# Charleston: Its Rise and Decline/Chapter 2

Chapter II.
CONSTANT BAY—THE PORT OF CHARLESTON.
THE port of Charleston was Constant Bay, a small inlet lying about a mile to the south of the Nile River mouth; an insignificant little bay whose existence was unknown to white men until gold was found upon the ancient leads adjoining it.
Mariners with experience of the seven seas viewed this South-West Coast with distrust; its reputation was known to all, and the ships that passed by day and night gave it a wide berth; it looked better from a distance. In all likelihood, eye of man excepting Maori, Tasman or Cook, had not until then viewed its narrow entrance. Tasman may have given it a casual glance as he sailed past on the 13th December, 1642, for his log shows that after sighting land (the hills between Okarito and Hokitika) he stood close in and ran along the coast within easy distance of the breakers, the weather being very calm. If he did give such a glance he little thought that behind it lay treasure such as he had been directed to seek—a land flowing, not with milk and honey, but with gold. However, no blame to him; it was not until he had been dead for about two hundred years that anyone else thought of seeking there for gold.
The bay was declared the port of Charleston by proclamation on 9th October, 1869, and defined as being “a circle of one nautical mile from the flagstaff,” though not before several vessels had ventured into it, and at least one had rued the day that she did.
The flagstaff and signalman’s cottage were upon the rocky point locally known as Flagstaff Hill, referred to in the ​Gazette as “the north point,” which separates Constant Bay from Second Bay. The latter was also known as Joyce’s Bay, owing to a family of that name having occupied a flat space near to its entrance. Second Bay, bounded on its northern side by Point Robertson, sometimes referred to as Charleston Head, was not navigable.
A fairly large cleft in the rocks of Flagstaff Hill, with a tiny beach, was known as Ladies’ Bay, because by convention it was reserved for women bathers. This, and a small bay just south of Constant Bay, and called Doctor’s Bay, were the town’s bathing places. It is said that Doctor’s Bay was so called because a doctor had been drowned there. Second Bay was the men’s swimming place, and several lives were lost there; one being D. Sanderson, a Shetlander, on 30th January, 1869, and another the Rev. W. D. Rusz, on 8th April, 1873. On 1st May, 1869, at a meeting held in the Wellington Hotel on Constant Quay, Mr. George Miall, of Deep Lead, was presented with a gold ring in recognition of his daring in the recovery of the body of Mr. Sanderson.
Apparently in the earliest days of Charleston, sea-borne supplies were landed at Little Beach as well as at Constant Bay, for in 1867, Mr. John Blackett, Provincial Engineer, in a departmental report stated: “There are two landing-places here; one in Constant Bay immediately in front of the town which is laid out on ground rising from the bay, and one a little to the north, not far from the river mouth. Constant Bay is composed of a small circular sandy beach, to which access is gained by a channel between high shelving rocks, about sixty feet wide and several chains in length, making the entrance at any time a critical proceeding and, when there is any sea, highly dangerous. The other landing is merely a piece of open beach, marked off by signal staffs which denote the best course to vessels entering. A tramway is now in course of construction by Mr. Nees, from the second described landing-place to the diggings.” Enquiries have failed to find any record of this tramway, but probably it connected with the tramway that, it is known, Mr. Nees constructed from the Nile bridge to Darkie’s Terrace Road, behind the Camp Reserve.
—By courtesy of Dr. F. A. Bett.
Thomas Alfred Sneyd Kynnersley Chief Warden and Commissioner of Nelson and Westland.
The Gazette notice informed mariners that: “A flagstaff at Constant Bay, Pakihi, has been erected on the North Point, where the following signals will be shown:—Red flag at masthead—boats can enter; blue flag at masthead—low water, wait for tide; white flag—entrance dangerous, surf too heavy for boats.”
On 14th August, 1868, notification was made by Commissioner Kynnersley that “on and after the 1st September the new code of bar and danger signals will be used at the Signal-stations of Westport and Charleston,” and in that month a new Signal-station at Constant Bay was built by the Government, the contractors being Charles Craddock and party. The difference in signalling was mainly the substitution of balls for flags.
