March 16th
1946 was a great day - but I must go back a little before that day.Return to Geoff & Chris's website
Les Pooch -- life story
Our Wedding Day and Honeymoon at Anawhata
March 16th
1946 was a great day - but I must go back a little before that day.
Gwen and I met at the Auckland Young People’s Club in 1943. Gwen’s mother had recently passed away although I didn’t realise it at the time.
I was President of the Club at the time and one evening my attention was drawn to the back row of the Club where a young lass with shiny red hair was sitting.
After the meeting was over I introduced myself to her, got a cup of tea for her together with a plate of carefully selected cakes - and we then chatted for quite some time. I was strangely moved, a feeling of, I realise now as “love at first sight”. Although I certainly did not know anything about “love” I was more than happy to share time with her and that was how it all began.
Gwen lived at Takapuna for a while with her father who declared that he wished to re-marry and so Gwen had to look for board elsewhere. As far as the new wife was concerned, Gwen was not wanted. Gwen found board at Narrow Neck with Vena Wallis, the wife of an overseas soldier.
Vena was young, bright, breezy, vivacious and full of fun, helping draw us closer and closer. We three are still very good friends.
Our friendship grew and developed, deepening to the stage 18 months later, announcing our engagement. It was natural progression.
When Vena’s husband Ralph returned from overseas duty, Gwen then went to live with her father and step-mother at the home at 367a Great South Road. It was a large section, large lawns, big trees with a hammock stretched between two of them - but that is another story!.
I spent quite a lot of time out there with Gwen but for her it was not a happy time. And numerous things happened there which contributed to Gwen looking forward to our wedding. Nell, that was her name, did not come to the wedding.
And so I come to 16th March 1946.
As I write this, (18th March 2003) we are holidaying for a few days, celebrating our 57th Wedding Anniversary of the Big Day.
There is a lot of that day that has faded into the background but lots of the good things still remain clear in my mind.
Best Man (my brother Digger) together with Neil Hickman my Groomsman and I were picked up from home at Mt. Albert by Ivan Dow who was the salesman at Harvison and Seymour and taken to St. Stephen’s Church in Herne Bay. We waited for what seemed a very long time in a dark and most uninteresting vestry, just the three of us..
At last the Minister came and invited us to accompany him to the front of the Church. Wow! The Church was full!! - full of all our good friends and there, sitting there directly in front of me, smiling, looking very happy was Mum and Dad. To reassure them that all was well with me, I gave them a big wink. That was naughty! I should not wink in Church!! And the first opportunity following the ceremony that she had, Mum let me know!!!
I must admit I cannot recall much of the ceremony but coming out of the vestry after the signing and recessing down the aisle, all those people here to wish us well, rapturously happy, smiling, congratulating, shaking my hand, yes, hand for the other was holding very firmly onto Gwen whose extreme shyness of those days, floating on the air of happiness, I feared that she might just float right away.
Once outside there were people everywhere and the girls from work had spent many hours on the punching machine making confetti - I believe there were two cartons the size of 4 gallon tins full - and we got the lot. The footpath as far as one could see was covered and I had more than my share in and around me. When going to the photographers Gwen told me that she was full of it but quickly added that she had Betty her Bridesmaid to help her! Blow!!.
Our Wedding Cars were a matched pair of Packhard Limousines. I had never sat in anything like that before and felt quite regal. Off we went to Bellwood Bridal Studios in Karangahape Road for formal photos. We did have a candid cameraman who only took a few photos at the Church.
Then to the Commodore Lounge for our Wedding Breakfast. It was an upstairs venue where The Warehouse Downtown now stands in Customs Street.
It was a traditional meal for those days, Sandwiches, Savouries, an assortment of Cakes (No smorgasbord those days) plus Fruit Salad (and for an extra 3 pence we could have ice cream). Through Digger who worked for the Dairy Company, we had that absolute luxury of fresh cream -unheard of in those war and post-war years.
