Pilot's House Gets Historic Recognition
New Zealand Historic Places Trust Information Release
18 July 2008
An important survivor of early New Zealand colonial history, the Pilot's
House, near the mouth of the Wairau River has received top recognition
by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust with a Category 1 registration.
It is the only pre 1900s building left in the area around the river mouth,
as former hotels and cottages of the Boulder Bank settlement are now only
archaeological remains.
The Pilot's house is architecturally special as a rare example of a pre-1870s
timber house, retaining much of its original fabric and design. It remains
on its original site. The Pilot Station was established at the Wairau
Bar in 1868 on land that was previously reserved as a memorial to the
victims of the nearby Wairau Affray. It was the home of the first official
pilot James Bulliff and his wife Clara and their seven children for the
next 18 years. Two children died in infancy and are buried on a ridge
nearby.
Pilots had long been used to guide ships into port through treacherous
coastal waters. It was a skilled and valued profession, with 'inshore'
ship handling considered by experts as the most exacting part of all marine
navigation. Bulliff was known as a skilled, courageous and daring pilot.
He carried out the duties of a marine pilot and harbour master - charting
and reporting on the channel, organising the removal of snags and communicating
with ships through a system of signals (coloured balls, flags, semaphore
arms and lights).He died in 1886 and his successor moved into a newly-constructed
house next door.
The original Pilot's House was bought by Samuel Aldridge, who lived in
it with his family and ran one of Marlborough's first commercial poultry
farms from the property. The Station continued to operate throughout the
twentieth century, until gradual decline of the coastal shipping industry
led to the Port at Blenheim being disestablished in 1968. The Wairua River
itself had a series of wharves servicing several flax mills, flour mill,
dairy factory, the Boulder Bank Village and providing a passenger service.
Although the area around the river mouth is scattered with remainders
of this history, including the remains of an old wharf and breakwater,
possible pilot's post and signal mast, and the hulk of a retired steamer
moved to the site in 1929 to form part of the breakwater, the Pilot's
House is the best preserved structural remnant of the past maritime occupation
of the area. This increases its value as a record of a period when small
ports were prolific and vital to the local and wider communities they
served.
There has been a considerable amount of work undertaken for greater protection
of the 'Pilot House' by the Orchard and Heffer families, to remove tree
limbs threatening the house, the instigation of geomagnetic surveying
of DOC and the family land and to provide security fencing. The Marlborough
District Council has assisted with a funding grant for the security project.
The Marlborough Branch Committee of New Zealand Historic Places Trust
has worked closely with the owners and Council on its protection and with
Trust Central Region staff on archaeology issues and its registration.
For further information
Central Region Office
New Zealand Historic Places Trust
Tel: 04 801 5088
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