Although the “Port of Charleston” was not gazetted until 9th October, 1869, Captain Beveridge was (Nelson Gazette) appointed Harbourmaster “at Constant Bay” on 23rd January, 1868, and was, by notice in the New Zealand Gazette, appointed Harbourmaster at “the Port of Charleston” on 29th June, 1868. However, he had been acting in that capacity during a portion of 1867; and had been preceded by Messrs. Salter and Collinson as signalmen, but which of the latter was the earlier is not clear. Captain Beveridge had previously been master of the schooner Salopian, of Dunedin. The Harbourmaster’s salary was fixed at £240 per annum, with an additional £48 for acting as “Customs Court Waiter.”
Neither then nor after was the port provided with either mooring or wharfage facilities beyond heavy ring-bolts set into the rocks at either side and into a large rock at the centre of the beach, for securing ships’ lines. These ring-bolts were provided in 1869, the Provincial Council’s Appropriations, 1869-1870, showing an item of £400 for the purpose, and the estimates a sum of £200 for “removing a rock.” Now, nearly three-quarters of a century later, these ring-bolts remain, rusted and thinned, the sole memento of Charleston’s shipping days.
Vessels moored and anchored in the bay as best they ​might; they ran upon the beach, and were unloaded into vehicles when the tide receded. A number of surf-boats was at all times, from 1867 onwards, available for assisting in mooring, unmooring, or towing vessels. These boats were privately owned and controlled. The charge for such services, or for tendering vessels outside, was ten shillings per ton, but whether computed on the tonnage handled or upon the registered tonnage of the vessels, is not stated.
In 1868, the Charleston Surf Boat Company operated, also Craddock & Company; and in 1869 the Albion Surf Boat Company. It was notified that inward-bound vessels requiring a surf-boat “must hoist a flag at the main mast.”
It is generally accepted that Charleston was named after Captain Charles Bonner, master of the ketch Constant, the first vessel to enter the bay (1866) and to trade regularly there in the settlement’s earliest days. The place became known as Charlie’s Town, then as Charles Town, and the latter name apparently was accepted by Mr. Greenwood when he made the first survey in 1866-1867, but was amended by him to Charleston.
The Constant was then owned by Reuben Waite, one of the first, if not the first, of the white settlers on the South West Coast, a trader and merchant operating from the Buller to the Grey. He gave to Constant Bay the name of the little vessel in which he first visited there. She was of 13 tons and carried a crew of three, was registered at Hobart Town, and built in 1863. She was totally wrecked on the Grey bar, 24th August, 1870, with the loss of two lives, Peter Shields and James Kern. The master, then John Pascoe, was the only survivor. He was part-owner of the vessel, with John Haye, of Charleston and Christchurch. Both vessel and cargo were uninsured. The ketch was valued at £200. In 1868 she was owned by McDonald Bros., then by E. Suisted, of Westport, who sold to John Haye, on 10th April, 1869.
It was with mixed feelings that men and women first viewed Charleston, their future home-place. Some experienced a faint dismay, it seemed ultima thule; others felt satisfaction, it was a waste to be converted into a land of plenty. Others again, viewed it with mild indifference as a place where a ​fortune might, or might not, await them—if not, they would seek one elsewhere.
The scenes of those first few months of settlement can only be surmised; no participant lives to tell of them, and none has written of them. To-day imagination fails to recreate the atmosphere or picture the drama. One thought occupied all minds, talk had but one topic, gold; gold that meant the fulfilment of many day-dreams, a life of ease, a home in the land of birth, maybe to be shared with one already selected; and much else.
Strangely, no thought was given to the possible existence of hostile natives. This unconcern was justified; no Maoris lived about Charleston either then or later, their nearest village being at Tauranga Bay.
About 1834 Niho and Takerei passed over the pakihi which was eventually the site of Charleston, and rumour has it that human bones have been found along their track, but no clash between Maori and white settler ever occurred on the South-West Coast.
Close to Constant Bay, on its southern side, is Ussher’s Rock, a jutting crag from which a well-known musician of that name lost his life while fishing. To the north of Second Bay, on Point Robertson, were the “Fishing Rocks” or “Cod Rocks,” ledges in the cliffs, from which many fished, and from which several lost their lives; Mr. P. Kilmartin being one of the latter. The fish caught were mostly red cod.