While on the question of costs, we had the unenviable task of telling Gwen’s father that the meal was to cost 4s (40 cents) a head (and later told him that we would like ice cream at 3d a head extra) He didn’t make any comment but we often wonder what his thoughts would have been.
Our Wedding Cake was a truly magnificent affair. Ray Kennerley, a member of our Young People’s Club iced it for us - denies any description - it had the most delicate and intricate decorations all around the sides, across the top with ever so delicate small while icing swans around the top edges. At that time we were still on rationing with meagre amounts of sugar on coupon each week. Mum cut us down on sugar usage plus cadging where she could to enable us to collect sufficient sugar for icing the cake. My cousin Hec Harris worked for Henry Berry and arranged for them to grind the sugar into icing sugar. And so we had sufficient for our beautiful cake. The top tier was sealed in a tin before being cut some 20 months later at the Christening of our first-born, David.
Honeymoon? Ah, yes, that was great!. Ivan Dow drove us from the reception to Gwen’s home then to our flat in Ponsonby, on to my home in Mt. Albert to collect all our food requirements for the fortnight then off to Anawhata. On the way Ivan’s car broke down but a little time later we got it going, thank goodness.
We reached
the top of the hill just on dusk. Anyone arriving at the top of the hill could
always expect a welcome from Colonel Todd and this time was no exception.
Conscious of the impending darkness, I put my pack on my back, took Gwen’s
suitcase in my hand and started off but didn’t get far when Toddy caught up to
us “you two were married this afternoon” he proclaimed. Yes, we were. Toddy
demanded that we leave our heavy piquau with all our food for a fortnight, only
take what we needed for the night, and he would take the rest down the next
morning. He kept
his word for which we were most grateful.
We reached Parker’s house and they demanded that we go in for a few minutes, which we did and then down to the “Little Brown Owl” our cottage.
We were, by this time, after such a big, long day, so tired that we literally collapsed into bed - a strange experience for both of us, having somebody in bed next to you.
Anawhata was and still is the most relaxing place one could ever find. The sound of the pounding waves, the lovely warm sunshine, plenty of good fishing and swimming, walking and talking together - alone - it was heaven. Just the two of us - just what we needed!.
One day we walked over to Piha for fresh supplies, intended staying the night in Hec’s batch but Gwen (aftermath of the stresses of pre-wedding) developed a very sore throat and so we decided to return to Anawhata. Relaxation was the remedy and we had plenty of that.
Two weeks later, Ivan returned to take us back to our flat in Ponsonby to commence life together as husband and wife. In those days girls did not normally go back to work after marriage so Gwen was at home while I went back to work at H & S, working frantically to catch up on what had piled up in my absence.
And so began, and continues today, a very happy relationship. It has not always been easy and at times darned hard, there were times when the greengrocer arrived that Gwen would not answer the door as she didn’t have the money to buy anything - and that happened quite often. We have “done it together” and that is the secret for any married couples, “together” with that ever-so-necessary word “respect” for each other.
I have been persuaded by David and Geoffrey to add to this Anawhata Chapter after answering some of their questions.
There are
so many memorable aspects that one does not know where to start nor what will be
of interest to others against what is pure, selfish, nostalgia.
Perhaps the best place to start would be
the stream (or as we called it “the creek”)
(Photo
was taken in the bend just below Forgies’).
From earliest days the creek has played an important part in life surrounding the Anawhata area.
A clinker-built dinghy was the only alternative to a trek over the hills for Forgies to get to the beach for swimming or fishing. Well up past Forgie’s there still remains the relics of a large dam that held back the water which, when tripped (opened) would rush down the valley, taking with it the Kauri logs that had been felled and rolled into the bed of the stream, ending up around the flat land opposite and a little below Forgie’s.
