Island Bay Grandparents

More than a hundred years ago our wider family began to settle in Wellington, at Island Bay, which is on the very exposed South Coast. This area though has some protection from the somewhat stormy Cook Strait, which is afforded by the proximity of Taputerenga Island at the mouth of the Bay. This provided a relatively safe haven for the fishing boats - first the Italian fisherman, then soon after by the early fishing vessels too of the Shetland Island fisherfolk. With their experience of the vast and challenging northern waters beyond the “Auld Rock” as Shetlanders know their island homeland, and the Italians different experiences in the Mediterranean waters – these two culturally diverse groups used their complementary skills and knowledge to make the most of the sometimes wild - Cook Strait environment together.

For us it started with our great-great uncle – Peter Scott Isbister 1892-1951 who arrived via Australia in 1911 as an Able-Bodied Seaman, from his native Shetland Islands north of the British mainland. He was followed on the “Ionic” in 1912 by his newly married sister Margaret Jane (Maggie) 1890-1959 and her husband Andrew Jamieson, a Shipping Clerk; another married sister, Barbara Ann (Babsie) 1891-1978 and her husband John Oliver TAIT, a fisherman, also arrived in Wellington too in 1912.  Babsie’s twin Tommy 1891-1947 who was also a Seaman likewise came to Wellington.  

Next, in 1913, working his passage on the “Rimutaka”, came their father Thomas Isbister 1853-1925 – also a seaman, as so many Shetland men were. 

This Shetland chain had one more link to come, that of our great-great Grandmother Catherine Isbister, previously Pottinger, nee Goodland 1855-1949, bringing her youngest daughters Laurina aka Ina 1895-1983 and Mary Catherine 1898-1941. These three landed at Wellington in 1915 on the “Remuera”. Granny Isbister and her family settled at Island Bay, where her husband Thomas became a Fisherman. They all lived in the south-eastern corner of the Bay bounded by Trent Steet, Brighton Street, The Esplanade, and Queens Drive. 

Shetlanders have a saying that they are ‘fishermen with a croft’ as their work cycle saw involvement in the planting times and the harvests, meaning the women took care of the crop and the sheep, knitting as they went to the peat banks for fuel to fire the oven and warm the croft house. The knitwear products of their labours brought in cash money to augment the subsistence life they lived at the mercy of the weather and the Lairds.

Coming to Wellington gave new opportunities for both men and women. Fellowship with their countrymen already settled here helped the transition to life in Aotearoa. Wellington being a major port city and a very walkable place, meant too that visiting seamen and compatriots were welcomed into Shetlanders homes and hospitality enjoyed, as was news from home as they went about “Coontin Kin” as they shared the commonalities of their oral history. 

There were about 300 Shetlanders in Wellington when the Shetland Society of Wellington was formed in 1922 – thus now in their Centenary year, and it has played a big part in supporting the cultural mores of these immigrants: providing friendship, dances, and picnics, amongst other social and sporting pursuits. Andrew Jamieson, Babsie and her husband J.O. Tait (Jack), were on the first committee; as was a later arrival Meg DUNCAN, my great aunt.

Our paternal great grandparents: Laurence (Laurie) Duncan 1873-1944 and his wife Elizabeth (Betty) Jamieson 1873-1926, opened the next chapter of migration from Burra Isle in the west of Shetland in 1912, first moving to Aberdeen in northeast Scotland firstly and then in 1922 sailing on the “Waimana” from Southamptonand  arriving in Wellington on ANZAC day. 

Great-Grand Pa Laurie and great-Grannie Betty brought with them seven of their eight offspring – eldest daughter Elizabeth (Lizzie) 1896-1962 had married a Scottish piper in the military, later emigrating to North America. Those who landed in Wellington were Laurence (Laurie) 1897-1966, James (Jimmy) 1900-1979 who had married Ruby Violet Paul just before the ship embarked (they got to have a honeymoon on board ship), John (Jock) 1902-1951, Margaret (Meg) 1904-1984, Andrina Christina Jane 1908-1972, William (Bill) 1910-1980, and Ruby Grace 1912-1982. 

Their sojourn at Aberdeen had been about upskilling, finding other ways to use their seamanship, and in particular earning cash money that would facilitate the migration to New Zealand. This stood them in good stead once a boat to fish from and living quarters were secured. During their time in Aberdeen, World War l intervened, and both Laurie senior and Jimmy served in the Royal Naval Reserve, on the Trawler Fleet in the North Sea. Younger son Jock (my grandfather) worked as a Riveter’s assistant in the shipyard near Torry where they rented accommodation, whilst Laurie junior left the sea and joined the fledgling Air Force.

On arrival in Wellington the family stayed with Shetlanders who lived in Lyall Bay until their new house at Island Bay was ready for occupation. While the Isbister side of our family lived in the south-eastern corner of Island Bay, our Duncan family lived in the southwestern corner of the bay on Derwent Street, Knoll Street and The Esplanade. Clearly, they did well at sea, establishing themselves in this community, and were able to build homes for their families. Sadly, Grannie Betty, a chronic asthmatic and bronchitic, didn’t live long in this new land.

John Duncan – (Jock), was married 1927, at the Wellington Congregational Church (then on The Terrace) to Mary Kathleen Stewart (Cissie) 1906-1989, a book keeper and fellow Shetland Islander. They had met in Wellington. They were my paternal grandparents, and they too built a house at Island Bay on the Esplanade. My father was born at this home in 1930. Jock was a Seaman on the “Rama Torch” sailing between Wellington and the Chatham Islands. Later he too joined the fishing at Island Bay. 