Like other coastal towns of mushroom growth with access to the sea, such as Westport, Greymouth and Hokitika, the first settlement at Charleston was about its port, the bay. On the first survey plan the numbering of sections started from there, those close to the beach and on the flat above it being from 1 to 102, the distinction of holding No. 1 falling to Charles Craddock. Apparently Darkie’s Terrace Road and the old Buller Road were not at first much occupied, as no section numbers were allotted to them on this plan. Later, both were closely occupied. Before long the centre of the town was in Prince’s Street East, then called Main Street, in Camp Street, and in Rotten Row then called Coal Street. A road, Prince’s Street West, the bay end of which was called ​Beach Street, or The Cutting, ran from Rotten Row to Constant Quay; this is now an almost impenetrable mass of gorse and thicket-growth, a melancholy sight to those who remember it as a busy thoroughfare. The Charleston Argus of 4th May, 1867, stated “the old township . . . below the cutting in Coal Street, and around the bay, continues almost in the same state of six months back, and it is only on rising the terrace to gain the extensive plateau, that the new and important portion of the town is seen.”
Constant Bay was not a haven for shipping nor a refuge from storms, but a rock-bound inlet open to the heavy swells and rollers of the South Tasman Sea, with little shelter from its gales. Its shallow waters, narrow entrance, bar and rocks, made it a risky riding-place where not a few craft came to grief.
An early-day official described it as “a picturesque cleft in the rocks, shaped like a spoon, a narrow channel seventy to eighty feet wide that ran for some distance into the rocks and then opened out into a round bay.” Mr. Blackett, Provincial Engineer, did not deem it a harbour, but in his report of 1867 referred to it as a “landing-place.” It was at first called Constant Cove.
The Charleston Argus of 13th March, 1867, stated that on that date two steamers, the Halcyon and the Tasmanian Maid, also the schooner Emma Jane and a ketch, were outside the bar, unable to enter the bay owing to the heavy sea. The surf-boats were unable to venture out to tow or tender the vessels. The Emma Jane attempted to enter, nearly went on the rocks, and was lucky in being able to beat to sea again. The others left for elsewhere without landing passengers or cargoes. The same newspaper on 10th April, 1867, recorded that six vessels were lying at anchor in the offing, but heavy seas had, for three days, prevented any from entering the bay, nor could the surf-boats venture out for towing.
On 11th May, 1867, this newspaper stated “all matters in connection with shipping here have been at an entire standstill during the week, gales and heavy surf having sealed up the entrance to the bay, which during the past two or three days has presented one sheet of foam.” Some of the shipping ​and surf-boat disasters are referred to in another chapter.
When the Government constituted Constant Bay a port, its control was vested in Commissioner Kynnersley who exercised his powers through the Warden of the District. It is not clear what port dues and other charges were imposed, but such revenue was received, and expenses met, by the Provincial Council. To face journeys in the little coastal craft of those days called for courage and determination. Many passengers, especially women, after a few hours aboard cared little whether the vessel carried on or went down, and so ended their sufferings.
The second and last Harbourmaster gazetted was Captain David Cunningham, appointed on 24th November, 1869, at a salary of £400 per year, but his period of service is not on record, though as the Council’s appropriation for this item in the financial year was only £192, it is assumed that he served about half of it. Thereafter the duties of signalling and piloting were undertaken by the crew of the principal surf-boat, in charge of James Parsons, who had with him John McHerron, Alfred Leggatt, and another, probably Jack Spiers or Jack Grant. When Parsons relinquished the position, it was assumed by Charles Craddock (1873) who had as a crew George Hurburgh, Alfred Leggatt, and James Tier. The latter was a survivor of the wreck of the General Grant on the Auckland Islands on 13th May, 1866. Craddock lost his life while assisting at the wreck of the Shepherdess on 16th September, 1879, and was succeeded by his mate, Hurburgh.
The Provincial Council continued to make grants for “Harbourmaster and Signalman at Charleston” during the years 1871 to 1875, recognising that the surf-boat crews were performing the duties. The votes were from £100 to £120 per annum.
Owing to the unfavourable conditions at the port, freights were high and insurance almost unprocurable. It has been said that shipowners fixed their charges to include the values of their vessels, to cover damage or loss; yet, for a time, the port was busy; although risks were many and working costly, profits were large and the district flush with money.
