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- As were the case with all pioneer
groups, the women of PUHOI had a incomparable share of the burden to carry.
- For men, it was constant and harsh
labour but, for women, the toil of a man and many other things in addition..... the
responsibility of running the household, constant bearing and rearing of the children, the
chore of being doctor, nurse and teacher to her children.
- Mrs LORENZ TURNWALD B. 11.12.1791 in Poppowa,
Bohemia who lost her husband on the voyage out in the "WAR SPIRIT" took her
grant of land, settled on it with her five fatherless children and toiled like a male.
The five children of ANNA TURNWALD
and the late LORENZ were:
Bartolomaus B 25.1.1851 at
Poppowa, Bohemia -
D. 2.12.1899 at Puhoi, Auckland NZ- Lorenz(2),
B 3.7.1853 at Poppowa, Bohemia -
D. 2.3.1940 at Puhoi, Auckland, NZ
- Joseph John,
B.12.11.1855 at Poppowa, Bohemia -
D. 25.12.1938
- Katharina B. 25.11.1858 at Poppowa,
Bohemia -
D: 20.11.1919
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- Elizabeth,
B. 6.5.1861 at Poppowa, Bohemia -
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- ANNA TURNWALD
used the axe, split her shingles and floated her cargo to the punt with the finest of
them. She succeeded in clearing a few of her forest acres and then set about growing
remarkably unblemished crops in her garden.
- Far from being a defenceless
widow dependant upon the rest of the community, ANNA TURNWALD always kept open house for everybody and was a source
of strength to the rest of the community.
- It is sad to relate that she died
4.11.1877 tragically after accidentally being shot in her knee by her son, as he
cleaned his gun.
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- Mrs BECHER was another of the great
women of PUHOI. She had 8 or 10 children and a sick husband, and worked more arduously
than any woman in the settlement at that period.
- The Wenzl KAES family succeeded in
acquiring a few fowls but longed for a cow. They bought one on credit for twelve pounds
Sterling from a farmer in Silverdale (a near-by township) and for three years and four
months, the family had to strive to pay for that cow. Mr KAES took his eggs and fowls on
his back and hiked over the 30 miles to AUCKLAND where he cried his wares in the city
streets. Part of whatever trivial sum he made in this way had to go towards the payment of
the cow.
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- Mrs RUSSEK was an educated woman and
for many years taught the children of the settlement their catechism. Early in her life at
PUHOI, she met with family tragedy. While her husband was building a whare, their
small daughter climbed up a ladder and fell off breaking her leg. Mrs RUSSEK then carried
the child on her back over the thirty long miles to AUCKLAND to have the leg attended.
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- This family lived close to starvation
for many years. On one occasion, Mrs RUSSEK was weeping because she had no food to give
her children. Then one of her boys borrowed a gun, went out and shot a pigeon - then
everything was alright again - until the next meal. In his excitement the boy threw the
gun down and ran to retrieve his bird and carry it home - it took a entire day's search to
find the sector again and recover the missing firearm.
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- Mr & Mrs Joseph WECH lived
further into the bush than most settlers. With the lengthy distance to bring their timber
to the punt, the most they could produce in a month was 10 tons which bought them a profit
of only two pounds Sterling. With no money for food, this family quite literally lived on
the bush and Mrs WECH existed for weeks on nikau palm alone - at the same time nursing a
baby.
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- Mr Vincent WENZLICK has left on
record an account of the home life in the early day. It places the mothers as the pivot
around which the families move. They must have suffered too, the constant fear of any
bushman's wife, hatred of the crashing trees that could widow them an a moment.
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- The child's impression of a homely
atmosphere in a one-room shanty with a blazing fire and lights of flaring kauri gum
indicates that the children felt secure inside their four flimsy walls but their mother
must always been aware of the dangers that lay outside, particularly when the wind howled
and roared through the tall kauris and the small house in the clearing was the centre of a
sea of waving, thrashing and sometimes falling trees; when the burning off of a clearing
set the bush on fire; winter rains marooned them in a sea of mud.
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Even today PUHOI mud has a quality
all its own. It is said that it can be used for glue in winter and cement in summer. It is
also recounted that, in the middle period of the settlement, when Mr Joseph WECH was
thrown from his buggy into the mud, he didn't know whether to burrow up or burrow down to
get out!
The mud may be a joke today, but it
was a disaster to the women who had to struggle through it dragging a sledge load of
timber or carrying the shingles to the river on their backs or trying to walk through it
on her way back from AUCKLAND.
One traveller describes the long
walk home as follows:
"First we had to ascend a most
weary and difficult ascent of stiff and yellow clay - over two miles of one continues
rise. Then again, through mus and swamp, over rise after rise without even the light of
day through the dense foliage. Oh, how weary was the plodding on this muddy way for never
ending miles. Surely this mountain track eclipses all other roads in New Zealand."
Even the third generation of PUHOI
people have recollections of the hardships of earlier times, and how the women cutting the
timber with a cross-cut saw, swinging an axe in the bush and the tying and shearing of the
sheep they had managed to rear.
- One GG grandmother remembers riding
into town to church with one child on the saddle in front of her while her husband rode
with another. She also recalls having her house dragged to anew position by a team of
bullocks.
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Another - also a GG grandmother, who
at the age of twelve had started farm work with her pioneer grandmother and had just
carried on. She lived alone, milked her own cows, did her own fencing, cut the wood for
her fire and hauled it home, looked after a beautiful garden and besides all this, her
concept of a worthy and comfortable number to cook for was twenty four especially for
Christmas dinner.
The women of PUHOI have always been
noted for their excellent cooking and baking. In the early days of course they had little
opportunity - for want of suitable ingredients - to use this skill. As conditions
improved, they preformed culinary miracles with the aid of open fireplaces, camp ovens and
the kerosene tin. As the years passed they gave way to the wood stove and today the
electric stove is supreme, with cooking now much easier than it was, but many of the older
residents would doubt that it is as good.
The recipes bought with them from
BOHEMIA were used for a great number of years, and with PUHOI being noted for its
hospitality, many people have had the opportunity of tasting these exotic, and some quite
famous dishes including:
"Kochen" - a delicious
cheese curd tart and "Arbrentz" - a gravy seasoning.... the smell of it cooking
made you anticipate a mouth watering feast. "Doughnuts were another favourite and
every mother in the district was an expert at making these.
It cannot be doubted that much of
the strength of the settlement of PUHOI lay - and still lies - in the strength of
character and will of its women.
A letter from Maria RAUNER, wife if
Martin RAUNER, written from PUHOI on 1st June 1885, and which has miraculously escaped
destruction, tells her sister that "we have set up everything very well for ourselves
and have everything we need. We lack nothing and also have the church and school near the
house and our children are being much better educated here than at home in
Germany".
This short citation gives a very
certain indication of how well they had settled down in New Zealand and had begun to enjoy
the fruits of their labour.
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