1863: Puhoi

June 29, 2025

By AHNZ

Today in history, 29 June, 1863, the settlement at Puhoi was founded. Each adult was granted 40 acres, each child 20. More waves of these Catholic Bohemian settlers were to follow but they had to work for it!

(No “Golden Visa” scheme back then!)

Thick with forest and accessed through a tidal river, ‘Puhoi’ (ref. Keith Sinclair) is a Maorified corruption of the ‘Up the boo-ay’ or, aka, “up in the wop-wops.”

The settlers, all Roman Catholics from Bohemia in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, got a better chance at life in their new country. Led by Martin Krippner, an Austrian army captain, they knew that here in New Zealand they could own their own land. They had also been told that the opportunities and standard of living in the new land would be vastly superior. This wasn’t quite true or at least not for a couple of decades yet and because they would make it so. In the end the promise was kept to them but only because they kept it to themselves.

“It had been glossed over that this particular block of Puhoi land was steep, not particularly fertile and with few flats that could be ploughed or cultivated. Also the hills were covered with dense almost impregnable heavy native forest…The first main group of 82 Bohemians – 37 adults, 14 teenagers, 25 children and 6 toddlers and babes in arms (2 more were born on the way) said goodbye to parents, relatives, friends and a Homeland that they would never see again. Others left behind were sad but they had other commitments or more simply could not raise the fare.” – Puhoi Historical Society (accessed 2010)

“Grey’s thinking, I’m certain, was also to place these settlers so as to create a buffer to the north in case of any hostility from unfriendly Maoris. A cheap way for The State to get some warriors who would be an asset in defending New Zealand’s capital city, Auckland.” – 1879: Puhoi Hotel, AHNZ

“Perhaps his talks with Sir George Gray on the subject of Immigration fired hid imagination, for he asked permission of the government to organise a settlement of BOHEMIAN people in the AUCKLAND Province. This Provincial Council agreed that all who came to NEW ZEALAND in the group could benefit under the forty-acre system of land grants. It was enough for Capt. KRIPPNER. With characteristic enthusiasm he wrote to his brothers in BOHEMIA with lyric descriptions of the Colony. And his brothers spread the word.” – A Story of Puhoi, K.Mooney. The Bohemian Association of New Zealand

The State, on the other hand, got a buffer community in case of northern aggression. And, the warrior mercenaries that came with them led by Kripp’. They came in handy that December in the defense of Howick and for teaching Kiwis about something new to the culture: The Christmas Tree.

I might wonder if Kripp’ played a bit of a trick on those people for his own ambitions. In the early days it must have looked a bit like that. However, in the long run he is considered a good guy and founding hero.

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Image ref. a scene from a superb diorama at the Puhoi Heritage Museum.; AHNZ Archive (2019)

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