NEWS

 

 

Many thanks to Air New Zealand for their poster promoting the Waipu Games.

 

These were on display at the main airports in New Zealand.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Sailors and Settlers

By John McLean

 

 

John McLean is a descendant of Nova Scotian settlers who sailed on the Ellen Lewis to New Zealand from Nova Scotia in Canada. Below is the outline inside of the dust cover.

 

Betty Powell resident historian of the Waipu Museum has said of ‘Sailors & Settlers’ “It is the most definitive book on the Nova Scotians ever written to date.”

Forced to leave their native Scotland as a result of the Highland Clearances, thousands of clansfolk sailed to Nova Scotia, many of them settling on the tree covered Cape Breton Island where they built boats, including two of the ones that would take them to the Antipodes.

When Cape Breton Island became overpopulated for what its marginal land and difficult climate could support, the people of Saint Ann’s and its wider community, encompassing Baddeck, Boularderie, Big Harbour and Middle River, uprooted themselves a second time and sailed across three oceans to New Zealand, which was just being opened up to British settlement. Thus did they become pioneers in both hemispheres.

 

Most of them settled on the land in Waipu and other parts of North Auckland but they were also prominent as bushfellers, shipbuilders and sea captains in both the Auckland province and beyond.

This is the first book to list the names of all those who sailed to the Antipodes on the Margaret, Highland Lassie, Gertrude, Spray, Breadalbane and Ellen Lewis as well as those who took passage on the other ships – the Lady Grey, Union, Prince Edward, George Henderson, Sea Gull, Pakeha and Emulous. In addition to detailed descriptions of each voyage there are pen sketches of many of the colonists, which give an interesting insight into the pioneers and their achievements.

 

Cover design: Simon Johnson

 

The painting on the front cover is of the Ellen Lewis, the last of the six ships to sail from Cape Breton Island with settlers for New Zealand. It was done by Maurice Forrester in 2003.

The book is 450 pages approx. with 24 pages of illustrations/photos.

 

this book can also be purchased from the author for $60,

email: jnmcl90@hotmail.com

 

 

The Host Clan for the
141^st Games 2012 is

Clan Stewart