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Foxton
1886–1890
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10 June 1886
The sound of deep rumbling and the house shaking in the middle of the night woke Daniel from a deep sleep. Minor earthquakes were not uncommon and could rattle the teacups and more on occasions, but his instinct told him this was something bigger.
Emma stirred beside him, and then sat bolt upright. “Shall I get the children?” she asked, halfway out of bed and lighting the candle she kept on the bedside table. Daniel checked his fob watch: two-thirty.
“No. Leave them be if they are still asleep. I don’t think this is close by, but it feels big.”
Emma took the candle to check on the children and found both of them sound asleep. Returning to bed, she pulled the handmade patchwork quilt up to her neck to keep out the cold winter air.
“What’s happening?” Emma placed her hands over her stomach where their next child was growing.
Daniel propped himself up on the pillow beside her. “Not sure. An earthquake somewhere, but it’s deep so I don’t think it will bother us.” He hoped his words would reassure her but there would be no sleep for either of them listening to the rumbling and feeling the tremors travelling underground.
To pass the time they talked about the latest letter from Elizabeth.
“How do you feel about your mama passing?” asked Emma. She knew how bad she’d been when her mother had died, but Daniel had said little. The letter had taken more than six months to arrive, and they learnt that Sarah Winter had died peacefully in her sleep in Chesterfield, in the care of her daughter, Elizabeth, September last.
“Not sure. It seems strange that life carries on regardless. I haven’t seen her in over twenty years. It’s almost like she’s another person; but even so, mothers are special beings to their children. Just as you are to our children, my Liebling.”
After a restless night they rose with the dawn.
* * *
Several days passed before the whole story of the earthquake was known. The newspapers were filled with an account of a vast volcanic eruption to the east. Mt Tarawera had exploded. Mud, ash and steam had been seen spewing from the dome, with red-hot molten scoria pouring down the mountainside, burying many villages, as well as the world-famous Pink and White Terraces. The rumour of a ghost waka gliding across the misty waters of the lake warning people away not long before the eruption soon spread. Flags flew at half-mast, and people wore black armbands at the shocking loss of life.
Reporters estimated that the resulting plume of ash, which could be seen across a great distance, had risen six or seven miles in the air. Mud from the eruption was dropped miles away from the site. Despite warnings about the danger, they read that people were flocking to the area to see the devastation for themselves. They went to take photos, to be part of the desolation, to have stories to tell their children and grandchildren.
For Daniel and Emma the eruption had little effect and life continued much as it had until December, when William made his entry into the world, providing Daniel with a second son.
1887
Daniel held the letter in his hand, staring at it while he thought about what it would mean to Emma. Like him, she rarely heard from her family, but when she did it often meant bad news. Her father getting married again wasn’t all that bad, but it wasn’t good news either.
“How do you feel about this?” Daniel sat at the table watching her knead the bread dough.
“I hate it.”
“Thought you might. But can you explain why?”
“She’s foreign for a start. What sort of name is Lukaschewski?”
“Whoa on, there! You can’t hold that against her. Many people here and around Halcombe are ‘foreign’ – as you call her. We all are, if you want to think about it. We are all from somewhere else.” Daniel pulled the tobacco tin towards him and started to roll a cigarette.
“That’s not what I mean.” Emma thumped the bread dough on the table in frustration. “I mean ... I mean, she isn’t Prussian like us.”
“How do you know? And you said your father came from Bohemia,” he reminded her. “Where do you think she is from?”
“I don’t know. Poland, I would guess.”
“But do you know for certain?” asked Daniel, lighting his cigarette.
“No.”
“Does it matter? What would you say if she was German?” Daniel put forward another argument hoping to ease her anger.
Emma’s voice held a bitter edge. “German or not, it matters. I think not German, so, yes, it matters.”
“So, what other reason do you have for not liking the fact your father has remarried?”
“He should have stayed loyal to Mama and her memory. It’s only been four years.”
“Ah. Yes. Loyalty. Strange thing, loyalty. Means different things to different people. But he has been a man on his own trying to bring up young children. And what about young Bill? What’s he now? Five?” Daniel hazarded a guess. Putting one foot up on the other knee he sat back savouring the taste of the tobacco.
“No. You are wrong. He is much older. Our Charlie is three and little William a few months already. Let me think ... Heinrich, um Henry, would be a man now, twenty-three I think, so Fred about fifteen then, and Clara twelve. William must be nine. They don’t need a new mama.” Emma was defiant.
