More than 120 descendants of passengers who travelled to Nelson 180 years ago on the emigrant ship Bolton gathered at Olive Estate on Sunday for a non-rigged reunion.
The Bolton was the sixth emigrant ship to reach Nelson’s shores when it anchored outside Nelson Haven on 15 March, 1842, after voyaging from Gravesend, England, on 29 October, 1841.
Reunion captain and Olive Estate resident, Val Trow, who descends from the Hopgoods, who were one of the 50 families onboard the ship, says her reunion idea set sail when fellow Olive Estate resident and marine artist Paul Deacon showed her his drawing of the Bolton.
“It got me thinking if there were any other descendants around from the Bolton,” she says.
Then, on a New Year’s trip to Okiwi Bay, she met a lady from Tauranga who told her she had “deep roots” in Nelson, and her pioneer ancestors came on the Bolton with the first hop plants.
Val says this encounter put more wind in her reunion sails, and she proceeded to put a post on the Top of the South Island, New Zealand History Facebook group, where she received an “overwhelming” response.
“The 125 descendants who came to the reunion were from the north of Auckland, Tauranga, New Plymouth, Picton, Blenheim, Christchurch, and Ashburton,” she says.
“I had to turn 20 people away because of the numbers [due to space at the venue].
“The reunion was important because as we get older our history starts to mean a lot to us, ‘how did we get here?’, ‘how did our olds come?’, ‘when and why did they come?’.”
Descendants shared stories about their connections to the Bolton families at the event, and two Paul Deacon paintings of the ship in Nelson harbour were also unveiled.
