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Otago Mapped Following the Discovery of Gold in 1861 and the Hector Surveys of 1862-1864
This map of the Province of Otago was published in 1866 and reflects the culmination of two decades of intensive geographic, hydrographic, and geological surveying in southern New Zealand.
The map delineates Otago’s mountainous interior, intricate coastline, major lakes, rivers, settlements, and the gold-bearing regions that spurred mass migration and economic transformation during the 1860s. The coastal outlines and geographical positions were principally charted by Captain John Lort Stokes, R.N., known for his work on the HMS Acheron, which surveyed much of New Zealand’s coastline from 1848 to 1851. The interior was mapped by J. T. Thomson, the first Chief Surveyor of Otago Province, and his assistants Alexander Garvie and James McKerrow, whose topographic surveys provided the first systematic cartographic record of inland Otago. Mining surveyors J. Drummond, J. J. Coates, and W. C. Wright contributed further detail during the gold rush era, while geological features and exploratory data were added from expeditions by Dr. James Hector, W. C. Rees, P. Q. Caples, and W. Arthur.
By the time this map was published, Otago had experienced profound changes. Originally settled by Scottish Presbyterians in 1848 as a Free Church colony centered at Dunedin, Otago was initially a remote and underpopulated frontier. This changed dramatically in 1861 with the discovery of gold at Gabriel’s Gully, which launched the Otago Gold Rush. Within a year, the population swelled as prospectors and entrepreneurs flooded into the province. The demand for accurate surveying and mapping intensified, prompting efforts by the provincial government to support infrastructure, regulate mining claims, and plan new towns. Thomson’s early surveys laid the groundwork, but much of the fine-grained detail—especially in remote interior and alpine regions—emerged through the efforts of explorers and field geologists like Hector.
Dr. James Hector, appointed in 1862 to direct the Otago Geological Survey, played a crucial role in charting Otago's mineral wealth and broader topography. Though the province was crisscrossed by rudimentary tracks and packhorse routes, Hector initiated reconnaissance surveys of the interior. Guided initially by Thomson, he visited goldfields at Lawrence and coal seams at Kaitangata, surveyed the Manuherikia Valley, and traced the volcanic formations and limestone outcrops of the North Otago coast. In the Wanaka and Queenstown districts, he explored the Matukituki and Greenstone valleys and assessed potential routes to the West Coast, though many proved impassable. His expedition into Fiordland in 1863 aboard the schooner Matilda Hayes marked one of the most ambitious surveys, extending into Lake McKerrow and up the Hollyford Valley. Though he believed he had pioneered the overland route to Lake Wakatipu, he was preceded by Patrick Caples.
Hector’s final major reconnaissance took place in 1864 when he surveyed the rugged coastal zone between the Clutha and Mataura rivers, now known as the Catlins. This area had resisted inland access, and Hector resorted to traveling by whaleboat. Adverse weather delayed the expedition, but by its conclusion, Hector had completed a comprehensive geological survey of the entire province. The data from his fieldwork, combined with Thomson’s topographical groundwork and Stokes’s earlier coastal surveys, formed the basis of this 1866 map, which stands as a landmark in the cartographic and scientific documentation of Otago.
In the upper left corner of the map of the Province of Otago is a detailed inset titled Table of Distances and Area of the Province of Otago, providing logistical and geographical data to support overland travel and regional understanding. The Table of Distances lists the mileage between key settlements and routes, including numerous entries originating from Dunedin, such as distances to Blueskin (13 miles), Invercargill (134 miles), and Clyde (132 miles). Additional routes are noted from regional junctions like Lawrence, Kye Burn, and Clyde, reflecting the transportation network critical for accessing goldfields, inland towns, and frontier stations.
The Area of the Province of Otago quantifies land by elevation bands, calculating approximately 13.36 million acres (20,876 square miles) in total. Of this, the majority—6.8 million acres—is between 1,500 and 5,000 feet above sea level.
The legend explains map symbols used, identifying features such as goldfields, government townships, bridle tracks, digging areas, Native Reserves, heavy bush, and accommodation houses.
This is one of a series of maps of Otago first published in 1856, all of which are very rare. This example of the 1859 map illustrates how much additional information was added by the later explorations of Doctor Hector.
Rarity
The map is very rare.