On that flat was, and I guess still is, the remains of a huge Kauri log, probably more than 8 feet wide and 24 feet long which had come down from up the valley and jammed against the bank, too difficult to dislodge so just left where it lay to rot away. Logs brought down the steam to that flat were then moved to a position where they could be winched up to the top of the hill, then by bulloch team, on to the top of the hill overlooking the northern end of Piha where it was placed on skids (the skid-rails were still there in the mid 1940’s but now grossly overgrown) down to Piha where they were either milled or winched up to the top of Piha hill overlooking Karekare before being skidded down to Karekare where it would then go on rail-tracks to Whatipu before being floated up the Manukau Harbour to Onehunga - a long journey from Anawhata.
One of the logs floated down the stream, overshot catchment area and ended up on Anawhata beach where it lay for many years before my Dad, assisted by Steve Derrick, a neighbour of ours from New Lynn, split it into timber suitable for the entire framing of our beach cottage affectionately called “Little Brown Owl” because of the colour of the paint used.
First of all a hole was drilled into the centre of the log, a charge of gelignite was placed in that hole and with one sharp explosion the log lay clean open. The grain was beautifully straight which made it so much easier to split the various 4x3, 4x2 and 3x2’s for the floor joists and framing. So good was the grain there was only a minimal amount of trimming necessary to obtain perfectly straight lengths of timber.
The stream was an endless activity in so many ways. Eel fishing was always exciting as well as an additional source of diet although there was always plenty of good schnapper and other fish.
The first thing that we kids did after our arrival for Christmas holidays was to gather flax sticks to make rafts which we poled up and down the creek. We held races, were Tom Sawyer, pirates, etc.
Swimming, source of drinking water and ablutions - even in the depth of winter, that is where we washed, everyone up to their knees, which meant that older ones were further out than little ones, for morning washes and cleaning teeth.
In my earlier days I remember at high spring tides, mullet would swim up from the sea, swollen by big waves that would run well up the creek, possibly to spawn, then back again to the open sea before the tide receded after high tide. Occasionally we would manage to capture one of these mullet, hitting it with a supple-jack stick - not often though.
I have seen the creek in very high flood after heavy rains in the Watakeries; scouring out a deep 6 foot chanel in the sand as it went. That was exciting and scary. So much for the creek.
When we first camped at Anawahata we lived in a large centre-pole tent that Dad had made, right on the edge of the beach by Father Atkinson’s cave. I think it may have been our second year there, I was quite small, a huge landslide occurred just along from the cave and Dad considered it too dangerous for us to remain there so he moved us and all our camping gear across the flooded creek to a piece of flat land inside Bull Point alongside Albert Troughear’s camp.
Albert was a white affluent man who owned a new Baby Austin motor car. Albert was determined that it would be possible to drive his car down the sledge-track onto the beach - which he did. But getting it back up the hill again was another story. Extra horse (man) power was needed to coach his baby Austin up the hill again. That was the first time a car had ever been on Anawhata beach.
In those days the cars could be driven over the extremely rough terrain to the top of the knoll where the sledge track began. All that land is now covered in titree and gorse. In the earlier days it was grass upon which sheep grazed with a little low wind-blown titree.
We spent a couple of years at Piha while Mum was having Ngaere and Ivan then we returned to good old Anawhata.
At that time we cleared out and formed a shelter in one of the caves along from Father Atkinson’s cave and pitched our large tent on a flat clearing in front just off the beach. There we stayed for some years until Walter Parker invited us to build a cottage on a piece of his land on the southern edge of the beach.
As I have previously mentioned, the whole framework came from the split Kauri log. Weatherboards came from my God-father Bill Ireland who was building the Croydon Road railway overbridge - 12x1 pine. Two big square windows and roofing iron came from my Grandfather’s blacksmiths building in Mount Albert, a door from goodness-knows where likewise a Dover stove which served us so well for many many years.
In the holiday season we would put up tents for all the extra people to sleep in and they would stay up until well after Easter.
Thanks to the New Zealand Co-op Dairy we had running water. Digger obtained some 1” pipes, formed a little dam further up the hill towards Parker’s and gravity did the rest. It was pure luxury having not to carry water any more.
