Paying for passage from Scotland to NZ

[glenview]

Hi Rootschatters
I have re posted this here at the suggestion of a more experienced user on the Scotland site. I live in Scotland and am interested in who was involved in helping the emigration to NZ and in what way.

Original request:
I have come across terminology on an emigration record that I don't understand. I would like to be clear in my head about who was paying and who was to be paid back for the journey made by a family of few resources emigrating to New Zealand in 1862.
Someone on this site very kindly sent a link to records which helped me confirm that the family that I had lost track of in Scottish records had indeed emigrated. He/she found them on a passenger list.

One sheet on which their names appear is headed Assisted emigration to Canterbury New Zealand, by the ship Chariot of Fame and another is headed BILLS sent from the colony to the undermentioned Persons Passengers by the Chariot of Fame

The columns of the sheet about bills are:
Name of Person to whom Bills have been remitted by Friends in the Colony (husband ,wife, children)
Drawer (a former neighbour in Scotland)
Acceptor (a name I don't recognise is in this column)
Ist 2nd or 3rd of exchange (1st)
Date  (June 1862)
Amount of Bill  (£20 each for the couple and £16.13.4 for 4 children 17,15,13,11years old
Amount to be collected     " " "

If anyone can explain what the usual practice was I would be very grateful.

Thank you in anticipation

Mary

[minniehaha]

Hello Mary,

You may find some information in 'Papers Past'....

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/

And/or at these websites......

http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/history-of-immigration/page-3

http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/history-of-immigration

You could also contact: Otago Early Settlers Museum........

http://www.toituosm.com/

[Scroll to the bottom of the page for the e-mail address]

A little about the 'Chariot of Fame'.......

59th Anniversary……

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19220130.2.84?query=chariot%20of%20fame


Minniehaha.

[Lucy2]

Hello Mary

From our PapersPast website, a couple of items pertaining to Immigration Regulations - specifically relating to the Canterbury Province.

Newspaper:  "Lyttelton Times" - (Canterbury)

from - January 1858
http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/LT18580106.2.3.3.

and 3 December 1862
http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/LT18621203.2.22.2

[There were numerous similar advertisements placed in the local newspapers - have just given you one example from 1858 and another from 1862 (the only variation seemingly being that the cost of "17 pounds per passage" was added to the 1862 one.]

   ~  Lu

[Lucy2]

Hello again Mary

The following is an extract from the "Falkirk Herald" (Stirlingshire, Scotland) - 17 March 1859 - page 1.

ASSISTED  EMIGRATION   --   CANTERBURY,  NEW ZEALAND

The Provincial Government* is now assisting good labourers and mechanics to emigrate to Canterbury.   The passage money is L 17 [17 pounds].

Part of this is paid by the Emigrant - an equal part is paid by the Government* - and the balance, if any, is advanced to the Emigrant as a "loan" which he repays to the Government* after his arrival in the Colony.

Single men are required to pay down L 10 [10 pounds] in cash;    but good married couples will be taken for condsiderably less.

Preference given to Agricultural Labourers and Shepherds and respectable married men between 20 and 40 years of age.

Applications to :  John FITZGERALD, Esq., Canterbury Emigration Offices, London
or to :   John CAMPBELL, Writer, Emigration Agent, Cross, Falkirk.[/i]
                                                      - - - - - - - - - - - - -

[(my note) * refers to the Provincial Government of Canterbury in the Colony of New Zealand. ]

   ~ Lu

[Beg Clonrode...]

I have come across terminology on an emigration record that I don't understand.

Hello...

As I understand it ... (and assuming your family is the MUIRHEAD family) ...

BILLS = a bill of exchange.

In this instance an agreement between two parties, namely the former neighbour you mentioned as being the Drawer (Party A) and the Provincial Goverment of Canterbury (Party B).

Party A is already resident in New Zealand. Party A promises Party B that he will pay £56-13s-4d towards the fare of the MUIRHEAD family. Party A then notifies the MUIRHEAD family of his actions.

In exchange, Party B will tell their agent in the United Kingdom (the Acceptor) to accept the family as passengers. When the family turns up the Acceptor tells his bosses (Party B) to start getting the promised money off Party A.

According to the Chariot of Fame passenger list the family also paid £4-5s-0d in cash, presumably at the time of departure, and still had £10-11s-8d outstanding when they arrived in the Colony.

Regards
Beg

[glenview]

Thank you so much Minnie Haha and Lu.
The links are wonderful and I can search by names from my records to get more of what happened next. I do have the deaths so I know the period to search. I could be distracting myself this winter in New Zealand newspapers. The records seem to very extensive and it's great they have been digitised.

It was great to read about the fact that the ship was a spacious one and know that their passage may have been reasonable in the long confinement aboard. Agricultural families at sea; how must that have been for them!

Best wishes from Scotland

Mary

[glenview]

Thank you also to Ben

Ben,
 I have sent you a personal message.

Mary

[Beg Clonrode...]

Hello Mary...

Thanks for the PM.

Happy to help and happy to be proven wrong

---

If you click the second link provided by Lucy in reply #2 (Lyttelton Times - 3 Dec 1862) and scroll down to Immigration Regulation No.2 it says...

[...] Any person resident in the Province desirous of assisting their friends in England or elsewhere etc [...]

Famous last words :-) but this is why I'm reasonably certain that the person who put up the money for their fare (the Drawer/Sponsor) is already in NZ. In fact he/she would be somewhere in the province of Canterbury.

In the 1860's the different provinces of NZ had "competing" immigration schemes. It's unlikely one provincial government would enter into a bill of exchange with someone from another province or another country.

It wasn't until 1870-ish that the Government of NZ merged the "competing" immigration schemes into one scheme. One of the bonuses was that the government kept records of the names and NZ addresses of any sponsors. Quite a few, but by no means all, of these records survive.

If you want you can post any details you have about the Drawer/Sponsor to this thread and someone here will most likely track him/her down.

---

You have the name of the family in your signature so I assumed it was the right family. Plus you mentioned the children's ages.

Regards
Beg

[glenview]

Thank you Beg
That was a very full explanation and I have hopes of further information from this thread.

So if anyone has information about a George Adam or possibly Adams who would probably be a farmer in Canterbury area. He was the drawer of money to help Peter and Margaret Muirhead from St Ninians, Stirlingshire, Scotland. The family included a son, John, who was a farm servant like his father and three daughter at least one was a domestic servant. 

The wife/mother, Margaret, was an Adam and Peter Muirhead's mother was an Adam. It was a common name in the St Ninians area.
I would love to find out if George Adam in Canturbury had any connection to either family.

Thank you

Mary