OCLC locates example in the National Library of New Zealand, Univerity of Otago,
Provenance
Dominic Winter: 2024.
John Turnbull Thomson was an accomplished British civil servant, surveyor, and topographical artist. He began his career at 17, working for the East India Survey, and only three years later he was appointed Government Surveyor at Singapore. There he was responsible for allotment and topographical surveys of the island of Singapore and its dependencies, and the hydrographic survey of the Straits of Singapore. He was also the architect of the Horsburgh Lighthouse on Pedra Branca, and several other iconic buildings around Singapore.
John Lort Stokes (1811–1885) was a distinguished British naval officer, explorer, and hydrographer whose long naval career encompassed three major surveying expeditions aboard HMS Beagle and a pioneering hydrographic survey of New Zealand aboard HMS Acheron. Born in 1811 at Prendergast, Pembrokeshire, Wales, he was the second son of Anne Phillips, the daughter of a physician, and her husband, Henry Stokes. At the age of thirteen, he entered the Royal Navy as a first-class volunteer aboard HMS Prince Regent in 1824 and was transferred a year later to the Beagle.
Stokes served on all three commissions of the Beagle, rising from midshipman to assistant surveyor and ultimately to commander. During the Beagle’s first voyage (1826–1830) and its more famous second voyage (1831–1836) under Captain Robert FitzRoy—with Charles Darwin aboard as naturalist—Stokes contributed to the hydrographic surveying of South America and to the meridian distance survey that was a principal object of the voyage.
Promoted to lieutenant in 1837, Stokes became assistant surveyor to J. C. Wickham on the Beagle’s third voyage, now focused on Australian coastal surveys. In March 1841, following Wickham’s retirement due to illness, Stokes assumed command and was confirmed as commander later that year. During this expedition, he surveyed the northwest coast of Australia, the Arafura Sea, Torres Strait, and the southern coast of Tasmania. His inland explorations were curtailed by a serious wound—he was speared in the shoulder during an encounter with Aboriginal people—but his hydrographic work remained of lasting value. Stokes named numerous geographical features, including the Victoria River and Port Darwin, and produced the first adequate charts of Bass Strait.
Returning to England in 1843, Stokes published his account of the Australian expedition in Discoveries in Australia (1846), a two-volume narrative combining technical survey work with vivid travel descriptions. Promoted to captain the same year, he was soon appointed to command HMS Acheron, a paddle steamer newly assigned to undertake the first comprehensive hydrographic survey of New Zealand's coastline. Departing from Plymouth in January 1848, the Acheron reached Auckland in November after stops in Rio de Janeiro, the Cape of Good Hope, and Australia.
New Zealand, at the time, was a young and expanding colony lacking adequate coastal charts. The growth of immigrant traffic and internal coastal trade underscored the urgent need for safe navigation. Over the course of three years (1848–1851), Stokes and his crew surveyed key harbors including Waitemata, Wellington, Akaroa, Lyttelton, and Otago, and examined critical waterways such as Cook Strait, the Marlborough Sounds, Foveaux Strait, and the fiords of the southwest. Stokes’s charts and detailed coastal views—marked by astronomically determined positions and observations of tidal behaviour—provided an essential foundation for the safe development of maritime infrastructure in the colony. Notably, his chart of Foveaux Strait corrected numerous errors and remained authoritative into the twentieth century.
The expedition also generated reports of natural history and inland exploration. Among his collaborators were future hydrographers G. H. Richards and F. J. O. Evans, and prominent naturalists like David Lyall and William Swainson. Inland observations included Stokes’s own account of the Canterbury Plains and Waimakariri Valley. While his naming of coastal features lacked imagination, his communications with Governor George Grey, especially regarding Māori willingness to sell land in Murihiku, had significant political consequences, initiating negotiations that led to the 1852 land purchase.
Stokes writings in the Nautical Magazine and the informal Acheron Narrative—the latter written by G. A. Hansard—offer valuable contemporary insight into colonial New Zealand. The Acheron was paid off in Sydney in 1851, and though Stokes believed the survey could have been completed quickly, the vessel was replaced by the slower Pandora.
From 1859 to 1862 he conducted surveys of Devon’s coast and the River Tamar. He was promoted to rear admiral in 1864, vice admiral in 1871, and admiral in 1877 before retiring in 1878. Settling in Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire, he was appointed a county magistrate and lived out his final years there.
