Maori History
Maori had settlements in Central Otago, associated with early occupation. Six were known on Lake Hawea (Te Taweha o Hawea, Mahaea, O tu Purupuru, Turihuka, Te Taumanu o Taki and Pakituhi) and one near Cromwell (Wairere). The moa-rich area was known for camps where moa were butchered and cooked (for example there were large sites in the Hawksburn and Happy Valley areas, as well as the Nevis Valley), and there were quarries used for stone tools in the region of Tiger Hills and Mount Benger. The swampy plains in the Maniototo provided eels and other food resources. Trails through the area provided access to these rich caches in this arid landscape. There are no recorded Maori archaeological sites at the site of Moutere Station Complex.
Early Pastoralism
Moutere was one of the earliest runs taken up in Central Otago, part of the opening of the interior of the South Island to pastoralism that had gained momentum by the mid 1850s in both Canterbury and Otago. These early years also saw the beginning of the wool servicing industries, which formed one of the backbones of the New Zealand economy, built on the pastoral enterprises. Pastoral stations, with the homestead and utilitarian buildings essential to the functioning of the station provide insight into the workings of these vast landholdings. The ‘functional entity’ of a run was built around the necessary basics – access to transport routes (the woolshed was usually closest to the road), with buildings often spread out (a reflection of the limitless space in isolated, largely unpopulated areas). The layout of buildings and the relationship of their functions provide important insight into pastoralism. According to Stephenson et al, Moutere Station was one of the ‘big five’ stations of Central Otago. The others were Earnscleugh, Morven Hills, Kawarau, and Galloway.
Alongside Galloway Station (Run 220), Moutere (Run 221) was one of the first two pastoral runs to be taken up in Central Otago in 1857. Moutere Run was bounded on three sides by water (the Manuherikia on the east, Chatto Creek on the north, and the Clutha/Mata-Au River on the south), hence the name, which referred to a place almost surrounded by water. Scotsman Watson Shennan (1835-1920) applied for both runs to the Waste Lands Board, leasing the land for fourteen years with a yearly charge of 6d per head of cattle, and 1d per head of sheep. Shennan leased over 100,000 acres of land. He was able to purchase a pre-emptive right of 80 acres for each run and 10 acres for each out station. A pre-emptive right at or near the homestead of 640 acres could also be given, as a safeguard against the possibility the run might be required for closer settlement.
Watson Shennan and his brother Alexander Shennan are described in many historical accounts as exemplifying the pioneering, hard working, and independent spirit typical of the early runholding period in Central Otago. Watson Shennan was born in Galloway in Scotland, the son of a farmer, arriving with his brother in Otago at the age of 22 aboard the Thomas and Henry in 1857. He farmed in Otago all his life, and was a significant figure in the region, associated with major pastoral properties including Puketoi and Conical Hills. He retired to Dunedin in 1904, dying there in 1920.
As one of the earliest runholders in this isolated area, Shennan had to negotiate access from the coast, a difficult and risky undertaking, but rewarding, giving the Shennan brothers the first glimpse of the country they were to take up. Looking down over the Manuherikia Valley from the top of the Knobby Range, Alexander exclaimed: ‘Here is the country we are looking for; a land well grassed & watered – a very land of promise. Here we will pitch our tent, & here we shall stay & make our home for good.’ On descending into the valley the Shennans found the country ‘all open, well grassed & watered, sufficient scrub for fuel for many years, but no bush or timber.’ Satisfied with the land they saw, the Shennans applied for what amounted to 100,000 acres, naming the two runs Moutere and Galloway. Having been granted the license, there was then a requirement that the land be stocked, and sheep were acquired from Mr Anderson in the Clutha district and were on the run by March 1858.
Getting the stock onto the run was a difficult undertaking. Shennan recounted the journey over the rugged country in 1910. He scouted the country for a route suitable for a bullock dray, only to find once into the journey, that the soft autumn ground on the slopes of the Lammerlaw Ranges made the use of the dray impossible and he had to return the dray to Tokomairiro. The party droving the sheep continued, supplied only with pack horses, and the delay meant that the drovers were subject to appalling conditions on the high tops. Shennan recounted that ‘I do not think it possible to experience greater hardship and live’ – with drifts of snow from 4 feet to 30 feet deep. ‘My party had nothing hot to eat or drink for three days, and the bullocks were not out of the yokes for the same time, and had hardly any food. When I picked the party with the sheep in Ida Valley they were out of provisions and had only mutton to eat for some days and had lost a man and a horse….The horses had to be moved from one big now tussock to another, that being the only food they could get. The party could only find enough sticks to boil the billy and cook a chop not sufficient for a fire to warm them. A journey to the South Pole is nothing to a trip like that.’