“But how do you know? You only hear from them when something has changed. You don’t know what they think or how they feel. What about Clara? Doesn’t she need a mother figure?”
“No. I know what it feels like to be a young girl. I know ... oh, why are you tormenting me like this? Why are you taking his side?” Emma’s cheeks flared red as she thumped the bread again.
“I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m just trying to make you see another side. To see logic.” He stubbed out his cigarette.
“I don’t want to see logic. There’s nothing I can do about it, and there’s nothing I can do to help. But I don’t think it’s right and I never will,” she said, stubbornly sticking by her unexplainable gut feeling.
Daniel didn’t pursue the matter, but he agreed with her. Having done some asking around at the pub he had found his father-in-law’s new wife was an older woman with a couple of sons who had a reputation for being rather wild. He, too, was worried.
He watched Emma move around the kitchen doing chores, banging pots and pans and kneading the new batch of bread dough with a vengeance. Anger had put colour into her cheeks, and she looked fetching. He wanted her as much as on their first day. Getting up from his chair he moved behind her and put his arms around her waist, kissing the side of her neck.
Giggling and arching her neck, she smiled. “Behave. I’m busy.” She put the back of her floury hand up to his face. “The children will see.”
He continued nuzzling at her neck, making her laugh. “William is asleep, you told me so yourself, and Lizzie and Charlie are playing outside. They won’t know.”
“But it’s daylight,” she half-heartedly protested, continuing with her work as best she could.
“Yes, it is.” He loved it when she was like this, hesitant but not opposed. It made him feel strong, loved, admired – and seriously aroused. His kisses became more earnest.
She nudged him to one side. “Let me put this bread in the oven.”
Daniel stepped back, letting her pass between him and the table, only for her to find his hand moving up the back of her leg as she bent to open the oven door. She shrieked, slammed the door shut and jumped up all in one movement, falling straight into his arms. Throwing her arms around his neck, she responded to his kisses as their ardour increased. As one they shuffled along the hallway, kissing and loosening clothing as they went to collapse on the iron-framed bed in their room, stifling giggles so as not to attract any attention from the children.
Their lovemaking was urgent and completed without any of the usual preliminaries and tenderness that normally accompanied their unions. It felt right on this occasion.
With her arms around his neck and his head inches from her own, Emma examined his face: every line, every wrinkle, every expression a product of his life. “I love you, Charlie Adin.”
“And I love you, my Emma, mein Liebling. That is all you have to think about.”
1888
On this mild spring day, the funeral of Captain Francis Robinson was the largest the town had ever seen. The townsfolk appraised with sombre pleasure the accoutrements of status: the black hearse with its shiny panelling, two black horses, their dark, feathered plumes nodding with each prancing step as the hearse made its way up Main Street towards the cemetery.
As the cortège passed, the men removed their hats as a mark of respect, while the women bowed their heads, taking the opportunity to inspect one another’s dresses out of the corner of their eye. The keening of the Maori women, their heads swathed with green garlands, rose in the air like a prayer. Daniel and Emma stood amongst the silent crowd.
“He were a great man,” whispered Daniel. “He’ll be sorely missed, I can tell you. He kept to himself and was quiet spoken, like, but no one else has done so much for this town. Generous to a fault, he was.”
Emma nodded in agreement. “I remember Annie telling me about him. At least he’s seen his time. He was eighty-two. Maybe his boys will carry on. Look at them all following along behind. Doesn’t it make you proud to see so many of them? Six sons and four daughters – my, that is a family.”
“Yes, yes.” Daniel was impatient, not wanting to be distracted from what he was going to say. “He gave me my first job, remember? Digging ditches at the side of the road.”
“But you’re your own man now, contracting and all.” Emma looked at him quizzically.
“Yes, but he were the first. I owe him a debt of thanks. He were a favourite among the local Maoris and all. Look at them. Turned out in force they have.”
Emma strained to see over the heads of people in front of her. “I knew there were a lot of them living hereabouts, but I’ve never seen so many either. Is it safe?”
“Of course it is, silly. These people aren’t the rebels. They are working folk, just like me.”
Emma noticed an unusual object through the hearse windows. “Why have they placed that lump of green stone on his coffin?”
“That’s a mark of their respect. It’s a great tribute. Greenstone is highly valued, so to give it away is the highest honour they can bestow.” Daniel was mesmerised and in a world of his own following the hearse with his eyes.
