Notes |
- 1 -1841 census was living in the Granary Loft at Milling Farm or Malling as it is known today, Menteith Scotland.
In 1877 purchased 18,000 acre property Achray at Rotherham in the Amuri County North Canterbury, which he sold to his 3rd son James.
2 - 1841 census entry (N.B. ages over 15 were rounded down to nearest 5 years)
Port of Menteith parish ED 3 page 1
Address Milling No.2-Granary Loft
Cameron John M 32 Male Servant
McFarlane John M 25 Male.Servant
Ritchie William M 13 Male.Servant
McMaster Alexr M 10 Male.Servant
3 - JOHN MACFARLANE, of Coldstream, Rangiora, Canterbury, New Zealand, b. in Perthshire, Scotland; landed in Nelson in 1842, and in 1850 proceeded to Canterbury. He was the president of the Northern Agriculltural Association for about 17 years, and took an active part. in the business of the County Council. He m. in Wellington, February, 1849, Miss CAMERON, and d. 23rd October, 1884., aged 67, leaving six sons and three daughters.
Mr.John Macfarlane possessed large estates in the middle island of New Zealand. His widow survives.
[ Burkes Colonial Gentry ]
4 - Mr. John Macfarlane , one of the pioneers of settlement in New Zealand, was born in Perth, Scotland. He was brought up to sheepfarming by his father, who was a farmer and dealer. Mr. Macfarlane landed in Nelson, in 1842, and two years latr removed to Wellington. About the end of 1850, three weeks prior to the arrival of the first four ships, he came to Canterbury, and took up the Loburn run-so named by him-which he worked till 1862, when, owing to the advent of free selectors, he sold out and purchased land about three miles from Rangiora, since known as "Coldstream." Mr. Macfarlane resided on this property till his death in 1884, and took considerable interest in local affairs in Rangiora. He was married in Wellington, in 1848, to a daughter of the late Mr. Donald Cameron, who came to the colony in 1840. Mrs Macfarlane survives her husband, and is well known throughout the Rangiora district. She has six sons and three daughters and about forty grandchildren.
[The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Canterbury Provincial District] Old Colonists published 1903]
4 - LOBURN (Run IA)
Loburn is the spelling which has long been used for the name of this station and for the district which is named after it, but the older spelling was Lowburn, and Macfarlane, who named it, said it was undoubtedly the right one.
Loburn lay on the north side of the Ashley and took in the downs at the back of Mt. Grey. At one time it took in most of Whiterock as well. Run lA, of about thirteen thousand acres, was taken up by John Macfarlane in September, 1851. Macfarlan
e sold Loburn to Cunningham Brothers (Arthur and Charles, sons of Cunningham of Fernside) in 1862, and built a new homestead at Whiterock, in my note on which I have placed an account of him. John O'Halloran, afterwards of Glentui, was his head shepherd at Loburn.
Loburn was very scrubby, and a bad place to get a clean muster, and the Cunninghams had a very bad time with scab. It was a poor run altogether, but there was some heavy land in the valleys, a good deal of which was bought in small blocks by navvies with the money they had been paid for digging the Lyttelton tunnel.
The first brand ever registered in Canterbury was for 'Lowburn' by John Macfarlane on 14th January.
[ The Early Canterbury Runs: Containing the First, Second and Third (new) Series by: L. G. D. Acland Publication, 1946 p71 The Plains North of the Waimakariri ]
5 - Whiterock (Runs 127, 165, 166 and 168)
Whiterock was bounded on the north by the south branch of the Waipara and ran to the top of The Brothers. It was bounded by Mt. Grey on the east, the Okuku River on the west, and Loburn on the south.
Runs 165, 166 and 168 were taken up in August, 1957, by John Macfarlane. He had taken up Loburn in 1851 and worked Whiterock as part of it until he sold Loburn in 1862, when he built a homestead at Whiterock.
A man called Young took up Run 127 (Mt. Karetu, the part of Whiterock adjoining Mt. Brown), in November, 1853, and had 1200 sheep there in 1858. He sold his run and sheep to Macfarlane about 1860. I have not been able to find out who he was or anything about him.