​It is stated that upon one occasion eight or nine vessels lay in the bay at one time, but no record of a greater number than seven can be found, nor is it easy to imagine more possible; that even seven could do so is a source of wonder. The Charleston Argus of 29th May, 1867, records that six sailing vessels and one steamer (the Bruce) arrived at Constant Bay during one day; whether other earlier arrivals were also there is not stated. This newspaper had, on 4th May, 1867, stated that “upwards of two hundred vessels have visited Constant Bay during the past seven months.” On Friday, 8th November, 1867, The Charleston Herald showed six vessels as “arrived”; the Flying Squirrel, Elizabeth, Hope, Ann, Constant and Louisa; and two “departed,” the Jane Ann and the Flora McDonald. These, however, represented the shipping since the newspaper’s previous issue, Tuesday 5th. How many were in the bay at the same time cannot be surmised; but eight vessels used the port during the three days. On 28th May, 1868, there were four vessels in harbour, viz., the schooners Nile, Fairy, Fancy, and the ketch Endeavour. On 14th March, 1868, three vessels, the S.S. Waipara, the schooner Standard, and the ketch Constant, arrived at the bay and left again the same day. On 22nd June, 1868, the surf-boats towed in five vessels “one after the other”—the Constant, Harry Bluff, Ann, Joseph Paul, and Standard.
In June, 1868, the Provincial Council received a report from the Harbourmaster of Constant Bay which expressed the opinion that “to make Charleston a good harbour would require dock-gates across the entrance, or large swinging booms might be the means of breaking the heavy seas.” An irreverent member of the Council referred to Constant Bay as “The hole in the wall.”
During the same month Mr. Donne moved “That His Honour the Superintendent be requested to take the requisite steps to get Charleston made a port of entry and a warehousing port.” The Provincial Secretary stated that the Government opposed the motion, “because Charleston was not a port.” He suggested that Mr. Donne should have worded the motion differently, and have requested money to make a port. He had heard one Honourable Member declare that he had walked ​over the so-called harbour. Although the Council adopted the motion, the request was not granted. However, shipping trade flourished as long as road traffic was limited to the Beach-route, but from the completion of the Addison’s Flat Road (1874) the covered-wagons entered into greater competition, and port trade languished.
Constant Bay and Second Bay, when the first arrivals beheld them, formed a scene of pristine loveliness—the scenic beauty for which the Coast is famed. Blue waters, bounded upon one side by a rugged coast, and on the other by the cliffs of Point Robertson, with green forest extending to the sea edge save where the two white beaches glistened in the sunshine—a cheering welcome and smiling invitation to the newcomers, a promise of pleasant things. This beauty was soon despoiled by man in his feverish search for gold. The poet may exclaim
“A bitter price to pay Is this for progress—beauty swept away,”
but fortune-hunters are material-minded and do not see with poets’ eyes.
Soon the forest was converted into planks and fuel; the face of the country pockmarked by sluicing claims; while there sprang up shelters, huts, and business premises; and Nature’s quiet was broken by the sounds of industry. The most promising spots were annexed with scant consideration to the planning of a town; claims were staked wherever gold lay thickest. The town must take such spaces as were left.
Fortunately, a sufficient portion was left unsought, and upon this unwanted area, Mr. Greenwood laid out the township. Thus Charleston attained a semblance of order lacking in some other goldfield towns, which consisted of intermixed workings and buildings scattered about without thought of plan. The beaches of the bay were never worked for gold, as were Little Beach and Nine-mile Beach; although in June of 1868 a party erected a “box” on Constant Bay beach for “combing,” and proved it unprofitable.
Shallow as Constant Bay originally was, the years saw it gradually silting up, due to the immense quantity of tailings carried into it from the scores of sluices on the Town Lead. ​To-day there is scarcely space wherein a vessel could ride.
In 1870, Warden Broad reported, “ground sluicing is fast filling up Charleston’s harbour with tailings, and will probably before long render it impossible for vessels to enter it.” Another report stated: “A difficulty in the mode of discharging tailings which, owing to the extensive nature of ground-sluicing operations carried on, are of very great quantity, and have already silted up the harbour to a very great extent, and in another place have covered the main road and threaten still further injury.” Also in 1870, the District Engineer reported, “the tailings running into the harbour have been filling it rapidly, especially raising the level of the beach at high-water mark; the rocks which were proposed to be removed last year are now nearly buried up.” Reference to the illustration of the bay, about 1924, will show how well-grounded these fears were.