Six-year-old Lizzie and four-year-old Charlie were restless, and baby William grizzled. Lizzie danced up and down on the spot, while young Chas was stirring up the dust making patterns with his fingers. Their antics drew Daniel’s attention from the funeral.
His patience snapped. “Enough, you two. Show some respect.” He pulled Chas to his feet and laid a heavy hand on Lizzie’s shoulder. “Stand there and don’t move.”
Emma tried to shush William from his whimpering.
Daniel glared at her, his eyes accusing. “I want to pay my respects in peace and quiet. If you can’t keep them still, then you should take them home.”
Nonchalant in the wake of his bad mood, Emma was not in the least put out. “Yes, Charlie, I will. You go ahead and see the burial without me. I’ll see you at home when it’s over.”
People started to fall in behind the hearse to walk with the cortège.
“Righto. I need to see Jock about that horse of his and might call into the hotel on the way home. I’ll be back for my dinner.”
“Make sure you are. I don’t want to come looking for you again. And I will, be sure of it.”
Wondering how the tables had turned on him, he replied, “Yes, yes, a’right. I’ll be home.”
Daniel walked briskly to catch up with the tail end of the procession, turning once to watch Emma and the children fading into the distance, disconcerted by her emphatic tone. As she matured, she was the one who was becoming the dominant force in the family, she who decided what would happen and when – a woman, still in her twenties, who was already showing how strong she could be. He wasn’t sure he liked it.
1889
‘A Narrow Escape’ read the headline in the local Manawatu Herald on 15th January. Young Charlie had fallen in the river and nearly drowned. Daniel threw the paper down in disgust. They might not have mentioned him by name, but everybody in town knew who it was.
The river was known to be treacherous, but the boy had ignored his mother’s warnings. Emma’s screams brought young Alex Langley, one of the mill hands, running. But, in the end, he also got into trouble too, and the police constable helped them both out of the water.
The paper detailed everything they could about the whole event. “Embarrassing me, they are,” he muttered, knowing he’d not been at home and only heard what had happened much later.
Nevertheless, he had to admit he was content, overall. Unlike many who had suffered during the long depression, he had been one of the lucky ones contracted to the newly formed Foxton Borough Council. At least he could pay his bills and put food on the table. He’d even managed to provide work for a few men and contribute to helping that Irish fellow, Parnell, in his fight for justice for working-class people like him.
Looking back, he wondered what use it would be in New Zealand, but it was the principle that mattered. More and more as time passed, he reconsidered his time in the army. He regretted every minute. All I’ve done is help the leaders of the time put down ordinary people, to have control over them, their land and their rights. And for what? Maybe the natives are different, but they only want to live their life undisturbed. Just like me.
Listening to Emma’s views on war over the years, he had become more open-minded than most. He knew that from his mates. He’d argued this point over many a pint with them, and sometimes things got quite heated.
Sitting at the table while Emma cleared away the dinner plates and made a cup of tea, he talked through his concerns.
“I know most people considered the natives hostile and the country needed to be made safe for the new immigrants. But what if they’d treated them as normal people, like us? What if we’d bought the land fair and square instead of cheating them out of it, or just taking it, as sometimes happened? Wouldn’t that have meant better conditions for people arriving here anyway?”
Emma carried on making the tea. “That’s not the way it works, Charlie. And you know it. War has always been the way one country has controlled another, much as I hate it. Here’s no different.”
“Well, it should be.”
“Where has this all come from? Why are you defending the natives?” she asked, handing him his cup.
“I’m not.” Daniel was surprised at Emma’s attitude. “And I’m not even talking about them. I‘m talking about ordinary folk being able to go about their business without the bosses taking everything from them.”
Taking a sip of her tea, she took a moment to answer. “But that’s the way it’s always been. There are the bosses and there are the workers. We are the workers. What’s wrong with that?” Emma could be very pragmatic when it suited her.
“Everything!” Daniel banged his cup into the saucer. “That’s why I supported that Irish fella. He was against them English landlords what were never there, putting up rents and forcing hard-working people out of their homes and off their farms where they’d lived for centuries. It’s not right. It was cruel. Those people hadn’t done any harm. Just so the English could own some land and make money.”
Emma reached her hand across the table, placing it over his. “But that’s true of everywhere. That’s why we left Prussia. Remember? Peasants forced to fight each other, forced off their land so the wealthy could get richer. You know I hate war and fighting and killing as much as you – possibly more. Most people living here are runaways from persecution. And now there’s even more fighting than ever, from what you’ve told me.”