Besides fishing there were other sources of good food; mussels, crayfish, mushrooms and blackberries in season as well.
Long before land-yachts were even thought of, cousin Holland Allely, a keen yachtsman designed and built a triangular-shaped contraption with a sail which we ran up and down the hard sand when the tide was out.. Two push-bike wheels in the front and a small flat wheel at the back for steering
The Anawhata days, especially “Little Brown Owl” days hold so many memories that a whole book would have to be written to contain even a fraction. Visitors were always welcome; we were the first to meet people as they came down the hill and there was always a “cuppa” offered. Of course visitors or campers arriving usually had fresh buns or cakes which we graciously shared.
Once “Little Brown Owl” was built, we were privileged to be able to drive down to Parker’s house which made it so much easier and less distance to carry our belongings. Prior to that our cars were parked at the top of the hill and we had to carry everything down. We thought nothing of three or four loads one after the other - it was hard work, a large piquau on our back, a sack of potatoes on top and something in our hands! We were hardened to it and we did it willingly.
After we were married and had children, Gwen would spend most of the six weeks Christmas holidays at the beach with the children and after my two weeks holiday were over I would go back to work, returning each week-end. Many and varied were the ways of getting there. We did not have a car. A number of times when I had a lot of provisions to carry, the best way was to push-bike all the way, a few times I would meet up with Mr & Mrs Scrivner who were in town shopping and obtained a ride with them and a couple of times I had a ride with John Ansell who lived at Waiatarua to the beginning of the Anawhata road. Despite stringent petrol rationing he would take me the extra distance but it was still a long walk from there to the beach with a heavy pack. A couple of times, when all else failed, I took the 3pm bus to Titirangi and walked all the way from there, arriving long after dark.
Returning home on Sunday nights was usually OK as I could line up somebody returning for a lift. Of course if I had biked out I had to bike back home again. Hitch-hiking was not an accepted thing in those days and I was never offered a lift in all the times I walked.
Upon arrival at the beach I was naturally very welcome - I had fresh supplies for the following week and I always tried to include some little cakes or other goodies as a treat also bread, butter, tomatoes and fresh milk, etc. Unfortunately ice cream would not last during the long journey.
Fishing in those days was good. Off at day-break to either Keyhole or Flat Rock, according to the stage of the tide, then back again before breakfast with sufficient fresh fish for everyone. The smell of our breakfast fish frying still lingers in my memory; and maybe there could be a few spuds over from the night before to make chips.
For a real fishing expedition or crayfishing it was Fisherman’s or Pearson’s far to the left, almost to White’s Beach, or to Cannibal’s Creek which was quite dangerous to get to.
There were plenty of mussels and paua also sea-eggs (Kina) which we didn’t touch.
When we swam, we all swam together at the same time for safety reasons and we never ever had any trouble. We knew the Coast and respected it. We read the waves and were always on the look-out for the “big ones”. If it was rough, Dad would stand watch while we all swam.
Knowing the Coast as I did, I personally took part in a number of searches when somebody had drowned at Piha or elsewhere down the Coast but, knowing the Coast as I did, I stressed that the current off Anawhata was a deep one and further out in a northerly direction and to expect to find what they were looking for at Maori Bay or the southern end of Te Henga in so many days after the drowning. Surface drift did bring in odd bits of dunnage from ships and once, after the Piha surf-boat had capsised the broken oars from the boat arrived on our beach.
In the very
early days, up until the late 1930’s Mobbs had mules and donkeys to pull his
sledges. I can only
just remember the mules running free but the donkeys were for many years, even
well after we were married, tame enough to ride on.
Oh how I wish that I could spend some more time there to relive those wonderful days but the reality of it is a physical impossibility so I will just have to indulge myself as often as I wish with my precious memories. And the other equally impossible wish would be for our children, especially our grandchildren to gain some practical experiences of what it was like for me.
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