No vessel has entered the bay since the Shepherdess in September, 1879, and for some time prior to that the port had failed to attract regular shipping; probably the only visitor being the Wild Wave, which narrowly escaped remaining there. Nevertheless, The Charleston Herald, loyal to the last, continued its shipping column:
Port of Charleston.
In 1874 the Nile bridge was carried away by a flood, and the town was left dependent, or nearly so, upon such supplies as could be brought by road and be ferried across the river. Consideration was then given to the possibility of regular seaborne trade by way of the Nile, which was a shallow stream with a tidal basin. Its mouth was narrow, with a nasty bar and a bad approach, while the entrance to the basin was through a slit or cleft so narrow that the overhanging branches of trees were but a few yards apart. The Nelson Handbook of 1874 speaks of this river-port as being: “Immediately north of Point Robertson, with about six or seven feet of water at its mouth at Spring Tides. It is seldom used by vessels, although it is ​perfectly safe when once inside.” The last remark is much like damning it with faint praise, yet is more than could have been said of Constant Bay.
As early as 1869 effort was made to form a company to provide a suitable steamer for the Westport-Charleston-Brighton trade. Meetings were held and Committees appointed in each of these towns. The Committee for Charleston was Messrs. Dwan, Allen, Bridson, Neale, and Hunter. The effort was unsuccessful.
About 1874 Captain Samuel John Riley, owner of the 13-ton P.S. Result, essayed the working of the Nile River, and being successful, his little boat became a regular trader there, and continued to be until replaced by a larger steamer, the Nile, also owned by Captain Riley, about 1887. Both the Result and the Nile were built for the firm of Riley and Seaton, of Westport.
In April of 1880 the prospectus was advertised of the “Result Steamship Company Limited,” the registered office of which was to be at Charleston. Its objects were—(1) the purchase of the paddle steamer Result of 13 tons and 18 horse-power; the Result wharf and store at Charleston, and the store at Westport; from Captain Riley, for £2,000; (2) to open and maintain steam carrying trade between the ports of Charleston, Westport, Brighton and Karamea.
Alonzo W. Dwan was the advertiser. Flotation was not effected, and Captain Riley carried on.
The Result, when taken off the Nile River trade, lay in the Buller lagoon for some years, being then purchased by Sang Bros., who ran her (as a sailing vessel) in and about Nelson Bay where eventually she was wrecked. This little steamer is not to be confused with her namesake, a fishing trawler that foundered in Port Ahuriri on Christmas Day, 1931.
The Nile was imported in parts and assembled at Westport in 1887. She was a paddle steamer, being fitted with the engines and paddles from the Result. Her parts were built by Messrs. Cran & Co., of Leith, to a design supplied by Mr. Waters, Engineer to the Westport Coal Company. After leaving the Nile River, the Nile went to Port Chalmers, where ​she was converted into a screw steamer. Later she was purchased by the Karamea Dairy Company, and served them for several years. To-day she is a fishing trawler working from Greymouth.
The first wharf or jetty on the Nile River was on the south side, just below the bridge, but later this was abandoned and another built on the northern bank, nearer to the river mouth, where deeper water was obtainable. The basin was, like Constant Bay, suffering from the tailings carried into it; both Darkie’s Creek and the river itself being sludge channels.
The Signalman for the Nile River was Henry Small, whose cottage stood beside the road close to Little Beach. The tiny beach within the basin was called Small’s Beach, because of his control of this harbour.
After the Nile deserted the river, a little steamer, the Karamea, made occasional trips to secure loads of railway sleepers, but for many years past the river has had no keel across its bar.
Two matters which cause conjecture and which enquiries have failed to elucidate are—(1) In the Provincial Council Estimates of June, 1867, was an item of £240 for “Harbourmaster at Constant Bay and the Nile.” Was there shipping at the Nile before about 1874? It is believed not. (2) In 1870 the Provincial Council made a grant of £85/5/10 for “repairs to jetty at Charleston.” So far as is known there was never a jetty at Constant Bay, nor a jetty at Nile prior to about 1874. In the Provincial Council, on 25th June, 1867, a motion (probably on the representation of Mr. Nees) to provide wharfage accommodation at Charleston, was negatived.
In fairly recent years there was talk of erecting a Meteorological Observatory on Flagstaff Hill, but as yet no such step has been taken.