Watson Shennan arrived on the run in autumn, late in the season for building, given that the only available materials were clay and stone. He camped in a tent with a stone and clay chimney for cooking. No timber for building was to be found, with the nearest bush being 160 kilometres away. Shennan’s first priority was to erect sheep yards, which he managed using green scrub. After surviving winter in a tent, Shennan then erected some more permanent yards and huts in the spring with ‘as much vigor as circumstances allowed.’ The first shearing was in 1858.
The next hurdle was getting the wool to market. The preferred route was to Waikouaiti, on the coast north of Dunedin, and from there to Dunedin by ship. The overland journey took three weeks, and as a sledge could only carry four bales, and two teams could therefore take only 8 bales it could take the whole summer to get the wool down to market, and the stores back to the run.
Having stocked the run the Shennan brothers were aware of the need to improve their merino flock. Alexander travelled to Germany where he purchased 15 rams and 27 ewes for £2,000 from the King of Prussia’s Potsdam stud. He later obtained 22 sheep from Paris, with the resultant stock being the first Stud Merinos imported into Otago, and the ancestors of the Merino flock on the farm today.
The Shennans’ quiet life was abruptly brought to a halt with the discovery of gold at the nearby Dunstan field in 1862, which resulted in an inundation of miners looking for supplies on the Shennan properties. Within a day of the discovery Shennan had travelled to Dunedin and ordered every available wagon to be loaded with flour and stores and dispatch them to the rush, and mustered his stock to make mutton available for the miners. He sold the supplies from a canvas shop on the Clutha/Mata-Au River. Even with the foresight, miners still ran short of supplies and sheep were taken for food. Shennan described the rush as a ‘terrible affair’, with all the hopes of the squatter vanishing. He felt that nothing good came of the mining and that it brought ‘ruin and desolation’ to the land.
John Connell’s survey of the 23 acre pre-emptive right of Run 221 located on the true right bank of the Manuherikia River completed in July 1865 shows the structures built by this date, on this first site, to the east of the present farmstead. On the southern boundary are three buildings in a row, the northern most of which is marked as a stable. To the east of these three structures are three other buildings marked as house, kitchen and store. To the north is a T-shaped woolshed within a fenced area. T.B. Kennard, an early station hand in Central, recalled that when he knew the run (between 1860 and 1862) Shennan’s run ‘was a large compact one and the station was the usual clay buildings.’ The buildings were fairly primitive clay-walled structures, with rat-infested rush roofs. The store house was stood on piles surrounded by tin to keep the rodents out. Raupo was used for mattress fillings.
Another block survey completed around 1866, showing Watson Shennan as applicant, shows an eleven acre block (possibly an outstation) with a house, located in the north/central part of the run equidistant between Chatto Creek and the Clutha/Mata-Au River. Later owners Robert McLaren, William Greig and Robert McGregor Turnbull are noted on this plan. This is likely to be the site of the current farmstead.
In 1865 Watson Shennan sold Moutere to Robert McLaren, William Greig and Robert McGregor Turnbull, and shortly afterwards purchased the Puketoi Station in the Maniototo. Land transactions from this period are difficult to follow as the first certificate of title for the homestead block is not issued until 1874, and the earlier transactions are only indicated on the survey plans associated with the pre-emptive rights. By the late 1860s the large sheep stations were consolidating and the best pastoral land was taken up.
Robert McLaren erected the beginnings of the present homestead in 1873, joining two musterers’ huts (which are likely to be the house indicated in the circa 1866 survey), with the cluster of essential farm buildings being built around these structures. Although exact construction dates for these buildings are unclear, they are likely to range from the 1860s through to the 1870s or 1880s. The woolshed was moved to its present site. Shearing would initially have been done in the open or under a shelter and the wool stored in a separate building. As the wool industry developed, and runs became more settled, a purpose-built woolshed was essential. The woolsheds for large stations were often T shaped in plan, with a screw press.