The great depression of the 1930s had a huge impact on the fishing industry around Wellington. Our Duncan family took a pragmatic approach and explored the possibilities of moving to the promising seas about the Chatham Islands – initially Jimmy headed southeast with another Shetlander. They soon reported good catches of cod were to be had and in due course Grandpa Laurie, Granma Clara (he had remarried 1929, to a seaman’s widow Clara Jackson) and the rest of the family migrated too for various periods of time. Some rented out their houses and survived in somewhat rudimentary iron huts near to the beach at Kaingaroa, Te One, and Waitangi, on Chatham Island. 

Conditions were harsh and challenging weather wise, being located eastward of the mainland by about 500 miles (800km). During these years two of the sons in law also worked the sea and died. As the depression eased - they returned to Wellington, whence most of them migrated north to Napier, settling at the fishing village of Port Ahuriri, from which they - Laurie, Jimmy, Jock, and Bill - fished Hawke Bay and the East Coast of New Zealand, and brought up their families. Throughout their fishing life the Duncans were also involved in rescuing those in peril on the seas. 

Cissie Duncan, nee Stewart, my grandmother, landed in Wellington on 5th February 1924, having taken ship on the “Corinthic” from London with her family. She was born in Lerwick, Shetland - her parents were Laurence Gilbert Stewart 1877-1962 a cooper, the son of Halcrow Nicholson Stewart 1847-1913 of Lerwick, also a cooper, and Mary Magdalen Oliver previously BEST 1844-1885 of Labrador, Canada; Cissie’s mother was L.G. Stewart’s wife Jemima Pottinger 1877-1950 the daughter of Catherine Goodlad of Tingwall, Shetland, and her first husband James Pottinger 1853-1877 of Nesting, Shetland. 

Previously Great Grandpa L. G. Stewart took ship and worked a passage as a seaman to New Zealand and back, to both earn cash and to see what opportunities they might have in Wellington. Subsequently our great grandparents with their seven surviving children arrived at the Port of Wellington.: The children were:

• James Laurence (Jim)1903-75, - 

• Robert Halcrow (Bobbie) 1905-72, 

• Mary Kathleen (Cissie) 1906-89, 

• Thomas (Tommie) 1907-68, 

• Joan Margaret (Joey) 1909-60, --- 

• Laurina (Ina) 1915-2005,

• John William (Johnny) 1917-98; 

In 1861 they married and made their way to Dunedin, Otago – their son Alfred Faithful 1868-1935 became our great grandfather. Her father, Owen Pierce 1838-1884, a slate quarryman, had left Wales via Liverpool in 1857 on the “Guy Mannering” for Melbourne seeking gold. 

Jessie’s mother - Helen (Ellen) GALLOWAY 1839-1902 sailed 1853 from Scotland with a group of needle women at the tender age of fourteen, bound for Tasmania. 

Both Owen and Helen took ship 1861 on “City of Hobart” for Port Chalmers, him in September and her in December – we don’t know if this was co- incidental, or a planned journey. having been married 1895 at Cromwells’ St.  John’s Church to Jessie Pierce.  

Howsoever that may be, they became the grandparents of Annie Helen (Nellie) Faithful 1897-1973, a dressmaker living with a relative at Mt Victoria who met Charlie Campbell in Wellington in 1916 while he was undertaking his military training for the Rifle Brigade, before embarkation for the West Front. Letters passed to and from between these two until he arrived home in 1919. Charlie Campbell and Nellie Faithful married 1922 at Cromwell.

They had three daughters.

Charlie’s journalism took our maternal grandparents from Southland to Christchurch, and thence to Wellington in 1933 – where they settled at Island Bay, living in Aranoni Street for about thirty years. During this time, he was a reporter for the Alexandra Herald, Southland Times, The Press, The Evening Post, and the NZ Press Association. He had several spells in the Parliamentary Press Gallery, also serving as vice Chair and Chairman of the Gallery. For my brother and I many happy days were spent with them at Island Bay, walking with Grandma down to the shops for groceries, going on the trams to ‘town’, walking with Grandad to the beach – picking up driftwood and shells while Grandad filled a bucket with seaweed for his hillside garden – and a walk or tram to the Zoo at Newtown. My favourite was the elephant.

John James Duncan and Helen Poppy Campbell were my parents. They met in Wellington as six-year old school children. John had come up from the Chathams with his mother who was expecting the birth of her second child while staying at Medway Street with her parents.

Island Bay school was rather crowded in 1936 so the youngest had to walk down to St Hilda’s Church Hall for classes – mother was a small child, and father, who was always considered a strong, tall boy, carried her bag.

Fast forward to the late 1940s and John had moved back to Wellington from Napier to join the ‘P & T’ working in the Post Office Stores at Thorndon and reacquainting himself with Wellington - running with the harriers and sailing at Evans Bay. Helen had found work as a librarian at Victoria University, where she also played hockey. She played the bagpipes with the Wellington Ladies Highland Pipe Band. They had met again at a Scots ball - not long after the families reconnected and a marriage was made in 1953 at St. Andrews on The Terrace in the central city. 

During my life I have had four sojourns in the capital city, this current one the longest stay, of fourteen years so far. The lives of my grandparents Jock and Cissie, and Charlie and Nellie; together with their ancestors, have influenced my roots and connections with this place known as Wellington.