Little Port Cooper #1

Now I move into jetty territory that I haven’t really explored, research-wise, before (Governors Bay and Teddington being home ground and already investigated). Also I wanted to visit the places I was researching/writing about and Little Port Cooper is a challenging visit – access only by sea or on foot. So two days ago Russ and I left the car at Te Pohue/ Camp Bay and walked the old pack track to the lonely schoolhouse at Little Port Cooper, just beneath Adderley Head, at the entrance to Whakaraupo/Lyttelton Harbour. Sam and Pete let out the schoolhouse as basic accommodation for trampers and those wanting a remote break in a stunning landscape (see Facebook page).

School house, Little Port Cooper (Jane Robertson, 2018)

Little Port Cooper (Jane Robertson, 2018)

I’m going to do two posts about Little Port Cooper since its history is so interesting – and surprisingly colourful if you only know it as the peaceful bay of today.

This first post isn’t about jetties as such but it is about the interface between land and sea and a total reliance on the sea to make a living, bring in essential supplies and save lives. The post draws heavily on Gordon Ogilvie’s Place names of Banks Peninsula and the Port Hills (Canterbury University Press, 2017) and his Banks Peninsula: Cradle of Canterbury (GP Publications, 1994). Also Mary Stapylton-Smith’s The Other End of the Harbour (Hazard Press, 1990) and Adderley to Bradley: A History of the Southern Bays of Lyttelton Harbour (Friends of Diamond Harbour Library, 2009).

Prior to European settlement, Little Port Cooper, known as Waitata (water beating down) was an outpost settlement for the Port Levy Māori. Adjacent Adderley Head was known as Toloa or Te Piaka (a hollow gourd). 

In the 1830s Waitata was home to the only whaling station on the north side of Banks Peninsula. The brig Bee, under the command of Captain George Hempleman, entered the harbour in February 1836. Hempleman took advantage of the shelter of Waitata to beach the Bee for repairs and to build a whaling boat. According to early settler James Hay, a baby was born to the Hemplemans on board the Bee.[1]

By the middle of July 1836 Hempleman had set up a tryworks and men’s accommodation on shore and a group of his men stayed in the bay for about eight months. A second shore works, operated by another whaler, was likely set up at much the same time. By the end of the year there were nine whaling ships using the bay as a base or refuge. Apparently Captain J.B. Cécille of the French corvette Héroïne set up an observatory at Waitata in July 1838. For a short time from 1839 a shore station was operated by Captain Swift of the Favourite while by 1844/5 the station owner was James Ames. 

There is no evidence that the whalers built a jetty of any sort. Rather they would anchor their boats off shore, beaching them only when repairs were necessary. I imagine Little Port Cooper (a name  introduced in 1849) was often a busy, noisy place with strong, weather-beaten men working hard in the confined space. 

An unknown artist’s depiction of the Bee beached for repairs at Little Port Cooper. I found this painting at https://sites.google.com/site/lytteltonnz/timeline  Does anyone know who the artist is or for what purpose it was painted?

Offering a sheltered proximity to the harbour heads and a great view of the coastline, Little Port Cooper was used as a pilot base from 1853 onwards. The Adderley Head Signal Station was established in 1867 when the Provincial Government ‘invit[ed] Tenders for the Removal of the Pilot’s House, Boat Shed, &c., from Sumner, and their re-erection at Little Port Cooper.’[2]

Duties included keeping a four-hour watch (later extended to six hours) day and night, for approaching ships, acknowledging requests for a pilot and relaying shipping movements to the Time Ball Station at Officers Point above Lyttelton township. Messages were sent by code flags flown from the flagstaff during the day and by carbide Morse lamp at night. Communications with Lyttelton improved with the introduction of a telegraph line in 1876 and a telephone system in 1880 - the first submarine telephone service in New Zealand. [3]

Initially two houses were built for the pilot and signal personnel on Long Point (Cabbage Tree Point), below the headland. Here, on a very exposed site (described by Gordon Ogilvie as ‘windy’ and ‘sea-lashed’) with little flat space, the pilot boat would be launched. 

The flat space at the base of Adderley Head where the pilots and signalmen lived initially.  There is a low stone wall at the base of the hill. The men had a track up the hill to the signal station directly above. (Jane Robertson, 2018)

Not surprisingly, in 1875 the houses were dismantled and moved to a far more sheltered area above the beach at Little Port Cooper. A third house and a school were built in 1883. In 1885 the pilots relocated to Lyttelton Port leaving only the signalmen and their families – a community of up to 20 adults and children (see next post for photos of these beach homes).

We can only imagine the challenges involved in living in such a remote community where the only really viable access was by sea. A small sad notice in the Star, 21 October 1880, offers a glimpse of the potential difficulties. "Galbraith. – Oct 16, at the Pilot Station, Little Port Cooper, the wife of Captain John Galbraith, of a daughter. Stillborn."

In 1880 a Lyttelton Times reporter made a special visit to Little Port Cooper to witness the new telegraph and telephone system in action. The party was transferred from the tug to ‘a big white boat’ and rowed over to inspect the pilot-station boatshed, now established in a more sheltered location on the west side of the bay. 

The boatshed is a substantial structure, its walls being of concrete and its roof of iron, and its entrance way protected by a miniature breakwater of boulders ... at the far end of the boatshed is a large winch for hauling up or launching the boats easily and quickly. From the boatshed a broad pathway leads round to the houses.[4]

The big white lifeboat was built on the Isle of Wight. “... besides her stout planking, she has a thick diagonal lining, and a number of watertight compartments along each side , as well as fore and aft. She pulls 4 or 6 oars and sails extremely well.”[5]

A reporter from the Star described the scene three years later in more tabloid terms.

The bronzed boatman runs his vessel into the little stone jetty thrown up to make the pilot-men a secure landing place. Under the shed lies their great whaleboat, a model of neatness and order, ready to launch down the gridiron at a moment’s notice. [6]

To fetch supplies the signalmen would row the dinghy across the harbour to Lyttelton – not an easy task given the often-turbulent seas.

The Weekly Press, 7 November, 1899 (Christchurch City Libraries) 

Little Port Cooper showing plan of the pilot-station boatshed and slipway, Archives NZ, ECan. 

The ‘big, white lifeboat’ featured in the news. In a November 1899 emergency, signalmen GB Toomey and TT Carter launched the dinghy to search for Captain Lorraine whose parachute failure left him clinging to a large balloon. The balloon landed in the sea about 10 miles from Lyttelton but the signalmen found no trace of Captain Lorraine.

We boulder-hopped  to the remains of the old boatshed and slipway, now a hangout for local shags.

Looking down to the concrete walls of the boatshed and the boulder breakwater (Jane Robertson, 2018)

Remains of the boatshed and slipway (Jane Robertson, 2018)

Local residents (Jane Robertson, 2018)

In the next post I'll focus on the little settlement that surrounded the old schoolhouse.

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[1] Star, 19 May, 1919

[2] Lyttelton Times, 24 September 1867. I am interested in how often small buildings were relocated in earlier times. A number of harbour structures that I am aware of went off to serve another community.

[3] http://www.doc.govt.nz/parks-and-recreation/places-to-go/canterbury/places/banks-peninsula-area/adderley-head-signal-station, accessed 30 November 2017

[4] Lyttelton Times, 26 February, 1880. The ‘broad pathway’ has now eroded away and access is pretty much limited to rock scrambling.

[5] Ibid

[6] Star, 1 May, 1883

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