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The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Wellington Provincial District]

Otaihanga

Otaihanga.

Otaihanga —a flag station on the Wellington-Manawatu Railway Company's line—is situated thirty-five miles from the Empire City and forty-nine miles from the terminus at Longburn junction. There is a considerable proportion of bush, a large part of which has been felled and sown down in English grasses. Otaihanga is a portion of the Hutt County, and is in the electoral district of Otaki, Paraparaumu being postal town.

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Beauchamp, Edward Hayes, Sheep-farmer, Manawak[unclear: aim]iko (“eating the heart of the nikau”) Station, Otaihanga. Mr. Beauchamp is the senior partner in the firm of Beauchamp and Field, whose estate of about 1000 acres of which some 800 acres have been cleared, 200 being still standing bush, carries 1600 sheep besides 130 head of cattle. Born in Hampshire. England, Mr. Beauchamp was educated at Weybridge, Surrey, and came to Wellington in 1873 per ship “Calæno. “ For some years he was engaged in sheep-farming in Hawkes Bay and subsequently managed Mr. Mawley's estate at Rangitumau, near Masterton, for seven years. As a member of the Masonic fraternity he was initiated at Hastings in the Heretaunga Lodge No. 1812, E.C. Mr. Beauchamp was married in 1881 to the fourth daughter of the Hon. Colonel Haultain, of Auckland, and has two sons and one daughter.

Magrath, John Andrew Nicholson Settler, “Ard Craith,” Otaihanga. The subject of this sketch was born in India in 1850. He comes of a military family, And in 1868, after passing through the Royal Military College at Sandhurst, he entered the 24th 2nd Warwickshire Regiment—now known as the South Wales Borderers—as ensign. It may be of interest to remark that Mr. Magrath's regiment was subsequently “cat up” in Zululand, during the war in that country. Leaving the army in 1871, he came to Wellington in the following year per ship “England.” After some years spent in the Rangitikei, Wanganui and Wairarapa districts, during which he was at times a teacher under the Wellington and Wanganui Education Boards, Mr. Magrath retired to the life of a settler at Otaihanga. His estate, “Ard Craith,”—Craith's or Magrath's hill—is beautifully situated, commanding a fine view of Kapiti and the adjacent coast of the South Island, and is about half cultivated. The property in the locality, which is some 400 acres in extent, is devoted to the breeding of horses, cattle, sheep and pigs of good varieties. He has some property in Donegal, Ireland, which is leased to a neighbouring landlord. In 1871 Mr. Magrath was married in Wanganui to a daughter of the late Captain Magrath, of the 65th Regiment, and has three sons and three daughters.