John Macfarlane came out to New Zealand in the early 'forties, and soon afterwards went to the Wairarapa, but was driven out by the Maoris in 1850 and came down to Canterbury. He landed at the Heathcote from a whale boat about a fortnight before the arrival of the First Four Ships, which he saw from the top of Scarborough Hill.
Macfarlane lived at Coldstream near Rangiora. His first manager at Whiterock was John Robinson. Robinson had been a shepherd at Esk Head and was supposed to have walked from there to Lyttelton and back to Christchurch in twenty-four hours, making only one stop-at Saltwater Creek, where he drank a pint of whisky. Owing to the scrub there, scab was very bad at Loburn and Whiterock in the 'sixties. Macfarlane was fined ?1000 on one occasion and ?1500 on another. In June, 1868, Mallock and Lance of Horsley Down claimed ?500 from him for contaminating 21,000 of their sheep, but Macfarlane got this reduced by arbitration to ?275. Robinson dipped the sheep in arsenic, and besides killing several hundred of them with it, nearly killed the shepherds as well. He left in 1869, and fell off the pier at Dunedin and was drowned. He was succeeded as manager by Alexander McLean, who stayed about five years, during which he cleared the scab. He used to dress the infected sheep with spirits of tar and tobacco, and then dip the whole flock a month later with sulphur and tobacco.
After this time, Macfarlane used Whiterock as a wether station and took the wethers on to Coldstream where he fattened them for the Coast.
For a time, in the 'sixties, Macfarlane let the run and sheep to his brother Malcolm (who was afterwards drowned in the Rakaia), and John Mann, but owing to scab they did no good and John Macfarlane took the run back some time before 1867, when he had 18,000 sheep there.
In 1882 Walter Nicholls, who at that time owned Haylands, bought Whiterock from Macfarlane.
Macfarlane's last manager was Miles Campbell, one of the compilers of the Cyclopaedia of New Zealand, who stayed on until about 1889 with Nicholls.
[ The Early Canterbury Runs: Containing the First, Second and Third (new) Series Author: L. G. D. Acland Publication: Whitcombe and Tombs Limited, 1946 ]
6 - Cora Lynn (Run 333)
Cora Lynn lies on the Waimakariri and Bealey rivers, and goes back to the unoccupied country on the main range next north of Glenthorne. It was taken up by Goldney Brothers in February, 1860. They paid rent for twenty thousand acres.
In 1867 the Goldneys sold Cora Lynn to John Macfarlane and Thomas Whillians Bruce, and went home to England. In those days Macfarlane sent many cattle to the Coast, and bought Cora Lynn as a convenient place for finishing them off before sending them over to Hokitika.
Their head shepherd at Cora Lynn was a man named Andrew Curie.
Macfarlane sold his interest in the station some time about 1870 to Bruce. Bruce had been Caverhill's manager at Motunau, and was known all over the province as the 'Little Angel.' Besides Cora Lynn he had Riversdale, across the Waimakariri, and the Inchbonnie estate (then known as the Paddock) on the West Coast Road beyond Arthur's Pass.
[ The Early Canterbury Runs: Containing the First, Second and Third (new) Series Author: L. G. D. Acland Publication, 1946 ]
7 - Macfarlane, John, sheep-farmer, Rangiora, assessesed for a properties of
4,082 acres worth 64,080pounds in Ashley county
88 acres worth 176pounds in Kaikoura county
25,204 acres worth 47,816pounds in Amuri county
57,328 acres worth 68,746pounds in Cheviot county
Making a total of 86,702acres valued at 180,818pounds of Country Lands
He also has a property in Rangiora valued at 250pounds, bringing his total property value in the colony to 181,068pounds at 1882 assesment.
[ Freeholders of NZ Oct 1882 - Assesment Rolls of the Property-Tax Dept NZ ]
8 - The original Hawkswood Station of around 40,000 acres was acquired by John Caverhill in 1859. Another Scottish settler, John Macfarlane, purchased the property from Caverhill in 1872 and it has been farmed by the Macfarlane family ever since. John Donald Macfarlane inherited Hawkswood, which was one of six large farms in the South Island purchased by John Macfarlane Sr. Earlier purchases included Coldstream (Rangiora), Kaiwara (Waiau), Achray (Culverden), and Lyndon (Waiau).
[ http://www.stagingpost.co.nz/history.html ]
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