The Moutere Woolshed is built of cob and is T-shaped in plan. Architect and historian Geoffrey Thornton records it as the only known cob woolshed in New Zealand, and that Moutere is the only station where all the buildings have been constructed of earth. The shorter arm of the ‘T’ houses the shearing board originally of 16 stands for blade shearers. The press tower projects from the roofline of the wool storeroom, and was built to accommodate the screw press. Anthropologist M.D. Dominy writes that the woolshed is the centre of the history and activity of high country sheep stations. ‘The cultural significance of the woolshed may also derive from the role it plays, like the yards and tailing yards, as a physical and conceptual intermediate space between uncultivated pastoral land and the homestead’ as the ultimate container for the expansiveness of stock activity and human labor, it is the physical site for harvesting a product, the fleece, and for concentrating the labor force (farmers, family, shearers and classer); and it is the conceptual site for distilling the landscape and pastoral activities of the year into fleece.’
By the 1870s there was pressure from local inhabitants to break up Moutere. In the late 1870s, for example, following a memorial from Alexandra residents, the Land Board recommended that 5,000 acres be open for selection on the agricultural lease system. In November 1878 Minister of Lands Robert Stout was reported in the Otago Witness as stating that 17,000 acres would be surveyed off the run on slopes of the Dunstan Range in blocks of 1800 to 3000 acres each, and on the river terrace flats, blocks of 300 acres.
There was tension between those who wanted land available for settlement and those residents who wished to see it retained in Crown ownership to enable mining to continue on the pastoral blocks. Alexandra residents noted that Moutere ‘contains two extensive, well-defined auriferous belts, both of which are being profitably worked; and is intersected by several water-races constructed at great expense, and which would be rendered valueless in the event of land being sold.’ Petitioners pleaded that only non-gold bearing land should be freeholded.
Small areas of land were subdivided from Moutere. In the mid 1870s Thomas Wilson farmed land on an agricultural lease in the Leaning Rock Survey District. Wilson had come to the Dunstan as a shepherd in the early 1860s (first at Black’s Station near present day Ophir, and then for Watson Shennan on Moutere. He helped the famed Hartley and Riley who made the Dunstan gold discovery cross the Clutha/Mata-Au, with their gold haul hidden in sacks made of their corduroy trousers. Wilson was issued the title to the land on which the Moutere homestead, woolshed and other outbuildings are located in 1874, though he seems to have held it for only a short time, transferring it to Robert McLaren and Robert Turnbull in 1875.
After this, with the Moutere runholder’s support Wilson applied for the freehold of the land which adjoined the Moutere pre-emptive right. In 1883 title was issued to the land on which the building known as Redfern Barn now stands the locality then known as Yankee Flat. This was the time when the infrastructure of the station was still being developed, and it is arguably more than coincidence that cob construction was used for Wilson’s other property (only separated from Moutere Station in 1883) just over a kilometre away (nearby in pastoral terms), which has been run as part of Moutere for one hundred years, since 1910. This property was only run separately from Moutere Station from 1883 to 1910.
Wilson developed his farm constructing a seven room dwelling, dairy, washhouse, waterwheel, barn, five stalled stable, cowshed, fowl house and sheep yards; one of these structures is what is now known as the ‘Redfern Barn.’. He farmed until ‘old age and failing health’ forced him to sell, and he retired to Oamaru, and later to Sydenham in Christchurch. Wilson sold the property to Eliza Jopp, from Moutere in 1910, where she continued Wilson’s farming operation. Wilson is recorded as a significant early pioneer, a ‘grand old man’, and one of the few settlers who came before the goldrushes and stayed on. According to Gillian Jopp, Eliza Jopp (wife of Andrew, who bought Moutere in 1891) ran a dairy operation there, as an adjunct to the station operation. The land was incorporated into the Moutere holding in the 1930s.
In 1875 Moutere was sold to Robert McGregor Turnbull. Turnbull, who also held Linnburn Station in the Upper Taieri, owned the property until around 1882. Alois Duffus Lubecki purchased the property at this time. Lubecki was the son Polish noble Prince Konstantine Alois Drucki-Lubecki (d.1864), the first known Polish settler in New South Wales, who immigrated to Australia with his Scottish born wife Laura. The family immigrated to New Zealand, where son Alois Duffus Lubecki became officer in charge of the Dunedin Telegraph Office, as well as finding time to become proprietor of Moutere Station, and was active in many community affairs, and was considered by Sir Frederick Chapman as ‘an eminent member of New Zealand society.’
The changes in ownership coincided with the burst of the economic bubble which resulted in the long economic depression of the 1880s and 1890s, which, combined with the effects of the rabbit plague, led to many runholders walking away from their properties.