“I don’t know what is best. I’m just a simple man. But I want people to treat me well, respect my right to live peacefully, let me earn enough to live comfortably and feed my family, and not bother anyone else. Why can’t we all be like that? Why do we have to control people?”
As usual the discussion went nowhere, solved nothing. He never could reconcile his deep-seated resentment of the rich and wealthy with respect for the decisions and laws made by those so much cleverer than he.
1890
“Here’s to Samuel Parnell and the eight-hour working day,” toasted Harry Proctor. “Hip, hip, hooray!”
“Hooray,” echoed the group.
Daniel charged his schooner with the others and drank his ale.
Today was the 50th anniversary of that day when the Wellington carpenter, Samuel Parnell, had refused to work more than eight hours each day.
According to the papers, the trade unions had organised parades throughout the country pushing to have the eight-hour day made official. Most businesses, and all government offices were closed, even though the day hadn’t yet been declared a public holiday. Despite the heavy showers, Daniel and his mates had taken the train into Palmerston North to watch the procession.
Several trucks carrying tableaux of the various trades crept their way up the main street, their sodden banners and bunting flapping and cracking in the cold, howling wind. Any sound from the brass bands was fractured, and fragmented in the air. Soaked through, the friends decided to skip the planned sports and return to the Foxton pub.
“Ah, yes, this is what life is all about,” said Daniel, drinking from his tankard. “The wife and kids at home, money in my pocket and convivial company on a day when the workers have the better of the bosses.”
“Too right you are there, Charlie.” Tom raised his mug. “I’ll drink to that. Have we ever wet the head of that new kid of yours?”
“What? Young Henry. Yeah. Back in February when he were born. But we can always do it again.”
“So how many is that now?” asked George.
“Four. Not as many as your lot, though, Tom. Not yet, any road.”
“No, but six is a mighty handful, I can tell ye. Can I thank you again for what you did in getting the extension to my house done?”
“Will you stop with that now?” Daniel never did find out how Tom discovered he was the one who helped him, and was always embarrassed when Tom raised it. “Enough is enough. It were years ago.”
“Maybe so, but I’ll never forget it, my friend.” Tom tended to get emotional when he drank – much like Daniel.
“Here’s to young Henry,” toasted Harry. “How about another round, everyone?”
To which they all agreed.
“How’s your Mary, Harry?” asked Daniel.
“She’s big now and there’s still a couple of months to go.”
“Emma said to say hello. Pass on her good wishes, will you?”
“Righto. Thanks.”
Sitting back in his chair and crossing his ankles stretched out in front of him, Daniel raised the subject nagging at the back of mind. “Tell me, someone. Does anyone know what Fred Fohrmann is up to these days?”
“Him what’s your missus’s brother, do you mean?” George was curious.
“Yeah. He’s been around a bit lately. He comes down for the running races. He’s not bad either. Often wins, or at least places, and picks up the odd shilling here and there. Emma is pleased to see him, but I wonder what sort of company he was keeping these days.”
“Well, I hear tell he’s in cahoots with some fellows up around Bulls way who’re a bit wild. Foreign fellas. Funny name, something ‘ski’ I think. There’s been talk of a bit of rustling going on. They disappear up to Taranaki regular like, as I hear it.” George was happy to impart something Daniel didn’t know.
Daniel drained his glass. “Thanks. I’d heard something similar.” Changing the subject, he turned to Harry. “What’s the latest with those horses of your pa’s?”
Their shared love of horses and racing had bound them together for several years, and they often compared notes when deciding which horses to bet on. Their conversation distracted Daniel from his thoughts about Fred.
“That stallion of his is doing well.” Harry was proud of the stable his father ran. “He’s got five mares to foal and he’s hoping for some good progeny out of them.”
“How did that colt go down at Otaki?”
“Not bad. Came third. Didn’t pay much but he’s learning what’s expected now. Pa hopes to see a lot of improvement next season. He’s not going to push him now; the ground will be too hard for him soon.” Harry’s knowledge of horse training was almost as good as his father’s. “He’ll train up the little filly for the summer carnival.”
“I like that filly of his. Any chance of me buying her?”
“Sorry, Charlie. Not that one. Maybe her foal, if you’re lucky. Anyway, you couldn’t afford her.”
“Yeah. You’re right there. Emma wouldn’t have it anyway. Never mind. I’ll just stick to the odd flutter now and then. Drink up. I’ll buy you another.”
