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Glentui
(Run 145)

Glentui lay on the foothills between the gorge of the Ashley and the Tui creek, and ran back to the Harewood Forest Reserve. It was originally a small run of five thousand acres carrying about 1400 sheep. It was taken up by H. C. H. Knowles in December. 1854.

In the 'seventies the Hon. Edward Richardson had a flax mill near the Ashley Gorge Bridge and began buying flax land out of the run. On the flax becoming unprofitable he converted the mill into a sawmill and Richardson and Company began buying up the bush land as well and stocked their cleared land with sheep, making Glentui untenable, so that in 1875 Knowles sold the station to Richardson and Company. Richardson and Company then obtained Wharfedale from G. W. H. Lee by a similar process.

In the late 'eighties Glentui and Wharfedale with 25,000 sheep passed from Richardson and Company to the Bank of New Zealand, and became the property of the Bank of New Zealand Assets Realisation Company in 1891. John O'Halloran was the company's manager. On the realisation of these properties in 1899 Glentui again became separated from Wharfedale and O'Halloran bought it. It still belongs to his family. The hills on the north side of the Tui Creek which belong to the present Glentui Station originally belonged to Birch Hill. Richardson selected this country when he was paid in land for building the first Ashley Gorge Bridge.

I have no particulars of Knowles. I learn from Who's Who in N.Z. that the Hon. Edward Richardson, C.M.G., was born in London in 1831, and arrived in New Zealand in 1861 with George Holmes. They came from Australia where they had been partners, and came over to build the Christchurch-Lyttelton tunnel. Richardson became a Member of the Provincial Council of Canterbury in 1870, Member of the House of Representatives in 1871, and Minister of page 65Public Works in 1872. He held this portfolio in several Governments. He died in 1915.