philip, nearly 7, splash and swim and play in the Cherwell alongside many other children in an unregulated sometimes noisy, but somewhat supervised (by the attendant who always prevents drownings) fashion.
The trio have walked down from Sandfield Road, Headington. About a mile-and-a-half. The afternoon passes. Picnic tea on the rug. Cold children wrapped in towels. Back to the cubicles to change. And a long walk home. Uphill all the way from the Marston Road past Headington Hill Hall to Pullens Lane, then along Cuckoo Lane to Sandfield Road.
A ‘golden time’? A ‘golden country’? Yes, in many ways. For me anyway. Just as much as George Orwell’s corresponding young days in the country were such to him. Sentimental? Mere nostalgia? Perhaps. But close parallels with the life in coastal Auckland for the NZ branch of our family. The South Pacific, and its amazing islands and climate and sunshine and colour and sub-tropical vegetation, and all within easy daily walking distance. Some of it merely a few hundred yards away from home. Simple pleasures. Just as in Oxford in the 1940s. (Added 11.2.16 NZ): And reflecting change. Dames Delight exists no more. Not a trace. Except here, perhaps. That world of 1940s Oxford is gone. By seventy years. The Cherwell still flows there of course. But the counterparts of the young people who were there, today’s 7-to-12-year-olds, are elsewhere. Many of them worshipping at the shrine of Apple’s Digital World. Which has its own merits. But it’s a tremendous change of culture. As great as from Catholic to Protestant in the 1530s? And back again in 1546? Well, almost, perhaps. No need to die for it now, thank goodness. But the loss of that simplicity? Is it not a real loss? Simple ‘river-side’ pleasures: bathing and fishing, largely unsupervised, unregulated, free-and-easy. Jury out. Not really lost perhaps? Merely migrated to the pages of ‘Country Walking’ or a similar journal?
A 1953 Sampler:
My mother, Gwen Penfold.Archer had two samplers in her Sandfield Road, Headington kitchen:
“Let nothing disturb thee,
Nothing afright thee,
All things are passing;
God never faileth;
Who God possesseth, in nothing is wanting;
Patient endurance attaineth to all things”.
This, I now realise, was a Catholic prayer, and I have found it available as a colourfully-printed prayer at our local Oakham Catholic church, so it probably dated from Mother’s days at a Catholic convent. But she never, I believe, abandoned it in the days of her abandonment of conventional religion.
But it is the other sampler which interests me here. It was an embroidered work, done by Mother’s mother, Rosa Penfold, in 1953, the year of HMQ’s coronation:
“Above all we must keep alive
That courageous spirit of adventure,
That is the finest quality of youth
And by youth I do not mean
Just those who are young in years
But those who are young at heart
No matter how old they may be.”
And I believe that it was indeed very much that ‘spirit of adventure’ that spurred Helen and Martin to decide to move to New Zealand just at the start of the 21st Century, matching Great Uncle Bob Penfold’s corresponding decision just under a hundred years earlier.
Day 60: 29.2.16 on board Emirates flight EK435 from Auckland to Brisbane at 2029hrs NZ time:
The departures this morning were very hard on the heart-strings. And yet that is what they should be. Seeing Helen standing at the top of the drive…..Just Helen. And never to be there again until when……? As Daniel said so many times in the latter days…..”I wish you could be with us until you die….!” How a five year-old finds ways to say what needs to be said. And Rebecca’s unspoken but clearly-heartfelt emotion too. Well,well. I, equally can’t find the right words to set it down. But the grandpa and grannie objectives came very much to the surface in these latter days.
And mission-accomplished in other ways too. So much has changed back at No.33, we gather from the FaceTime and email reports. We shall hardly know where we are, perhaps. So many changes. No more the six-or-more person-hours-per-day of visits from the carers every-day, come rain, come shine. The house our own again. Well, well. We shall see. One step at a time.
And we first have to ‘sign-out’ from our newly-acclimatised life in the balmy almost tropical heat of a New Zealand high-summer, which we have left in Auckland today (despite today’s symbolic(?) rainstorms), after growing to love it. Not least in its curative aspects which have been so beneficial to us both, bearing in mind the states of health in which we left UK on 1st January 2016. And here we are, on 29th February, both ‘ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven’ as the hymologist whose words I remember so well from my youth had it. My severe chest cough/infection gave up the struggle agains the onslaught of NZ’s summer balm about ten days into January. Ruth’s general well-being was likewise restored by the time of our return from Queenstown, and installation at 823 Riddell Road.
And the ‘post-Queenstown’ portion of our holiday, with all its relaxation and peacefulness, was itself a balm applied to the restlessness of our former existence, not least the delight of the books from the St Heliers Public Library, of which Ruth read so many, and I managed to read (fully, I add, because I am not famous for finishing books, nor even for reading them at all, as opposed to ‘hearing’ audiobooks) Neil McGregor’s “Shakespeare’s Restless World” a review of Shakespeare’s life and works in the manner of his “The History of the World in 100 Objects”.