The cache site marks the point of the Southern limit of the
Seventy Mile Bush that stretched all the way to the Takapu Plains.
Known to Maori as Tapere-nui-a-Whatonga, this forest stretched 70
miles from the Wairarapa to Hawke’s Bay.
A key part of Vogel’s immigration and public works plans was to
establish Scandinavian settlements along surveyed road and rail
lines though the bush. So in 1871 the New Zealand government sent
Swedish settler Bror Erik Friberg to recruit in Norway and Sweden.
Agents like Friberg offered subsidised passage and 40 acres of land
at £1 per acre, all of which could be paid off by working on road
and rail construction.
In May 1872 the ship Høvding left Christiania (Oslo) for Napier
with 365 Norwegians and 11 Danes. Meanwhile in London, the Ballarat
(with 71 Danes aboard) also set sail for Napier.
By 1872 the government-named Scandinavian towns of Norsewood and
Dannevirke were surveyed. Dannevirke’s plans show evocative street
names such as Gertrude, Dagmar, Christian and Hamlet. But these
roads existed on paper only and the young immigrant families
arrived to an expanse of dense forest.
As farms were drawn by ballot, nationalities were mixed throughout
the region, although there were concentrations of Norwegians in
Norsewood and Danes in Dannevirke.
Families often shared crude punga and totara bark houses while
‘slabs-hus’ (slab huts) were built. Men laboured on roads and
railways, often living away from home to pay debts. Women and
children remained in rough forest homes growing cabbages, potatoes
and carrots among the tree stumps. Fever claimed seven lives by
January 1873.
When the 1880s depression hit, some unemployed men felt betrayed
by a government that had promised them work. Bushfires helped clear
the felled forest but many houses, barns and fences also went up in
smoke. In 1888 a massive bushfire razed Norsewood and threatened to
do the same to Ormondville until a timely thunderstorm extinguished
it. During the 1880s the railway slowly progressed through the
bush. Sawmilling began, and tree by tree the land was cleared to
become productive farmland.
The cache a small camo 100ml pill container cotaining a Logbook
and pencil only. Please only sign
name and date only