In 1883 the Government opened three million acres of land for settlement in Otago. Land was reserved for townships, railways and agricultural blocks, and the runs themselves subdivided into 2,000-3,000 acres blocks and offered for lease or sale on deferred payment. Areas over 5,000 acres were let as runs for ten years. Seventy six runs were subdivided into 150 runs. Runholders fought fiercely to oppose the move.
The Jopp Family
In July 1891 Andrew Jopp (1842-1913) took over Moutere. Jopp had previously managed Puketoi for Watson Shennan. Andrew Jopp emigrated from Scotland in 1862, first working as a shepherd on Morven Hills Station, and later droving stock through Otago and Southland. He was appointed Government Ranger for Otago and Southland in 1870, completing annual returns for every sheep property with over 3,000 sheep. In 1873 he took over the management of Waipahi Station near Clinton, and in 1875 was appointed manager of the Shennan’s Puketoi Station. In 1888 he took over the management of the Teviot Station before purchasing Moutere in 1891. Jopp family tradition has it that Andrew established a small flock of Stud Merinos at Puketoi, and the progeny were registered in the first Moutere Stud return in 1904.
Andrew Jopp paid £15,000 for Moutere Station. The 48,000 acre run carried 18,000 sheep. Andrew and Eliza Jopp and their family of nine moved onto the station in July 1891. Jopp took over the station at a time when the government continued the move towards ‘closer settlement’, the cutting up of large estates into smaller holdings and in 1896 over 12,600 acres of Moutere, south to Clyde and up the Cromwell Gorge were subdivided from the run. The smaller runs combined the huge rabbit problem meant survival rather than profit was the experience of many runholders.
The New Zealand Sheepbreeders’ Association was founded in 1894, and a stud register was established at this time. The register recorded the breeding of all rams and ewes. To be eligible for entry in the flock book, uninterrupted use of purebred sires was required since 1880. The Moutere Merino Stud was registered in May 1904, with the flock founded on the 83 ewes and 31 lambs from Murray, Roberts and Co. from Gladbrook Station at Middlemarch. Of the twenty six Stud Merino flocks recorded in the 1904 NZ Flock Book only one is still in existence in 2009.
Andrew’s son Robert (1882-1966) (known as Bob) took over the run from his father in 1910. Bob was born at Puketoi. After being educated at Moutere School and Otago Boys’ High School he came home to Moutere to work the run around 1896. He managed the run through both World Wars (with the attendant labour shortages), significant economic depressions, along with the more mundane problems of harsh weather and rabbits. Bob was a prominent breeder of stud merinos. Building on Watson Shennan’s flock, he imported ewes from South Australia, maintaining two stud flocks.
In 1912 there was further subdivision with over 11,052 acres in four parts removed from Moutere (although some were repurchased by Moutere in the late 1970s). In 1920, 7,100 acres were made available for returned servicemen as a soldier’s settlement.
By 1938 Bob Jopp was living off the farm in Alexandra, and the Depression was taking its toll on the property. His son Andrew started working on the property in 1938 as ‘the boy’ on the run. He completed agricultural qualifications at Lincoln in the late 1930s, saw active service in World War Two and on his return managed to persuade his father to appoint him as manager. He focused on working on improving the run, including reducing rabbit numbers, dealing with footrot and improving the stud flocks. With the prosperity of the 1950s he spent money improving the buildings and services at Moutere, particularly the homestead.
In 1976 son Robert took over the management of the property. He was actively involved in Merino breeding, and was the chair of the Central Otago Stud Merino Breeders, and focused on the quality of the stud flocks.
Robert Jopp (1951-1996) was described as one of the ‘statesmen’ of the industry, a sector leader, and the fourth generation of his family to run the merino stud. Friend and fellow industry leader John Perriam described Jopp’s commitment to Moutere (New Zealand’s leading merino stud) as internationally recognised and Jopp as ‘without a doubt…the greatest influence on the national merino flock in recent years.’ Robert Jopp was the inaugural chairman of Merino New Zealand Incorporated, an organisation formed as a result of a growing desire by merino growers for ‘greater autonomy.’
In 2001 the last sheep were shorn in the old woolshed, after a new woolshed was constructed. The old shed has been partially incorporated into the new building, and it has been used to display memorabilia from the station, but the original layout is still readable in the building. In 2004 the Men’s Quarters located next to the Stable/Smithy burnt down.
The Jopp family has continued its association with Moutere to 2010 and beyond, and have remained leaders in the merino industry.
